The British actress passed away on 16 July (15), but no further details about her death were available as WENN went to press.

Pilbeam rose to fame as a child star with a number of stage roles before winning a part in 1934 film Little Friend at the age of 14, which brought her to the attention of celebrated director Hitchcock.

He cast her in his thriller The Man Who Knew Too Much in 1932 and gave her a starring role in Young and Innocent in 1937, and she was later his first choice for the lead role in his movie adaptation of Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca, but she eventually lost out to Joan Fontaine.

Pilbeam married Hitchcock's assistant director, Pen Tennyson, in 1939 after meeting him on the set of The Man Who Knew Too Much, but he was killed in a plane crash in 1941.

She went on to make a handful more movies, but retired from Hollywood in 1951 and shunned the spotlight for the rest of her life.