Post by atticus on Mar 19, 2016 11:35:19 GMT
Following the confessions of my early betting exploits, I though that some chums might like a look at another entry from my personal blog.
One of my buddies at school was Dennis O’Keefe. There used to be an American film actor of the same name popular in the forties and fifties who, as far as I can tell, finished his career appearing in the sixties show ‘Petticoat Junction’, a series that will evoke a few fond memories in readers of a certain vintage.
My mate Dennis, however, was not as well known but determined to be so. He had a bit of kudos because while at school had appeared as an extra in a couple of movies including ‘Spare The Rod’ which featured Max Bygraves as an inner city school teacher. I rather fancied this opportunity of flirting with fame so asked Dennis how to go about it.
‘No problem’, said he, and took me along to an office in Soho where I met Miriam. Miriam was I suppose in her forties with grotesquely dyed blonde hair who smoked incessantly, coughing and spluttering violently as she did so. I had a brief interview with Miriam who took my photograph and more or less said that I was now on the books and would be advised if anything turned up. In those days it really was that simple.
Success came early. I was offered work within a week on The Loneliness Of The Long Distance Runner, now well known as a brilliant film directed by Tony Richardson, and had to report to an address in Claygate, Surrey a few days later. For reasons I cannot recall, Dennis was not going to be part of this great adventure so in the summer of 1961, aged 16 I took my first steps towards stardom in the direction of Claygate.
Our duties were explained to us with great enthusiasm by a jolly lady who should have been called Beryl but probably wasn’t. I was one of around a dozen or so lads who were going to play pupils from a posh school competing in a cross country run against runners from the borstal at which Tom Courtenay was a resident. Miriam had not actually specified that my first steps on the road to stardom involved running around Claygate Park in singlet and shorts looking as though I was fit enough to be doing so but I have long forgiven her.
I had three days work on the film and had a great time earning £1.17.6d a day and all the food I could eat from the catering van. Oh, all right then – about £1.85 if you can’t work it out, which, believe me, was not that bad a rate of pay at the time.
Chief posh schoolboy (who actually has a line of dialogue in the film) was James Fox but I suspect he was earning above the daily rate of £1.17.6. It was good fun being up close and personal with the actors who, on my shift, included Michael Redgrave, Alec McGowan, a young John Thaw as well as Tom Courtney.
However, the most friendly, approachable and genuinely likeable actor I met was Arthur Mullard who was playing a straight role as a borstal officer. Arthur had appeared in dozens and dozens of films before this as well as being a stooge for just about every popular comedian at the time. While nobody was particularly aloof, Arthur went out of his way to be friendly to us humble extras and on the second day of shooting called me by name which he’d remembered. A lovely, lovely man.
My next venture into the world of cinema was in 1964 when I was one of an enormous number of extras in the film Catch Us If You Can which was a vehicle for sixties band The Dave Clark Five. Miriam had probably coughed her poor heart out by now so I became involved in this project simply by being in the right place at the right time and responding to the urgings of others. I appear in the party scene along with hundreds of others and because of this it was less enjoyable than my previous film appearance and I was only wanted for one day.
I feel that my crowning glory, however, came in 1970 when, again via wheels rotating within wheels, I found myself working on the Hammer horror movie Lust For A Vampire. It was filmed at Elstree studios and surrounding area and occasionally appears on telly at an hour when even burglars are in bed. I shall pass no comment on the quality of the film other than to say that the original director Terrence Fisher was replaced at short notice by Jimmy Sangster and that Ingrid Pitt, who at the time was the queen of Hammer horror films, turned the lead part down allegedly because of the terrible script. Her role was eventually played by Yutte Stensgaard who hitherto was best known as a hostess on the quiz show The Golden Shot.
The male lead was to have been Peter Cushing but he was replaced, again at very short notice, by Ralph Bates as Cushing’s wife had become seriously ill and he asked to be released so that he could care for her.
All of this I learnt on the first day at Elstree which was as chaotic as it could possibly be. Nobody seemed to know what was going on and eventually we extras engaged to play ‘villagers’ were taken in hand by Terry Pearce who was the second assistant director would you believe. We were obviously not considered worthy enough to be directed by even the assistant director.
The featured villager was the towering actor Nick Brimble appearing in his first movie. He’s gone on to enjoy a glittering acting career including playing Little John to Kevin Costner’s Robin Hood in Prince Of Thieves. At the time however we villagers spent our time telling rude jokes and quaffing pints in the nearby pub when we weren’t needed by Terry.
One of the delights of working on the film was being surrounded by so many beautiful girls. I managed to get a couple of dates with one of them, the gorgeous Sue Longhurst. Sue went on to appear in such classics of British cinema as Confessions Of A Window Cleaner, Secrets Of A Door To Door Salesman and Can You Keep It Up For A Week. She also turned up in The Fenn Street Gang and by a remarkable coincidence became a hostess on The Golden Shot. Ah, sweet Sue. I wonder if she’s spared me a thought during the intervening 45 years.
I read somewhere that the late Ralph Bates claimed that Lust For A Vampire was the worst film he had ever been in. As I said, I shall pass no comment but in my opinion, Hammer made a big mistake in casting Ralph Bates to replace Peter Cushing. They really should have got Arthur Mullard to serve up the stakes. He would have enhanced the movie no end. Oh, yus.
