Upstairs and Downstairs is a 1959 British comedy film directed by Ralph Thomas and starring Michael Craig, Anne Heywood, Mylène Demongeot, Claudia Cardinale, James Robertson Justice, Joan Sims, Joan Hickson and Sid James. It features the first English-language performance of Claudia Cardinale.
Plot
Richard Barry marries Kate, the daughter of his boss, Mr Mansfield. Mansfield tells Richard that he needs to take over the entertaining for their firm. Richard decides this will require hiring some domestic help at home, but there then follows a series of very unsuitable servants. Eventually, he hires a young Swedish blonde woman, Ingrid, who is most competent and liked, not only by Richard and Kate and their two children, but also by their male friends. But Ingrid likes Richard...
Cast
Michael Craig – Richard Barry
Anne Heywood – Kate Barry
Mylène Demongeot – Ingrid
James Robertson Justice – Mansfield
Claudia Cardinale – Maria
Sid James – P.C. Edwards
Joan Hickson – Rosemary
Joan Sims – Blodwen
Joseph Tomelty – Arthur Farringdon
Nora Nicholson – Edith Farringdon
Daniel Massey – Wesley Cotes
Austin Willis – McGuffey
Margalo Gillmore – Mrs McGuffey
Reginald Beckwith – Parson
Cyril Chamberlain – Guard
Dilys Laye – Agency girl
Irene Handl – Large woman
William Mervyn – Kingsley
Eric Pohlmann – Mario
Jean Cadell – 1st Old Lady
Barbara Everest – 2nd Old Lady
Stephen Gregson – Paul
Nicholas Phipps – Harry
Jeremy Burnham – Frank
Nicholas Parsons – Brian
Madge Ryan – Policewoman
Betty Henderson – Bridget
Barbara Steele – Mary
Susan Hampshire – Minor role
Oliver Reed – Minor role
Shirley Anne Field – Minor role
Sam Kydd – Driver
Production
It was based on a 1957 novel by Ronald Scott Thorn, the pen name of Dr Ronald Wilkinson. Filming began in March 1959.
Ralph Thomas and Betty Box made the film after a series of more expensive adventure films. "I'm glad we're back in comedy", said Box. "I like to make people laugh. I think they get enough crying in daily life. Also the results in comedy are more tangible. You hear where you succeed."
Ralph Thomas later called the film "a light comedy which I liked very much... I had a great cast in that one... For its period it was a very effective, very small little comedy, which I think was really very funny."
Michael Craig said "the jokes and the situations were pretty much the same as in all the other Box/Thomas comedies. That's not surprising as they were mostly written by the same person and had the same casts."
Nicholas Parsons, who had a small role called it "a delightful domestic romp" where Demongeot "was incredibly sexy, and everyone fancied her like crazy."
Sid James' eighteen month old daughter Susan appears in the film. James' biographer called the film a "glossy but empty-headed comedy... strangely out of touch for the late fifties." The ending of the film involves James' character announcing he has married a female colleague. Ralph Thomas said, "There is no way I could allow Sid to walk down the aisle. The public would never believe. it and besides that battered face just doesn’t go with a romantic role."
Release
Upstairs and Downstairs was one of seven Rank films bought for release in the US by 20th Century Fox.
Variety called it "simple, rather uneven, yet amiable."