1901-1933
British stage and screen actor Robin Irvine was born Leslie Robins Irvine on this day in London--in the Stoke Newington area of Hackney. He made his acting debut on the stage in 1918 while still at school, subsequently making his professional stage debut in London in 1923. Just two years later, he made his film debut in a supporting role in the fantasy drama The Secret Kingdom starring Canadian born actor Matheson Lang, whom resembled Irvine to the point of being a bit scary, a brilliant bit of casting, since Irvine was playing the son in the film. He did not make another film for two years; when, in 1927, he shows up in the lesser known Alfred Hitchcock film Downhill (also known as When Boys Leave Home) in another supporting role, this time to Ivor Novello's lead. Also appearing in this film is actress Isabel Jeans, who would become an early Hitchcock muse; her sister Ursula would marry Irvine in 1931. He appered again in another Hitchcock film with Isabel Jeans that same year. Easy Virtue, released in August of 1927, is a more well known Hitchcock silent film (widely available!) based on the Coward play of the same name, Jeans takes the lead, opposite Franklin Dyall, with Irvine again supporting in the role of John Whittaker. By the end of 1928 he had been in five more films when he appeared in an early British sound film The Intruder, a nine minute comedy produced by British Sound Film Productions. In 1929 (having gone to Germany to work), he appeared in Maurice Tourneur's 2 hour long German production The Ship of Lost Men (Das Schiff der verlorenen Menschen) featuring Fritz Kortner and Marlene Dietrich in the lead roles, it was his last film of the decade, but not his last silent film. Sound films were later coming to the continent than they were to the British Isles; and in 1930, he had a role in the Erich Schönfelder film Fräulein Lausbub, which was released very early into the brand new decade--it was a fully silent film release. Back in Britain, he had the lead role in the 40 minute full sound comedy Leave It to Me; filmed at Twickenham studios; it was the production of George King Productions, founded by the film's director George King. He would appear in just two more films in his life time, the last of which was the comedy Above Rubies, released in July of 1932. He accompanied his wife to New York in 1933, where she made her stage debut. The were in the process of returning to England via Bermuda when Irvine developed a fever from some sort of infection that developed into pleurisy that killed him rather quickly. He died in Bermuda on the 28th of April, 1933 at just the age of 31. Specific details of his burial are currently unknown, but it is known that his remains were returned to England and he is buried somewhere in the greater London area. His wife Ursula would remarry; she married Welsh actor Roger Livesey and together the two of them share a memorial plaque at The Actor's Church: Saint Paul's Covent Garden.
Still from Downhill
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