Charles Laughton Woman" (1933) in which he co-starred with Carole Lombard as a Cockney river trader in the Malayan jungle. Then came "The Barretts of Wimpole Street" (1934) as Norma Shearer's character's malevolent father (although Laughton was only three years older than Shearer); "Les Misérables" (1935) as Inspector Javert; one of his most famous screen roles in "Mutiny on the Bounty" (1935) as Captain William Bligh, co-starring with Clark Gable as Fletcher Christian; and "Ruggles of Red Gap" (1935) as the very English butler transported to early 1900s America. He signed to play Micawber in "David Copperfield" (1934), but after a few
Charles Laughton his sexuality was the reason Laughton and Lanchester did not have children. O'Hara claimed Laughton told her that he had wanted children but that it had not been possible because of a botched abortion that Lanchester had early in her career of performing burlesque. In her autobiography, Lanchester acknowledged two abortions in her youth—one of the pregnancies purportedly by Laughton—although she didn't mention whether she had been rendered infertile. According to her biographer, Charles Higham, the reason she did not have children was that she did not want any. Laughton owned a spectacular estate on the bluffs above Pacific Coast