Taste of Honey, A (1961, Rita Tushingham, Dora Bryan)

Jo, a teenage British working-class girl, learns that her alcoholic mother has married and suddenly finds herself without a home. She takes up employment at a shoe shop where she befriends a caring homosexual, Geoffrey. Together they find a place to live, but their lives are changed when Jo learns that she is pregnant from a brief liaison with a black sailor. The film earned British Academy Awards for Best Picture, Best Actress, Most Promising Actress and Best Screenplay, as well as awards for the two leads at the Cannes Film Festival. Adapted from a play by Shelagh Delaney.

Careful attention to the soundtrack of A Taste of Honey also reveals a quotation of John Dankworth’s theme from 1960’s film Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, which was co-produced by A Taste of Honey’s director Tony Richardson.

production details
UK | 100 minutes | 1961

Producer and Director: Tony Richardson
Director of Photography: Walter Lassally
Editor: Anthony Gibbs
Composer: John Addison
Script: Shelagh Delaney, Tony Richardson
Art Direction: Ralph W. Brinton

cast
Dora Bryan as Helen
Rita Tushingham as Jo
Murray Melvin as Geoffrey Ingham
Paul Danquah as Jimmy
Robert Stephens as Peter Smith
Michael Bilton as Landlord
Eunice Black as Schoolteacher
David Boliver as Bert
Margo Cunningham as Landlady