for British readers

[realthog]

There's a facility on the IMDB site whereby you can search for all the movies that two people of your choice have worked on together: you can find the starting page here.

As you type each name into the box provided -- John Smith, perhaps -- the search engine chunters a bit, then offers you a list of individuals to make sure it'll be searching for the right John Smith.

This evening, helping a friend with a query, I used the facility to check which movies Jack Nicholson and Boris Karloff had worked on together.

I typed in "Boris Karloff" and the list appeared. The first name on it was, unsurprisingly, Boris Karloff. But the second was . . .

. . .

     . . .

          . . .

                . . . Ann Widdecombe.

Huh? Ann Widdecombe? Yes, the string'em-up-but-for-gawd's-sake-don't-abort-'em socially conservative Conservative MP, a junior member of John Major's cabinet back in the days when John Major had a cabinet.

I mean, in a way it's quite fitting in that both could, in their heyday, have even hardened marines and stalwart professional wrestlers awakening from sleep with a scream, but it's hard to see the link otherwise.

Oh, Karloff and Nicholson appeared in two movies together, The Raven (1963) and The Terror (1963).