MONEY GONE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 5 July 1938, Page 9

MONEY GONE

“CHARLEY'S AUNT” FORTUNE VANISHES.

DISCLOSURES AT MEETING OF CREDITORS.

Thirty-nine-year-old Jevan BrandonThomas, son of the man who wrote “Charley’s Aunt” and left him a fortune, faced his company’s creditors recently, ruined. He sat at a green baize table in the Incorporated Accountants’ Hall, Victoria Embankment, London. W.C.. his head bowed despondently, listening to an auditor’s explanation of how his company’s London ventures had lost money at the rate of £6OO a week. In April, 1935, Jevan BrandonThomas, idol of Scottish repertory theatregoers, became a director of Brandon-Thomas Productions Limited. Their companies in the north, played to packed houses. Leases of the King’s Theatre, Hammersmith, and Wimbledon Theatre were taken. A new play, “Gaily We Set Out!” was produced at Hammersmith in January. Now the players are disbanded. Brandon-Thomas Productions, Limited, has gone into voluntary liquidation.

The liquidator, Mr F. R. Hopkins, said at the meeting that liabilities to unsecured creditors amounted to £3870. This included £Bl9 due to 14 actors entitled to a month’s notice. “In addition,” he added, “there are loan creditors for £4OO. J. BrandonThomas, who obtained personal loans from friends, is one of the creditors for £lBOO, and Miss S. Brandon-Tho-mas, his sister, for £lOOO, but they have both agreed to waive their claims.”

Assets of the company were stated to be £897.

Then Jevan Brandon-Thomas jumped to his feet, eager to make explanations. • “I have been ruined through this unfortunate venture. “But I am not trying to get out of my commitments because I am behind a limited company.. At the moment I am out of work, and I am going back to writing. “I wrote and produced ‘Passing Brompton Road’ for Marie Terfipest. “If and when I get on my feet again I shall take the barest amount for living expenses, and the rest I undertake now to pay over until there is not a farthing owing.”