Whitstable: N.p., 1993

1 p. TLS on Peter Cushing's personalised stationery. Unfolded. Fine condition.

TLS FAN LETTER FROM PETER CUSHING TO LEO McKERN DATED 16 SEPTEMBER 1993, LESS THAN A YEAR BEFORE CUSHING'S DEATH.

A warm, effusive fan letter from cinema's greatest vampire-slayer, it reads:

'Dear Leo McKern,
It's that fan again! Some years ago I wrote to you about your superb 'Rumpole' series, and received a most charming letter of thanks.

My admiration for your work goes back to the play (and subsequent film) 'A Man For All Seasons', and you have never failed to captivate me. Having seen you recently in 'Travelling North', and again the other evening in 'A Foreign Field' I just had to write once more.There is a 'je-ne-sais-quoi' quality about your performances which touches the heartstrings, and if you don't receive some public recognition eventually, there's no justice in this world!

Thank you, dear fellow, for such pleasure. It makes me very proud to remember we worked together in 1956 in 'Time Without Pity', with Michael Redgrave and Ann Todd. (Long ago and far away!)

With kindest wishes, and may God's blessing be with you always.

As ever,
(sgd) Peter Cushing O.B.E. Whitstable, Kent'

(The 'public recognition' Cushing refers to is of course not audience approval, but the possible future conferring of honours on McKern: Cushing himself was awarded the Order of the British Empire in 1989).

A touching salute to a fellow actor from one of the most distinctive and distinguished figures of British cinema.