RIP Herbert Lom

Well, crap.

You know you’ve created an indelible comedy character when you’re more remembered for that instead of playing such genre characters as The Phantom of the Opera (admittedly, in one of Hammer’s lamer movies) and Captain Nemo (in the rather more spectacular Mysterious Island). Yet Mr. Lom will surely always be best remembered for playing the perennially irked and rapidly homicidal Chief Insp. Dreyfus in the Pink Panther films opposite Peter Sellers.

Dreyfus was introduced in the second film in the series (and, in my opinion, the best one), A Shot in the Dark, along with his fellow supporting character Kato.  Toss in Blake Edward’s impeccible comic direction and another gorgeous score by Henry Mancini–including the brilliant Inspector Clouseau Theme, which is generally lost in the shadow of his Pink Panther Theme–and you have one of the great comedies. I HIGHLY recommend it for anyone who hasn’t seen it.

Meanwhile, the series entry with the biggest belly laughs (“Does your dog bite?”) was the fourth film, The Pink Panther Strikes Again, which was actually built around Dreyfus. In that entry, he actually makes himself into a globe-threatening supervillain in his efforts to kill the inept but indestructible Clouseau. The opening, when Clouseau appears at the insane asylum Dreyfus is hoping to be released from that morning, is one of the funniest stretches of movie you’ll ever see. Mr. Lom continued to play Dreyfus all the way up to Son of the Pink Panther.

Other great films to catch Mr. Lom in include The Ladykillers (opposite Alec Guinness and, again, Peter Sellers); the Henry Fonda version of War and Peace, in which Mr. Lom played Napoleon, a part he played on a couple of other occasions; the Michael Caine heist film Gambit; and the extremely fun spy flick Hopscotch, starring Walter Matthau.

Toss in such genre films as Journey to the Far Side of the Sun, Mark of the Devil, the 1970 Dorian Gray, the 1971 Murders in the Rue Morgue, Asylum, And Now the Screaming Starts, Dark Places, The Dead Zone, King Solomon’s Mines and Jess Franco’s typically woeful version of Count Dracula, in which Mr. Lom played Van Helsing opposite Christopher Lee’s Dracula. He appeared in two different versions of Agatha Christie’s Ten Little Indians.

Mr. Lom also starred in a British medical series in the ’60s called The Human Jungle. He retired from acting in 2004.

Mr. Lom was 95 at the time of passing.

  • SteveWD

    Watching movies with my son – when he was little we watched ‘Mysterious Island’. A couple of years later we watched ‘The Pink Panther Strikes Again’. As we were watching I said “remember Captain Nemo from ‘Mysterious Island’? – that’s him”. My son said, “no way!”. Sometime later we watched ‘The Dead Zone’ – same thing, my son says “no way!”. About a year ago (my son is 18 now) we watched ‘Asylum’ (I love that movie – finally found it on DVD). My son said “hey, it’s Herbert Lom!”. I was quite proud.

  • bgbear_rogerh

    I can see Dreyfus hanging by his finger, makes me laugh every time.

  • Ken_Begg

    I had the great joy to see that entry in the theater several times when it came out. That surveillance scene of Clouseau’s apartment made me laugh as much as any sequence I’d ever seen in a movie.

  • zombiewhacker

    “Mr. Lom continued to play Dreyfus all the way up to Son of the Pink Panther.”
    The funny thing is, didn’t Dreyfus die at the end of Pink Panther Strikes Again?

  • Ken_Begg

    Well, he was apparently eaten up by an energy beam. It could have teleported him somewhere rather than disintegrated him, though.

  • He was another actor I had no idea was still alive until I heard of his passing the other day. He was a perfect foil for Peter Sellers. RIP.

  • Pop once described THE PINK PANTHER STRIKES AGAIN as “the bad dream of the series” as a film which didn’t really connect to the continuity of the other films. If memory serves, the next film (although I can’t recall which film that was) glossed over the previous entry completely. It stands alone, as an unrelated spy movie spoof that just happens to feature the same characters.

    Speaking of the film, I can’t be sure about this, but I thought I saw two different endings! On the version I caught on TNT way back when, I distinctly recall seeing Dreyfus disintegrated -the last thing to go being his twitching eye* – and when I caught it on TCM years later, that scene was missing! Was this one of those scenes cut from the theatrical print which was edited back in for TV showings?

    * A nice nod to Lom was featured on the teleseries Family Matters. After years of putting up with Steve Urkel, Carl Winslow began to develop a nervous tick, the exact same eye twitch Dreyfus manifested.

  • MrTongoRad

    Picked up The Dead Zone on the way home, and will enjoy it tonight in tribute. Thanks for posting- he’s one of those guys where I know the face but not the name.