A scene stealing actor of lugubrious countenance, Wilfrid Lawson from keeping him in the cast. Alas, Wilfrid died within five months of the film being released of a heart attack.
Uncle of Bernard Fox and brother of Gerald Lawson.
Although Joseph Losey, who directed Lawson in the American play "The Wooden Dish", always insisted that he was one of the greatest actors he had ever known, the working relationship between them was never an easy one. Well before the end of rehearsals, Lawson had started calling his director "lousy Losey". In the end, Lawson resigned from the cast of the production in order to take a much smaller supporting role in another play (John Van Drutens "Bell, Book And Candle"), thereby ensuring the closure of "The Wooden Dish".
Christopher Lee considered Lawson to be "the greatest actor in the world", one who "had the divine madness"; however, the one time they worked together, on a segment of a minor TV series, was a disappointment for Lee, as Lawson was, he reported in his memoirs, drunk throughout.
