Film stars don't die in Market Harborough: Susan Shentall

You can search the Internet Movie Database - IMDb - for actors who were born or died in a particular place. Look for deaths in Market Harborough and you will find a member of Showaddywaddy, a lady who filmed an exotic dance before marrying a Conservative MP, and Susan Shentall.

Shentall made only one film, but in it she played Juliet to Laurence Harvey's Romeo. This was in a 1954 adaptation of Shakespeare's play directed by the Italian Renato Castellani. You can see the trailer above, and the whole film is on YouTube.

Most of the publicity about Shentall at the time the film was made and released centred on the circumstances of her casting. Here's the Daily News for 17 March 1953:

Susan Shentall held her first Press conference. yesterday. And it is likely to be the first of many, because this girl, who has never played a more important role than the Angel in a Nativity play at school, has been chosen by the Rank Organisation to play Juliet.

This week she travels to Verona where Renato Castellani will direct a colour film of Romeo and Juliet. ...

A fortnight ago, she had never even given a thought to a film or stage career. Although as pretty as a picture, she had never had the schoolgirl's dream of being a star.

Then how was she chosen? For months Castellani searched for his Juliet - in Ireland, Italy, France.

Then Mario, restaurateur in London, saw Susan dining quietly with her parents. Mario told Mrs. Janni, wife of the film's producer.

Within a few days Susan was at Pinewood, having colour tests, reciting the balcony scene. And Castellani was presented with a Juliet.

The reception for the film was at first positive, with Castellani winning the Grand Prix at the 1954 Venice Film Festival, But, according to Wikipedia, there was widespread criticism of the liberties he had taken with the text and the plot of the play, and the consensus was that the film was chiefly notable as a spectacle.

Nor did it prove popular with audiences - one Australian observer of the British film scene described it as the 'unchallenged flop of the year'. I will admit I had not heard of this version of Romeo and Juliet before I came across the IMDb reference to Shentall's death in Market Harborough.

Reading the reviews of Shentall's performance in the British regional press, they are at worst respectful and at best enthusiastic. There is talk of interest in her from Hollywood.

But this was the only film she was to make. Shentall had returned to England and married a Philip Worthington as soon as filming ended. Perhaps she wanted to be a dutiful Fifties wife or perhaps she did not much enjoy making the film.

Philip Worthington was from Leicester and his father was the owner of the Worthington's grocery chain, which I have blogged about before.

So that is how a film star came to live and die in Market Harborough.