HIS EXCELLENCY 1952 Eric Portman, Cecil Parker JAMES BOSWELL Ealing 20x30 POSTER

Original British 20 inch x 30 inch Double Crown Poster for the 1952 Robert Hamer Ealing Studios Comedy HIS EXCELLENCY, based on the play by Dorothy & Campbell Christie and starring Eric Portman, Cecil Parker, Helen Cherry, Susan Stephen, Edward Chapman, Geoffrey Keen, Clive Morton, Alec Mango, John Salew, Robin Bailey, Eric Pohlmann, Howard Marion-Crawford, Basil Dignam, Laurence Naismith, and Victor Maddern.

The post-war Labour government appoints an ex-docker as Governor of a Mediterranean colony.

Poster art by James Boswell. Born in Westport, New Zealand in 1906, Boswell was educated at the Elam School of Art in Auckland before moving to England in 1925 to study at the Royal College of Art. Although primarily a painter he temporarily gave this up in 1932 to work in graphics. At this time he joined the Communist Party and in 1933 founded the Artists International association, promoting left-wing and anti-militarist art. He attended James Fitton’s (Kind Hearts and Coronets) evening classes in lithography at the Central School and after the war became art director for Shell and art editor for the magazine Lilliput from 1947 to 1950. He is recognized as one of the outstanding draughtsmen of the 1930s and 1940s.

Printed by Graphic Reproductions Ltd. (Ealing’s main printer through the 1940s and 1950s)

The poster is in good condition with several horizontal creases and much creasing at the bottom. There is a stain on the reverse which bleeds through slightly just above the name ‘Eric Portman’ and there is a short tear in the bottom edge.