
John Standing
Actor · b. 1934 · London, England, UK
Sir John Ronald Leon, 4th Baronet (born 16 August 1934) is an English actor and baronet who is known as John Standing. He is the stepson of John Clements. Standing was born in London, the son of Kay Hammond (née Dorothy Katherine Standing), an actress, and Sir Ronald George Leon, 3rd Baronet, a stockbroker descended from Sir Herbert Leon, the builder of Bletchley Park. He succeeded his father as the 4th baronet in 1964, but does not use the title. The Leon family were, until 1937, owners of Bletchley Park, the country house in Buckinghamshire used in the Second World War as a code-breaking centre. He was educated at Eton College and Millfield School, Somerset. He served in the King's Royal Rifle Corps as a second lieutenant, before going on to study at the Byam Shaw School of Art in London Standing began his career in Peter Brook's 1955 production of Titus Andronicus starring Laurence Olivier and wife Vivien Leigh and later played leading parts in Oscar Wilde's The Importance of Being Earnest, Christopher Fry's Ring Round the Moon, A Sense of Detachment by John Osborne, and Noël Coward's Private Lives, with Maggie Smith. He was nominated for an Olivier award (1979) for Close of Play at the National Theatre. He made his film debut in The Wild and the Willing (1962), going on to appear in King Rat (1965), Walk, Don't Run (1966), The Psychopath (1966), The Eagle Has Landed (1976), The Elephant Man (1980), Nightflyers (1987), Mrs Dalloway (1997) and A Good Woman (2004). One of his first major television roles was as Sidney Godolphin in the BBC twelve-part serial, The First Churchills (1969). Other television appearances include Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (1979); the ITV sitcom The Other 'Arf (1980–84), with Lorraine Chase; The Choir (1995) and King Solomon's Mines (2004). In the United States, he made guest appearances in numerous weekly programmes including L.A. Law, Civil Wars and Murder, She Wrote, and co-starred briefly with Robert Wagner and Samantha Smith in the action series Lime Street (1985). In 1976, he also appeared opposite Peter O'Toole in the little-seen BBC thriller film, Rogue Male, directed by Clive Donner. He appeared in the horror film Nightflyers (1987) adapted from a short story by George R. R. Martin. In 2002, he had a speaking credit on Lost Horizons, the second studio album from the British electronic duo Lemon Jelly. On track 1, "Elements", he lists the basic “elements" that make up the world: ash, metal, water, wood, fire and sky. On track 3, "Ramblin' Man", Standing reads a long list of various locations around the world, ranging from small Sussex villages to major world capitals. In July 2010, it was confirmed that he would be appearing as Jon Arryn in the HBO series Game of Thrones, based on Martin's A Song of Ice and Fire novels.
Movies24
Movie7.9ActionThrillerIn a world in which Great Britain has become a fascist state, a masked vigilante known only as “V” conducts guerrilla warfare against the oppressive British government. When V rescues a young woman from the secret police, he finds in her an ally with whom he can continue his fight to free the people of Britain.
V for Vendetta
2006 · 15K votes
Movie8.1DramaHistoryA Victorian surgeon rescues a heavily disfigured man being mistreated by his "owner" as a side-show freak. Behind his monstrous façade, there is revealed a person of great intelligence and sensitivity. Based on the true story of Joseph Merrick (called John Merrick in the film), a severely deformed man in 19th century London.
The Elephant Man
1980 · 4.1K votes
Movie5.4HorrorA couple attempts to unravel a sinister plot within the English countryside estate of a dying man who has gathered an eclectic and notable group of house guests.
The Legacy
1978 · 80 votes
Movie7.4DramaAn aged Charlie Chaplin narrates his life to his autobiography's editor, including his rise to wealth and comedic fame from poverty, his turbulent personal life and his run-ins with the FBI.
Chaplin
1992 · 1.3K votes
Movie5.5ActionAdventureFormer CIA Operative James Dial is coaxed back into action to kill a terrorist in London, but it all goes wrong and he is forced into hiding, where he meets and befriends a 12 year old girl.
The Contractor
2007 · 209 votes
Movie6.7AdventureDramaWhen the Nazi high command learns in late 1943 that Winston Churchill will be spending time at a country estate in Norfolk, it hatches an audacious scheme to kidnap the prime minister and spirit him to Germany for enforced negotiations with Hitler.
The Eagle Has Landed
1976 · 397 votes
Movie6.0DramaTV MovieAn aging King invites disaster, when he abdicates to his corrupt, toadying daughters, and rejects his loving and honest one.
King Lear
2018 · 109 votes
Movie6.6ComedyMysteryAn American journalism student in London scoops a big story, and begins an affair with an aristocrat as the incident unfurls.
Scoop
2006 · 1.8K votes
Movie6.7HistoryDramaIn the summer of 2014, a World War II veteran sneaks out of his care home to attend the 70th anniversary commemoration of the D-Day landings in Normandy.
The Great Escaper
2023 · 178 votes
Movie6.3ComedyRomanceFleeing 1930s New York and leaving behind a chequered past, the giltzy divorcee Mrs Stella Erlynne travels to Italy's sun-dappled Amalfi coast. Mrs Erlynne's appearance causes a stir amongst the visiting aristocracy. Based on the Oscar Wilde play "Lady Windemere's Fan."
A Good Woman
2004 · 192 votes
Movie6.2DramaIn 1895, Oscar Wilde (1854-1900) was the most famous writer in London, and Bosie Douglas, son of the notorious Marquess of Queensberry, was his lover. Accused and convicted of gross indecency, he was imprisoned for two years and subjected to hard labor. Once free, he abandons England to live in France, where he will spend his last years, haunted by memories of the past, poverty and immense sadness.
The Happy Prince
2018 · 194 votes
Movie5.9WarActionA German spy is passing on information about the location of Allied ships in the neutral harbor of Goa, India, with catastrophic results. Unable to undertake a full military operation in the Portuguese stronghold, English intelligence brings out of retirement a crew of geriatric ex-soldiers, veterans from World War I, using their age as cover. These old soldiers are asked to take to the seas and pull off an unlikely undercover mission.
The Sea Wolves
1980 · 110 votes
Movie6.3ComedyCrimeAn American gets a ticket for an audience participation game in London, then gets involved in a case of mistaken identity. As an international plot unravels around him, he thinks it's all part of the act.
The Man Who Knew Too Little
1997 · 604 votes
Movie6.4AdventureDramaA family in financial crisis is forced to sell Lassie, their beloved dog. Hundreds of miles away from her true family, Lassie escapes and sets out on a journey home.
Lassie
2005 · 148 votes
Movie5.9DramaHistoryRogue Trader tells the true story of Nick Leeson, an employee of Barings Bank who--after a successful trading run--ends up accumulating $1.4 billion in losses hidden in account #88888.
Rogue Trader
1999 · 138 votes
Movie5.5DramaComedyAfter his wife dies, middle-aged businessman Philip Emmenthal, at the prompting of his playboy son Storey, populates his Geneva villa with eight-and-a-half concubines. Three are from Kyoto, where Storey manages Pachinco palaces. Each has a distinctive personality: a nun, a child bearer, a gambler, a student of Kabuki, a horsewoman with a pet pig, a maid. As a year passes, the women begin asserting their own power.
8 ½ Women
1999 · 70 votes
Movie7.0ComedyActionShelley, a slightly-crazy heiress, discovers that her eccentric millionaire uncle Jason Carr was rather more eccentric than even she had thought--he was a costumed superhero in his spare time, half of a duo calling itself "Captain Chameleon and the Paraclete of Justice." Now Shelley must find out exactly who murdered her uncle, with the help of her uncle's mysterious and handsome partner in fighting crime.
Chameleons
1989 · 1 votes
Movie7.2DramaWarWhen Singapore surrendered to the Japanese in 1942, the Allied POWs, mostly British but including a few Americans, were incarcerated in Changi prison. Among the American prisoners is Cpl. King, a wheeler-dealer who has managed to establish a pretty good life for himself in the camp. King soon forms a friendship with an upper-class British officer who is fascinated with King's enthusiastic approach to life.
King Rat
1965 · 83 votes
Movie5.1DramaComedyTwo hopeful lads from Leatherhead trying to break into the movies stumble upon the opportunity of a lifetime. Frustrated by their arty film teacher, wannabe producer Joe and his talented but neurotic director friend Baggy head to London to sell what they know is a script made of gold.
I Want Candy
2007 · 121 votes
Movie6.1DramaIn this sequel to Hope and Glory (1987), Bill Rohan has grown up and is drafted into the army, where he and his eccentric best mate, Percy, battle their snooty superiors on the base and look for love in town.
Queen & Country
2015 · 74 votes
Movie7.4TV MovieDramaParallel stories: 18th century Harrison builds the marine chronometer for safe navigation at sea; 20th century Gould is obsessed with restoring it.
Longitude
2000 · 35 votes
Movie7.3DocumentaryWarWinston Churchill understood the power of films, but the true extent of his use of cinema as a propaganda tool is rarely explored. In 1934, one of Britain's most celebrated film producers, Alexander Korda, signed Churchill up as a screenwriter and historical advisor. It was the start of a unique collaboration. Churchill provided script notes for Korda's productions and penned an epic screenplay. When war broke out, their collaboration took on national importance. Korda was sent on a mission to Hollywood to help bring America into the war, with positive results. With access to previously undiscovered documents, this film documentary examines that mission and a friendship that underpinned a unique, creative partnership.
Churchill and the Movie Mogul
2019 · 3 votes
Movie7.0ThrillerTV MovieRobert Wagner plays an American who owns a Lisbon nightclub and Teri Garr is a slightly dippy chanteuse who has stumbled across a Nazi plot to kidnap the Duke and Duchess of Windsor, living at the time (1942) in Portugal.
To Catch a King
1984 · 2 votes
Movie6.4ComedyRomanceDuring the housing shortage of the 1964 Summer Olympic Games, two men and a woman share a small apartment in Tokyo, and the older man soon starts playing Cupid to the younger pair.
Walk Don't Run
1966 · 87 votes
Series24
TV8.5Sci-Fi & FantasyDramaSeven noble families fight for control of the mythical land of Westeros. Friction between the houses leads to full-scale war. All while a very ancient evil awakens in the farthest north. Amidst the war, a neglected military order of misfits, the Night's Watch, is all that stands between the realms of men and icy horrors beyond.
Game of Thrones
2011 · 27K votes
TV7.5CrimeDramaThe peacefulness of the Midsomer community is shattered by violent crimes, suspects are placed under suspicion, and it is up to a veteran DCI and his young sergeant to calmly and diligently eliminate the innocent and ruthlessly pursue the guilty.
Midsomer Murders
1997 · 374 votes
TV7.5MysteryCrimeAn unassuming mystery writer turned sleuth uses her professional insight to help solve real-life homicide cases.
Murder, She Wrote
1984 · 471 votes
TV8.2CrimeDramaFrom England to Egypt, accompanied by his elegant and trustworthy sidekicks, the intelligent yet eccentrically-refined Belgian detective Hercule Poirot pits his wits against a collection of first class deceptions.
Agatha Christie's Poirot
1989 · 584 votes
TV7.0DramaWar & PoliticsL.A. Law is an American television legal drama series that ran for eight seasons on NBC from September 15, 1986, to May 19, 1994. Created by Steven Bochco and Terry Louise Fisher, it contained many of Bochco's trademark features including a large number of parallel storylines, social drama and off-the-wall humor. It reflected the social and cultural ideologies of the 1980s and early 1990s, and many of the cases featured on the show dealt with hot-topic issues such as abortion, racism, gay rights, homophobia, sexual harassment, AIDS, and domestic violence. The series often also reflected social tensions between the wealthy senior lawyer protagonists and their less well-paid junior staff. The show was popular with audiences and critics, and won 15 Emmy Awards throughout its run, four of which were for Outstanding Drama Series.
L.A. Law
1986 · 80 votes
TV8.2DramaThe gripping, decades-spanning inside story of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II and the Prime Ministers who shaped Britain's post-war destiny. The Crown tells the inside story of two of the most famous addresses in the world – Buckingham Palace and 10 Downing Street – and the intrigues, love lives and machinations behind the great events that shaped the second half of the 20th century. Two houses, two courts, one Crown.
The Crown
2016 · 2.4K votes
TV7.1Action & AdventureDramaHunter is an American police drama television series created by Frank Lupo, and starring Fred Dryer as Sgt. Rick Hunter and Stepfanie Kramer as Sgt. Dee Dee McCall, which ran on NBC from 1984 to 1991. However, Kramer left after the sixth season to pursue other acting and musical opportunities. In the seventh season, Hunter partnered with two different women officers. The titular character, Sgt. Rick Hunter, was a wily, physically imposing, and often rule-breaking homicide detective with the Los Angeles Police Department. The show's main characters, Hunter and McCall, resolve many of their cases by shooting dead the perpetrators. The show's executive producer during the first season was Stephen J. Cannell, whose company produced the series.
Hunter
1984 · 102 votes
TV7.8Action & AdventureCrimeA quirky spy show of the adventures of eccentrically suave British Agent John Steed and his predominantly female partners. Jonathan Steed - an urbane, proper gentleman spy - teams with various assistants throughout the series' run, including Dr. David Keel, Cathy Gale, Emma Peel and Tara King, to repeatedly save the world from diabolical schemes plotted by equally diabolical evil-doers (among them robots and man-eating monsters).
The Avengers
1961 · 156 votes
TV6.8DramaSoapHotel is an American prime time drama series which aired on ABC from September 21, 1983 to May 5, 1988 in the timeslot following Dynasty. Based on Arthur Hailey's 1965 novel of the same name, the series was produced by Aaron Spelling and set in the elegant and fictitious St. Gregory Hotel in San Francisco. Establishing shots of the hotel were filmed in front of The Fairmont San Francisco atop the Nob Hill neighborhood. Episodes followed the activities of passing guests, as well as the personal and professional lives of the hotel staff.
Hotel
1982 · 26 votes
TV5.2DramaA BBC television anthology series featuring productions of classic and contemporary stage plays usually broadcast on BBC1. Each production featured a different work, often using prominent British stage actors in the leading roles. The series was transmitted from October 1965 to September 1983.
BBC Play of the Month
1965 · 8 votes
TV7.1DramaSeries of single made-for-television dramas.
Screen Two
1985 · 7 votes
TV6.9Action & AdventureCrimeWealthy couple Jonathan and Jennifer Hart, a self-made millionaire and his journalist wife, moonlight as amateur detectives.
Hart to Hart
1979 · 133 votes
TV7.4Action & AdventureCrimeSimon Templar is The Saint, a handsome, sophisticated, debonair, modern-day Robin Hood who recovers ill-gotten wealth and redistributes it to those in need.
The Saint
1962 · 136 votes
TV5.2DramaAn anthology series of television plays which aired on BBC1 from October 1964 to May 1970. The plays were usually written for television, although adaptations from other sources also featured.
The Wednesday Play
1964 · 5 votes
TV7.0DramaITV Playhouse is a British comedy-drama TV series that ran from 1967 to 1983, which featured contributions from playwrights such as Dennis Potter, Rhys Adrian and Alan Sharp. The series began in black and white, but was later shot in colour and was produced by various companies for the ITV network, a format that would inspire Dramarama. Actors appearing in the series included Leslie Anderson, Gwen Nelson, Ricky Alleyne, Pat Heywood, Michael Elphick, Ian Hendry, Edward Woodward, Margaret Lockwood, Jessie Matthews and Lloyd Peters.
ITV Playhouse
1967 · 3 votes
TV7.0ComedyDramaA Time Prophet predicted that Kai would be the one to destroy the divine order in the league of the 20,000 planets, someday that will happen, but not today. Today a cowardly security guard, an undead assassin, a female with a body designed for sex and a robot head madly in love with her all make up the crew of the spaceship Lexx, the most powerful weapon in the two universes.
Lexx
1997 · 146 votes
TV7.0Anthology series of dramatic works.
ITV Saturday Night Theatre
1969 · 3 votes
TV7.1Sci-Fi & FantasyThe crew of Moonbase Alpha must struggle to survive when a massive explosion throws the Moon from orbit into deep space.
Space: 1999
1975 · 166 votes
TV7.0DramaComedyAn anthology of plays and novels adapted into feature length TV movies, broadcast on BBC2 from September 1977 to April 1979.
BBC2 Play of the Week
1977 · 1 votes
TV5.6CrimeDramaThe Vice is an ITV police drama about the Metropolitan Police Vice Unit. Spanning five short series from 1999 and 2003, it follows the London Metropolitan police force's vice squad, where prostitution, underage sex, and such organised crime are regular occurrences. Most episodes end where the main villain is caught but often not in a 'naturally' concluded way expected from other TV dramas, and often ending with more unanswered questions than answered. Leader DI Pat Chappel struggles to manage the balance between his private and professional lives — as do the rest of the team. Working in the seedy underworld leads to a continual dilemma — the tension between the Vice Squad and vice-related crimes runs throughout the series and gives the show a rich viewing experience. The line of the team staying on the right side of the law is often blurred, as almost every member at different points submits briefly or permanently to the dubious temptations, sometimes with drastic consequences.
The Vice
1999 · 8 votes
TV7.5MysteryCrimeAn anthology series produced by Thames Television, comprised of short mystery, suspense or crime adaptations featuring, as the title suggests, detectives who were literary contemporaries of Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes.
The Rivals of Sherlock Holmes
1971 · 11 votes
TV6.2DramaVan der Valk is a British television series that was produced by Thames Television for the ITV network. It starred Barry Foster in the title role as Dutch detective Commissaris "Piet" van der Valk. Based on the characters and atmosphere of the novels of Nicolas Freeling, the first series was shown in 1972.
Van der Valk
1972 · 10 votes
TV7.5DramaA critical and often humorous look at the upper class, tracking the protagonist's harrowing odyssey from a deeply traumatic childhood through adult substance abuse and, ultimately, toward recovery.
Patrick Melrose
2018 · 342 votes
- TVDrama
Drama 61-67 is anthology drama series which took a different title, based on year of transmission, each year. It alternated with Armchair Theatre from ABC in the Sunday evening slot. The series was described at the time as epitomising ATV drama.
Drama 61-67
1961