Cultural depictions of Winston Churchill

Winston Churchill in his air commodore's uniform

Named the Greatest Briton of all time in a 2002 poll, and widely regarded as being among the most influential people in British history, Winston Churchill has been regularly portrayed in film, television, radio and other media. The depictions range from minor character to the biographical centerpiece, exceeding 30 films, more than two dozen television shows, several stage productions, and countless books.

Film

Year Country Title Actor Notes
1935 Royal Cavalcade C.M. Hallard
1941 Ohm Kruger Otto Wernicke
1943 Mission to Moscow Dudley Field Malone
1949 Stalingradskaya bitva I Viktor Stanitsyn
1950 The Lights of Baku
The Fall of Berlin
1951 An American in Paris Dudley Field Malone
1952 Nezabyvaemyy god 1919 (Unforgettable 1919) Viktor Stanitsyn
1956 The Man Who Never Was Peter Sellers Voice only
1960 The Siege of Sidney Street Jimmy Sangster
1965 Operation Crossbow Patrick Wymark
1970 Liberation Yuri Durov
1972 Young Winston Simon Ward
1973 The Battle of Sutjeska Orson Welles
Days of Betrayal Jan Vitek
1976 The Eagle Has Landed Leigh Dilley Plays a stand-in for the real Churchill
1978 Picassos äventyr Sune Mangs
1979 Sekret Enigmy Józef Zacharewicz
1983 Le bourreau des cœurs René Douglas
1984 Katastrofa w Gibraltarze Wlodzimierz Wiszniewski
1987 Jane and the Lost City Richard Huggett
1989 Casablanca Express John Evans
1990 Stalingrad Ronald Lacey
1994 Caro dolce amore John Evans
2000 Shaheed Uddham Singh: Alais Ram Mohammad Singh Azad Joe Lamb
2002 Two Men Went to War David Ryall
2004 Churchill: The Hollywood Years Christian Slater
2005 Allegiance Mel Smith
2009 Inglourious Basterds Rod Taylor
2010 The King's Speech Timothy Spall
Paradox Alan C. Peterson
2012 FDR: American Badass! Paul Willson
The ABCs of Death Torgny Gerhard Aanderaa "H is for Hydro-Electric Diffusion"
Bad Ass Tyler Tuione
2015 Queen of the Desert Christopher Fulford
2016 Churchill's Secret Michael Gambon
2017 Churchill Brian Cox
Darkest Hour Gary Oldman Won Academy Award for Best Actor
Viceroy's House Gerry George
2018 Suffragette Ray Burnet
The Battle for Britain's Heroes Gerry George
2019 The Professor and the Madman Brendan Patricks
Operation Cicero Gerry George
2020 The Good Traitor Nicholas Blane
2021 Sardar Udham Tom Hudson
Audience u královny Vladislav Benes
Operation Mincemeat Simon Russell Beale

Television

Year Country Title Actor Notes
1960–1963 The Valiant Years Richard Burton Documentary
1974 Jennie: Lady Randolph Churchill Warren Clarke Episode "Lady Randolph"
The Gathering Storm Richard Burton
1975 Days of Hope Leo Britt this is a relatively negative portrayal of Churchill that highlights his attitude towards the coal miners during the strikes of 1921 and 1926
Edward the Seventh Christopher Strauli
1977 Eleanor and Franklin: The White House Years Arthur Gould-Porter
1978 Edward & Mrs. Simpson Wensley Pithey
1979 Churchill and the Generals Timothy West
1981 The Life and Times of David Lloyd George William Hootkins
1983 Winston Churchill: The Wilderness Years Robert Hardy
The Winds of War Howard Lang
1983 Number 10 Terence Harvey
1984 The Last Bastion Timothy West
1986 Lord Mountbatten: The Last Viceroy Malcolm Terris
1988 The Woman He Loved Robert Hardy
War and Remembrance
1989 Bomber Harris
1991 'Allo 'Allo! John James Evanson Episode "Up the Crick Without a Piddle"
The Treaty Julian Fellowes
1992 A Dangerous Man: Lawrence After Arabia Michael Cochrane
The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles Julian Fellowes
1994 World War II: When Lions Roared Bob Hoskins
1995 Hiroshima Timothy West
Annie: A Royal Adventure! David King
1998 Mosley Hugh Simon
2002 Bertie and Elizabeth David Ryall
The Gathering Storm Albert Finney Won Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Miniseries or a Movie
2004 Dunkirk Simon Russell Beale
Ike: Countdown to D-Day Ian Mune
2005 Wallis and Edward David Calder
2006 Agatha Christie's MarpleThe Sittaford Mystery Robert Hardy
2006 Above and Beyond Joss Ackland
2008 Family Guy Seth MacFarlane Episode "Road to Germany"
2009 Into the Storm Brendan Gleeson Won Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Miniseries or a Movie
2009–present Horrible Histories Jim Howick, Jalaal Hartley
2010–2011 Doctor Who Ian McNeice Episodes "The Beast Below", "Victory of the Daleks", "The Pandorica Opens", "The Wedding of River Song"
2012 Titanic Colm Gormley
Titanic: Blood and Steel Robert Whitelock
2013 Murdoch Mysteries Thomas Howes Episode "Winston's Lost Night"
2013-2014 Peaky Blinders Andy Nyman, Richard McCabe, Neil Maskell
2014 37 Days Nicholas Asbury
The World Wars Ian Beyts, Tom Vickers
2015 Up the Women Harry Peacock Episode "Train"
2016 The Crown John Lithgow Won Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series
Super Science Friends Adam Shaheen
Drunk History Louie Anderson Episode "The Roosevelts"

Theatre

Music

Radio

  • Peter Sellers included Churchill as his standard PM for The Goon Show. Churchill is depicted as he was during World War II. In The Goon Show, he is of course treated humorously, having a very African foreign secretary called Basil (played by Ray Ellington in Red Bladder mode). In addition he is responsible for supporting Neddie Seagoon's harebrained plans for long-range, jet-propelled guided NAAFI's, atomic dustbins, and throwing batter puddings at Clement Attlee.
  • Churchill's Other Lives, documentary series, played by Roger Allam (2011)

Literature

There are various alternative history works depicting a Nazi German victory or an otherwise widely different course of WWII posit various ultimate fates for Churchill:

  • In Len Deighton's 1978 SS-GB, Churchill refuses to escape Britain even when Nazi victory is certain. He is captured by the Nazis and executed, at his last moment defiantly making the V for Victory sign. In Len Deighton's 1981 XPD A group of former SS officers attempt to seize power in West Germany, in which they intend to publish some wartime documents about a secret meeting between Churchill and Hitler in June 1940.
  • In James P. Hogan's 1985 The Proteus Operation, Lord Halifax cravenly surrenders to the Nazis without fighting. Churchill, holding no official position of any kind, organizes some of his neighbors for a foredoomed defiance, confronting the German soldiers who arrive in their countryside with an assortment of shotguns and all of them getting killed. Time travelers from a bleak world of the 1970s return to 1939, contact Churchill and Roosevelt and provide information enabling them to do better and defeat the Nazis, creating the history we know.
  • In Leo Rutman's 1990 Clash of Eagles, Churchill escapes via the Bahamas. When the Nazis follow up their conquest of Britain with an invasion of the US, occupying New York City and much of the East Coast, the exile Churchill urges the Americans to go on resisting.
  • A similar role is given to Churchill also in the Nazi-dominated 1960s of Robert Harris' 1992 Fatherland. Churchill and most of the British Royal Family escape to Canada where he leads a Government in exile.
  • In Harry Turtledove's Worldwar series (1994–2004), in 1942 Extraterrestrials invaded Earth, forcing humans to stop fighting each other and unite to face the common threat. Churchill managers to beat off a large scale Extraterrestrial invasion of Britain, but must concede the reptile invaders – who prefer warm climates – in permanent occupation of most of the British Empire.
  • Harry Turtledove's Southern Victory series (1997–2007) is based on an earlier diversion from the history we know – the Confederacy winning the American Civil War and from 1862 becoming a fully recognized sovereign nation. In this history, the Entente is defeated by the Central Powers in the First Great War of 1914–1917. In 1935, the Conservatives led by Churchill go into coalition with the Silvershirts and by 1941, they declare war on a Germany still ruled by a Kaizer. Under these circumstances, Churchill ends up in an uneasy alliance with a Hitler-analogue – Jake Featherston, demagogue dictator of the Confederacy, who is involved in a wholesale genocide of Blacks.
  • In Harry Turtledove's 2003 In the Presence of Mine Enemies, Churchill and the remnants of the British Army resist to the bitter end, ultimately falling to defeat, though the exact circumstances of Churchill's death are undescribed.
  • In Harry Turtledove's The War That Came Early series (2009–2014), elements in Neville Chamberlain's government are receptive to Rudolf Hess's proposal that Britain stop fighting the Nazis and rather join them in a war against the Soviet Union. When Churchill, the war minister, objects, he is killed in a suspicious car accident.
  • In Newt Gingrich and William R. Forstchen's 1995 1945, Germany did not declare war on the US in 1941. In 1945 two separate wars end, the US victorious against Japan but the Nazis victorious in Europe. Britain remains unoccupied but its situation is precarious. In 1946 Churchill faces a land invasion of Britain, headed by Erwin Rommel, and bombings much more severe than the 1940 London Blitz, and is desperately begging for American help
  • Winston's War (2002) – Michael Dobbs
  • Never Surrender (2003) – Michael Dobbs
  • Churchill's Hour (2004) – Michael Dobbs
  • Churchill's Triumph (2005) – Michael Dobbs
  • In Jo Walton's Farthing (2006) Rudolf Hess's flight to Scotland in May 1941 manages to successfully negotiate peace terms with the United Kingdom, mainly because the United States never gets involved with the conflict, this is because Imperial Japan never attacks Pearl Harbor, resulting in Churchill being removed from office and the British Empire pulling out of the war.
  • In C. J. Sansom's 2012 Dominion, in the 1950s in which the Nazis occupy Great Britain through a puppet government, an ageing Churchill is leader-in-exile of the British resistance movement.
  • In Philip K. Dick's The Man in the High Castle (1962) Where the Axis Powers won World War II. The story occurs in 1962, fifteen years after the end of the war in 1947, and depicts the political intrigues between Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany as they rule the partitioned United States. The Grasshopper Lies Heavy, by Hawthorne Abendsen, the story within the story, United Kingdom contributes more to the Allied war effort, leading to joint British and Russian forces capturing Berlin, the British Empire becomes militaristic, anti-American post war, and begins a cold war against the United States that the empire eventually wins, Churchill remains Prime Minister until his death.
  • In Guy Saville's The Afrika Reich (2011) the United Kingdom is defeated by Nazi Germany during the Dunkirk Campaign, Churchill resigned, Lord Halifax becomes Prime Minister and signs a non-aggression pact with Germany ending the war.
  • In Guy Walters' The Leader (2003), King Edward VIII never abdicates, marries Wallis Simpson, leading to Oswald Mosley winning the 1935 election, allying the United Kingdom with the Axis Powers. Churchill and other anti-Nazi politicians are imprisoned on the Isle of Man.
  • In Murray Davies Collaborator(2004) Nazis conquer the United Kingdom and the Irish Free State, Churchill along with the British Royal Family flee to Canada where he leads a government in exile.
  • In Philip Kerr's Hitler's Peace (2005) Adolf Hitler, realising he is going to lose the war, tries to negotiate peace with Franklin D. Roosevelt, Joseph Stalin, Churchill refuses to listen and will only except unconditional surrender.
  • In Kim Newman's The Bloody Red Baron (1995) Count Dracula is Supreme Commander of the Central Powers armies during World War I, Churchill who is a vampire in the world, is a member of Lord Ruthven's cabinet.

Miscellaneous


This page was last updated at 2024-01-16 16:22 UTC. Update now. View original page.

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