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Leslie Halliwell
Robert James Leslie Halliwell (23 February 1929 – 21 January 1989) was a British film critic, encyclopaedist and television rights buyer for ITV, the British commercial network, and Channel 4. He is best known for his reference guides, Filmgoer's Companion (1965), a single volume film-related encyclopaedia featuring biographies (with credits) and technical terms, and Halliwell's Film Guide (1977), which is dedicated to individual films.
Anthony Quinton wrote in The Times Literary Supplement: "Immersed in the enjoyment of these fine books, one should look up for a moment to admire the quite astonishing combination of industry and authority in one man which has brought them into existence."
Halliwell's promotion of the cinema through his books and seasons of "golden oldies'"on Channel 4 won him awards from the London Film Critics' Circle, the British Film Institute and a posthumous BAFTA.
Born in Bolton, Lancashire in 1929, Halliwell enjoyed films from an early age. He grew up during the Golden Age of Hollywood, a period when film production was at its peak, with new releases debuting in cinemas with great regularity. Halliwell went almost nightly to the cinema with his mother, Lily, which provided an escape from the at times tough reality of their mill town. In 1939, Halliwell won a scholarship to Bolton School. After national service, he went on to study English Literature at St Catharine's College, Cambridge.
After graduating with a 2:1 honours degree, Halliwell worked briefly for Picturegoer magazine in London, before returning to Cambridge to manage the Rex Cinema from 1952 to 1956. Under his management, the cinema became extremely popular with the Cambridge undergraduate community, showing classic films such as The Blue Angel, Citizen Kane and Destry Rides Again. The Cambridge Evening News reported that "students felt their periods at Cambridge were incomplete without the weekly visit to the Rex." In 1955, after the British Censor had banned the Marlon Brando film The Wild One, Halliwell arranged for Cambridge magistrates to assess the picture. They subsequently granted him a special licence, and so the Rex became one of the few cinemas in Britain to show the film.
After leaving The Rex, Halliwell joined the Rank Organisation in 1956 on a three-year trainee course. He was then employed as a film publicist for the company.[citation needed] In 1958, he joined Southern Television, and was seconded to Granada Television a year later, where he remained for the next thirty years, at their offices in London's Golden Square. He married Ruth Porter in 1959 and they had one son. Initially appointed as Cecil Bernstein's assistant, Halliwell gained the role of Film Adviser to Granada's show Cinema, which was the most popular arts programme on television during the 1960s.
Halliwell was given responsibility for buying TV shows and in 1968 became the chief film buyer for the ITV network, a role he maintained throughout the 1970s and most of the 1980s. Travelling to Hollywood twice a year to view the latest TV pilots and film offerings and to trade fairs in Cannes and Monte Carlo, Halliwell became a major player in the television industry. In his capacity as chief buyer for the ITV network, he was responsible for bringing to British television screens some of the highest rated shows of the 1970s and 1980s, including The Six Million Dollar Man, Charlie's Angels, The Incredible Hulk, and The A-Team, as well as the James Bond film series, Jaws, and Star Wars.
In 1982, at the invitation of Jeremy Isaacs, he became buyer and scheduler of films for Channel 4. In keeping with the channel's intention to appeal to specialist audiences, Halliwell focused primarily on films from the 1930s and '40s. Over the next few years, the channel showed hundreds of vintage movies in seasons, with many titles introduced by filmmakers such as Samuel Goldwyn Jnr, Frank Launder and Sidney Gilliat. Isaacs later wrote that Halliwell had made an "unsurpassed contribution" to the channel's success. The British Film Institute gave Halliwell an award in 1985 'for the selection and acquisition of films with a view to creative scheduling.' Author and film historian Jeffrey Richards wrote:
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Leslie Halliwell
Robert James Leslie Halliwell (23 February 1929 – 21 January 1989) was a British film critic, encyclopaedist and television rights buyer for ITV, the British commercial network, and Channel 4. He is best known for his reference guides, Filmgoer's Companion (1965), a single volume film-related encyclopaedia featuring biographies (with credits) and technical terms, and Halliwell's Film Guide (1977), which is dedicated to individual films.
Anthony Quinton wrote in The Times Literary Supplement: "Immersed in the enjoyment of these fine books, one should look up for a moment to admire the quite astonishing combination of industry and authority in one man which has brought them into existence."
Halliwell's promotion of the cinema through his books and seasons of "golden oldies'"on Channel 4 won him awards from the London Film Critics' Circle, the British Film Institute and a posthumous BAFTA.
Born in Bolton, Lancashire in 1929, Halliwell enjoyed films from an early age. He grew up during the Golden Age of Hollywood, a period when film production was at its peak, with new releases debuting in cinemas with great regularity. Halliwell went almost nightly to the cinema with his mother, Lily, which provided an escape from the at times tough reality of their mill town. In 1939, Halliwell won a scholarship to Bolton School. After national service, he went on to study English Literature at St Catharine's College, Cambridge.
After graduating with a 2:1 honours degree, Halliwell worked briefly for Picturegoer magazine in London, before returning to Cambridge to manage the Rex Cinema from 1952 to 1956. Under his management, the cinema became extremely popular with the Cambridge undergraduate community, showing classic films such as The Blue Angel, Citizen Kane and Destry Rides Again. The Cambridge Evening News reported that "students felt their periods at Cambridge were incomplete without the weekly visit to the Rex." In 1955, after the British Censor had banned the Marlon Brando film The Wild One, Halliwell arranged for Cambridge magistrates to assess the picture. They subsequently granted him a special licence, and so the Rex became one of the few cinemas in Britain to show the film.
After leaving The Rex, Halliwell joined the Rank Organisation in 1956 on a three-year trainee course. He was then employed as a film publicist for the company.[citation needed] In 1958, he joined Southern Television, and was seconded to Granada Television a year later, where he remained for the next thirty years, at their offices in London's Golden Square. He married Ruth Porter in 1959 and they had one son. Initially appointed as Cecil Bernstein's assistant, Halliwell gained the role of Film Adviser to Granada's show Cinema, which was the most popular arts programme on television during the 1960s.
Halliwell was given responsibility for buying TV shows and in 1968 became the chief film buyer for the ITV network, a role he maintained throughout the 1970s and most of the 1980s. Travelling to Hollywood twice a year to view the latest TV pilots and film offerings and to trade fairs in Cannes and Monte Carlo, Halliwell became a major player in the television industry. In his capacity as chief buyer for the ITV network, he was responsible for bringing to British television screens some of the highest rated shows of the 1970s and 1980s, including The Six Million Dollar Man, Charlie's Angels, The Incredible Hulk, and The A-Team, as well as the James Bond film series, Jaws, and Star Wars.
In 1982, at the invitation of Jeremy Isaacs, he became buyer and scheduler of films for Channel 4. In keeping with the channel's intention to appeal to specialist audiences, Halliwell focused primarily on films from the 1930s and '40s. Over the next few years, the channel showed hundreds of vintage movies in seasons, with many titles introduced by filmmakers such as Samuel Goldwyn Jnr, Frank Launder and Sidney Gilliat. Isaacs later wrote that Halliwell had made an "unsurpassed contribution" to the channel's success. The British Film Institute gave Halliwell an award in 1985 'for the selection and acquisition of films with a view to creative scheduling.' Author and film historian Jeffrey Richards wrote: