Leonora Corbett

Leonora Corbett (28 June 1908 – 29 July 1960) was an English actress born in London, the daughter of Richard Ashwin Corbett. She was educated at Oxford High School, after which she spent two years studying dress designing before choosing to pursue a career on the stage.

Corbett made her acting debut in 1927 in a small part at the Everyman Theatre in Hampstead, subsequently spending a season with the Festival Theatre Company at Cambridge. Between 1930 and 1931 she was a member of the Everyman's repertory company, where she took on approximately a dozen roles drawn from classical works as well as contemporary plays by writers including A. A. Milne and Noël Coward. Her West End debut followed in November 1931 in Lady in Waiting, written by Harry Graham and Jacques Natanson, a performance that drew praise from The Times for its gaiety and charm. In August 1932 she appeared at the Malvern Festival under the directorship of Sir Barry Jackson, performing alongside Cedric Hardwicke and Ralph Richardson in Shaw's Too True to Be Good, a production that subsequently transferred to the West End.

Film producer Michael Balcon recruited Corbett to Gaumont-British in 1932, and she made her screen debut that same year in Love on Wheels. Her film work continued through the 1930s, though The Times noted at the time of her debut that her stage charm had not yet fully translated to the screen.

Corbett's Broadway career spanned 1941 to 1946. She made her Broadway debut on 5 November 1941, originating the role of the ghost Elvira in the first American production of Noël Coward's comedy Blithe Spirit, a run that extended to 657 performances. A later Broadway appearance placed her in the role of Sybil Bennett in Park Avenue, a play by George S. Kaufman, Nunnally Johnson, Arthur Schwartz, and Ira Gershwin, which opened in 1947.

Corbett had previously been in a relationship with Member of Parliament Robert Bernays and later married John Francis Royal, formerly vice-president of the American National Broadcasting Company. She died on 29 July 1960 in Vleuten in the Netherlands at the age of 52.