Don Sharp

Don Sharp
Born	19 April 1922 (1922-04-19) (age 89) Hobart, Tasmania, Australia
Occupation	Producer, Film director, Writer

Donald Sharp (born 19 April 1922, Hobart, Tasmania, Australia) is a British film director.

His most famous films were made for Hammer Studios in the sixties, and included The Kiss of the Vampire (1962) and Rasputin, the Mad Monk (1965). Also in 1965 he directed The Face of Fu Manchu, based on the character created by Sax Rohmer, here played by Christopher Lee. Sharp also directed the first sequel The Brides of Fu Manchu (1966).

Sharp was born in Hobart and attended St Virgil's College. He enlisted in the army on 7 April 1941 and was discharged on 17 March 1944 at the rank of corporal.^[1].

After the war he worked as an actor on stage and radio throughout Australia and in Japan. He then moved to England where he produced and co-wrote a film, Ha'penny Breeze (1950). He continued to act with small roles in such films as The Planter's Wife (1952) and The Cruel Sea (1953), but began to turn increasingly to writing and directing.

Among his other credits are Curse of the Fly, the spy-comedy Our Man in Marrakesh (1966), the fantasy Jules Verne's Rocket to the Moon (1967) and the 1978 remake of The Thirty Nine Steps, starring Robert Powell. He made another foray into spy culture with his feature-length reprise of the gritty Cold War TV drama, Callan (1974) starring Edward Woodward.

He also played the character Stephen "Mitch" Mitchell in the 1953 British science fiction radio series, Journey Into Space.

Sharp also directed the first great British rock 'n' roll movie, The Golden Disc (1958), released a year before the Cliff Richard vehicle Expresso Bongo (1959) and a full two years ahead of Beat Girl (1960). And in Psychomania (1971), Sharp creates a visual fugue by riffing on the great themes of the counter-culture era: bikers, standing stones and ritual magic.

Partial filmography

• Ha'penny Breeze (1950)
• Background (1953)
• Conflict of Wings (1954)
• The Golden Disc (1959)
• Linda (1960)
• Two Guys Abroad (1962)
• It's All Happening (1963)
• The Kiss of the Vampire (1963)
• Wichcraft (1964) (1964)
• The Devil-Ship Pirates (1964)
• Curse of the Fly (1965)
• The Face of Fu Manchu (1965)
• Rasputin: The Mad Monk (1966)
• Our Man in Marrakesh (1966)
• The Brides of Fu Manchu (1966)
• The Violent Enemy (1967)
• Rocket to the Moon (1967)
• A Taste of Excitement (1969)
• Dark Places (1973)
• Psychomania (1973)
• Callan (1974)
• Hennessy (1975)
• The Four Feathers (1977)
• The Thirty Nine Steps (1978)
• Bear Island (1979)
• What Waits Below (1984)
• Hold the Dream (1986) (TV)
• Tears in the Rain (1988) (TV)
• Act of Will (1989) (TV)

Notes

1. ^ http://www.ww2roll.gov.au/script/veteran.asp?ServiceID=R&VeteranID=880621

External links

• Don Sharp at the Internet Movie Database

Persondata
Name	Sharp, Don
Alternative names
Short description
Date of birth	19 April 1922
Place of birth	Hobart, Tasmania, Australia
Date of death
Place of death