In early 1960, I was a young actor, endeavouring to make a name for myself in weekly repertory and, during that time, I was invited by mutual friends to one of Marc Anthony’s Sunday tea parties. Over the next few years, before I opted to depart permanently for the Far  East, I spent many Sundays at Marc’s flat and was totally amazed at both the number and eminence of his guests, with some of whom I made lasting friendships. Needless to say, almost all were from the worlds of music, theatre and dance but there were also many who were just lovely people who had something to offer in the way of enlightened reminiscences and cultural conversations.

One of my closest friends and a long-­time friend of Marc’s was a ship’s surgeon, Dr John Latham, who worked for many years on the Union Castle cruise liners that plied between Southampton and South Africa.  On Marc’s death, John was bequeathed all Marc’s scrapbooks, which consisted of a miscellaneous collection of picture postcards, letters and newspaper clippings. John subsequently died and passed this collection on to me.

I’m ashamed to say that, for many years, it simply sat in boxes as I travelled around the world and I never seemed to find either the time or the inclination to sit down and study what it contained. My family and I moved to our current home on the beautiful Mornington Peninsula in Victoria, Australia, in 2014 and it became necessary to start a de-­cluttering process as we had, in terms of the vernacular, downsized.

It was only then that I fully realised the personal and historical treasure that was stored in these boxes.  There were signed photos of some of the great actors, actresses and dancers of their times, clearly on very friendly terms with Marc.  There was a treasury of newspaper clippings of his professional career, which he had meticulously (if rather haphazardly) stuck into albums. And there were scrapbooks of newspaper cuttings, year by year, from the early 1920s until 1970.

My first instinct was to go onto the Internet and delve further to try to get more information about this man whom I had known for barely a decade but had totally underestimated in terms of his impact on and association with the entertainment industry for so many years. But there was nothing. Not a trace of his extraordinary life.

This, therefore, is my very feeble attempt (using all his materials I have to hand and with whatever further information I have been able to unearth through further research) to try to set the record straight and at least shine a small light on the life of this very special man of music.