WARNING: This Article May Contain Spoilers

Born: 19th April 1935

Died: 27th March 2002 (aged 66)

Dudley Moore was born in Charing Cross Hospital to Ada and John Moore. He was born with a club foot for which he received continuous treatment throughout his early years. He grew up in Dagenham and at the age of 11 he earned a scholarship to the Guildhall School of Music. Nine years later he won an organ scholarship to Magdalen College, Oxford where he met and worked alongside playwright Alan Bennett in the Oxford Review (a comedy group for Oxford students – a bit like the Cambridge Footlights at Cambridge). Moore graduated after three years and went onto work alongside Johnny Dankworth and Cleo Laine. At 25 he left Dankworth’s band to join Beyond the Fringe, a comedy revue, where he met his future comedy partner, Peter Cooke. A year later the BBC offered Moore his own series, Not Only…But Also, onto which he invited his friend (Cooke) and their comedic partnership bloomed. As ‘Pete and Dud’ they worked together for twenty years. Dudley Moore moved to the United States in the late 1970s and was given his first Hollywood role in 1978 as Stanley Tibbets in Foul Play alongside Goldie Hawn and Chevy Chase.

It came as no surprise to me that Arthur tops Dudley Moore’s list of films – he was nominated for an Oscar and won a Golden Globe for his performance. Although it is not how he made his name it is probably what made him a star in Hollywood. It’s a feel-good film which takes you through a range of emotions all connected with Arthur (our eponymous ‘hero’ and Moore’s character), mainly through his relationship with Hobson (played by the wonderful Sir John Gielgud). Arthur Bach is a billionaire playboy and a lonely drunk, a role that Moore seems to relish in as it gives him the flexibility to show his physical comedy as well as his usual comedic ability. I have to admit there is more depth to this character than I remember – I have always enjoyed this film but more for Gielgud – maybe its watching it with older eyes that I have come to realise that Moore doesn’t just play Arthur as a drunk he plays the idiosyncrasies of the character to a tee. OK I’ve never seen this next film before I started this article, but you know when you see clips from a film you automatically make assumptions about what sort of film it’s going to be, right? I was wrong with 10, Moore’s second film on this list. I remember it always being trailed with Bo Derek running along the beach in her swimming costume but that is just a small part of the film. Moore plays George Webber who, at the age of 42, is having a midlife crisis – or male menopause as his friend, Hugh, calls it. George, unsatisfied with his current relationship, becomes obsessed with Jenny (Derek’s character) but he comes to realise that the grass is not so greener. Even though IMDb (the Internet Movie Database) classifies this as a Farce/Romantic Comedy I feel this is more of a straight role for Moore. Yes, it has some funny moments, both linguistically and physically, for him but it’s not the main crux of his character and I actually think he excels in this role as it is a small sidestep from what he is known for. It’s always nice to see an actor best known for one thing play something different. The only problem I have is that playing the ‘drunk’ seems to be a go-to for Moore and I’m hoping I will see a fresh style of character in some of his other films in this list. Right the next film on this list is Foul Play, this is not a starring role for Moore (he has about ten minutes screen time) but it was the film that launched him into Hollywood roles. To be honest the role of Stanley Tibbets is quite an inconsequential one, I understand why the character is there in the first place – Gloria uses him to get away from the albino – but after that I’m confused especially the reveal at the end that he is the conductor is totally unnecessary! Don’t get me wrong Dudley isn’t a wasted talent he plays the role well even if it doesn’t seem to fit within the rest of the plot. He is, I suppose, the comic entertainment something he is good at and can understand why he became a Hollywood actor after this performance, and I can also see why in the films that followed he tends to strip off quite easily! For his fourth film we have Like Father, Like Son was made in 1986 and is, as you may guess from the title and era, a body-swap film (my God how many films of this kind did the 80s produce?!). I always see these films as a clever way for the actors to flex their acting muscles and play characters below, or above, their own age bracket. Personally I think it was easier for Dudley, as Dr Jack Hammond, to swap places with Kirk Cameron (who plays Chris, Hammond’s son), as Dudley has always had a childlike quality to his acting but I don’t feel this film explores enough of their characters to fully test his range – not that I’m saying it’s a bad film I’m not, I’ve seen worse – but maybe if they didn’t jump around so much between the two lives we could have had a more polished performance from him. Looking at Dudley Moore, I would never say sex symbol or love interest but his final film on this list is yet another romantic comedy, Micki & Maude (that makes four out of five films on this list romances – Like Father, Like Son being the only exception) but I have to say he plays the role of ‘Lothario’ Rob Salinger very subtlety – he is a happily married man that has an affair which sets his life off on a rollercoaster of subterfuge. It’s another precise comedic role, by that I mean that Dudley never over plays the funny side playing both the drama and comedy with equal excellence and no surprise that he won a Golden Globe for his performance. As you know I’m not a Rom-Com fan, but I have enjoyed the way Dudley Moore plays these roles, I would just like to know was society in the seventies and eighties really as promiscuous as his five films have shown?!

For my favourite character of Dudley’s, I have to go back to my childhood and when he played Patch in Santa Claus: The Movie. However old you are there is always something special about Christmas films – whatever they’re target age group – and for me, even now as an adult, Patch’s naivety brings back the innocence of childhood. Patch represents the purity of the season against the corrupt corporate side and it’s this clear conscience that Dudley portrays so well with his diminutive stature and cheery face that works so well alongside the height of John Lithgow’s B.Z. The way he says his ‘elf’ lines is so throwaway that you almost miss them and the enthusiasm he has exudes from the screen, Patch’s integrity is so wonderfully played especially when he tells B.Z. that he is going to give his flying lollipops away for free because that’s what they do in the North Pole.

As well as being a comedy performer and film actor Dudley Moore was an accomplished pianist and composer (as shown in his performance in 10). He worked with Johnny Dankworth as well as having his own trio, the Dudley Moore Trio. The trio recorded several albums and had a regular spot at Peter Cooke’s nightclub, The Establishment. Moore composed film scores for several films including his and Peter Cooke’s interpretation of The Hound of the Baskervilles – a film that was classified as “a chore” and “a ponderous shambles” by the critics.

Dudley Moore was married four times and had two sons. In 1997, in New York, he was diagnosed with calcium deposits in the brain then, back in London, he underwent a quadruple coronary artery bypass and suffered four strokes. Two years later he was diagnosed with PSP (Progressive Supranuclear Palsy, a Parkinson-plus syndrome – a group of neurodegenerative diseases featuring the classical features of Parkinson’s disease with additional features). Later that year he made his last public appearance, reading poetry alongside Julie Andrews, at a charity concert for Music for All Seasons – he received a standing ovation. Dudley Moore passed away at the age of 66 in 2002 from pneumonia, secondary to immobility caused by his PSP.