The films features actor Ralph Richardson starring in a West End production of Othello. Pat McGrath plays his dresser, who joins the Fleet Air Arm and becomes a war hero – as famous as Richardson himself. British film stars Anna Neagle and Laurence Olivier make cameo appearances, as does director Michael Powell and fellow British film director Anthony Asquith.
The film is available as a supplement to the Criterion DVD of 49th Parallel.
The director Michael Powell during filming for The Volunteer, 1943