Biographie

When he first became a stage actor, his speaking voice was comparatively high-pitched, so he had voice coaching to lower it and make it more imposing and sonorous. When he later started acting in films, his modified voice was too deep for the young parts that he was auditioning for, so he had further voice coaching to raise it about an octave.

Spitting Image (1984) created a puppet of him and he featured in several of their sketches. In one scene he is in a restaurant, and asks "Do you serve a ham salad?", to which the waiter replies "Yes, we serve salad to anyone".

Because he had negative buoyancy when he was filming La mer cruelle (1953) and had to be in the water, he lay on top of a stuntman.

When his cousin Frank was called up into the RAF during WWII, he was in mid-rehearsal for a play, and asked Donald to take over his role. Frank was later killed in action.

He trained at the Webber Douglas Academy of Dramatic Arts in London, whose alumni include Terence Stamp, Hugh Bonneville, Rupert Friend, Angela Lansbury, Matthew Goode, Sue Johnston, Minnie Driver, Daniel Hunt, Nicholas Courtney and Julian Fellowes.