Biography
Griffith Jones (born Harold Jones; 19 November 1909 – 30 January 2007) was an Anglo-Welsh film, stage and television actor.
== Early life ==
Born in Notting Hill, London, on 19 November 1909, Jones was the 5th child of Welsh-speaking dairy owner and former lead miner William Thomas Jones and Harriet Eleanor J. Doughty (1878–1973). In 1930, he was studying law at University College London when Kenneth Barnes, the Principal of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, noticed him in a student performance and offered him a career as an actor. His first professional engagement was in Carpet Slippers at the Embassy Theatre, Swiss Cottage, in 1930, while still at RADA. He won the annual RADA Gold Medal in 1932.
== Career ==
His first West End production was Vile Bodies at the Vaudeville and Richard of Bordeaux (in which he appeared with John Gielgud) at the New Theatre. The following year he appeared with Laurence Olivier in The Rats of Norway. In 1932, he made his film debut, in The Faithful Heart, and he continued to appear in British films throughout the 1930s. He achieved success on the London stage and on Broadway as "Caryl Sanger" in the play, Escape Me Never, with Elisabeth Bergner, and also starred with her in the 1935 film version.
In 1940, he joined the British Army, but spent most of the Second World War in a touring concert party, returning to the West End in 1945 to star in Lady Windermere's Fan. He then became a fairly big star of the British cinema in the late 1940s, showing a particular talent for comedies.
