--- name: "Francis L. Sullivan" canonical: "https://film.one/person/francis-l-sullivan" fi1m_id: "francis-l-sullivan" imdb_id: "nm0838066" tmdb_id: 93900 wikidata_id: "Q969601" roles: ["Actor"] born: "6 January 1903" died: "19 November 1956" reviewed_on_fi1m: 2 average_fi1m_score: 79 average_as: "actor" average_over: 2 updated: "2026-09-19T23:44:06.745402+00:00" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Francis L. Sullivan ## Identity Francis L. Sullivan - **Canonical:** https://film.one/person/francis-l-sullivan - **Type:** Person - **Fi1m ID:** francis-l-sullivan - **IMDb ID:** nm0838066 - **TMDB ID:** 93900 - **Wikidata ID:** Q969601 - **Same entity:** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_L._Sullivan, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q969601, https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0838066/, https://www.themoviedb.org/person/93900 Actor. Born 6 January 1903 in Wandsworth, London, England, UK. Died 19 November 1956. ## Details - **Work:** Actor - **Born:** 6 January 1903, Wandsworth, London, England, UK - **Died:** 19 November 1956 - **Active:** 1938–1946 - **Also known as:** Френсис Л. Салливан, Фрэнсис Л. Салливан, Francis Loftus Sullivan - **Average Fi1m score:** 79, as actor, over 2 titles - **Fi1m score by decade:** 1930s 74 (1), 1940s 84 (1) - **Elsewhere:** https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Francis_L._Sullivan, https://www.wikidata.org/wiki/Q969601, https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0838066/, https://www.themoviedb.org/person/93900 ## Streaming the US now - **HBO Max:** [*Great Expectations*](https://film.one/film/great-expectations.md) (84) For United States; add `?region=XX` for another country. ## Fi1m on Francis L. Sullivan > Francis L. Sullivan was the heavy man in the good suit whom British films of the 1930s and 40s reached for whenever the law, the parish or the bank needed a face. He was most at home in Dickens, and he never asked to be liked. The voice arrives first, low and slightly peppered, and then the rest of him fills the doorway. Francis L. Sullivan was a big man with a famous double chin, and he did not try to hide either fact from the camera. He was cast as lawyers, officials and beadles because he looked like the sort of person who could refuse you something, and he played them without softening: as Mr Jaggers in *Great Expectations* (1946) he has, as we said in our review, the firmness to hold our attention without demanding our affection. That is a harder trick than it sounds. Most character actors want you on their side. Sullivan wanted you slightly afraid of him, and usually got it. He came up on the stage, at the Old Vic in *Richard III* when he was eighteen, and did not make a film until *The Missing Rembrandt* in 1932. Through the 1930s and 1940s he was a fixture of British pictures, and the studios kept finding Dickens for him: Jaggers twice, Mr Bumble in *Oliver Twist* (1948), Crisparkle. From the late 1940s he was in Hollywood as well, playing Pierre Cauchon in *Joan of Arc* (1948) and Philip Nosseross in the film noir *Night and the City* (1950), which we have not reviewed but which is where many people first notice him. He was better in company than alone, and best when the director around him was good. In *The Citadel* (1938) his Ben Chenkin is one of the reasons the Welsh valley feels lived in rather than built; he does not have much to do, and he does not do too much with it, which is exactly right for a film that wants its village to look ordinary. Under David Lean, who used him twice, he gets more room and uses it. We found, going back to *Great Expectations*, that Jaggers was the character we most wanted back in the frame, because whenever Sullivan is on screen the film stops being a costume piece and becomes a place where a boy might actually come to harm. The weight of him and the flatness of the voice do it; he says the terrible things about Pip's prospects as if reading out a bill. The reservation about him is a small one and it is really a reservation about the industry: he was almost never given a lead. Nobody built a film around that face, and it is not obvious what the film would have been. He knew the limits of the trade. "A good director can force almost anyone to act," he told an interviewer in 1950, which is a modest thing for a man who did not need forcing to say. Start with *Great Expectations*, where Lean puts him in the frightening half of the story and lets him stay there. Then *The Citadel*, for the pleasure of watching him do very little and do it precisely. ## Biography Francis L. Sullivan (6 January 1903 – 19 November 1956) was an English film and stage actor. He was born in Wandsworth, London, and attended Stonyhurst, a Jesuit public school in Lancashire. He made his stage debut at the Old Vic at the age of 18 in Shakespeare's *Richard III* and appeared in his first film, *The Missing Rembrandt*, in 1932. Sullivan is known for his roles in several adaptations of Charles Dickens, including Jaggers in both the 1934 and 1946 versions of *Great Expectations*, Mr Bumble in *Oliver Twist* (1948), and Crisparkle in *The Mystery of Edwin Drood* (1935). Other notable film roles include Philip Nosseross in *Night and the City* (1950) and Pothinus in *Caesar and Cleopatra* (1945). He also appeared in *Joan of Arc* (1948) and *The Citadel* (1938). In 1935 he married stage designer Frances Joan Perkins. Sullivan became a naturalised US citizen in 1954 and won a Tony Award in 1955 for his performance in Agatha Christie's *Witness for the Prosecution*. *Sources: en.wikipedia.org, imdb.com.* ## On Fi1m (2) - *Great Expectations* (1946), Fi1m 84, as Mr. Jaggers — [page](https://film.one/film/great-expectations.md) - *The Citadel* (1938), Fi1m 74, as Ben Chenkin — [page](https://film.one/film/the-citadel.md) ## Complete filmography (70) Every credit, newest first. Titles without a page can be requested for review on the HTML page. - *Hell's Island* (1955), as Barzland - *The Prodigal* (1955), as Bosra - *Drums of Tahiti* (1954), as Commissioner Pierre Duvois - *Plunder of the Sun* (1953), as Thomas Berrien - *Sangaree* (1953), as Dr. Bristol - *General Electric Theater* (1953), series, as Captain William Bligh - *Cavalcade of America* (1952), series, Actor - *Caribbean* (1952), as Andrew McAllister - *Pontius Pilate* (1952), as Herod Antipas - *My Favorite Spy* (1951), as Karl Brubaker - *Schlitz Playhouse of Stars* (1951), series, as Garman - *Behave Yourself!* (1951), as Fat Freddy - *Lux Video Theatre* (1950), series, as Detective Yates - *Sure As Fate* (1950), series, Actor - *Night and the City* (1950), as Philip Nosseross - *Robert Montgomery Presents* (1950), series, Actor - *The Red Danube* (1949), as Colonel Humphrey 'Blinker' Omicron - *Christopher Columbus* (1949), as Francisco de Bobadilla - *Suspense* (1949), series, Actor - *Joan of Arc* (1948), as Pierre Cauchon, Count-Bishop of Beauvais - *Studio One* (1948), series, as Herod Antipas, Long John Silver - *The Philco Television Playhouse* (1948), series, Actor - *The Winslow Boy* (1948), as Attorney General - *Oliver Twist* (1948), as Mr. Bumble - *Broken Journey* (1948), as Anton Perami - *Take My Life* (1947), as Prosecuting Counsel - *The Man Within* (1947), as Mr. Braddock - *Great Expectations* (1946), as Mr. Jaggers — Fi1m 84, [page](https://film.one/film/great-expectations.md) - *The Laughing Lady* (1946), as Sir Williams Tremayne - *Caesar and Cleopatra* (1945), as Pothinus - *Fiddlers Three* (1944), as Nero - *The Butler's Dilemma* (1943), as Leo Carrington - *The Lady from Lisbon* (1942), as Minghetti - *The Foreman Went to France* (1942), as French Skipper - *The Day Will Dawn* (1942), as Kommandant Ulrich Wettau - *"Pimpernel" Smith* (1941), as General von Graum - *21 Days* (1940), as Mander - *Young Man's Fancy* (1939), as Blackbeard, Vincent St George - *The Four Just Men* (1939), as Leon Poiccard - *The Ware Case* (1938), as Attorney General - *Climbing High* (1938), as Madman - *The Citadel* (1938), as Ben Chenkin — Fi1m 74, [page](https://film.one/film/the-citadel.md) - *The Drum* (1938), as Governor - *Kate Plus Ten* (1938), as Lord Flamborough - *Fine Feathers* (1937), as Hugo Steinway - *Dinner at the Ritz* (1937), as Brogard - *Non-Stop New York* (1937), as Hugo Brant - *Action for Slander* (1937), as Sir Quinton Jessops (as Francis Sullavan) - *Theatre Parade* (1936), series, as Hercule Poirot - *Spy of Napoleon* (1936), as Chief of Police - *A Woman Alone* (1936), as Prosecutor - *Her Last Affaire* (1935), as Sir Julian Weyre - *The Mystery of Edwin Drood* (1935), as Rev. Mr. Crisparkle - *Strange Wives* (1934), as Bellamy - *Cheating Cheaters* (1934), as Dr. George Brockton - *Great Expectations* (1934), as Jaggers - *What Happened Then?* (1934), as Richard Bentley, Prosecution Counsel - *The Warren Case* (1934), as Prosecuting Counsel (uncredited) - *Chu Chin Chow* (1934), as The Caliph - *The Return of Bulldog Drummond* (1934), as Carl Peterson - *The Fire Raisers* (1934), as Stedding - *Red Wagon* (1933), as Cranley - *The Wandering Jew* (1933), as Juan de Texada (Phase IV) - *Called Back* (1933), as Kaledin - *F.P.1* (1933), as A Sailor - *The Right to Live* (1933), as Roger Stoneham - *When London Sleeps* (1932), as Rodney Haines - *The Chinese Puzzle* (1932), as Herman Strumm - *The Missing Rembrandt* (1932), as Baron von Guntermann - *Destiny*, series, Actor ## Gallery - ![Francis L. Sullivan](https://film.one/media/person/59133/gallery-d674f9160f27.jpg) Francis L. Sullivan — film screenshot, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons (https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/37/Francis_L._Sullivan_in_Behave_Yourself%21.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail_unscaled) - ![Photo of Francis Sullivan and Richard Avonde from the Cavalcade of America presentation of "Margin for Victory". Though there are no copyright marks on the phot](https://film.one/media/person/59133/gallery-f18f64333d0f.jpg) Photo of Francis Sullivan and Richard Avonde from the Cavalcade of America presentation of "Margin for Victory". Though there are no copyright marks on the phot — Photo from BBDO (Batten, Barton, Durstine & Osborne)-ad agency for the program sponsor, DuPont., Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons (https://thumb.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/3c/Francis_Sullivan_Richard_Avonde_Cavalcade_of_America_1954.jpg/1280px-Francis_Sullivan_Richard_Avonde_Cavalcade_of_America_1954.jpg?utm_source=commons.wikimedia.org&utm_campaign=imageinfo&utm_content=thumbnail) ## Awards ### Other awards — 1 won - Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Play 1955: Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Play (won) *From Wikidata, which records wins more completely than nominations.* --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/person/francis-l-sullivan