DOCTOR IN DISTRESS

Original British 27 inch x 40 inch 1-Sheet Poster for the 1963 Ralph Thomas Comedy DOCTOR IN DISTRESS, based on the characters created by Richard Gordon and starring Dirk Bogarde, James Robertson Justice, Samantha Eggar, Barbara Murray, Mylène Demongeot, Donald Houston, Leo McKern, Dennis Price, Fenella Fielding, Jill Adams, Frank Finlay, Amanda Barrie, Reginald Beckwith, Bill Kerr, Peter Butterworth, Derek Fowlds and Ronnie Barker.

The fifth in the successful run of Doctor films reunites Bogarde and Robertson Justice, as Simon Sparrow returns to work for Sir Lancelot only to find his mentor shot by cupid’s arrow.

Poster art by Renato Fratini (1932 – 1973). An Italian commercial artist who specialised in cinema posters. In Italy he worked in Augusto Favalli’s studio, a major producer of Italian posters. He then moved to London at the behest of Eric Pulford, who ran the Downton agency, which had accounts with Rank and several other film companies. There Fratini enjoyed a successful career throughout the 1960s.

Poster design by Eric Pulford (1915 – 2005). Having taken life classes at Leeds College of Art for 5 years Pulford was apprenticed as a commercial artist in 1931 to Gilchrist Bros a process house of 24 staff. Leslie Whitchurch, a partner in a Leicester based agency and also a part-time publicity manager for Rank, became aware of Pulford’s work and asked him to do some freelance work for him. Then in 1943 Rank invited Pulford to start a publicity department for them in London resulting in posters for “Henry V”, “Odd Man Out” and “Oliver Twist”. When the head of Downtons advertising agency, Charles Collins, died, Pulford was asked to take over. He became chairman and managing director but still spent most of his time designing posters. He retired in 1986. Pulford is responsible, either through his own artwork or design, for several hundred posters, some for classic films such as the ones already mentioned plus “Edge of the World”, “The Importance of Being Earnest”, “Genevieve”, “Reach for the Sky” and “A Night to Remember”. He is, without doubt, the most important force in British film poster design from the mid-1940s to the early 1980s.

The poster is in good to very good condition with extra folds close to the originals and a short tear at the right end of one fold line. There is slight ink bleed through from the title being written in ink on the reverse visible towards the bottom of the poster.