John Williams

John Williams (15 April 1903 – 5 May 1983) was a Tony Award-winning British stage, film, and television actor. He is remembered for his role as Chief Inspector Hubbard in Alfred Hitchcock's Dial M for Murder, as the chauffeur in Billy Wilder's Sabrina (both 1954), as Mr. Brogan-Moore in Witness for the Prosecution (1957), and as the second "Mr. French" on TV's Family Affair in its first season (1967). Life and work Born in Chalfont St Giles in Buckinghamshire, England, in 1903, Williams was educated at Lancing College. He began his acting career on the English stage in 1916, appearing in J. M. Barrie's Peter Pan, Frances Nordstrom's The Ruined Lady, and Frederick Lonsdale's The Fake. In 1924 Williams moved to New York, where he was cast in a series of successful Broadway productions. He would appear in over 30 Broadway plays over the next four decades, performing on stage with performers such as Claudette Colbert in Clifford Grey's A Kiss in the Taxi in 1925, Helen Hayes in J. M. Barrie's Alice Sit-by-the-Fire and Gertrude Lawrence in George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion in 1946. In 1953, Williams won a Tony Award for Actor, Supporting or Featured (Dramatic) for his role as Chief Inspector Hubbard in Frederick Knott's Dial M for Murder on Broadway. Soon afterwards, when Alfred Hitchcock adapted the play to a film version released in 1954, he cast Williams in the same role. Williams' first appearance in a Hollywood film was in director Mack Sennett's short The Chumps (1930). He ultimately appeared in more than 40 films, including two other Hitchcock films: The Paradine Case (1947) starring Gregory Peck, in which Williams held a minor role as a barrister, and To Catch a Thief (1955) with Cary Grant and Grace Kelly, in which Williams portrayed a major character—a Lloyd's of London insurance representative. In the 1960 thriller Midnight Lace, starring Doris Day, Williams played a London police inspector much like his character in Dial M for Murder.