Stars hand it to British film industry

Press, 8 May 1985, Page 18

Stars hand it to British film industry

NZPA-PA London Five stars of the silver screen have gone down on their knees to hand it to British films — Hollywood style.

Omar Sharif, Charlton Heston, Sir John Mills, Dame Anna Neagle, and Alan Bates ceremonially left their handprints in wet cement to mark British Film Year.

The handprints form the start of a new star pavement in London’s West end to rival the famous tinsel town tradition outside Mann’s Chinese Theatre in Los Angeles. As Barry Norman, the television film presenter, told the large cheering crowds in Leicester Square, the idea has been “cribbed shamelessly from Hollywood.”

To a fanfare of silver trumpets and accompanied by servants in wigs and gold braid and maids to wash their hands, the stars removed their rings, coated their hands in barrier cream, knelt on cushions and thrust their hands in the cement outside the Leicester Square Theatre. Unlike the inauguration of the Hollywood star pavement in 1927 when actress Norma Talmadge accidently slipped over and left her footprint in wet cement, there was no mishap this time.

American Charlton Heston, star of “Ben Hur” and “El Cid” and now appearing on the London stage, became the first man to leave his mark in the pavements of both Hollywood and London, but admitted “this unique identity” would probably not last very long. Omar Sharif had no doubt of his record though. “I bet I will be the only Egyptian with a handprint here,” he said. “And I bet this will last longer than my films — cement is stronger than celluloid.”

Dame Anna Neagle, doyen of the British stage and screen and now more than 80, was supported in the large cheering crowds by Sir John Mills, himself now 77.

Said Sir John: “This is a marvellous idea and I’m personally very happy to be here as the first film I made was first shown here at the Old Empire in 1933 and I was booed off the screen.

“I got the bird then so it’s nice to be back and be cheered.”

The prints, alongside a bronze star-shaped plaque, will be guarded under a perspex cover by security guards for three days until the cement dries. Quick drying cement would crack' too easily, said a spokesman.