Marcel Varnel

Biography

French-born Marcel Varnel began his film career not in France but in Hollywood, as a 30-year-old in 1924. He left Hollywood for Great Britain in the mid-'30s and began turning out a series of low-budget comedies for Will Hay and George Formby, among others. While his films were for the most part undistinguished, they were popular and moved fast, as good comedies are meant to do. His best film is generally considered to be Oh, Mr. Porter! (1937), a Will Hay comedy about a hapless railroad employee who is made stationmaster of a run-down, bottom-of-the-barrel station in Ireland and his efforts to bring it up to speed, only to get involved with ghosts and gun-runners. It garnered Hay some of the best reviews of his career and Varnel's direction of the picture also met with critical acclaim. He died in an automobile accident in England in 1947 shortly after having finished This Man Is Mine (1946).