My Learned Friend

My Learned Friend
Directed by	Basil Dearden Will Hay
Written by	John Dighton Angus MacPhail
Produced by	Michael Balcon Robert Hamer
Starring	Will Hay Claude Hulbert Mervyn Johns
Cinematography	Wilkie Cooper
Edited by	Charles Hasse
Music by	Ernest Irving
Production company	Ealing Studios
Distributed by	Ealing
Running time	74 minutes
Country	United Kingdom
Language	English

My Learned Friend is a 1943 British, black-and-white, comedy, farce, directed by Basil Dearden with his regular collaborator, Will Hay, as the film's star in the role of William Fitch. The principal supporting roles were taken by Claude Hulbert and Mervyn Johns . Character roles went to Laurence Hanray as Sir Norman, Charles Victor as "Safety" Wilson, Ernest Thesiger as Ferris and Ronald Shiner as the Man in Wilson's café. It was produced by Michael Balcon, Robert Hamer and Ealing Studios.

The film's title refers to a tradition in British law: when addressing either the court or the judge, a barrister refers to the opposing counsel using the respectful term, "my learned friend".

This was Will Hay's last film; Hay went on to star as "Doctor Muffin" in The Will Hay Programme that aired on the radio in 1944. The humour of My Learned Friend took a darker turn than any of Hay's earlier films.

Plot

This comedy sees Will Hay playing a seedy lawyer, who finds himself marked for assassination by a forger whom he previously defended unsuccessfully. He teams up with an incompetent solicitor to try to prevent the deaths of others involved.

The film climaxes with a sequence where Hay hangs from the hands of the clock face of Big Ben in an attempt to prevent a time bomb being detonated.

External links

• My Learned Friend at the British Film Institute
• My Learned Friend at IMDb