A PHOTOGRAPH of Hollywood star Charles Laughton, taken 90 years ago when he was a pupil at Stonyhurst College in the Ribble Valley, has been discovered in the college archives. ADRIAN WORSLEY talked to college film buffs to ask whether it hints at the colossal acting talent to come. . .

HE WAS a giant of the cinema, in every sense, but you wouldn't think it to look at the timid boy peering out from this old photograph.

Described by a cruel classmate as "the ungainliest of boys with a huge head", Charles Laughton cut a withdrawn figure when he attended Stonyhurst College.

But over the course of the next 40 years, the former East Lancashire pupil would become one of the 20th Century's most talented and popular actors with a string of towering performances, most notably as the Hunchback of Notre Dame and as the portly king in The Private Life of Henry VIII.

The class photo recently discovered in the college archives shows a 15-year-old Laughton wearing the uniform of the Officer Training Corps, the forerunner of today's CCF, Combined Cadet Force.

College archive staff uncovered the picture last month after a woman, who was researching Charles Laughton's history, asked the college if he had ever joined the CCF.

Staff eventually spotted his distinctive features after trawling through many group pictures of former cadets.

But the photo barely hints at the career ahead. At Stonyhurst, Laughton suffered from glandular problems, which caused him to gain weight and made him self-conscious and withdrawn at school.

He eventually came out of his shell when he took a debut role as the innkeeper in the school production of The Private Secretary. However, he was forced to give up his acting ambitions by disapproving parents, who made him take up the hotel catering trade instead.

But, after serving in the First World War where he was gassed in the trenches, he decided to enrol at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts in 1924. The rest, as they say, is history.

Stephen Oliver, a classics teacher and head of Year 9 at the college, has formed Stonyhurst's Laughton Society, a film club for students.

He said: "Looking at him then, few of his classmates would have predicted that a glittering career lay ahead of him.

"Because of his unconventional looks - his ugliness - he was often cast in ugly roles and was probably best known for playing the Hunchback of Notre Dame.

"He also starred in Mutiny on the Bounty and had a major role in Spartacus.

"He went on to direct his only film, the Night of the Hunter with Robert Mitchum, in 1955.

"But probably due to its lack of success he never directed again.It's now a classic, of course."

Laughton acted in a total of 41 plays and 55 films and died in Hollywood from cancer in 1962, aged 63.

In 1971 he was elected to the Hollywood Hall of Fame.