Molly Adair

(b. Twickenham, London, 24/03/1905 – d. Watford, England, 09/09/1990). British actress. Marguerite Mary Potter (Molly Adair) must have been just 17 when she came to South Africa to play the part of the grown-up Emmeline in the African Film Productions version of H. De Vere Stacpoole’s The blue lagoon (1923), directed by Dick Cruikshanks and William Bowden and co-starring Arthur Pusey. However, by that time she had already acted in at least six films, including the title role in Stella (1921) an adaptation of H. Rider Haggard’s novel Stella Fregelius. After The blue lagoon she stayed on to film another novel by Stacpoole, namely The Reef of Stars (1924), directed by Joseph Albrecht, in which she played the parts of both Chaya and Chaya’s daughter, Princess Moya. While on location near Porto Amélia (present day Pemba in Mozambique) she met New Zealand-born Arthur Siggins, who had served in the South African War and had been a member of the British South Africa Police (BSAP) in Rhodesia. They subsequently married and their daughter was to become the British actress Jill Adams. Siggins later wrote Shooting with rifle and camera (1931), an account of his involvement with the 1929 film version of The four feathers. (FO)

Sources

S.A. Pictorial, 9 February 1924

Cambridge University Library: Royal Commonwealth Society Library, Papers of A.J. Siggins, RCMS 19

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0010461/?ref_=fn_nm_nm_1

Private correspondence

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