by Stephen Vagg
Whenever you write an in-depth article on someone, it’s sometimes best not to consider the fact that they, or one of their loved ones, might actually read it – that can cloud the mind, cause one to pull punches, and write a dishonest piece. So, it’s always (irrationally) a jolt to be contacted by a family member, which is what happened when Paul Silver, grandson of film mogul Nat Cohen, emailed me about my piece(s) on his late grandfather. Paul was bemused that someone had gone to such effort and wanted to know about the background to the articles; in turn, I wished to discover more about Nat Cohen, and Paul graciously agreed to a short interview over zoom from his home in London.
We started off talking about Nat Cohen’s background.
“His father was an immigrant from Poland, a peasant who came over here to England and saved up some money, then sent for his wife – who was pregnant with my grandfather – and daughter. My grandfather was born here in London in 1905, and his sister was born in Poland.
“His father was a kosher butcher in the East End but obviously a smart guy. He invested in property. The hot thing at the time were cinemas and he invested in a few of them. He died in 1930, when he was only 50. His gravestone, which I found recently, was one of the most elaborate gravestones I’ve ever seen. I’ve got a copy of his will. It leaves substantial sums to hospitals and other organisations. He was a warden of the Jubilee Street Synagogue. My grandfather inherited cinemas from his father. He was far more interested in that than being a butcher (laughs). Then from cinemas he went into production.”
Nat Cohen was married in 1932 and had two daughters, Jackie (born 1934, died 1965) and Angela (born 1936, died 2024). Paul is Angela’s son.
“My mother and aunt went to the USA during World War Two with their mother. They were sponsored by [Hollywood producer] Sam Goldwyn. I don’t know how my grandfather knew Goldwyn. My grandfather was always trying to do stuff in the States, and they obviously had some kind of relationship. They went over there in 1940 when my mother was four and came back when she was seven.
“My grandfather lost his wife to cancer when she was 37 [in 1948] – my mother was 11 and her sister was 13. He never remarried but had a series of girlfriends. When he died, my mother comforted one of his girlfriends at his funeral. I’ve got a letter that girlfriend wrote to my mother about what a good guy he was – it was so sweet, she really loved him.”
Cohen lost his eldest daughter, Jackie, to cancer in 1965.
“My mother talked a lot about Jackie. She and my mother were very close. She was older than my mother. She was a wild one. Very beautiful and lots of fun. My mother was very sensible.”
According to Paul, Cohen was particularly close to Angela, Paul’s mother.
“He was Chief Barker of the Variety Club in 1956, which was a huge thing then. He hosted lunches and dinners – my mother was his companion at those events until she married my dad in 1958. They were incredibly close. My father was in the rag trade. Nat Cohen loved my dad – he was a real family guy. He adored his grandchildren.”
Paul was quick to deny the allegation from Carry On producer Peter Rogers that Cohen dropped the Carry On films in the 1960s because of his daughter’s objections, assuring us with a smile that his mother “was not prudish in any way.”
Angela gave birth to two sons, Anthony in 1960 and Paul in 1962. Jackie had a daughter, Caroline, born in 1956. Paul’s godfather was Stuart Levy, who teamed with Cohen for many years through the highly successful Anglo-Amalgamated Pictures. Paul says he did not have much to do with the Levy family – Levy died in 1966, a widower whose only child, a daughter, predeceased him in an accident in 1962. However, Paul does recall “The Beatles story” involving Levy, a rare example of Nat Cohen’s shrewd judgement failing him.
“Stuart Levy was from Liverpool – he knew Brian Epstein’s parents, they were both part of the Jewish community there, they had a store. When Epstein came to London, his parents said to him ‘contact Stuart Levy, set up meeting, maybe he’ll do a movie with The Beatles’. Nat Cohen met them, and he was not impressed. He called Stuart a biased Liverpudlian. (laughs)”
(Thus, Cohen missed financing A Hard Day’s Night, a massive box office hit. This did however lead to Cohen financing a film starring The Dave Clark Five – Catch Us If You Can – which was the first feature credit for director John Boorman and writer Peter Nichols.)
“We used to have Thursday family dinners at my grandfather’s place. He had the most incredible apartment at St James overlooking Green Park. My great-grandmother, my parents, my brother and I, and my cousin would all be there.”
Paul’s great grandmother was the mother of Cohen’s late wife. “She died a year before my grandfather did [in 1988]. She was born in 1889!
“He was a family man as well as all his gallivanting (laughs). If he was doing something respectable, like a Royal Premiere or something, he would take my mother as an escort.
“He was incredibly kind. My cousin Caroline wrote to me recently saying ‘I often think back on what he did. It didn’t occur to me it was strange’. For instance, we had this family doctor and if ever anyone was not well you called the doctor, and it was all sorted. Only later did I realise my grandfather was paying all the bills. Thinking back on that… what a great backbone, that we never had to worry about health costs growing up.
“He was a big lover of life. A very good card player. We went over to dinner on Thursday nights because on Friday nights he played gin rummy. When I was 23, he introduced me to Joe Dwek, a world champion backgammon player. They knew each other through cards and backgammon. I contacted Joe five years ago and he told me what an incredible card player my grandfather was. If Joe Dwek thinks you’re a good card player, you’re a good card player!”
Cohen had a great love for horse racing and he would attend the races every Friday and Saturday when he was in England. His horse, Kilmore won the Grand National in 1962.
“He won 20,000 pounds in prize money in that race. I found out they also backed the horse and won an extra 50,000 pounds. That was a lot of money back then.”
Stuart Levy’s horse won the Grand National in 1965 and Paul now has both trophies in his possession. He would frequently attend the races with his grandfather.
“When we were kids and we were with him, he would say to us ‘you’re not to call me grandpa, you’re to call me cousin’. So, we called him ‘Cousin Nat’. My brother and I bought him a box of matches and had ‘Cousin Nat’ inscribed on it for him.
“He was a gambler in business but only when the odds were stacked in his favour. I have a philosophy when I look to invest in something. I ask myself, ‘If everything in this deal goes wrong, what’s it going to cost me? If it’s not going to cost me too much, and there’s a chance I could make some real money out of it, then I’ll do it’. I got that from him, I think. He was like that too.
“He was very fair, very honest, his word was his bond, if he said he’d do something he did it. When my grandfather died, a letter sent to Screen International signed by Ken Loach and David Puttnam said if Nat Cohen said he would do something he would be good for it. He was known for that. He was just a great guy.
“He’d have a Rolls Royce with a chauffeur. A suite at The Carlton hotel in Cannes. He’d spend a month at the Hotel du Cap. That’s why I have to work for a living now (laughs).”
Paul says Cohen’s close friends included Jim Carreras from Hammer Films, Bernard Delfont from EMI and Mike Frankovich from Columbia.
“I’ve read a letter from Prince Phillip thanking him for the work he did for the Duke of Edinburgh scheme [it is likely this was the movie Some People which Cohen helped finance.]. It’s on the notepaper of the Royal Yacht Britannia thanking him for his contribution. My mother once went with my grandfather to Lord Brabourne’s daughter’s wedding – Lord Brabourne produced the Agatha Christie films. She said it was a relatively small affair, but the Queen was there, and she came up and said ‘Oh hello Nat’. He said, ‘May I present my daughter?’ And my mother almost fell over (laughs).
“He didn’t discuss movies with me. I do know that his big thing was making the Agatha Christie films. That was the peak of his career. There’s a photo of him and Ingrid Bergman holding the Oscar that she won for her role in the film. He had a good feel for what the public wanted to see in his time.”
Cohen made the Agatha Christie films [Murder on the Orient Express, Evil Under the Sun] while head of EMI Films, a company that Cohen worked for until it was taken over by Cannon Pictures in 1986.
“For the last few years of his life, because of his age in his mid-seventies, they [EMI] would renew his contract annually. Then EMI sold its film division to Cannon [in 1986]. They didn’t want him anymore. That came a bit of a killer for him, literally – he had no hobbies outside horse racing. My mother said she hoped he’d drop dead on a racecourse. That’s what he really loved. He loved racing and business.
“I moved to New York in 1985 then to Hong Kong, so I didn’t really see his decline. Before I went to New York, we went to a party with an Iranian exile – I was exhausted and went home, but he wanted to stay. 80 odd years old. But I met him and my mother in California after the October 1987 stock market crash. He’d just fallen apart really. He died in February 1988.”
Paul did not enter the film business, becoming a stockbroker and real estate investor, although his father-in-law is legendary British producer Laurence Myers. And Paul occasionally dabbles in the entertainment industry by acting as an “angel investor” in theatre productions through Nat Cohen Entertainments, just as his grandfather did for producers such as Michael Codron.
“What more can I say? He was a top man. A great guy.”
