JOSEPHINE AND MEN

Original British 11 inch x 8 1/2 inch Trade Advertisement from Kinematograph Weekly for the 1955 Roy Boulting Comedy JOSEPHINE AND MEN, based on a story by Nigel Balchin and starring Glynis Johns, Jack Buchanan, Donald Sinden, Peter Finch, Heather Thatcher, Ronald Squire, William Hartnell, Gerald Sim, Hugh Moxey, Sam Kydd, Wally Patch, Victor Maddern, Thorley Walters, Laurence Naismith, John Le Mesurier and Lisa Gastoni.

The trouble with Josephine is that her ever-loving and over-sympathetic nature leads her to switch from needful men to even more needful men…

The advert art is by Michael ffolkes (1925 – 1988). A British illustrator and cartoonist. Born as Brian Davis in London, he studied art at Saint Martin’s School of Art, and in 1942 sold his first drawing to Punch, signing it “brian”. He went on to study painting at the Chelsea School of Art and later adopted “Michael Ffolkes” as his artistic name, becoming a professional cartoonist in 1949. He typically signed his cartoons as “ffolkes” in an all-lowercase printed style.

In 1961 he began illustrating the film reviews in Punch, and once admitted that “my whole life has been influenced by the cinema”: “I still often draw classic film situations – the mad scientist, Pancho Villa, Beau Geste and the Hunchback of Notre Dame.” In 1965 he admitted that “some of my opinions are outrageously right-wing”, and was described as “a Boulting Brothers impersonation of a Conservative”. Not surprisingly then that he illustrated 5 of the posters for the Boulting Brothers’ classic 1950s satires “Private’s Progress, “Brothers in Law” “Lucky Jim”, I”m All Right Jack” and “Happy is the Bride”

An exhibition of his cinema caricatures was held at the National Film Theatre, London in 1982.

The Advertisement is in very good condition.