Bryan Forbes
Bryan Forbes, CBE (; 22 July 1926 – 8 May 2013) was an English film director, screenwriter, film producer, actor and novelist, described as a "Renaissance man" and "one of the most important figures in the British film industry". Best known as the director of the film The Stepford Wives (1975), he wrote and directed several other critically acclaimed films, including Whistle Down the Wind (1961), Séance on a Wet Afternoon (1964), and King Rat (1965). He also scripted several films directed by others The League of Gentlemen (1960), The Angry Silence (1960) and Only Two Can Play (1962).
Early life
Forbes was born John Theobald Clarke in Stratford, London, on 22 July 1926 in Queen Mary's Hospital, Stratford, West Ham, Essex. His father was a salesman and he grew up at 43 Cranmer Road, Forest Gate, West Ham, where he attended West Ham Secondary School and Horncastle Grammar School after he was evacuated during World War II to Lincolnshire. A schoolfriend at West Ham was artist Albert Herbert.Lionel Gamlin of the BBC took him on as the host of Junior Brains Trust, and invented Clarke's pseudonym of Bryan Forbes.