Separate Tables (1958)  Full Cast and Crew for Separate Tables (1958)   Directed by Delbert Mann  Writing credits John Gay John Michael Hayes (uncredited) Terence Rattigan (also play)  Cast (in credits order) Deborah Kerr .... Sibyl Railton-Bell Rita Hayworth .... Ann Shankland David Niven .... Major Angus Pollock Wendy Hiller .... Pat Cooper Burt Lancaster .... John Malcolm Gladys Cooper .... Mrs. Railton-Bell Cathleen Nesbitt .... Lady Matheson Felix Aylmer .... Mr. Fowler Rod Taylor .... Charles Audrey Dalton .... Jean May Hallatt .... Miss Meacham Priscilla Morgan .... Doreen  Rest of cast listed alphabetically: Hilda Plowright .... Mabel (uncredited)  Produced by Harold Hecht .... producer Harry Horner .... associate producer (uncredited)  Original Music by David Raksin Harry Warren (song "Separate Tables")  Cinematography by Charles Lang (as Charles Lang, Jr.)  Film Editing by Charles Ennis Marjorie Fowler  Production Design by Harry Horner  Art Direction by Edward Carrere  Set Decoration by Edward G. Boyle  Costume Design by Edith Head (Miss Hayworth's gowns)  Makeup Department Harry Maret .... makeup artist Helene Parrish .... hair stylist Franz Prehoda .... makeup artist Joan St. Oegger .... hair stylist Robert J. Schiffer .... makeup artist (uncredited)  Production Management Gilbert Kurland .... executive production manager  Second Unit Director or Assistant Director Tom Shaw .... assistant director (as Thomas P. Shaw) Harry Horner .... second unit director: Bournemouth (uncredited)  Sound Department Fred Lau .... sound recordist  Other crew Harold Adamson .... lyricist: "Separate Tables" Mary Grant .... costume supervisor Harold Hecht .... presenter (as Hecht-Hill-Lancaster) James Hill .... presenter (as Hecht-Hill-Lancaster) Burt Lancaster .... presenter (as Hecht-Hill-Lancaster) Vic Damone .... singer: "Separate Tables" (uncredited)  Awards for Separate Tables (1958)  Academy Awards, USA 1959 Won Oscar Best Actor in a Leading Role David Niven 1959 Won Oscar Best Actress in a Supporting Role Wendy Hiller Wendy Hiller was not present at the awards ceremony. Harold Hecht, the film's producer, accepted on her behalf. 1959 Nominated Oscar Best Actress in a Leading Role Deborah Kerr 1959 Nominated Oscar Best Cinematography, Black-and-White Charles Lang 1959 Nominated Oscar Best Music, Scoring of a Dramatic or Comedy Picture David Raksin 1959 Nominated Oscar Best Picture Harold Hecht 1959 Nominated Oscar Best Writing, Screenplay Based on Material from Another Medium Terence Rattigan and John Gay Golden Globes, USA 1959 Won Golden Globe Best Motion Picture Actor - Drama David Niven Nominated Golden Globe Best Motion Picture - Drama Nominated Golden Globe Best Motion Picture Actress - Drama Deborah Kerr Nominated Golden Globe Best Motion Picture Director Delbert Mann Nominated Golden Globe Best Supporting Actress Wendy Hiller Laurel Awards 1959 2nd place Golden Laurel Top Male Dramatic Performance David Niven 1959 Nominated Golden Laurel Top Female Dramatic Performance Deborah Kerr - 5th place. 1959 Nominated Golden Laurel Top Female Supporting Performance Wendy Hiller - 4th place. New York Film Critics Circle Awards 1958 Won NYFCC Award Best Actor David Niven Writers Guild of America, USA 1959 Nominated WGA Award (Screen) Best Written American Drama Terence Rattigan and John Gay  AMG Info for Separate Tables (1958)  US (1958)- 98 min. - Feature, B&W Plot Synopsis Based on Terence Rattigan's play, Separate Tables is about a number of characters and their adventures at a British seaside hotel. Among the guests are an alleged war hero (David Niven), a timid spinster (Deborah Kerr) and her domineering mother (Gladys Cooper), and a divorced couple (Burt Lancaster, Rita Hayworth) trying to re-ignite their romance despite the presence of his mistress (Wendy Hiller). All of the characters' lives become intertwined in the course of the film as the story examines love affairs and secrets. Separate Tables is a fine, textured drama, filled with terrific performances and was nominated for several Academy Awards, including Best Picture, Best Actress (Deborah Kerr), Best Actor (David Niven), Best Supporting Actress (Wendy Hiller), Best Screenplay From Another Medium, Best Cinematography and Best Music. Niven and Hiller won Oscars for the film. Review Adapted by John Gay and Terence Rattigan from Rattigan's play and produced by star Burt Lancaster's independent company, Delbert Mann's Separate Tables (1958) showcased the acting talents of its British-American cast in a character study of isolated individuals making tentative connections in a seaside hotel. True to Lancaster and long time producing partner Harold Hecht's preference for off beat material, Separate Tables's then-frank exploration of repression and loneliness involves sexual frigidity, perversion, jealousy, domestic violence and divorce, with the confines of the hotel enhancing the characters' emotional claustrophobia. As an alcoholic writer and his aging beauty ex-wife, Lancaster and Rita Hayworth play against glamorous, potent type; David Niven and Deborah Kerr reveal the considerable turmoil beneath the prim surfaces of a blowhard retired military man and a mother-dominated spinster. More a mature succès d'estime than a popular hit, Separate Tables nevertheless received seven Oscar nominations including Best Picture, Screenplay and Actress for Kerr. Wendy Hiller won the Best Supporting Actress statuette for her resigned hotel manager and Niven added a Best Actor prize to his award from the New York Film Critics.  Amazon.com Review for Separate Tables (1958)  Terence Rattigan's pair of one-act plays are deftly woven together into this intelligent, handsome drama, a kind of somber Grand Hotel of lonely and repressed lives at a British seaside hotel in the dreary off-season. David Niven and Wendy Hiller earned well-deserved Oscars for their subdued turns, as a blustery old warhorse hiding a guilty secret and the efficient hotel proprietress, respectively. Burt Lancaster is the alcoholic American whose secret affair with Hiller is complicated when his former wife (Rita Hayworth) breezes in and reopens old emotional wounds, and Deborah Kerr is a mousy woman whose secret love for Niven is shattered by scandal. Director Daniel Mann (Marty) remains true to the good manners and quiet desperation that keeps these sad souls isolated at separate tables. He gracefully floats between the two dramas and patiently allows his repressed characters to open up and reveal their true feelings in their own quiet fashion.  CineBooks' Motion Picture Guide Review for Separate Tables (1958)  US (1958): Drama 99 min, No rating, Black & White CineBooks' Motion Picture Guide Review: 4.0 stars out of 5 Terence Rattigan's original play consisted of two one-acts set in the same Bournemouth, England locale. It was a tour de force for Eric Portman and Margaret Leighton, who played it successfully in London, then in New York during the fall of 1956. Rattigan collaborated with John Gay to blend the two stories into one that used four actors instead of two. Synopsis The single guests. The title refers to the practice of some hotels of seating solo guests at their own dining tables. The small hotel is at the seashore, and the dining room is filled with a host of lonely people. Maj. Pollack (David Niven) is the ultimate Englishman, peppering his dialogue with all the Major Blimp clichés like "actually," and "I say," and "Good show." He is a one-time military man who waxes on and on about his experiences in the war's North African campaign, but his stories have the ring of prevarication about them. Mrs. Railton-Bell (Gladys Cooper) is a stern and forceful matriarch with a shy daughter, Sibyl (Deborah Kerr), a mousey spinster fascinated by Maj. Pollack but far too shy to let him know. The third at the Mrs. Railton-Bell table is Mrs. Railton-Bell's friend, Lady Matheson (Cathleen Nesbitt), a peeress of the realm. Mr. Fowler (Felix Aylmer) is a former schoolteacher who talks about his glory days when he guided the lives of young people. Miss Meachum (May Hallatt) is a racing enthusiast, and Charles (Rod Taylor) and Jean (Audrey Dalton) are unmarried lovers. The hotel is run by Miss Pat Cooper (Wendy Hiller), a plain but pleasant woman who wants to make sure all her guests are happy, but she is not all that happy herself since her lover, John Malcolm (Burt Lancaster), has not popped the question yet. John is a reclusive American writer who drinks more than he creates and spends much of his time in his room. Complicated relationships. Sibyl and Maj. Pollack begin a halting relationship, but Mrs. Railton-Bell does her best to put an end to it before it can blossom. John's former wife, Ann Shankland (Rita Hayworth), arrives at the hotel. She is a blowsy, sad social type with a penchant for histrionics. Disgrace. Then the truth about Maj. Pollack comes out. He wasn't a major at all, just a noncombatant supply officer. Further, Maj. Pollack is arrested by the local cops for harassing women at the small movie house in Bournemouth's center, then released. Mrs. Railton-Bell suggests that Maj. Pollack leave this genteel hotel immediately, but Miss Pat Cooper springs to his defense, saying the decision is Maj. Pollack's. Former wife. Ann, a needy woman, fearful that she may never find another man, makes it clear that she would like to renew her life with John. But he is becoming more enamored of Miss Pat Cooper, who is as sweet as a dessert trifle. Facing disapprobation. Maj. Pollack decides that he is not going to leave the hotel but will tough it out in the face of the grim disapproval on the guests' faces. In the morning, Maj. Pollack enters the dining room, and the other guests are pleasant enough, offering their "good mornings" but little else. Mrs. Railton-Bell tries to get Sibyl away from Maj. Pollack, but when the quiet daughter asserts herself, ignores her mother, and begins a conversation with Maj. Pollack, Mrs. Railton-Bell realizes that she no longer can pull Sibyl's strings. Happy ending. The picture concludes with the hope that Maj. Pollack and Sibyl will eventually get together and that the same will happen for John and Miss Pat Cooper. Critique It's adult, intelligent, and every role is marvelously shaded. The idea of bringing various types to a hotel setting had been done before in GRAND HOTEL (1932) and other films but seldom as touchingly as in this film. To anyone who saw the play, the screen adaptation is a marvel of interweaving that appears to be one ensemble tale rather than two disparate stories. The addition of Vic Damone crooning the title song over the titles was not needed.  Leonard Maltin Review for Separate Tables (1958)  US (1958): Drama 99 min, No rating, Black & White Leonard Maltin Review: 4.0 stars out of 4 Terence Rattigan's pair of romantic playlets set at English seaside resort are reworked here into superb drama in the GRAND HOTEL vein; Lancaster and Hayworth are divorced couple trying to make another go of it, Hiller is his timid mistress, Niven a supposed war hero, Kerr a lonely spinster dominated by mother Cooper. Bouquets all around, especially to Oscar winners Niven and Hiller. Screenplay by Rattigan and John Gay.  Memorable Quotes from Separate Tables (1958)  Ann Shankland: I didn't mean any harm. John Malcolm: That's when you do the most damage. Ann Shankland: We all make mistakes. John Malcolm: You specialize in them. Ann Shankland: You're making it a bit too obvious, you know, that you hate the very sight of me. John Malcolm: The very sight of you is perhaps the one thing about you I don't hate. Mrs. Railton-Bell: Are you on the side of Mr. Malcolm and his defense advice or are you on the side of the Christian virtues -- like Mr. Fowler and myself? John Malcolm: Never in my life have I heard a question so disgracefully begged. You should be in politics, Mrs. Railton-Bell. Mr. Fowler: The trouble about being on the side of right, as one sees it, is that one often finds oneself in the company of such very questionable allies. John Malcolm: You know something, Ann? No one I know of lies with such sincerity. Miss Meacham: And what do I know of morals and ethics? Only what I read in novels. And as I only read thrillers, that doesn't amount to much.  Trivia for Separate Tables (1958)  Director Delbert Mann specifically shot May Hallatt's pool split in a long take with a moving camera--he wanted to show that a stand-in was not doing her trick shot for her. Unfortunately, the picture was taken from him, and re-edited with the middle of the shot removed, destroying that effect.  Goofs for Separate Tables (1958)  Crew or equipment visible: Camera reflected in window in the last dolly shot.  DVD Details  Separate Tables (1958) Product Details Format: Black & White, Closed-captioned, Dubbed, Letterboxed, Subtitled, Widescreen, NTSC Region: Region 1 Aspect Ratio: 1.66:1 Studio: MGM DVD Release Date: December 11, 2001 Run Time: 99 minutes DVD Features Available Audio Tracks: English (Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono), French (Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono), Spanish (Dolby Digital 2.0 Mono) Commentary by: director Delbert Mann CLICK HERE to purchase the DVD. Please sign the registry by clicking here. . --|-- INDEX --|-- BIOGRAPHY --|-- DOWNLOADS --|-- FILMOGRAPHY --|-- IMAGES --|-- LINKS --|-- This site is not officially endorsed or authorized by Deborah Kerr. Unauthorized use of this material is strictly prohibited. © 2006 by Meredy, all rights reserved.