A FORGOTTEN STAR by Jonathan Croall, 7.30pm, Monday 28 July Upstairs@North London Tavern

A FORGOTTEN STAR is a play about the career of Jonathan’s father, John Stuart, a popular star of the British silent films in the 1920s. He had a fan club as big as Ivor Novello’s and was constantly mobbed by adoring female fans.  He starred in Alfred Hitchcock’s directing debut and acted opposite most of the leading actresses of the time.  But he faced many challenges including the offer of a contract from Hollywood, and the coming of the ‘talkies’ which instantly ended the careers of so many stars on both sides of the Atlantic.

Jonathan Croall is a biographer and theatre historian, whose 25 books include the lives of John Gielgud and Sybil Thorndike, and books about Hamlet and King Lear containing interviews with leading actors and directors. He has written wo plays about Bernard Shaw and is currently writing AFTER GATSBY, centring on Scott Fitzgerald’s attempt to make it as a screenplay writer in Hollywood, while battling with is alcoholism and his wife Zelda’s descent into insanity.