Basil Dearden, the director of All Night Long, toiled in Great Britain's B-movie industry for years until he won acclaim in 1958 for the crime drama Sapphire, which was nominated for four BAFTA (British Academy of Film and Television Arts) awards and won the Best Picture prize.

After Sapphire, Dearden was promoted to A pictures and turned out such notable films as the heist thriller The League of Gentlemen (1960), Woman of Straw (1964) with Sean Connery, Ralph Richardson and Gina Lollobrigida, and Khartoum (1966) starring Charlton Heston and Laurence Olivier.

All Night Long was made between Dearden's controversial melodrama Victim (1961) with Dirk Bogarde as a lawyer hunting blackmailers who prey on closeted gay men and Life for Ruth (1962, aka Walk in the Shadow).

Screenwriter Paul Jarrico, who co-wrote the screenplay for All Night Long under the pseudonym Peter Achilles, had been blacklisted by Hollywood since the early fifties due to his ties to "subversive" organizations as classified by the House Un-American Activities Committee.


Jarrico, who previously received a Best Writing Oscar® nomination for Tom Dick and Harry in 1941, didn't return to using his real name in film credits until 1968 with the French film, The Day the Hot Line Got Hot starring Charles Boyer, Robert Taylor and Marie Dubois.

All Night Long also featured the involvement of another victim of the Hollywood Blacklist, actress Betsy Blair. Her film career in the U.S. ended after she received a Best Actress Oscar® nomination for Marty in 1955. Shortly thereafter, she was blacklisted as a leftist sympathizer and relocated to Europe for film work, appearing in such offbeat features as Michelangelo Antonioni's Il Grido (1957) and Francesco Maselli's I Delfini (1960).

Blair had previously starred in a 1955 television production of Othello directed by Tony Richardson and played the part of Bianca. In All Night Long, Dearden's modern adaptation of Othello, Blair was cast as Emily, a character who didn't exist in the Shakespeare play, but Maria Velasco ended up playing the part modeled on Bianca, now named Benny.

At the time he made All Night Long, Patrick McGoohan was not yet a well-known actor in America or a major star in his own country though he had previously appeared in the popular TV series, Danger Man (1960-1961).

McGoohan's film career took an upward swing in 1963 when he appeared in the made-for-TV movie The Scarecrow of Romney Marsh, broadcast on "The Wonderful World of Disney." He would follow that with a starring role in the Disney family drama, The Three Lives of Thomasina (1964).

McGoohan would go on to achieve cult status for his appearance in the sci-fi TV series, The Prisoner (1967-1968).

Othello obviously had a strong impact on McGoohan because he would later direct the film version of Catch My Soul (1974), a rock musical based on the Shakespeare play. The film starred musician Richie Havens in the Othello part and would be McGoohan's only attempt at directing a feature film.

Paul Harris made his film debut as Aurelius Rex in All Night Long but only appeared in a few random television episodes after that with 1965 marking his last on-screen appearance.

Marti Stevens, who was said to be a protégé of Marlene Dietrich, plays the Desdemona character in All Night Long, now called Delia Lane. It was her first major starring role in a film but for the rest of her career she worked mostly in television with the made-for-TV movie The Day the Bubble Burst (1982) her last screen credit to date.

Keith Michell, a South Australian actor who later starred in many London stage plays and became a popular screen actor in England, plays the part of Cass Michaels in All Night Long, a character inspired by Cassio in Shakespeare's Othello. He later became a popular recurring character on TV's Murder, She Wrote.

Richard Attenborough was still a well-regarded character actor at the time he made All Night Long which he would follow up with strong performances in the World War II epic, The Great Escape (1963), Seance on a Wet Afternoon (1964) and The Sand Pebbles (1966), which won him a Best Supporting Actor Golden Globe award. He began to focus on directing movies in 1969, beginning with Oh! What a Lovely War, but continued to accept acting roles and is still working.

All Night Long marks the only time that jazz musicians Dave Brubeck and Charles Mingus appear as themselves in a dramatic film. Bandleader, conductor and alto sax player John Dankworth would also make a cameo appearance in Joseph Losey's The Servant in 1963.

If you look closely at the partygoers grooving to the music of the famous musicians on display in All Night Long, you might spot Carol White, Italian actress Gabriella Licudi and Tony award winning dancer/choreographer Geoffrey Holder. White enjoyed brief critical acclaim for her breakthrough role in Ken Loach's Poor Cow (1967). Licudi has enjoyed decorative parts in The Fall of the Roman Empire (1964), The Liquidator (1965) and Casino Royale (1967). Holder is probably best known for his appearance as Baron Samedi in the James Bond adventure, Live and Let Die (1973).

Cinematographer Edward Scaife has filmed a number of memorable British and American productions over the years, from cult B-movies such as Night of the Demon (1957, aka Curse of the Demon) and Tarzan's Greatest Adventure (1959) to big-budget features such as The Dirty Dozen (1967) and three for director John Huston, including The Kremlin Letter (1970).

Other film adaptations of Shakespeare's Othello include O (2001), which is set in a high school and stars Mekhi Phifer, Josh Hartnett and Julie Stiles, a 1995 adaptation starring Laurence Fishburne, Orson Welles'The Tragedy of Othello: The Moor of Venice (1952), a 1965 version with Laurence Olivier and Maggie Smith, and a well-regarded silent German version in 1922, directed by Dimitri Buchowetzki.

by Jeff Stafford

SOURCES:
The Memory of All That by Betsy Blair (Alfred A. Knopf)
Patrick McGoohan: Danger Man or Prisoner? by Roger Langley (Tomahawk)
www.afi.com
www.screenonline.org.uk
IMDB