RAKE’S PROGRESS

Original late 1940s Re-Release British 30 inch x 40 inch Quad Poster for the 1945 Sidney Gilliat Drama THE RAKE’S PROGRESS, written by Val Valentine and starring Rex Harrison, Lilli Palmer, Margaret Johnston, Godfrey Tearle, Guy Middleton, Jean Kent, Griffith Jones, Garry Marsh, Marie Lohr, David Horne, Alan Wheatley, Brefni O’Rorke, John Salew, Charles Victor, Joan Hickson, Olga Lindo, Howard Marion-Crawford, Emrys Jones and Kynaston Reeves.

The film’s plot follows the career of upper-class cad Vivian Kenway (Rex Harrison). He is sent down from Oxford University for placing a chamber pot on the Martyrs’ Memorial. Sent to South America, he rebels against plantation life, eventually becoming a car racing driver. He descends to a life of woman-chasing and drunkenness, which causes the death of his father, Colonel Kenway (Godfrey Tearle). The plot diverges from the theme of the Rake’s Progress paintings by having him redeem himself by a hero’s death in World War II.

Poster printed by W.E. Berry, Ltd., Bradford

The poster is in good to very good folded condition with a few pieces out of the left border and bottom corner which have been replaced with white paper taped from the reverse. There are other pieces of tape around the edges supporting short tears. There is also slight creasing.