LegacyMichael Balcon
Born in 1896, Michael Balcon was a patrician, headmasterly figure who ran Ealing Studios along very strict lines. “Benevolent paternalism” is the phrase most often used to describe his regime. He could be stubborn and chauvinistic. “He didn’t really approve of women behind the camera,” producer Betty Box noted. However, in his own mild-mannered way, he was also innovative and even quietly subversive.
Balcon’s moment of epiphany came at the end of World War II when he began to steer Ealing Studios toward making intensely British comedies that offered their own barbed critique of post-war British society. Ealing was “the studio for good British films.” In Passport to Pimlico (1949), Whisky Galore! (1949), and The Titfield ...
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