It was during Fleming’s meetings with Paul Dehn, an early candidate to write the screenplay, that the subject of who to cast as Bond first arose. In a letter dated 11th August 1959 to his friend Ivar Bryce Fleming announced, ‘Both Dehn and I think that Richard Burton would be by far the best James Bond!’ It’s a fascinating suggestion, and undeniably the first recorded statement by Fleming about who should play his hero. Years later Fleming would champion David Niven as Bond, a very traditional English actor and a million miles away from the wild Celtic image and brooding manner of Burton. And what a Bond a pre-Cleopatra/pre-Elizabeth Taylor Burton would have been, before vats of vodka and a heady dose of disillusionment frayed his edges beyond repair.

This is but one of a myriad of alternate Bond universes that The Search for Bond, the new book from film journalist Robert Sellers, throws up. It is where Patrick McGoohan stared back at Eunice Gayson across the green baize of a casino table in Dr No, where Burt Reynolds drove the underwater Lotus Esprit or indulged in banter, Smokey and the Bandit-style, with Sherriff J. W. Pepper, or Lewis Collins kicking Michael Gothard’s car over a cliff. But all that was never to be, and maybe it was for the best. After all, the actors the producers finally did cast as Bond have been arguably the perfect choices for their era. Can we visualise another actor other than Moore in The Spy who Loved Me or Timothy Dalton in The Living Daylights?

Daniel Craig’s departure as Bond left the producers in the same dilemma as when Pierce Brosnan was earlier dispensed with. There is no obvious candidate to replace him. It seems that pretty much every British actor who can walk in a straight line and owns his own tux was being touted for the role in the press, so many names have been mentioned: Idris Elba, Tom Hardy, Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Tom Hiddleston, Aidan Turner, James Norton, Michael Fassbender, Jamie Bell, Luke Evans are just a few. By the time this book is published we may know the answer as to who the producers have chosen. He will join an illustrious and exclusive club. More people have walked on the moon than played James Bond. As 007 contender Neil Dickson has so humorously suggested, maybe they should all get their own badge.

The post Casting the impossible: The search for James Bond appeared first on The History Press.

Track 1: Il cielo in una stanza by Mina

The dreamy orchestration evokes Vivien’s first glimpse of Ceylon in 1953, where she would film Elephant Walk. During that time, she also had an affair with Peter Finch. It also made me think of Vivien’s earlier trip to Capri in 1936, when driven by lust, she embarked on the island to surprise her lover, Laurence Olivier, who was holidaying with his wife, Jill Esmond. The beauty of those 2 island paradises, with the tropical flowers, crystallised waters, and exotic scents was intoxicating for Vivien, but her actions were far from dazzling. The contrast reminded me of this song, which, despite sounding romantic (as Italian lyrics always do!) is actually about a brothel.

Track 2: Loco Amor by Pedrito Martinez

The passionate chants of ‘Loco Amor’ (Spanish for ‘crazy love’) bring to mind the long days and nights Vivien spent with Peter in Ceylon, as well as her time with Larry. During the early days of each affair, she was swept up in the intensity of her feelings and only had tunnel vision for the man (or men) she loved. I purposely chose classic songs in Italian, Spanish and French to represent Vivien’s worldliness but also to keep the listener lost in translation, symbolising the secret world in which Vivien and Larry (more so than Peter) existed during those hedonistic days of clandestine meetings in nondescript places and stolen moments on the film set.

Track 3: Good Luck, Babe by Chappell Roan

‘Stop the world to stop the feeling’ summarises the desperation Vivien felt in 1953, when she knew something was a miss, but she was at a loss to understand it. This perfectly sums up the heightened feelings of falling for Peter and the damage it caused, and the tragic aftermath when her mental health collapsed and she was hospitalised for several weeks. Vivien would often wish the world could stop many times throughout her life. It also suggests the loss of Vivien’s support from Larry, as he moved on and had affairs with younger women. Powerless was how Vivien felt, but she also knew nobody could match the intensity of her love.

Track 4: Wake Up Alone by Amy Winehouse

The consequence of Vivien’s illness meant that she drove people away and those she loved bore the brunt of the violence which often came with a manic depressive episode. This song reflects the loneliness of being mentally ill and misunderstood, and the longing she felt to put things right. Sadly, her relationships were fractured beyond repair and the men in her life eventually left her.

Track 5: Young and Beautiful by Lana del Rey

After Vivien awoke from her coma at the hospital, following her mental breakdown, Larry did not recognise her. The woman he loved was a stranger to him and he was afraid. In his memoirs, he wrote, ‘I loved her that much less.’ Having weathered several storms throughout their affair and, then, marriage, the lack of familiarity startled him and he realised it was the beginning of the end. Vivien must have realised it too, but her obsession for Larry would keep her bound to him, at whatever cost to her sanity. The idyllic image he held of her was shattered forever and she was always trying to go back to a happier time, but failed in her mission.

Track 6: Eternal Source of Light Divine by G.F. Handel

The pomp and splendour perfectly sum up the Oliviers when they are at their greatest: on the world’s stage and adored by their legions of fans. Onstage, they were invincible – the King and Queen of the theatre, and the audience forming their court of devoted subjects.

Track 7: You Belong To Me by Patsy Cline

The sentimentality of Vivien and Larry’s marriage, as well as the 1940s and early 50s, when they were the golden couple and seemingly untouchable, are conveyed in the lyrics. It’s all about the past, where Vivien remained stuck for much of the 50s and 60s. She longed for Larry, after he left her, and held onto the happier memories, even if much of it was a figment of her imagination. This much was true, when, in 1962, Vivien went on a lengthy tour of Australasia, retracing the steps she took with Larry in 1948, but, to her sadness, everything had changed. She looked for him everywhere and spoke of him in interviews, as if he was lingering in the next room.

Track 8: Cherry by Lana del Rey

The toxicity of Vivien’s affair with Peter and her failing marriage to Larry was a running conflict throughout her life in the 1950s. In 1955, Vivien and Larry did a season at Stratford but as soon as Peter entered the scene, she discarded Larry for her lover. ‘I fall to pieces when I’m with you’ could have easily translated to Vivien’s question, when she asked her husband and lover, ‘Which one of you is coming to bed with me?’

Track 9: tolerate it by Taylor Swift

Several parts of this song are reflective of Vivien and the men in her life, not only Peter and Larry, but her first husband Leigh Holman, whose love she only ever tolerated. Likewise, Vivien felt neglected by Leigh during their brief marriage and failed to connect on a romantic level with him and his love for her grew after she abandoned him for Larry. And, as Vivien’s marriage to Larry was coming to an end, she often felt he tolerated her and it broke her heart and shattered her confidence.

Track 10: I’d Rather Go Blind by Etta James

In 1960, Vivien attended the divorce hearing alone and wept openly as her marriage to Larry was dissolved. She was distraught, as she always hoped he would call the divorce off. Likewise, when she discovered, from the paparazzi, that he had married Joan Plowright, she was shocked but hid it for the sake of keeping up appearances – those feelings of sadness and regret were also apparent when Larry had children with his new wife. The song reminds me of Vivien’s remark: ‘I’d rather live a short life with Larry than a long life without him.’

Track 11: Please, Please, Please, Let me Get What I Want by She and Him

In middle age, Vivien was desperately trying to navigate her personal life and the lull in her career. She was also beginning a new relationship with Jack Merivale and trying to repair her bond with her only child from her first marriage, whom she abandoned for Larry. I think she was trying to repair her karma and her self-worth by doing good deeds. But her mental illness would cast a dark shadow over her plans and derail her progress. Nevertheless, it was a battle she continued to fight.

Track 12: Je ne sais plus by Dalida

In English, the song is ‘You Don’t Own Me’. Despite the challenges Vivien faced, it was important, as her biographer, to restore her sense of power. She’s an empowering woman who lived by her own set of rules, for better or worse, and was governed by her soul’s journey, instead of society’s rules. She was open about her illness and she was authentic in her passion for living.

Track 13: All Too Well (Ten Minute Version) by Taylor Swift

The greatest battles in Vivien’s life were her mental illness and her (finally) agreeing to give Larry a divorce so he could remarry. She romanticised their life together and carried a torch for him always, seemingly forgetting the horrific times they shared and the infidelity on both sides. Unfortunately, for Vivien, Larry moved on and started a family with his new wife. In Vivien’s dream world, she and Larry would remain friends and be in each other’s lives, but he kept her at arm’s length. To her, their marriage, even when it was over, was sacred. I feel, she was always hoping Larry would romanticise her, as she did him – she remembered it ‘all too well’.

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The women on whose shoulders we now stand

On 2 December 2017 I had the pleasure of taking part in Palimpsest: Symposium – A Celebration of Black Women in Theatre at the National Theatre. It was the actress Martina Laird who invited me to take part and celebrate the work of those she described as ‘the women on whose shoulders we now stand’. I said I would be happy to start the event (which included two panel discussions) with an illustrated talk about early appearances of black actresses in British theatre. I gave it the title ‘Black Women in British Theatre: The Beginnings 1750s to 1950s’ and I began by acknowledging the actress who had played Shakespeare’s Juliet in Lancashire in the late 1700s. The attendees included many black women who were drama students, actresses, playwrights and directors. I wasn’t sure how many of them would have heard about the actresses I discussed. There is very little accessible information about the early years of black British theatre and so the lives and achievements of many of these women have been lost in time and space.

The actress who played Juliet in the 1790s remains unidentified, but the reference to her ethnicity is clear. When John Jackson published The History of the Scottish Stage in 1793, he noted the following:

‘I had accidently seen the lady, as I was passing through Lancashire, in the part of Polly [in John Gay’s The Beggar’s Opera]. I could not help observing to my friend in the pit, when Macheath addressed her with “Pretty Polly” that it would have been more germain to the matter, had he changed the phrase to “SOOTY Polly.” I was informed, that a few nights before, she had enacted Juliet.’

At the National Theatre, I began with the unidentified actress who played Shakespeare’s Juliet in the 1790s and closed with Cleo Laine’s dramatic debut in Flesh to a Tiger at the Royal Court in 1958. I spoke about Emma Williams, the West African who acted in George Bernard Shaw’s Back to Methuselah in the 1920s, sharing the stage of the Royal Court Theatre with Edith Evans and a young Laurence Olivier. After 1929, Emma vanishes but other black British actresses surfaced in the 1940s, and I mentioned them also, including Ida Shepley and Pauline Henriques. I hoped that the talk would draw attention to the lives of these extraordinary women. Afterwards, I took part in a panel discussion hosted by Martina Laird and Natasha Bonnelame, Archive Associate at the National Theatre. The panellists also include Yvonne Brewster and Angela Wynter. It was an enjoyable, inspiring event. That was the morning session. In the afternoon, Martina and Natasha hosted another panel discussion, this time bringing Yvonne and Angela back together alongside the actresses Anni Domingo, Noma Dumezweni and Suzette Llewellyn.

In the 1980s and 1990s I had the pleasure of befriending some of the women who are featured in this book. They include Elisabeth Welch, Pauline Henriques, Carmen Munroe, Cleo Sylvestre, Pearl Connor-Mogotsi, Nadia Cattouse, Isabelle Lucas, Joan Hooley, Corinne Skinner-Carter and Anni Domingo. Over a long period of time, these personal friendships have given me insights into the work of black women whose lives intertwined with many aspects of black British theatre. Trusting me with their stories and, in some cases, sharing their memorabilia, has been a wonderful experience.

In 1987 I met Carmen Munroe for the first time when I interviewed her for the magazine Plays and Players in her dressing room at the Lyric Theatre in Shaftesbury Avenue. Carmen was taking it easy between the matinee and evening performances of James Baldwin’s The Amen Corner in which she played – brilliantly – the leading role of Sister Margaret. Carmen told me that her first professional appearance was as a maid in Tennessee Williams’s Period of Adjustment at the Royal Court in 1962: ‘But I never played a maid again. I figured once you have played a maid, there didn’t seem much point in playing another.’ Eventually some good theatre work came her way including Alun Owen’s There’ll Be Some Changes Made (1969): ‘I thought “Gosh, this is the opening that I’ve been dying for”. We had wonderful reviews and I thought “I hope this continues,”’ and it did, with a revival of Jean Genet’s The Blacks (1970) at the Roundhouse: ‘This gave black actors and actresses a great opportunity to get together and really put on what turned out to be a wonderful production.’ Then came George Bernard Shaw’s The Apple Cart (1970) at the Mermaid. ‘Following in Dame Edith Evans’s footsteps’, wrote one reviewer. ‘Why doesn’t someone write something for this girl?’, wrote B. A. Young in the Financial Times.

For Carmen, these years were particularly rewarding but, in 1971, the work suddenly stopped: ‘I did a lot of work. Mainly because directors wanted to use me. Then it changed. Suddenly black artists became a “threat” to the establishment.’ Carmen believes that Enoch Powell’s inflammatory ‘Rivers of Blood’ speech in 1968 was partly responsible for this. In 1973, she seriously considered giving up her acting career: ‘For almost a year I spent a depressing time believing that I was not going to realise my potential. This is a hard thing to take. But I hung on.’ In 1985, Carmen played Lena Younger in Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun at the Tricycle Theatre. It was directed by Yvonne Brewster. And when The Amen Corner came along, she told me she found it ‘amazing to be in a cast where people are doing something wonderful. It is fulfilling to be part of this. To experience this. I’ve been in the business a quarter of a century and I’m aiming to partake in the next quarter of a century too, and hope there will be more work like The Amen Corner’. There was and Carmen continued to win critical acclaim for her leading roles in such plays as Alice Childress’s Trouble in Mind at the Tricycle in 1992.

I met Nadia Cattouse for the first time in 1989 and she offered some fascinating insights into the problems black actors faced in the 1950s and 1960s, especially if they came here from the Caribbean:

‘They had this fixed idea in their heads that, if you were American, you were streets better than anyone who came from the Caribbean. Our accent bothered them. They constantly told us to place our emphasis on a different syllable, and this would make us so self-conscious we could never think ourselves into a role because we were always conscious of the demand from the director, or whoever, that we speak in a different way. And so there was a kind of loss of control of the performance we would like to give. I had a lot of that. We did not want to rock the boat so usually we could use our intelligence to guide ourselves through, without upsetting the status quo, because time costs money in this business and we had to remember that too.’

I also enjoyed meeting Corinne Skinner-Carter in 1998 when I interviewed her for the Black Film Bulletin. Corinne had come to Britain from Trinidad in 1955. She worked as a dancer and actress but she also had teaching to fall back on when acting work became scarce. After her arrival, Corinne befriended Claudia Jones, a fellow Trinidadian who, like Edric and Pearl Connor, also Trinidadians, made things happen. Corrine said:

‘Claudia had been persecuted in America for her political beliefs. After settling in England, she launched the West Indian Gazette in Brixton. This was Britain’s first major newspaper for black people. In 1958, Claudia decided to pull together a group of black people from the arts, to show everybody that we were here to stay, that there was harmony between blacks and whites, in spite of the Notting Hill riots. So, Claudia co-ordinated the first West Indian Carnival in Britain with the help of Edric and Pearl Connor, Cy Grant, Pearl Prescod, Nadia Cattouse and myself. The first Carnival took place in St Pancras Town Hall, and it was packed! It was not until 1965, the year after Claudia died, that Carnival took to the streets of Notting Hill.’

Corinne also gave me an overview of her life and career: ‘I have always been very selective. If I am not happy with a script, I turn it down. But I have been fortunate. On coming to England in 1955, I trained as a teacher, so I haven’t always had to rely solely on acting for my bread-and-butter.’

Extracted from Deep Are the Roots: Trailblazers Who Changed Black British Theatre by Stephen Bourne

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What drew you to Maria’s story?

I have been a fan of Maria Callas for over 15 years and I had read everything written about her. As a young girl, I never felt like I knew Maria, the woman, from reading her story. She was always overshadowed by Callas the ‘diva’ and the company she kept. My instincts always told me there was more to Maria than what we knew. So, as I grew older and made a career as a biographer, I thought it was time to delve into her true story. Maria’s story.

What surprised you most during the research process?

I was surprised that all of my instincts were correct. During the research process, I would have certain feelings about her life and then find the documents to support it. That felt supernatural but Maria herself said she was completely instinctive! We’re similar in that way. My astrologer friend joked that I’m a ‘clairvoyant biographer’ who’s hung up on solid facts. I never speculate and I question everything. But I think I was surprised by how ordinary she could be behind the scenes: she’s so relatable in that she loved gossiping, watching soaps, reading horoscopes, and playing with her dogs. That’s the Maria I love.

What’s one misconception of Maria you’d like to correct?

There were several but namely that she was a diva in the derogatory sense of the word. She was not. She was a total professional and like-minded colleagues loved working with her and respected her. I’d like to correct the misconceptions that her husband, Battista Meneghini, made her career and without him she’d be nothing. There’s another misconception that she lived entirely for Aristotle Onassis and that she lost her voice because of him. That does a disservice to not only Maria, the woman, but Callas, the artist. Callas’s voice was a force of nature and a mere mortal such as Onassis could not destroy it. On a similar note, she did not die of a broken heart. The idea that her life was as big as an opera really disrespects Maria because during her lifetime very few took her suffering seriously, they believed it was all part of the prima donna act. In fact, she attempted to share her story and wanted to be understood, but many could not see past the vision they had created of her. Can you imagine how claustrophobic that was and how lonely she felt?

Almost 50 years since her death, do you think the way we treat celebrities like Maria has changed?

I don’t think so, the media and public love to take an exceptionally gifted person, build them up only to tear them down. With Maria, she was being gaslit by her husband and he leaked things to the press without her knowing. So, although she tried to have a private life away from the limelight, those who were supposed to protect her really let her down. The same with her mother and sister, and others, they all exploited her. She continues to be exploited to this day and I felt like I had to fight to protect her. However, I think there is a good platform to discuss certain injustices, particularly when it comes to women from all walks of life, and that is why Maria’s story is so relevant. People might not be able to relate to the exceptional talent of Callas but they’ll find common ground with Maria.

How would you like Maria to be remembered?

As a human being.

The post Ask the author: Lyndsy Spence on Maria Callas appeared first on The History Press.

1.

HMV – the chain of record stores that once straddled the globe – started as a single shop at 363 Oxford Street, London. Opened in 1921 by parent company His Master’s Voice to sell the 78s and gramophones they manufactured, 363 had Sir Edward Elgar lead an orchestra in its interior on the opening day and traded until 2018.

2.

Rough Trade opened in Ladbroke Grove in 1976 and quickly became the epicentre for the London punk movement. So much so, shop founder Geoff Travis started Rough Trade Records – the record label that launched The Smiths, Stiff Little Fingers, The Libertines and many other pioneering rock bands. Rough Trade still trades in Ladbroke Grove while operating shops in Brick Lane, Bristol, Nottingham and a mega-store in Brooklyn, NYC.

3.

Up in Walthamstow, north east London, Small Wonder Records also opened in 1976 and also set up Small Wonder Records – issuing only 45 singles. The Cure, Bauhaus, Crass and the Cockney Rejects all released their debut singles on Small Wonder.

4.

Based in leafy Richmond, south west London, Beggars Banquet was a small chain of record shops that had been launched by Martin Mills in the early-1970s. Mills also saw the potential in having an in-shop record label and scored huge success with Gary Numan in the late-1970s. His Beggars Group are now the world’s foremost conglomerate of independent record labels and have taken the likes of The Prodigy and Adele from unknown to superstardom. Banquet Records continues to trade today in Richmond.

5.

Outside of Kingston, Jamaica, London is the world’s foremost city for reggae record shops: from a handful of Jamaican-owned shops at the start of the 1960s, by the late-1980s there were dozens of ‘dub shacks’ across the capital. Today around ten London reggae record shops continue to specialise in ska, rocksteady, reggae, dub and dancehall.

6.

Many famous musicians love to go record shopping in London. Amongst those noted for going out and buying hot wax are Jimi Hendrix, Marc Bolan, Mick Jagger, Paul Weller and Shirley Bassey.

7.

Rock On, a tiny record stall in a West London covered market that specialised in vintage rockabilly and R&B 45s, grew to become Ace Records, the world’s foremost reissue label of, well, rockabilly and R&B.

8.

When acid house took the UK by storm dozens of dance music shops set up across London selling house, techno, trance. Some of these were noted not only for selling tunes that got ravers raving but also the – ahem! – pills and pot they used to help conjure up altered states.

9.

21-year old Richard Branson set up the very first Virgin Records in January 1971 above a shoe shop in Oxford Street, London, after realising his magazine Student only made money from offering mail order rock albums. Catering to long haired students and hippies, Virgin Records made so much money Branson then set up the Virgin record label so beginning to build his empire.

10.

In 2021 London remains the world’s foremost city for record shops and Soho, Brixton, Ladbroke Grove, Hackney, Peckham and Camden are all home to a selection of dynamic independent record shops.

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Although Diana could be considered indulged, she was still a female child being raised in an age of male breadwinners and female homemakers. Men would generally hand over their wage packets to their wives; however, this is slightly deceiving as they often held back a significant percentage of their income for drinks down the pub and other such luxuries, while women ploughed the money into home and family.

When Diana set off on her London adventure at the age of fourteen to join the London Academy of Music & Dramatic Art, it was with the financial backing of her parents. Despite her father begrudgingly accepting Diana’s desire to take acting lessons, she was under a heavy burden of expectation. It was expected she would fail and return home to teach elocution lessons or become a secretary. Perhaps she would eventually marry the ‘decent sort of chap’ her father had in mind for his only daughter’s future.

Diana’s father kept his daughter under control by giving her just enough money for her accommodation at the YWCA, lunches, travel to and from the Academy each day, and weekly train fare home at the weekend. She defied everyone’s expectations and signed her first contract with the Rank Organisation. At this point she professed little interest in her income, and she allowed her father to take care of her finances. She said, ‘money was the last thing I cared about. My real concern was acting and making films’.

Diana earned extra money modelling for the Camera Club and she was often handed cash after completing acting assignments. It would be true to say she lived for the day, spending money on parties, ‘friends’ and the young men in her life. This was soon to change. Rank were having financial difficulties and eventually made their contract artistes, including Diana, redundant. Diana, unable to put the brakes on her spending, resorted to writing post dated cheques and borrowing money.

Around this time she met the man who would alter the direction of her career and change everything. Dennis Hamilton breezed into Diana’s life with devastating charm. Later she denied that she had ever been in love with him, but she clearly was under his influence. In 1951, within weeks of meeting him, he convinced her they should get married. It was here that Diana’s financial turmoil began in earnest. Their marriage would unfortunately result in her becoming as famous for her court appearances and bankruptcy exploits as for her acting career.

Dennis had an inability to live within his means. He took control of Diana’s life and career, making decisions on which jobs she could accept, disregarding her art, chasing the money, and turning down roles that would further Diana’s reputation as an actress. For example, he chose to accept cabaret and Revue roles on her behalf because they commanded a higher salary.

Their marriage was never built to last, but even after they separated Dennis managed her financial and business affairs. He purchased property, cars and a boat without consulting Diana in the decision making process.

When Dennis died suddenly in 1959 he left no assets to Diana. Although living separately, they had still been married, which resulted in Diana having to pick up the debts he had left behind. Diana carried the financial burden of Dennis’s debts over to her second marriage, claiming in her bankruptcy trial that when the marriage had ended she signed away £100,000 worth of assets ‘at the point of a gun’.

Diana continued the pattern of giving financial and career control to husband number two, British-American actor Richard ‘Dickie’ Dawson. She was once again the breadwinner of the family, and a working mother of two young sons, Mark and Gary. Diana’s work ethic was beyond reproach – she would do whatever it took too keep her children in the lifestyle they had become accustomed to whilst living in California.

Sadly, the marriage to Dickie was doomed and Diana returned to London, leaving her children with their father. Consequently, on her return Diana had to face the British taxman, as tax bills had been avoided by the men in charge of her finances over the years. Everything Diana had worked for had been left behind in California and her finances were a mess. However, she felt that she needed a home for her sons to stay when they were visiting.

A deal was struck. Diana would allow Dickie to divorce her, and he would keep custody of the boys and the family home in America, avoiding the reach of the British tax system. In return, Diana would have open visitation rights and would buy Orchard Manor, in Sunningdale, Berkshire, with money from the boy’s trust fund.

On 23 November 1968, Diana married her third and final husband, the actor Alan Lake, who famously declared ‘at least no one can say I’m marrying her for her money.’ Still broke, and despite difficult times, Diana took control of her finances. She insisted on being paid in cash, negotiated her own prices, and took jobs that many of her fellow Bombshells would have refused.

Years after Diana’s death in 1984, her son Mark took part in a documentary called Who Got Diana Dors’ Millions. Diana had allegedly stashed cash in secret bank accounts. Before she died she gave Mark a piece of paper with what appeared to be one half of a code Alan held the key to but sadly he died before the code could be fully unlocked.

By letting men take control of financial decisions Diana lived much of her life like many women of her era. However, she did break from these norms by eventually taking complete control of her money and her career. And who knows? Perhaps she really had been secreting away the millions she earned all along, and they are still tucked away in a place only she knows.

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Mark Gatiss talks about the actor Peter Wyngarde in Jason King ‘popping his cherry’ – that is, making him realise he was gay. What was the first television programme that made you think the same way?

I cannot think of a specific programme that made me realise I was gay, but when I was growing up I was drawn to strong working class women in TV dramas. These would include Ena Sharples and Elsie Tanner in Coronation Street. In 1970, when I was twelve, I bought a paperback book about the series and from this I read about the writer Tony Warren who created Coronation Street and Ena and Elsie. The book didn’t state that Warren was gay, but it was clear from the interview with him that he was. It intrigued me that a gay man had created what was then Britain’s most popular television show and some of its most iconic women characters came from him. In Playing Gay I quote from an interview with Tony Warren in which he acknowledges that some of the lines he scripted for Elsie Tanner in early episodes came straight from the mouths of gay men he befriended in Manchester in the late 1950s and early 1960s.

Which programme do you think has had the biggest impact on society?

Undoubtedly The Naked Civil Servant, first shown in 1975, has had the biggest impact on society. Everything about it is outstanding, including the script, acting, direction, sets, costumes, music. It has stood the test of time. It never fails to entertain, shock, raise a smile, move the viewer to tears. The main reason for this is John Hurt’s unforgettable portrayal of Quentin Crisp. As I have stated in Playing Gay, in 1975 this was the first television drama to portray the life of a gay man which was acceptable to the majority of its viewers.

The book is peppered with anecdotes from your own life – did you find that as the subject was so much a part of your childhood and adolescence it was hard to separate your memories from your research?

I found it very difficult to be objective. Fortunately, I do not write from a detached, ‘academic’ perspective. I avoid using academic theory and jargon. Apart from anthology and technology, there are no words ending in ‘ology’ in Playing Gay! I write from the heart, with careful attention to detail and the sources I use whether they be books, newspaper reviews, interviews or the actual programmes. Fortunately, I have managed to locate and view most of the television programmes cited in Playing Gay. Some of them no longer exist, but quite a number have survived in the archives.

If you had to pick a favourite, which character from the Golden Age is the most important to you and why?

There are several gay characters in television dramas that have made an impression on me but two that are memorable and have stayed with me are Lola, the gay transvestite in Crown Court (1976). Brilliantly portrayed by Philip Sayer, Lola is falsely accused of importuning an undercover, plain-clothes police officer in a gay club. However, Lola is determined to prove his innocence. Defiant, with a tremendous belief in himself, Lola is a champion of gay individuality and confidence in an era when we, as a community, were still misunderstood, despised and spat upon by society. I would also like to mention John Bury, beautifully played by Joseph O’Conor in the remarkable play Only Connect (1979), written by Gay Sweatshop’s Noel Greig and Drew Griffiths. He is an older gay man, living in retirement in a mining town, who recalls a love affair he had in his youth with Edward Carpenter (1844-1929), the English writer and Utopian socialist.

Playing Gay’s early roots are in Out of the Archives, a season at the BFI Southbank that you curated in the 90s. Twenty-seven years have passed since this began; what, to you, was the best thing you found in your research?

The best thing I ever found was Only Connect. I first saw it when Its producer W Stephen Gilbert screened it for me at his home. He had kept a private recording on videotape. In 1992, when I launched Out of the Archives at the National Film Theatre, I screened it for the public for the first time since its transmission thirteen years earlier. I love Only Connect, which is why I have included a chapter about it in Playing Gay, as well as a tribute to the late Drew Griffiths, who was taken from us too soon. In Playing Gay I have said: ‘The Naked Civil Servant and Only Connect are two sides of the same coin. The former is all about oppression, individuality, fighting, and Only Connect is about loving, but this was the breakthrough.’

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Born in Linlithgow Palace on 8 December 1542 and pronounced queen six days later when her father, James VI, died with no male heirs, Mary’s life was set to be a difficult one. After spending the first five years of her life in Scotland, she was sent to France where she spent 13 years at the French court and married the first of her three husbands: Francis II of France.

Mary would rule as Queen consort of France for only 17 months until Francis suddenly died on 5 December 1560 of a middle ear infection that led to an abscess in his brain. Nine months later a grief-stricken Mary returned to Scotland where her Catholicism attracted suspicion in the Protestant country. When she was later accused of plotting the murder of her second husband, Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, and went on to marry the man who was believed to have carried out the deed, James Hepburn, 4th Earl of Bothwell, the Scots forced Mary to abdicate in favour of her son, the future James VI of Scotland and I of England.

Mary fled to England, expecting her cousin Elizabeth I to help her reclaim her throne, but instead Mary was kept prisoner in England from 1568 until her execution in 1587, accused of plotting to assassinate Elizabeth and place herself on the English throne.

Since her execution, Mary’s character has been debated time and time again. Was she a victim or a villain? Whoever she was, we continue to be fascinated with her story.

Mary has inspired books, operas, plays, songs, television series and continues to inspire filmmakers, but who portrayed her best? Take a look at the seven actresses below and decide for yourself!

Mary of Scotland (1936)

Mary, Queen of Scots (1971)

Gunpowder, Treason & Plot (2004)

Elizabeth I (2005)

Elizabeth: The Golden Age (2007)

Reign (2013-2017)

Mary, Queen of Scots (2018)

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The Wizard of Oz may have done its best to exploit the possibilities of Technicolor at a time when most films were black and white, but it was branded as ‘ugly’ by The Times reviewer in 1940. The paper’s anonymous critic did not even think the young Judy Garland or the song Over the Rainbow worth a mention, though he was happy to share his views on just how vulgar the whole thing looked. ‘The scenery and dresses are designed with no more taste than is commonly used in the decoration of a night-club,’ was the slightly sniffy assessment.

There was some hope at least for the young Scottish actor playing a secret agent called James Bond in an adaptation of Ian Fleming’s spy novel Dr No. ‘Perhaps Mr Sean Connery will, with practice, get the ‘feel’ of the part a little more surely than he does here,’ wrote The Times reviewer in an un-bylined review. It was actually written by Dudley Carew, poet, novelist, cricket aficionado, friend of Evelyn Waugh and the principal film reviewer for The Times from the 1940s to the early 1960s.

As for the addition of speech to films, that was deemed something of a distraction from the visuals. And it seemed there was a very real risk of confusing the audience. ‘All the special subtlety of acting which is peculiar to the film has been sacrificed, we feel, for a poor imitation of the stage,’ said The Times review of The Jazz Singer in 1928.

The job of the film critic is a tough one, offering judgment on a film from one single viewing, whereas history, television, video and DVD have provided the public with the chance to reassess such duds as The Wizard of Oz and It’s a Wonderful Life. And of course tastes change too, for many of the films that attracted critical disdain on first appearance were also shunned by the public when they came out.

‘It is all very loud and overpowering,’ said Dudley Carew in his review of It’s a Wonderful Life, ‘and at the end the audience feels as though it had been listening to a large man of boisterous good nature talking at the top of his voice for over two hours.’ It’s a Wonderful Life lost money on its original release. It was only in the 1980s that its popularity really took off, after the copyright holders failed to renew the rights – television stations could show it and video companies bring out cassettes without having to pay anyone. ‘It’s the damnedest thing I’ve ever seen,’ said director Frank Capra. ‘The film has a life of its own.’

Much of the fun in editing The Times on Cinema was reading those early reviews, which underline just how subjective the film criticism process is, and how distance and new technology, along with changing tastes and values, have given so many films a second chance to work their way into the hearts of the viewing public. In some cases films, damned at best with faint praise on original release, have been recognised not just as classic movies but have, in the case of The Wizard of Oz, James Bond and Carry On, become cultural landmarks.

In many instances The Times on Cinema juxtaposes original reviews with later rather more positive reassessments. So could some of the films disdained by critics in recent years be the classics of the future? I could not resist the temptation of juxtaposing a couple of reviews of Brief Encounter, described as a ‘subtle and deeply moving drama’ in Kate Muir’s 2015 reassessment, alongside a review of Fifty Shades of Grey, which Muir reckoned ‘starts out hilarious, becomes ludicrous and is finally dubious’. Perhaps it too will be reassessed at some future point. But it is doubtful.

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Such shows were typically aimed at an audience gathered around the rented set in the corner of the living room, with no means of recording the show for a later date. The advent of early home VCRs and the flowering of the local “video library” – typically found in the village electrical shop – seemed to mark the beginning of the end to this era of television.

Some of the medium’s seasonal tropes – the broadcasts of Billy Smart’s Circus or the BBC Pantomime – lasted well into the 1970s but their roots date from the time when the medium’s raison d’être was presenting a live spectacle. On Christmas Day 1965 William Hartnell’s Doctor, – part H G Wells scientist, part caterpillar from Alice in Wonderland – addresses the camera to wish a happy Christmas to those ‘at home’; it is a thousand pities that the episode is “missing, believed wiped”.

To view footage of black and white TV broadcasts of the 1950s or 1960s, with its shadowed sets, is to have the impression that one is witnessing a ghost world not so far removed from the Victorians. By 1958 the BBC Television Christmas Party had evolved into Christmas Night with the Stars, which remained a Corporation fixture for more than a decade. The final edition aired in 1972 and it seems faintly bizarre to see The Goodies, Cilla Black and Lulu in colour as it is a show that will be forever associated with bottles of Wincarnis and rousing numbers from Billy Cotton and His Band. David Nixon and Jack Warner were the perfect hosts, as they both conveyed the air of an amiable 19th-century paterfamilias hosting an afternoon of party games and although in 1964 the line-up may have included The Baron Knights but the ethos is still close to the magic lantern.

Only a handful of editions of Christmas Night with the Stars survive as fortunately does one gem from 1957. Hancock’s 43 Minutes – The East Cheam Repertory Company shows the Tony Hancock/Sidney James partnership at its finest. The joy of the show is not in some of the acts, or even the guest star is John Gregson but that it is presented within the context of the Railway Cuttings partnership. Hancock is resplendent in a white dinner jacket as he opens the show– only to discover that Sid has spent almost the entire budget of £2,500 leaving only 9d. The result is our hero having to introduce the sort of acts that brought about the death of Variety, especially John Vere’s spectacularly useless magician “Arnold” and the stunningly inept jugglers of Johnny Vyvyan and Mario Fabrizi. All the while, James is on hand to offer to reassure Hancock that matters will undoubtedly improve. They probably will not, of course, but Hancock knows that Sid is always reliably unreliable.

Another vital element of Christmas television was the festive edition of a BBC1 or ITV sitcom which, by the late 1970s, was an integral part of the day as much as the boxes of Meltis Newbury Fruits and various adults passing out post-Queen’s Speech. The format seemed to be set in stone; opening credits festooned with holly, the theme tune augmented with a choir and a plot involving “The Boss” making a surprise appearance dressed as Santa Claus. Naturally, he would be embraced by “the Mother in Law” under the mistletoe, the latter having over-indulged with cooking sherry, just as Roger, the caddish (i.e. he wears a cravat) sales rep who lives next door makes a surprise appearance. With hilarious consequences.

The best of the festive sitcoms did not merely involve Christmas trees falling over or people sitting on plum puddings for no well-defined reason but expanded on the familiar characters. No-one who has ever seen Yes Minister will forget either Nigel Hawthorne’s delivery of Sir Humphrey’s seasonal greetings or the incredulous reaction of Paul Eddington to the following:

‘I wonder if I might crave your momentary indulgence in order to discharge a by no means disagreeable obligation which has, over the years, become more or less established practice within government circles as we approach the terminal period of the year…’

One of the best examples of the genre is The Twenty-Six Year Itch transmitted on 25th December 1979 as the final edition of George and Mildred. George and Mildred remains a much-underrated show, with Brian Murphy and Yootha Joyce creating a believable and very human married couple. The plot has George contemplating an affair with Beryl (the wonderful Patsy Rowlands), the new barmaid at the local pub but he could never face hurting Mildred. The sight of Murphy sat in the over-tinselled living room explaining that his marriage was not often happy ‘but sometimes that’s all you can expect’ conveys a sense of melancholy that would have wholly alien to Terry and June.

Perhaps the defining factors for a great Christmas comedy show are the investments of time, effort and imagination. The audience can innately sense when a show is the result of meticulous planning and execution. One of the highlights of the 1964 Christmas Night with the Stars was Benny Hill’s documentary spoof The Lonely One, concerning a Ton-Up boy delinquent “Willy Treader”, whose ambition is to be ‘someone important…like Albert Schweitzer or Screaming Lord Sutch’. The routine was possibly Hill’s finest creation as both writer and performer, a reminder of the great comedy actor who was largely overlooked by British cinema.

23 years later Mel Smith and Griff Rhys Jones in The Homemade Xmas Video was a reminder of suburban life at its most grim yet oddly life-affirming; at least the dreadful protagonists are enjoying themselves. It must also be said that the raid on the local forest involving a second-hand Austin Maxi getaway car is a highlight of 1980s television. At the end of the decade, The Jolly Boys’ Outing should have the natural conclusion to the misadventures of Derek and Rodney Trotter.

As a conclusion to this tribute to the ghosts of television past, Morecambe and Wise’s 1977 Christmas Special was their last and possibly greatest for the BBC. Above the quite incredible array of guests – Elton John, cast members of Dad’s Army and The Good Life, plus various dancing newsreaders – is the impression that every second on screen is the result of decades of experience. And in the opening Starsky and Hutch spoof, Eric’s look of utter bemusement as his police revolver becomes jammed in the umbrella of a passer-by is worth any number of Mrs. Brown’s Boys.

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