Nicholas Phipps

William Nicholas Foskett Phipps (23 June 1913 – 11 April 1980) was a British actor and writer who appeared in stage roles between 1932 and 1967 and more than thirty films between 1940 and 1970. He wrote West End plays, songs and sketches for revues, and film scripts. Life and career Early years Phipps was born in London on 23 June 1913, the son of the civil servant Sir Edmund Bampfylde Phipps and his wife Margaret, née Percy. He was educated at Winchester College. He made his first appearance on the stage at the Old Vic on 25 January 1932, walking-on Julius Caesar. In 1933, he played in Anew McMaster's Shakespearian season at the Chiswick Empire, and at Christmas, appeared at the Embassy in Aladdin . At the St Martin's in March 1934 he played Henry in Love in a Mist, subsequently joining the Northampton repertory company. During 1934–35, he was co-director of the Imperial Institute Theatre. He toured in 1934 in P. G. Wodehouse's Good Morning, Bill and was a member of the Oxford Playhouse in 1935–36. In 1936, Phipps toured with Dame Sybil Thorndike's company in Noël Coward's Hands Across the Sea, D. H. Lawrence's My Son's My Son and Euripides' Hippolytus. He toured in South Africa in 1937, in The Frog and The Amazing Dr Clitterhouse, and on his return, played at the summer theatre at Perranporth. At the Gate Theatre in December 1937 he appeared in Members Only. His last three appearances before the Second World War were as Tony Fox-Collier in Spring Meeting (Ambassadors, May 1938), as Roland Capel in First Stop North (King's, Hammersmith, May 1939) and in The Gate Revue at the Ambassadors (June 1939).