Buchanan was the major British musical stage and screen star
of his day. He appeared in a series of musical comedies many
of which were later made into films. He first went into management
in 1922 producing and starring in Battling Butler.
In the mid-1920s, he also starred in New York productions of
Charlot revues.
In 1926 Buchanan teamed up with Elsie Randolph in Sunny.
She was a comedienne and their stage partnership was rooted
in romantic comedy, but to their public they were a romantic
couple (both on and off stage). For the next ten years they
starred together in a string of successes, including That’s
a Good Girl (in which Elsie played a female detective),
Stand Up and Sing and Mr Whittington (an updated
version of the Dick Whittington legend). In 1933 Buchanan built
the Leicester Square theatre where the Odeon cinema now stands.
Buchanan remained popular on stage and film throughout the
1940s and early 1950s. In 1951 he had the unenviable task of
taking over the lead in King’s Rhapsody after
Ivor Novello died and in 1953 he made his best film, The
Band Wagon, with Fred Astaire.
Introduction
