 An amiable light comedy actor with lugubrious features, popular on stage and in British films from 1948 to 1960, often as endearing upper-class fools, often flustered and bewildered, sometimes providing a light touch in serious films such as The Wooden Horse (d. Jack Lee, 1950). After Tonbridge School and (briefly) the Grenadier Guards, he made his West End debut in 1938, and was spotted by Anthony Asquith while touring in Quiet Wedding and cast in the 1941 film. After RAF service in WW2, he continued in supporting roles, becoming busy in the late '40s, when he featured more prominently in such Gainsborough films as Broken Journey (d. Ken Annakin, 1948), My Brother's Keeper (d. Alfred Roome, 1948), and the popular mermaid comedy Miranda (d. Annakin, 1948). In another popular success, The Chiltern Hundreds (d. John Paddy Carstairs, 1949), he starred as a twittish Viscount who unsuccessfully stands for both Tory and Labour as an election candidate. In the '50s, he starred on the West End stage in The Little Hut for three years. His reputation for playing genial upper-class twits continued with the infantile Humpy in All for Mary (d. Wendy Toye, 1955), 'J' in Three Men in a Boat (d. Annakin, 1956), and Lt. Fairweather in Up the Creek and Further Up the Creek (both d. Val Guest, 1958). A sighting of Tomlinson on stage by Walt Disney led to his best remembered role, the prosperous Edwardian father in Mary Poppins (US, d. Robert Stevenson, 1964), resulting in other US and British children's films, such as Bedknobs and Broomsticks (US, d. Stevenson, 1971) and Wombling Free (d. Lionel Jeffries, 1977). Bibliography
Autobiography: Luckier Than Most, 1990 Roger Philip Mellor, Encyclopedia of British Film
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FILM & TV CREDITS
