How tall was Robert Donat

marcus said on 17/Oct/22
Just saw Young Mr. Pitt, Donat's performance was the equal of the best modern British Actors

Rabindra sankar sen roy said on 23/Jun/18
Robert Donat is solid 6' tall

Neelasish Sen Roy said on 15/Jun/18
He looks 6'1"/185cm in Good Bye Mr Chips with 6'3" Paul Henried

Arch Stanton said on 4/Jan/14
I have Goodbye Mr Chips on DVD now and watched it again! His performance in that film is quite loveable and brilliant and was clearly an Oscar winner. He's 3 inches taller than a heeled Garson and 2-3 inches shorter than Paul Henreid who was listed as 6'3". This seems accurate.

Arch Stanton said on 16/Dec/13
Looks about this in The Private life of Henry VIII.

Arch Stanton said on 7/Dec/13
Mr. R says on 19/Nov/13
He seemed tallish, but some of that was his slim build. I will go with 5-11. By the way, most people don't know this, but he won the Oscar in 1939 for "Goodbye Mr. Chips" over Clark Gable for Gone With the Wind. Big upset!

Not surprising though, it was a superior performance to Gable's who did little but stand there and look smarmy...

Mr. R said on 19/Nov/13
He seemed tallish, but some of that was his slim build. I will go with 5-11. By the way, most people don't know this, but he won the Oscar in 1939 for "Goodbye Mr. Chips" over Clark Gable for Gone With the Wind. Big upset!

Sam said on 14/Nov/13
I disagree that he was as short as 5'10", he could look on the side in most of his roles, not average range.

Knowitall said on 14/Nov/13
In Hitchcock's The 39 Steps, Donat's character is described as being five foot ten.

I believe that was his true height.

Arch Stanton said on 30/Oct/13
Seems ill health was the reason he never made it as a big Hollywood star, he was only 53 when he died in 1958. That was a pity I think, he definitely had that rare on screen likeability, although Cary Grant is a personal favourite of mine in that respect.

Arch Stanton said on 30/Oct/13
Nice one Rob! Yeah he had that special charisma about him I think. Looked 6 ft to me, similar height on screen to Gable, and could be compared to both Gable and Laurence Olivier. Says on the pedia that "For a number of years, British film exhibitors voted him among the top ten British stars at the box office in an annual poll in the Motion Picture Herald." Might be true, he won an Oscar for his role in Goodbye Mr Chips but not sure really why he didn't become a bigger star. Post 1945 his career sort of died. It says he suffered from "psychosematic asthma" and self-doubt. He wasn't the only very talented British actor of that period never to make it as a major Hollywood star though.

Sam said on 30/Oct/13
Good addition, always glad to see the classic film stars added. From memory, I think he was a little taller seeming next to 6'3"ish Paul Henreid, more like easily 6'1", although since Donat was the lead, they might have used tricks to make him seem taller, like they did with Bogart next to Henreid in Casablanca.
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