Frank Vosper

Frank Permain Vosper (15 December 1899 – 6 March 1937) was an English actor who appeared in both stage and film roles and a dramatist, playwright and screenwriter.^[4][5]

Frank Vosper
Publicity still, autographed: 1933
Born	Frank Permain Vosper[1][2] (1899-12-15)15 December 1899 Hampstead, London, England
Died	6 March 1937(1937-03-06) (aged 37) at sea
Occupations	Actor, dramatist/playwright, screenwriter[3]

Stage

Vosper made his stage debut in 1919 and was best known for playing urbane villains.^[6][7]

His extensive stage experience included appearing in his own play Love from a Stranger (1936), adapted from the short story "Philomel Cottage" by Agatha Christie.^[3][8]

His screenplays included co-writing the comedy No Funny Business (1933) with Victor Hanbury.^[9] He also co-wrote the adaptation of G.B. Stern's novel Debonair with the novelist which opened at the Lyric 23 April 1930.^[10]

He also wrote People Like Us, based on the case of Edith Thompson and Frederick Bywaters.^[11] Banned by the Lord Chamberlain after a performance at the Strand Theatre featuring Atholl Fleming,^[12] it remained unperformed until 1948, when it premiered at Wyndham's Theatre in London, with Miles Malleson, George Rose, Robert Flemyng and Kathleen Michael.^[13]

Death

Vosper drowned on 6 March 1937, when he fell from the ocean liner SS Paris.^[14] His body was found several weeks later on 22 March washed up on the shores near Beachy Head. The death was eventually ruled as accidental after considerable media speculation.^[3] Several newspapers reported that earlier in the evening Vosper had been attending a farewell party for Miss Muriel Oxford, "Miss Great Britain" of 1936, in her cabin, and that he had threatened suicide if she refused to marry him. Miss Oxford reported that her last conversation with Vosper was "quite normal" and that he never threatened suicide.^[15][16][17] According to the Daily Express Fiction Library edition of Murder on the Second Floor, Vosper fell from the French ocean liner SS Normandie, while contemporary newspaper accounts and the evidence produced at the inquest stated it was the liner SS Paris.^{[2][18][15][16][17]}

Filmography

Actor

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1926	Blinkeyes	Seymour	(film debut)
	The Woman Juror	Morgan	Short
1929	The Last Post	Paul
1932	Rome Express	M. Jolif
1933	Strange Evidence	Andrew Relf
1934	Waltzes from Vienna	Prince Gustav
	Dick Turpin	Tom King
	Red Ensign	Lord Dean
	Jew Suss	Karl Alexander
	Blind Justice	Dick Cheriton
	The Man Who Knew Too Much	Ramon Levine
	Open All Night	Anton
1935	Royal Cavalcade	Capt. Robert Falcon Scott
	Heart's Desire	Van Straaten
	Koenigsmark	Maj. Baron de Boise
1936	Spy of Napoleon	Napoleon III
	The Secret of Stamboul	Kazdim	(final film role)

Screenwriter

Year	Title
1932	Murder on the Second Floor
	Rome Express
1933	No Funny Business
	On Secret Service
1937	Love from a Stranger (based on his play)
1941	Shadows on the Stairs (based on his play)
1947	Love from a Stranger (based on his play)

Plays

• The Combined Maze (1927)
• Murder on the Second Floor (1929) - later adapted by Vosper into a novel of the same name.
• Debonair (1930)
• Love from a Stranger (1936)