Cavalcade

It's a cavalcade of death among Deb's favored actors of classic films: Ruth Hussey and Sir John Mills both died last week. Hussey was a talented MGM contract player who is best-remembered for playing Liz Imbrie (Jimmy Stewart's photographer pal) in The Philadelphia Story, for which she was nominated as Best Supporting Actress by the Academy. Hussey generally played supporting roles in good films and ingenue and lead roles in minor films.
John Mills' career retrospective reads almost like a Who's Who and What's What of 20th century film and theatre (despite the fact that modern audiences would be far more likely to know of his spunky and undeniably talented daughter Hayley, of Pollyanna and Parent Trap fame). He debuted in a light British film (which I recall as a Jessie Matthews musical) The Midshipmaid, worked in the Brit film and theatre industry through the 1930s, and emerged to good notice for supporting Robert Donat in Goodbye, Mr. Chips. While Mr. Chips brought him international notice, he continued to work in the UK through the 1940s, notably with Noel Coward and David Lean. His role as Pip in 1948's Great Expectations assured his dubious immortality, due to the fact that it would be required viewing for several generations of high school students who were forced to watch it as part of studying Dickens in literature class (as a filming of Dickens' classic novel, it has really never been bettered, as evidenced by the simply dreadful modernized version from the 1990s). He received an Oscar for Best Supporting Actor in 1970.

Ah, yes, good movies.