Renowned for the breathy quality of her husky voice,[6] Johns sang songs written specifically for her both on screen and stage, most notably "Sister Suffragette", written by the Sherman Brothers for Disney's Mary Poppins (1964), in which she played Winifred Banks and for which she received a Laurel Award, and "Send In the Clowns", composed by Stephen Sondheim for Broadway's A Little Night Music (1973), in which she originated the role of Desiree Armfeldt and for which she received a Tony Award and Drama Desk Award.
Early life and education
There were situations that were hard for parents to turn down. It's difficult to turn down a chance to star with Laurence Olivier, to say, 'No, she has to go to school'. They had a big decision to make ... I was interested in everything. I wanted to be a scientist. I would've loved to go on and on at university. But you can't do everything in life.
Johns was born into a theatrical family. Her mother was Alyce Steele-Wareham, an Australian-born concert pianist who had studied in London and Vienna.[8] Originally of English descent, Alyce's family found fame as performing actors, singers and musicians, touring Australia, New Zealand and South Africa with their musical programmes;[9] her grandmother, Elizabeth Steele-Payne, was one of the first accomplished women violinists of her time.[6] Johns' father was Welsh actor Mervyn Johns, who became a star of British films during the Second World War and worked regularly at Ealing Studios.[10] Through him, she was a cousin of British judge John Geoffrey Jones.[11] Alyce and Mervyn met while studying in London, he at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and she at the Royal Academy of Music. They married on 17 November 1922 in St Giles, London, and began touring with her family's theatre company.[12] Glynis Margaret Payne Johns was born on 5 October 1923, while her parents were touring Pretoria, capital of the then Union of South Africa (a dominion of the British Empire and later the British Commonwealth of Nations).[13] She was named "Margaret" "Payne" after her grandmothers Margaret Anne Samuel and Elizabeth Steele-Payne.[14]
The family returned to England just a few months after she was born.[5] Aged five, she joined the London Ballet School; by six, she was hailed in Britain as a dancing wonder;[8] by ten, she was working as a Ballet instructor; and by eleven, she had earned a degree to teach. Hoping to study with the Sadler's Wells Ballet at age twelve, she was enrolled instead at Clifton High School in Bristol, balancing academia with the two hours a day she spent at the Cone School of Dancing (which later merged with the Ripman School to form Tring Park School for the Performing Arts).[15] As a dance student, Johns amassed some 25 gold medals.[16][1] Aside from her Clifton education, she also attended South Hampstead High School in London,[17] where she was a contemporary of Angela Lansbury.[5]
Career
1923–1939: Career beginnings
A fight breaks out at school between Midge Carne (Glynis Johns, left) and Lydia Holly (Joan Ellum) in the 1938 film South Riding, produced by Alexander Korda and directed by Victor Saville
Johns made her theatrical debut in October 1923 at just three weeks old, carried onto the London stage by her grandmother, Elizabeth Steele-Payne, a violinist-impresario[6] who had inherited the production's company from her father.[18] She thus became the fourth generation in her mother's family to appear on stage.[14]
In 1931 at the age of 8, Johns was cast as Sonia Kuman in Elmer Rice's Judgement Day at the Phoenix Theatre in London. She played alongside theatre actors Sir Lewis Casson, Ronald Adam, and George Woodbridge, who played Judge Vlora, Judge Tsankov and Judge Sturdza respectively.[19] As a child ballerina in 1935, Johns played Ursula in Buckie's Bears;[11] this production lasted from 27 December 1935 to 11 January 1936 at the Garrick Theatre.[20] Her proficiency in dance led her to be cast in several children's plays throughout the 1930s, notably during the Christmas holidays. She was spotted by a manager and subsequently cast in her first major stage production, as Napoleon's daughter in the 1936 short play St Helena at The Old Vic; she was in productions of The Children's Hour and The Melody That Got Lost the same year. Following this, she was recast as Sonia Kuman in Elmer Rice's 1937 production of Judgement Day (this time at London's Strand Theatre), J. M. Barrie's 1937 play A Kiss for Cinderella,[14] and Esther McCracken's 1938 play Quiet Wedding, in which she played the bridesmaid Miranda Bute at Wyndham's Theatre, London.[21]
For her role as playful Cornish mermaid Miranda Trewella in Ken Annakin's eponymous 1948 black and white comedy film,[29] in which she causes havoc in a London household, David L. Vineyard on MysteryFile writes that "Johns is a revelation: long platinum hair, Khirghiz eyes, and that breathless voice, perfect for this sexy romp,"[30] with ScreenOnline's Matthew Coniam relating that "Miranda ... is played ideally by Glynis Johns ... a strikingly unusual actress facially reminiscent of Gloria Grahame, with a melodic, purring voice."[31] As Miranda, Johns wore a tail made specially by The Dunlop Rubber Company and commissioned by producer Betty Box. The cast also included Griffith Jones, Googie Withers, and David Tomlinson, with whom Johns was later reunited in The Magic Box (1951) and Mary Poppins (1964). Given the weight of her tail, Tomlinson recalled his alarm at having to carry her around.[32] The following year, she had a brief cameo in Helter Skelter, a gleefully scattershot comedy in which she again played the flirtatious mermaid Miranda.[1]
Johns starred in two more films that year. She was cast in Thornton Freeland's comedyDear Mr. Prohack, a modern version of Arnold Bennett's 1922 novel, Mr Prohack, as adapted in the play by Edward Knoblock.[33] In it, Johns plays Mimi Warburton, the private secretary and love interest of Charles Prohack, played by Dirk Bogarde.[34][35] That same year, Bogarde began a relationship with Johns' ex-husband Anthony Forwood.[36] The cast included "a winning gallery of femmes fatales." Playing a character very unlike herself, Author John Reid wrote that "Glynis Johns ... is so much better at playing a scheming minx than an honest woman."[37] In Third Time Lucky (1949), she played Joan Burns, a "capable femme fatale."[1] Of this role, Fint on Letterboxd wrote that "Glynis is as winningly winsome as ever, her husky tones approximating a British Jean Arthur."[38]
On stage, Johns reprised her role as Miranda Bute in Richard Bird's play Quiet Weekend, which ran from 22 July 1941 to 29 January 1944 at Wyndham's Theatre in London.[14] During The Blitz, she was recast in Judgement Day, which she played at the Phoenix Theatre in London despite the dangers posed by German bombers. Following this, she appeared in Peter Pan at the Cambridge Theatre in 1943, I'll See You Again in 1944, and Fools Rush In in 1946.[39][14]
In the 1950s, Johns enjoyed more film roles than any earlier decade. Her successes in Miranda (1948), Third Time Lucky (1949) and in others movies made her a household name, both in Britain and the United States; director Ken Annakin was an early admirer of her work.[40]
Johns was reunited with Richard Todd for two swashbucklers made for Walt Disney: The Sword and the Rose (1953), directed by Ken Annakin, and Rob Roy, the Highland Rogue (1953).[51] At the same time, she made Personal Affair,[52] a British drama film starring Gene Tierney and directed by Anthony Pelissier, in which Johns plays teenager Barbara Vining who pursues her Latin teacher, Leo Genn's Kay Barlow. The following year, Johns had the starring role in J. Lee Thompson's drama film The Weak and the Wicked alongside Diana Dors and Rachel Roberts, playing an upper-class prisoner, Jean Raymond, who was framed by her friend and for which Johns was widely praised.[53] Johns did another for Annakin, The Seekers (1954),[54] then co-starred with Robert Newton in The Beachcomber (1954). She played the Christian missionary in both films, appearing respectively as Marion Southey, the fiancé to Jack Hawkins' Philip Wayne who seeks to establish Christianity in 19th century New Zealand, and Martha Jones, who seeks to introduce it to the Welcome Islands.[1] For both, she was paid £12,500 a picture.[55]
In 1954, Johns was one of five judges to oversee the final of the National Bathing Beauty Contest in Morecambe, England, where Pat Butler was declared the winner. Sitting beside newspaper editor Charles Eade, Johns was the youngest and only woman judge.[56]
In 1960, Johns starred as Clarissa Hailsham-Brown in Godfrey Grayson's mystery film The Spider's Web, a screen adaptation of the eponymous 1954 play by Agatha Christie, and for which American author Matthew Bunson writes that "Despite its very modest budget, The Spider's Web was able to attract the considerable talents of Glynis Johns."[67] Johns had a supporting role in The Sundowners (1960), for which Variety wrote that "Glynis Johns is a vivacious delight",[68] with The New York Times'Bosley Crowther adding that her role as the Australian landlady Mrs. Firth (which earned her an Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actress) was "played richly" and with effervescence.[69] Johns starred in the remake of The Cabinet of Caligari (1962) as the easily offended and oft-frightened Jane Lindstrom,[70] and she was one of four stars in the 1962 Technicolor drama film The Chapman Report.[71] While filming her first scene in the Chapman Report with director George Cukor, he kicked her in the shin. Though a "subtle kick", it was described as an "unprovoked attack" and by Johns as "so unexpected that I did a terrible sort of double take." On the set, tensions were high, though she and Cukor later laughed about it and he noted she was "wonderful in the picture."[72] The following year, Johns supported Jackie Gleason in George Marshall's adaptation of the eponymous Corinne Griffith memoir Papa's Delicate Condition, a role described by Jeffrey Kauffman as "neatly understated".[73]
Mary Poppins (1964) is considered Walt Disney's crowning live-action achievement, and is the only one of his films which earned a Best Picture nomination during his lifetime.[74] In the film, Johns plays Winifred Banks, the wife of George Banks, mother of Jane and Michael, and member of Emmeline Pankhurst's "Votes for Women" suffrage movement, to which she is completely dedicated.[75] When first approached by Walt Disney, Johns thought it was to play the title role of Mary Poppins (played by Julie Andrews), not Mrs. Banks. To ensure she accepted, he explained the mishap over lunch and arranged for the Sherman Brothers to write her a musical number: the song "Sister Suffragette", a pro-suffrage protest songpastiche, was written in 1964 with her in mind.[76] "Johns is endearing as the mother," wrote The Hollywood Reporter's James Powers in 1964, "happy as a lark at getting chained to a lamp post for the cause ... she comes in strongly as a singing actor."[77] The role earned her the Laurel Award for Best Female Supporting Performance.
Johns as Winifred Banks in the trailer of Mary Poppins (1964)
Johns was cast in 1961 in the ABC/Warner Bros. crime drama The Roaring 20s. She portrayed Kitty O'Moyne, an Irish immigrant who falls overboard into the harbour as she arrives in the United States.[83] Johns guest-starred in the CBSanthology seriesThe Lloyd Bridges Show in the episode "A Game for Alternate Mondays" of the 1962–63 television season, playing widow Leah Marquand, with Leslye Hunter as her daughter Isabella.[84] On 5 August 1963, Vacation Playhouse premiered the episode "Hide and Seek" as the pilot of her eponymous CBS television series Glynis. The original working title for the series was The Glynis Johns Show; in it, Johns played the neophyte mystery writer and amateur sleuth Glynis Granvile.[85] In the autumn of that year, Glynis officially premiered, starring Johns and Keith Andes as her husband, Keith Granville, a criminal defence attorney. Due to pressure from NBC's The Virginian and Bill Cullen's The Price Is Right game show on ABC, the programme was cancelled after thirteen episodes.[86] In 1965, when CBS reran the series as a summer replacement for The Lucy Show, Glynis ranked No. 6 in the Nielsen ratings.[87] Johns remained busy on screen, appearing as Steffi Bernard in the episode "Who Killed Marty Kelso?" of ABC's detective series Burke's Law opposite Gene Barry.[1] In 1967, she appeared in four episodes of the Batman television series as villainess Lady Penelope Peasoup, one half of the evil duo with Rudy Vallée as her brother Lord Marmaduke Ffogg.[88]
On stage, Johns played the invalided gentlewoman in Broadway's Too True to Be Good in 1963.[89] She returned to London's West End in 1966 to star alongside Keith Michell in The King's Mare at the Garrick Theatre, in which she played Anne of Cleves and Michell King Henry VIII. Commenting on the production, S. Stanley Gordon writes that "The heavens must have blessed us, for we received the wonderful news that... London theatre's favourite daughter, Glynis Johns, had agreed to come to London to star in our play." The play was written by screenwriter novelists Jean Canolle and Anita Loos.[90] From 1969 and into the 1970s, Johns turned increasingly to stage work, appearing first in A Talent to Amuse (1969).[21]
1970–1979: A Little Night Music and acclaim
In the 1970s, Johns' career focus was on the stage. Following her appearance in earlier Cowardian productions, Johns starred in two more Coward plays in the early 1970s: from 27 January 1970 to September 1970, she was in Come As You Are at London's New Theatre and Strand Theatre, and from 6 March 1972 to 12 March 1972, she was in Marquise at the Bristol Hippodrome in England.[21]
In 1973, Johns was in the original cast of A Little Night Music, written by Stephen Sondheim, which premiered at 18:30 on 25 February at the Shubert Theatre in New York. The song "Send In the Clowns" was written with her in mind.[93] Commenting on director Harold Prince in a 1973 interview, she says he "has eyes in the back of his head and a real driving force, a life force. And with it goes a great deal of loge. He calls us 'crew' and himself 'captain,' and he's heartbroken when opening night is over, simply because he doesn't want to be away from us. I think he falls in love with his company."[94] For her role as Desiree Armfeldt, she won a Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical and Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actress in a Musical.[95] Sondheim referred to her vocal qualities as a "rumpled bed";[6] as Anthony Tommasini put it in The New York Times: "Stephen Sondheim composed his most famous song, 'Send In the Clowns,' for an actress with virtually no voice, Glynis Johns, and few genuine singers have performed it as effectively."[96]
Johns' film roles of the 1970s included playing Myfanwy Price in Andrew Sinclair's 1972 drama film Under Milk Wood opposite Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor,[100] Eleanor Critchit in Roy Ward Baker's 1973 anthology horror film The Vault of Horror (in the segment The Neat Job, a tale of marital discord), Swallow in the 1974 short film adaptation of Oscar Wilde's The Happy Prince[26] and Mrs. Amworth in the 1977 British-Canadian horror anthology filmThree Dangerous Ladies, a reprisal of the role.[101] Of her original performance as Mrs. Amworth in the eponymous 1975 short film, Ian Holloway on Wyrd Britain writes that "the titular lady" is "played with flamboyant aplomb by the fabulous Glynis Johns."[102]
1980–1999: Final roles
Playwright Noël Coward, in whose plays Johns frequently starred
In classical theatre in Europe, everybody plays all kinds of parts. Juliets go on to play the Nurses; they don't want to play Juliet again. I think we've got to remember to grab onto our perks, whatever is the good thing about each age. Each stage of life should be a progression.
Johns' screen work of the 1980s took second place to her work on stage.[1] In 1982, she was cast as Laura Fitzpatrick Morgan in the American-British biographical television film Little Gloria... Happy at Last with Lucy Gutteridge in the leading role of Gloria Morgan Vanderbilt.[103] Johns had a starring role in Nukie (1987), a South Africanscience-fiction film in which she played the decisive Sister Anne alongside actors Anthony Morrison, Steve Railsback, and Ronald France.[104][105] In 1988, Johns provided the voice for Miss Grimwood, proprietor of Miss Grimwood's Finishing School for Girls, in Scooby-Doo and the Ghoul School. The plot follows the characters as Miss Grimwood hires them as her gym teachers; once there, however, they find it is actually a school for the daughters of paranormal beings.[106][107] The same year, Johns starred in Zelly and Me, an American drama film written, directed and produced by Tina Rathborne. In it, Johns plays Co-Co, the wealthy grandmother of protagonist Phoebe (played by Alexandra Johnes) and an egoist with a deeply competitive streak.[108]
During the first season of NBC's hit sitcom Cheers, Johns guest-starred as Diane Chambers' mother, Helen Chambers, an eccentric dowager who, due to a stipulation in Diane's late father's will, will lose all her money unless Diane is married by the next day.[109] In 1985, Johns played Bridget O'Hara in the episode "Sing a Song of Murder" of CBS's crime drama television series Murder, She Wrote, working again with Angela Lansbury.[1] From 1988 to 1989, she played Trudie Pepper, a senior citizen living in an Arizona retirement community, in the television sitcom Coming of Age, also on CBS.[110]
Following earlier work in the 1970s, Johns narrated two more albums for Caedmon Records: The Light Princess in 1981 and Bargain for Frances and Other Frances Stories in 1984.[91][111]
In 1991, Johns returned to A Little Night Music aged 68, this time playing Madame Armfeldt, the mother of her original character Desiree, with Gordon Davidson directing at the Ricardo Montalbán Theatre in Los Angeles. Following this, she starred as Myrtle Bledsoe in the premiere of Horton Foote's A Coffin in Egypt from June to July 1998 at the Bay Street Theatre in New York.[112]
Johns appeared in just three films in the 1990s, as the grandmother in each. She played the camera-toting grandmother in the 1995 Sandra Bullock hit While You Were Sleeping[26] and the waspish Grandma Rose in Ted Demme's 1994 black comedy filmThe Ref. Of this role, Caution Spoilers' Sarah notes that "Glynis Johns as the awful Rose is terrific"; her character was often at odds with her son Lloyd Chasseur, played by Kevin Spacey.[115] In 1998, Johns was named a Disney legend in the film category.[116] Her last film appearance was as the grandmother of Molly Shannon's Mary Gallagher in the 1999 film Superstar.[117]
Public image
Studio publicity photo of Johns in 1959
In September 1946, when she was still fairly new to the profession, Powell and Pressburger hailed Johns "one of the most sought-after of all young British stars".[118] She was voted by British exhibitors as the 10th most popular box-office star in 1951 and 1952.[119][120] By the time of Loser Takes All (1956), Johns was a top box-office draw.[1]
A devotee of British cinema, Johns said in 1946, "I would sooner play in a good British picture than in the majority of American pictures I have seen,"[121] She found her stardom in 1940s Britain (wherein her "glistening blue eyes and perfect comic timing made her British cinema's most sought-after female lead") and was already a star by the time she was in No Highway in the Sky, a joint British and American production produced in 1951, and her first role in American cinema.[3] Johns became an indelible part of the cinema histories of both Britain and America, maintaining her British and American careers simultaneously. Following No Highway in the Sky, she took on increasingly more roles in America and elsewhere: the majority of her television credits were American, including her eponymous 1963 sitcom Glynis, though her film and theatre credits (with several notable exceptions) were British.[3]
Glynis has light brown hair, blue eyes, and is five feet four inches [163 cm] in height. Dancing is still of great interest to her and is her favourite recreation, coupled with the collecting of good syncopated numbers: Glenn Miller's In the Mood is her favourite. Her favourite classical composers are Grieg, Mozart and Debussy. Riding, tennis and ice skating are her sports, and her ideal holiday is one spent in a mountain resort where there is plenty of night-life. Her favourite reading is autobiographies, preferably those of celebrities she knows personally.
Johns was married four times. She met her first husband, Anthony Forwood, while rehearsing for Quiet Wedding (1941). A year after they met, Forwood asked her on a date and they were married within a month on 29 August 1942 in Westminster, London. The couple's only child, actor Gareth Forwood, was born on 14 October 1945.[123] Following a lengthy court proceeding, she was granted a divorce on 25 June 1948 "because of adultery by her husband."[124]
Johns began dating producer Antony Darnborough after working together on Encore (1951).[125] He proposed to her at Windsor's Sunningdale Golf Club in June 1951.[126]The Daily Telegraph later said that "theirs was to have been one of the most glittering show business weddings," but it never took place. Gertie (1951) took her to Broadway and their wedding was postponed; in December 1951, it was called off. The former couple remained "good friends" and she appeared in his 1953 television drama Personal Affair.[125][127]
On 1 February 1952 in Manhattan, New York, Johns married David Foster, a Royal Navy officer and later president of Colgate-Palmolive.[128] They divorced on 17 May 1956 on the ground of his adultery with an unnamed woman.[129] He did not contest the charge.[130]
Johns married Cecil Henderson, a businessman, on 10 October 1960 in Westminster, London.[131] They divorced on 21 June 1962. He cited adultery and she did not contest the charge.[132]
Johns' fourth and last husband was the writer and United States Air Force captain Elliott Arnold.[133] They announced their engagement on 25 June 1964 and were married on 1 October in Los Angeles, California.[134][135] They divorced on 4 January 1973.[94][136]
In a 1973 interview with Robert Berkvist, Johns described – in her experience – the compatibility of theatre and marriage: "Acting is my highest form of intelligence, the time when I use the best part of my brain. I was always told, by my married friends, for example, that I could apply that intelligence to something else, some other aspect of living, but I can't. I don't have the same flair in other things." On the subject of a fifth marriage, she reflected that "I'd tread very softly in that area. Very softly. I certainly wouldn't rush into anything again, and I'd have to have an awful lot in common with anyone I'd consider marrying next time. Why so many marriages? It was absolute conservatism on my part. I was brought up to feel that if you wanted to have an affair with a man, well, you married him. I have friends who, if they'd followed that rule, would have collected an awful lot of pieces of paper by now."[94]
Following the death of her mother, Alyce Steele-Wareham, on 1 September 1971 in Westminster, Johns' father Mervyn Johns married actress Diana Churchill on 4 December 1976 in Hillingdon, London.[137] Johns' grandson, Thomas Forwood, is a French writer and film director.[5][131]
Health and voice
Following her marriage to David Foster in 1952, she became fourteen pounds (6.5 kg) overweight. Talking to Lydia Lane, she describes this ordeal: "I was relaxed, happy, with little to do and I suppose I simply didn't burn up as much energy as usual. My appetite stayed the same and I gained a few pounds at a time until one day I discovered I was fourteen pounds overweight." Her solution was simple: "I'm convinced that weight is a mental problem," she said. "I counted calories for a while but nothing happened until I became really disturbed about it. From that moment on, I began to lose weight and in three weeks I was back to normal. The point I am trying to make is that dieting alone is not enough. It must be accompanied by a strong will and determination to lose [weight]."[138]
Johns previously had severe migraines. In a 1955 interview she admitted that "Only recently have I learned how to relax. And since I have, the migraine headaches which have plagued me for years have disappeared. I've finally learned to be still inside. Someone told me once, 'When you let God in on your problems, you can let go and relax,' and I've found that it works."[138]
A few days before Johns was due to play Desiree Armfeldt at the opening night of A Little Night Music in 1973, she was rushed to hospital for emergency treatment of an intestinal infection. The debut was postponed by a week and Tammy Grimes was thought to be a likely successor. Though her doctor was "aghast", Johns rejoined the show after just two days: "I was not going to have anybody else sing my songs," she said.[94]
Johns suffered from stage fright throughout most of her career. In a 2023 interview, her grandson Thomas said "Of course, she came across as supremely confident, but in private she suffered quite crippling stage fright that she never really got over – only managed – so that makes her career even more remarkable."[5]
Johns' voice has been described by a press agent as "like the sound of a brook burbling over a pebbled bed."[139] In Finishing the Hat (2010), Stephen Sondheim wrote that she had a "small but silvery voice that was musical and smokily pure".[122]
Later years and death
Johns was predeceased by all four of her husbands. The first to die was her third husband, Cecil Henderson, in 1978, followed by her fourth husband, Elliott Arnold, in 1980, her first husband, Anthony Forwood, in 1988, and her second husband, David Foster, in 2010. Her then 62-year-old son, Gareth Forwood, died in 2007 from a heart attack during cancer treatment.[140]
Johns retired to the US,[142] where she later resided at the Belmont Village Hollywood Heights, a senior living community, located near the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles, California.[142][143]
Johns died in Los Angeles at an assisted living home, on 4 January 2024, at age 100 from natural causes.[144][4][131] In April, her ashes were transported to Wales to be buried at Jerusalem Independent Chapel in Burry Port, alongside the remains of her father Mervyn Johns. The song "Send In the Clowns" was played at the service.[145]
Advocacy
Chris Bryant, Labour MP for Rhondda, described Johns as "a lifetime ambassador for the creative arts in the UK and particularly Wales."[5] In 1971, Johns told BBC Cymru Wales that a national theatre in Wales would be a positive addition to the country, because "Welsh people ... have a love for their art and are not mercenary about it."[146]
^Benedick, Adam (12 September 1992). "Obituary: Mervyn Johns". The Independent. Archived from the original on 12 May 2022. Retrieved 23 December 2017.
^"Variety, February 1952". Internet Archive. 6 February 1952. Retrieved 17 October 2022. Glynis Margaret Payne Forwood to David Foster, New York, Feb. 2.
^"Glynis Johns". The Powell & Pressburger Pages. Picturegoer. 28 September 1946. Retrieved 26 September 2022. she came to this country when she was still a child, and attended Clifton High School. Then she attended the Cone School of Dancing. For two hours each day she put in intensive training at the rail in the ballet class
^ abcdefg"Glynis Johns Past Productions". Theatricalia. Matthew Somerville. 20 May 1990. Retrieved 19 October 2022. Alma Rattenbury, Cause Célèbre 1977 – March 1978, Her Majesty's Theatre, London and Haymarket Theatre, Leicester. Leontine, 13 Rue de L'Amour, Forum Theatre Billingham, Paul Elliott Entertainments Ltd, Starchoice Season Ltd, and Triumph Theatre Productions Ltd January – 8th May 1976, Phoenix Theatre, London, Theatre Royal, Norwich, and other locations.
^"A Movie Review by David L. Vineyard: Mad About Men (1954)". MysteryFile. Vanillamist. 24 March 2010. Retrieved 19 October 2022. Johns is a revelation: long platinum hair, Khirghiz eyes, and that breathless voice, perfect for this sexy romp
^"Miranda (1948)". ScreenOnline. BFI Screenonline. 2014. Retrieved 19 October 2022. strikingly unusual actress facially reminiscent of Gloria Grahame
^"Third Time Lucky, 1949, Directed by Gordon Parry". Letterboxd. Letterboxd Limited. 13 July 2018. Retrieved 19 October 2022. Glynis is as winningly winsome as ever, her husky tones approximating a British Jean Arthur
^Brooks, Tim; Marsh, Earle F. (17 October 2007). The Complete Directory to Prime Time Network and Cable TV Shows 1946–Present (9 ed.). Ballantine Books. p. 543. ISBN978-0-345-49773-4.
^Yet More Theatre Reminiscences – November 1977 to February 1978 (Cause Célèbre – Her Majesty's Theatre, London, 27 February 1978) "I remember this as a riveting play – the first time I had seen a courtroom drama and you should never underestimate how exciting they can be. Glynis Johns was superb as Alma Rattenbury, and Lee Montague and Bernard Archard were fantastic as the opposing barristers."
^Johns, Ian (8 September 2019). "Mrs Amworth". Wyrd Britain. Retrieved 19 October 2022. the titular lady – played with flamboyant aplomb by the fabulous Glynis Johns
^Terrace, Vincent (2011). Encyclopedia of Television Shows, 1925 through 2010 (2nd ed.). Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company. p. 203. ISBN978-0-7864-6477-7.
^"Johns, Glynis (1923–)". Screen Online. Encyclopedia of British Film. 2014. Retrieved 19 October 2022. she had a well-publicised engagement to producer Antony Darnborough
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