Screen idol Dirk Bogarde wrote to director Joseph Losey after completing Accident (1967), a witty study of simmering class conflict and sexual tension:
Thank you from my heart for the last three months. Stephen* has completely gone away and it seems has taken part of myself with him. I have never felt quite so abandoned and destroyed as I do today but in the vacuum which remains there is great happiness that you trusted me to play him even if here and there I might have failed you though I tried constantly, sometimes desperately, not to. I miss you greatly and love you more than you could ever guess.”
* Bogarde is referring to his character in the film, an academic who develops an obsession with one of his students.