Anne Heywood

Acting

Anne Heywood

Born 1931-12-11 · Birmingham, England, UK

Anne Heywood (born Violet Joan Pretty) was a British actress, best known for her Golden Globe-nominated performance in The Fox (1967). She was born on December 11, 1931, in Handsworth, Birmingham, England, and passed away on October 27, 2023, in Houston, Texas, USA. Heywood started her career as a beauty queen, winning the Miss Great Britain title in 1950. She later trained at the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art and signed a contract with the Rank Organisation, which launched her film career. She starred in notable films such as Violent Playground (1958), Floods of Fear (1958), The Chairman (1969), and Good Luck, Miss Wyckoff (1979). Her role in The Fox was groundbreaking, as it depicted a lesbian relationship, which was rare for mainstream cinema at the time. She continued to take on bold and unconventional roles throughout her career. Heywood was married to Raymond Stross, a film producer, until his passing in 1988. She later married George Danzig Druke in 1991.

Acting credits

Good Luck, Miss Wyckoff poster
5.3

An abusive sexual relationship between a white spinster schoolteacher and a young black janitor in 1956 Kansas complicates her struggle to come to grips with her sexuality and emotions.

Good Luck, Miss Wyckoff

1979

Trader Horn poster
5.0

During the First World War a Hunter and trader in Africa joins forces with a couple looking for a source of platinum try to survive while fleeing British soldiers, dealing with German slavers and troops, natives and cannibals.

Trader Horn

1973

What Waits Below poster
4.4

The US military is running a test for a special type of radio transmitter, to be used to communicate with submarines, in a deep system of underground caves in Central America. When the signal from one of the transmitters suddenly disappears, a team of soldiers led by Major Elbert Stevens and cave specialists led by Rupert 'Wolf' Wolfsen including scientist Leslie Peterson are sent in to find out what happened. Exploring deep underground, they stumble upon a tribe of albino cave-dwellers who have apparently been isolated from the rest of the world for thousands of years. The cave-dwellers are hurt by radio frequencies and are able to see in infra-red frequencies, tracking the explorers by their body heat.

What Waits Below

1984

A Terrible Beauty poster
5.4

In 1941, the IRA plans a campaign to coincide with the planned German invasion of England. Dermott O'Neil finds it easy to get into the IRA, but can he get out?

A Terrible Beauty

1960

The Fox poster
6.3

Jill Banford and Ellen March have built a good life together on a hardscrabble Canadian farm. Then handsome Paul Grenfell enters their isolated world, and sets friend against friend. But is Paul the real trouble between Jill and Ellen? Or has his presence merely awakened the unspoken, unexplored sexual tension that always existed between the women?

The Fox

1967

The Nun and the Devil poster
5.4

It's 1577. The Mother Superior at the convent of Archangel is seriously ill. The determined and calculating Mother Giulia plots to become the next Mother Superior. She receives tough competition from tormented lesbian Sister Chiara and the lusty Sister Carmela.

The Nun and the Devil

1973

The Chairman poster
5.6

An American scientist is sent to Red China to steal the formula for a newly developed agricultural enzyme. What he is not told by his bosses is that a micro-sized bomb has been planted in his brain so that should the mission ever look likely to fail, he can be eliminated at the push of a button!

The Chairman

1969

Carthage in Flames poster
5.2

Historical drama depicting the last of the Punic Wars between the Roman Republic and Carthage.

Carthage in Flames

1960

Checkpoint poster
5.6

Stanley Baker's O'Donovan is sent to steal the plans of a rival company's racing car designs, to ensure his employers win the competition. However, when opening a safe containing the plans, he triggers an alarm leading to a gun battle where he kills a number of people. James Robertson Justice, alarmed by the scandal surrounding the killings, orders his agent be killed surreptitiously to hide his involvement with the plot. The film uses original footage from the Mille Miglia , an Italian open-road endurance race, featuring classic period racing cars.

Checkpoint

1956

Midas Run poster
4.7

A veteran secret service officer from Britain hijacks a government shipment of $15 million of gold out of an irritation for never being knighted.

Midas Run

1969

Ring of Darkness poster
4.8

Once a Satanist who surrendered her soul and body to the devil himself, Carlotta Rhodes begins to regret her tryst with Lucifer when her teenage daughter, Daria, starts showing the evil influence of dear old Dad. Convinced that she can stop the devil's power on earth, Carlotta calls upon an exorcist for help.

Ring of Darkness

1979

Upstairs and Downstairs poster
5.8

On marrying the boss's daughter, Richard takes his father-in-law's advice to hire a live-in domestic. He soon finds good help is hard to come by. Run-ins follow with dipsomaniacs, bank robbers, a Welsh lass who takes one look at London and runs, and an Italian charmer who turns the place into a bawdy house. Then when Ingrid arrives from Sweden things actually start to get complicated.

Upstairs and Downstairs

1959

The Lady of Monza poster
4.9

A true story taken from the archives of the archdiocese of Milan. Based on the life of Marianna De Leyva, better known as "The Nun of Monza," a 17th century nun accused of and tried by the church for breaking celibacy and plotting murder.

The Lady of Monza

1969

Lady Godiva Rides Again poster
5.9

Marjory Clark wins a competition in her Midland town and finds herself in a Festival of Britain procession as Lady Godiva - though not in the buff. This leads by way of a suspect beauty competition to the show-business world of London. But it could be a slippery slope for simple home-town Marge.

Lady Godiva Rides Again

1951

The Brain poster
5.8

After the mysterious crash of a millionaire's private plane, scientists secretly harvest the dying man's brain and keep it alive in a laboratory in order to communicate via telepathy.

The Brain

1962

Kolossal - The Magnificent Macisti poster
9.0

A documentary on the history of Italy's peplum genre.

Kolossal - The Magnificent Macisti

1977

Violent Playground poster
7.2

A Liverpool juvenile liaison officer struggles with a young and dangerous pyromaniac.

Violent Playground

1958

Doctor at Large poster
5.7

Losing out to Dr. Bingham (Michael Medwin) in a competition for house surgeon when he offends a member of the board, young Dr. Simon Sparrow (Dirk Bogarde) finds himself going from post to post, filling in for other physicians. At one distant country post, he is taken aback when he works with a patient whose husband died after Simon treated the man years before. In another hospital, Simon examines a surprisingly mature teen and also tries courting devoted nurse Nan McPherson (Shirley Eaton).

Doctor at Large

1957

Memories of Manon poster
8.0

Yvette Marcel asks her godfather Control and McCall for help dealing with her irrational father, who is intent on locating Manon, the mother she believed had been killed years before. Created by editing 2-parts of episodes of the TV series, The Equalizer.

Memories of Manon

1989

The Killer Is on the Phone poster
5.4

A woman whose husband was murdered five years previously, is stalked by his killer, who wants to eliminate her as a potential witness. What he doesn't know is that the shock of his murder caused her to have amnesia, and she doesn't remember anything.

The Killer Is on the Phone

1972

Love Under the Elms poster
5.5

An adolescent boy and girl meet at a rural, turn-of-the-century Austrian resort where they are vacationing with their respective liberal-minded, single parents. Their budding love affair hits a serious snag when their two parents fall in love as well.

Love Under the Elms

1975

The Very Edge poster
5.3

Tracey Lawrence is assautled in her home and is so affected by the traumatic event she now finds all men totally repulsive, including her husband. Her attitude does not change with time, and to make matters worse her husband has got romantically involved with his secretary. Also, the police still have not tracked down Tracey's attacker and there is no guarantee that she is safe.

The Very Edge

1963

90° in the Shade poster
5.7

In a Prague shop, an assistant has been carrying on an affair with the dishonest, married manager. An emotionally repressed auditor with domestic problems of his own uncovers serious stock discrepancies. A test of loyalties and a questioning of values concludes in tragedy.

90° in the Shade

1965

Dangerous Exile poster
6.3

Dangerous Exile is a 1957 British historical drama film directed by Brian Desmond Hurst and starring Louis Jourdan, Belinda Lee, Anne Heywood and Richard O'Sullivan. It concerns the fate of Louis XVII, who died in 1795 as a boy, yet was popularly believed to have escaped from his French revolutionary captors.

Dangerous Exile

1957