Withington history
Robert Donat

Unveiling of a plaque to Robert Donat (Actor) : 15th May 2011

At 3.00pm on Sunday, 15th May, a new-style commemorative plaque was unveiled by Brian Donat at his famous father’s birthplace and home for the first five years of his life, 42 Everett Road, Withington. The inscription on the plaque was decided by his son Brian Donat and his daughter Joanna Wellington and is in white enamel on patinated (surfaced) bronze:

ROBERT DONAT

ACTOR

1905 – 1958

Academy Award-winning Actor

was born here

March 18th 1905


Photographs of the event follow, together with more details of the actor's life and how the plaque came into being. The event was marked with an article in the  Manchester Evening News and South Manchester Reporter.


 
Brian Donat, who came over from Canada for the event, holding his father's Oscar award.
  
Brian's speech before the unveiling.
 
The plaque.
  
BBC interview: Brian Donat.
 
BBC interview: Dan Moynihan.
  
The crowds...
 
 
 
The house.
  
One of the owners: Martin Steward.


Notes contributed by Dan Moynihan:

My sincere thanks go to the current owners for agreeing to have the plaque installed.  Not everyone would welcome a commemorative plaque on their wall but Mr and Mrs Steward have been most agreeable.  

To mark the occasion, Cornerhouse Cinema screened “Goodbye, Mr Chips” and John Rylands’ Library put on an exhibition of Robert Donat memorabilia.

In 1910, the Donat family moved to St Paul’s Road to a house that has not survived.  Robert attended St Paul’s and then Central School for Boys in Whitworth Street.  Though he left school at 15 without any qualifications, he had already built up a reputation as a reciter of poetry.  This came about through one James Bernard, a Rusholme elocutionist to whom Robert had been sent to cure his speech impediment (shades of “The King’s Speech”!).

Mr Bernard successfully trained Robert as a reciter, taking him on as his secretary when he left school.  At 18, Robert joined Sir Frank Benson’s company, a touring company specialising in Shakespeare.  He did so well that he was a star of stage and screen before he was 30.

This isn’t the place to give details of Robert’s distinguished stage and film career but I’d like to mention that of the 16 British best actor Oscar winners, three were born and brought up in Lancashire – Robert Donat (1939: “Goodbye, Mr Chips”), Rex Harrison (1964: “My Fair Lady”) and Sir Ben Kingsley (1982: “Gandhi”).

I have long been an admirer of Robert Donat’s films. I recall seeing him playing a Chinaman in his last film, “The Inn of the Sixth Happiness”, at the Coronation Cinema – now The Farmer’s Arms’ car park – in Northenden.  I didn’t know till much later that Robert suffered a brain haemorrhage while making this film, but carried on working until his scenes were completed.  The cast and crew gave him a standing ovation. A few days later, on June 9th 1958, Robert died at the age of only 53.  Laurence Olivier said that but for his illness (asthma of the most acute kind), Robert Donat would have been the greatest actor in the world.

In 2007, I thought it would be fitting if a plaque could be installed on Robert’s birthplace in Withington to mark the 50th anniversary of his death.  I mentioned this to Susannah Wright of the “South Manchester Reporter”, and she ran with the idea.  The first of several stories she penned on Robert Donat and the commemorative plaque appeared in the “Reporter” on October 11th 2007 and they created a lot of interest. I would like to thank Susannah for all the research she did, including contacting Robert’s surviving son, Brian, who lives in Vancouver.  

But these things take time to bring to fruition, and it wasn’t until January 2011 that I was informed that the City Council’s Commemorative Plaques’ Panel had given its approval.  

There is already a plaque on Robert Donat’s London home, 8 Meadway, Hampstead and so, to the best of my knowledge, Withington’s Robert Donat will be the first British actor to be commemorated by two plaques.