Michael Klinger (1 November 1920 – 15 September 1989)[1] was a British film producer and distributor. After Tony Tenser, then a publicist, became his business partner, the two men created the Compton cinema chain and distribution company and financed Repulsion (1965) and Cul-de-sac (1966) both directed by Roman Polanski. After their association ended, Klinger produced Get Carter (1971), starring Michael Caine, and Gold (1974), with Roger Moore in the lead, and was the executive producer of the 'Confessions' series of sex comedies with Robin Askwith.
Klinger was born in London to Polish-born Jewish parents.[2] His father was a tailor by trade.[3] During the Second World War, Michael worked for the British Government as an inventor. He devised a machine to test bombs without the need to detonate them; however, because he was a government employee, he earned no money for the invention except for a six shilling pay increase.[4]
After the War, Klinger worked on the market in the East End of London, before being offered the opportunity to invest in a Soho cinema.
Klinger was initially the owner of a strip club, but began a business association with Tony Tenser in 1960 after they had met following a publicity stunt organised by Tenser at a cinema Klinger managed.[5]
The two men opened a private members cinema, the Compton Club that year, apparently with John Trevelyan, then head of the British Board of Film Censors, as a founder member.[6] A distribution firm Compton Cameo Films was established.[7] Both enterprises were originally dedicated to imported exploitation films, but undertook its own films in the 'nudie' genre, though their first, Naked as Nature Intended (1961), directed by Harrison Marks and starring Pamela Green, was marketed as a documentary. For about eighteen months, Klinger and Tenser's company owned the Windmill Theatre, after its nude reviews had ended, and reverting the auditorium into its earlier use as a cinema,[8] and using it as a setting for Secrets of a Windmill Girl (1966).[5]
It was Klinger though who persuaded Tenser to back the first English language feature films of Polish director Roman Polanski. Despite the success of Repulsion (1965) and Cul-de-Sac (1966), Klinger and Tenser ended their business connection in 1967.
Klinger sent the Ted Lewis novel Jack's Return Home to director Mike Hodges, asking whether he would be interested in adapting and directing a film version. Hodges agreed. The result, starring Michael Caine, Get Carter, was released early in 1971.[9] Klinger, Hodges and Caine formed a production company to make Pulp which followed in 1972.
^The IMDb website gives these dates, but his year of birth is given as 1920 on the website of the University of Western England where Klinger's archive is held.
