Britain’s Queen Elizabeth has included three Trinidadians a film director with T&T roots in her 2020 New Year’s Honours List. Singer Billy Ocean, actor Rudolph Walker, television presenter turned Lib Dem peer Floella Benjamin are among those in line for honours, along with film director Sam Mendes whose grandfather was Trinidadian.
Ocean, born Leslie Sebastian Charles, has been made a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (MBE) for his services to music.
A recording artist who had a string of R&B international pop hits in the 1970s and 1980s, Ocean was the most popular Trinidad–British R&B singer-songwriter of the early to mid-1980s. His hits include “When the Going Gets Tough, the Tough Get Going, “Caribbean Queen (No More Love on the Run), Get Outta My Dreams, Get into My Car” and There’ll Be Sad Songs (To Make You Cry).
In 2002, the University of Westminster, London, awarded him an honorary doctorate of music. In 2011, Ocean became a Companion of the Liverpool Institute for Performing Arts, presented to him by Sir Paul McCartney.
MBE is the third highest-ranking Order of the British Empire award, behind Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) which is first and then Order of the British Empire (OBE).
Walker has award the CBE, the highest-ranking Order of the British Empire award in recognition of his foundation helping disadvantaged children become actors.
He is best known for his roles as Bill in the ITV sitcom Love Thy Neighbour and Patrick Trueman in the BBC soap opera EastEnders, in which he has acted since 2001.
Originally from San Juan, Walker began acting as an eight-year-old in primary school and join Derek Walcott’s Trinidad Theatre Workshop as its youngest member. He left T&T at the age of 20 in 1960. He had been planning to go to the United States, where he had connections, but actor Errol John — who had already migrated to Britain but was in Trinidad doing a play — convinced him to go to the UK.
Benjamin, already a baroness, has been upgraded from OBE to Damehood for services to charity. She gets Dame Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (DBE). The two senior ranks of the Order of the British Empire are Knight or Dame Grand Cross, and Knight or Dame Commander.
A television presenter, singer, businesswoman and politician, she is best known for children’s programmes such as Play School, Play Away and Fast Forward. In June 2010, Lady Benjamin was introduced to the House of Lords as a Life Peer nominated by the Liberal Democrats with the title of Baroness Benjamin, of Beckenham in the County of Kent.
She was born in Pointe-à-Pierre, Trinidad, one of six siblings, with three brothers and two sisters. Her father, “a policeman and a talented jazz musician”,decided to emigrate to Britain, and in 1960 the children joined him in Beckenham, Kent.
Having left school to work in a bank, Benjamin studied for A-levels at night school. After a spell as a stage actress in West End musicals, she began presenting children’s television programmes in 1976, notably Play School for the BBC.
Mendes, who won the Academy Award for best director for American Beauty, has been recognised for services to drama. He, built his early reputation on the stage, as artistic director of London’s Donmar Warehouse and for his productions of such musicals as Oliver! and Cabaret.
American Beauty, his first film, saw him win best director honours at the 2000 Golden Globes and the Oscars that followed. His other films included Jarhead, Road to Perdition and 2008’s Revolutionary Road, which starred his then-wife Kate Winslet. His other film credits include 2012’s Skyfall and 2015’s Spectre, the two recent instalments in the James Bond series.
His upcoming war epic, 1917, tells of two young British soldiers racing against time to avert an assault on their comrades.
