Feed Editor 6 May 2008 19:58:40 GMT Whirligig presents news items about the programmes which were broadcast to our televisons and radio sets back in the Fifties in the UK. There are also news items about the stars and celebrities of that era and links to other websites of relevent interest. News of what is new on the Whirligig website is also available here. http://www.whirligig-tv.co.uk Copyright (c) 2005 Whirligig.TV, All rights reserved en-gb http://www.whirligig-tv.co.uk/tv/whirligig.gif http://www.whirligig-tv.co.uk Disillusioned with the experience of regular unemployment as an actor in Britain, in 1959 Bernard Archard booked a seat on the next boat to Canada, with plans to make a new start. But then he was asked to audition for the starring role in Spycatcher, as Lt-Col Oreste Pinto, a wartime Allied counter-espionage expert. The programme, which ran to four series, finally made Archard a star at the age of 43 and he became a prolific character actor in films and on television. Following his success in Spycatcher, Archard was frequently typecast as policemen, in long-forgotten films such as The Clue of the New Pin (1960), Man Detained (1961), The Silent Playground (1963) and The List of Adrian Messenger (1963). On television, he was HM Inspector of Constabulary on official visits to the police stations in both Z Cars (1965) and its spin-off, Softly Softly (1967). 6 May 2008 19:58:25 GMT http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/bernard-archard-star-of-the-tv-series-spycatcher-821630.html After spending the Second World War as an officer in the Grenadier Guards, Lyttelton became a pioneering figure in the British jazz scene. He formed his first band in 1948 after spending a year with George Webb's Dixielanders, a band that pioneered New Orleans-style jazz in the UK. The Humphrey Lyttelton Band quickly became Britain's leading traditional jazz group, and continental tours gave them a following in Europe. In 1949, he signed a recording contract with EMI which led to a string of records in the Parlophone Super Rhythm Style series and which have become highly sought after. By the late 1950s he was branching out, enlarging his band and experimenting with mainstream and non-traditional material, and shocking his established fans in the process. In 1959, the band made a successful tour of the United States. He was a keen amateur calligrapher and birdwatcher, and in 1984 formed his own record label, Calligraph. He composed more than 120 original songs during his career. In 1993 he won the radio industry's highest honour, a Sony Gold Award. He also won lifetime achievement awards at the Post Office British Jazz Awards in 2000, and the inaugural BBC Jazz Awards the following year. It was in 1972 that, against his better judgement, he took on the chairmanship of Radio Four’s I’m Sorry I Haven’t a Clue. Nobody imagined that his role, somewhat like a naïve and despairing schoolmaster who was forced to read out double entendres that he never understood, would last for the rest of his life. His sharp humour was hilarious and yet without malice. 28 Apr 2008 17:58:24 GMT http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?&xml=/news/2008/04/26/db2604.xml Hazel Court was born in England in 1926 and became one of the 'Gainsborough girls' at the Gainsborough production company in the 1940s, but significant screen roles were to elude her until her induction into the horror genre, notably in the Hammer Film The Curse Of Frankenstein(1957), where she played the evil count's unwanted suitor. Though appearing in the intervening period in the horror classic The Man Who Could Cheat Death (1959), her enduring popularity was initiated by her involvement in Roger Corman's 'Poe cycle' of films. Of these films, Court appeared in The Premature Burial (1962), The Raven (1963) and The Masque Of The Red Death (1964), in each case starring alongside Vincent Price - and giving him a hard time; Court's 'Poe' roles found her playing conspiring and treacherous women, and at her worst she was at her best...in the eyes of her many fans. In later years, Court took an interest in painting and the arts, exhibiting in the USA and in Europe. 18 Apr 2008 07:39:07 GMT http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?&xml=/news/2008/04/18/db1803.xml Johnston's first work was as an "in-betweener" - the artist responsible for the drawings that appear between the extremes of an action drawn by an animator - on Mickey's Garden (1935), the second colour Mickey Mouse short. The following year, he was promoted to apprentice animator, working under Fred Moore on such shorts as Pluto's Judgment Day and Mickey's Rival. Under Moore, Johnston became assistant animator on Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937), responsible for drawing the dwarfs (which Thomas was also working on). By Pinocchio (1940) he had progressed to animator, and supervised the Blue Fairy sequence. The same year he was in charge of the Pastoral Symphony section of Fantasia before joining Thomas, who had done preliminary work on Bambi. As well as the young Bambi segments, Johnston (credited as supervising animator) developed Thumper. Johnston was also responsible for the animation of the young Bambi. He drew the stepsisters in Cinderella (1950); Alice and the King of Hearts in Alice in Wonderland (1951); and, two years later, Mr Smee in Peter Pan. After the good fairies in Sleeping Beauty (1959) and 101 Dalmatians, Johnston and Thomas did some of their best work in The Sword in the Stone (1963), for which Johnston was responsible for all the leading characters. The following year Thomas did the dancing penguins in Mary Poppins; Johnston drew the ones who were waiters. 16 Apr 2008 07:42:46 GMT http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?&xml=/news/2008/04/16/db1601.xml Widely remembered for his excessive corpulence on stage and television, Willoughby Goddard spent over 40 years never trying to disguise it. It brought him authority, variety, monotony and joy. Whether he was genial or aggressive, alarming or soothing, he could be cast in all sorts of moods. Sometimes he played up self-consciously to his weightiness; sometimes it hardly mattered. He could play judges, professors, mayors, landlords, managing directors and chairmen; he could also play sundry characters of no importance whatever. On television he created first a fine impression as Professor Mark Harrison in The Voices; and in the Adventures of William Tell he put the shivers up watchers as the hero's splendidly weighty main protagonist Landberger Gessler. As Sir Jason Tovey in The Mind of Mr Reeder he was well cast; and as the monstrous Lord Charley, who sought artistic grants from Hattie Jacques as Miss Manger, it was said that “he knew his business”. With Charlie Drake in Drake's Progress Goddard found a strong sense of fun, and one of his last appearances was as Professor Siblington, last seen watching from the elegant spires of an English college in Porterhouse Blue (1987). 15 Apr 2008 07:42:18 GMT http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?&xml=/news/2008/04/15/db1502.xml Four new video clips in the 1950's Commercials series on the website have been added. They are one of the Esso Blue Dealer series along with Rael-Brook Shirts and two OXO ads, the first featuring Sooty with Harry Corbett and the other being one of the first of the Katie and Philip series 13 Apr 2008 17:47:23 GMT The actor John Hewer won worldwide fame playing Captain Birdseye in the long-running fish finger TV commercials. He played the role from 1967 until the late 1980s. The jovial, bearded naval captain outlasted the Milky Bar Kid and Ronald MacDonald to become the longest running "brand personality" since food advertising began. Hewer worked his way up to parts in the films The Dark Man (1951, a melodrama in which his taxi-driver character falls victim to Maxwell Reed's seaside murderer) and the thriller Assassin for Hire (1951, as a violinist whose instrument and lessons are paid for by his brother, a professional killer). He then landed the title role in the BBC children's series The Great Detective (1953), playing it for the first four episodes, with Graham Stark taking over for the final two – curiously, with no explanation for the switch. At about the same time, Hewer took the role of John Parrish, the bank clerk wrongly suspected of being involved in a heist, in the first episode of the crime series Colonel March of Scotland Yard (1955-56), which starred the horror actor Boris Karloff as an eyepatch-wearing detective investigating eerie cases involving criminals known by names such as the Abominable Snowman and the Missing Link. During his career, the actor also produced music-hall shows on Southend Pier with the bandleader Henry Hall, and he was hired by Canadian television to host the variety show The Pig and Whistle (1967-77), set in a fictional, traditional English pub and featuring British music-hall entertainment. 20 Mar 2008 07:53:22 GMT http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article3575398.ece Barry Morse made his professional début in the People's Theatre production If I Were King while at Rada and finished his time at drama school by taking the title role in Henry V for a Royal Command Performance in front of George VI and Queen Elizabeth. Then, in 1937, he made his first television appearances in some of the BBC's earliest broadcasts. He made his film début as a stooge to Will Hay in the wartime espionage comedy The Goose Steps Out (1942) and followed it with character roles in pictures such as Thunder Rock (1942) and When We Are Married (1943). Morse's West End début came in School for Slavery (Westminster Theatre, 1942), which he followed with Crisis in Heaven (Lyric Theatre, 1944) directed by John Gielgud. In 1951, Morse, his wife and their two children emigrated to Canada, settling in Toronto when CBC introduced the country's first television service the following year, with Morse working as an actor, producer and director. Over the years, he won Canada's Best TV Actor award five times, but he was also prolific on radio, most notably acting in and producing the drama series A Touch of Greasepaint (1954-68), a chronicle of actors down the years. But he became known worldwide through The Fugitive, also directing a 1967 episode, before moving back to London and playing Mr Parminter, the secret service contact issuing assignments to an American government agent played by Gene Barry, in the British series The Adventurer (1972-73). 5 Feb 2008 19:57:20 GMT http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article3307612.ece The first love of BBC Radio producer Richard Willcox was music hall and variety, and for many years he produced the famous Billy Cotton Band Show. The programme, which was broadcast from 1949 to 1968, became a national institution and was as much a part of the traditional Sunday lunchtime as roast beef. Cotton, a former racing driver, was a larger-than-life character who started each show with the cry “Wakey-Wakey!”. This was followed by the band's signature tune, Somebody Stole My Girl. Willcox revealed that Cotton's catchphrase originated in the days when the band had toured the country the week prior to Sunday morning rehearsal. Cotton would arrive in the BBC studio to find weary band members nodding off. “Oi, come on,” he roared. “Wakey! Wakey!” Noting its effect on everyone, it was suggested by a BBC executive that that was how the show should begin. When the series finished Willcox's knowledge and love of light entertainment made him a natural choice for producing other radio series such as The Windsor Davies Show and The Impressionists. During his long career with BBC Radio he held several posts including assistant head of light entertainment and, prior to taking early retirement. 5 Jan 2008 08:45:02 GMT http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article3133357.ece While working at a job in the sound effects department of NBC Radio, Melvin did a nightclub act and appeared and won on the Arthur Godfrey's Talent Scouts radio show. While appearing on Broadway in Stalag 17, he got his break into television by getting the role of Cpl. Henshaw on the popular The Phil Silvers Show program. TV fans of this era usually best remember his role as Henshaw, Sergeant Bilko's right hand man on that show. During this period, in addition to his role on The Phil Silvers Show, Melvin was often cast in slightly loud, occasionally abrasive, but generally friendly second banana roles. Melvin was also adept at "tough guy" roles; in an example of his range as an actor, one episode of Sergeant Bilko featured Melvin doing a recognizable impersonation of Humphrey Bogart. The jowly, jovial Melvin spent decades playing a series of sidekicks, second bananas and lovable lugs, including Archie Bunker's friend Barney Hefner on "All in the Family". But his place in pop culture will be fixed as butcher and bowler Sam Franklin, the love interest of Brady family maid Alice Nelson, who was played by Ann B. Davis. Melvin played the role from 1970 to 1973. 25 Jan 2008 07:52:04 GMT Allan Melvin, character actor has died aged 84 Pat Kirkwood's career spanned more than six decades and she played the lead roles in the West End shows of Noel Coward, Cole Porter and Leonard Bernstein. After appearing in a talent contest on the Isle of Man she was invited to an audition with the BBC in Manchester She made her professional debut, aged 14, as a singer on the BBC radio programme The Children's Hour. A year later, in April 1936, she made her first stage appearance at the Royal Hippodrome, Salford, billed as The Schoolgirl Songstress. The following year she starred in her debut film - Save a Little Sunshine. After the success of the revue Black Velvet at the London Hippodrome in 1939 she was hailed as "Britain's first wartime star". She became the first female to have her own television series with The Pat Kirkwood Show in 1954 and also appeared in various TV plays. In Our Marie (1953) she played the music hall star Marie Lloyd; she also appeared in Pygmalion (1956) and The Great Little Tilley (1956) as another music hall star, Vesta Tilley, which was directed by Hubert Gregg and subsequently became the film After The Ball (1957). In 1953, she was reunited with George Formby on the panel of What's My Line but was seen on screen feeding Formby questions to ask the contestants. 29 Dec 2007 09:04:49 GMT http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;?&xml=/news/2007/12/29/db2901.xml 1957 was a very special year for the British Monarchy. It had already become an annual tradition for the monarch to issue a Christmas message to people in the United Kingdom and around the world. But fifty years ago this Christmas, Queen Elizabeth II's message was televised for the first time. In her broadcast, the Queen spoke about the technological developments that allowed her image to appear in people's homes around the nation, saying that "I very much hope that this new medium will make my Christmas message more personal and direct. That it is possible for some of you to see me today is just another example of the speed at which things are changing all around us." This Christmas, fifty years later, the British Monarchy embraced another new technology by launching The Royal Channel on YouTube. 25 Dec 2007 10:12:36 GMT http://www.youtube.com/theroyalchannel Anton Rogers was a member of the helicopter crew that provided the focus for the BBC comedy series The Sky Larks (1958). During the 1960s and early 1970s Rodgers secured fairly regular employment as a guest star in Lew Grade's contemporary thriller series, including Danger Man (1964-65), The Saint (1967) and The Champions (1968). He was a Scotland Yard detective who teams up with astrologer Anoushka Hempel in the light-hearted series Zodiac (1974), another policeman in the comic mystery series Murder Most English (1977), Lillie Langry's weak-willed spouse who has to turn a blind eye while she conducts an affair with the Prince of Wales, in Lillie (1978) and a country practice vet in Noah's Ark (1997). Few of his TV series attained the status of true classics, though Fresh Fields and May to December scored well in the ratings. Fresh Fields was sufficiently popular for Thames Television to reunite Rodgers and Julia McKenzie in their old roles of William and Hester Fields, in a new setting, in French Fields (1989-91) . 4 Dec 2007 18:57:32 GMT http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;j?&xml=/news/2007/12/03/db0301a.xml In 1956 she landed her first job in television, as a £7-a-week secretary in Granada's press office. Sacked after six months, she moved to ABC Television where she became production assistant to the drama director Ted Kotcheff and worked on the production of the Armchair Theatre series, overseen by the company's new head of drama, Sydney Newman. As production assistant in a "live" gallery, Lambert had to take over as studio director in November 1958 when one of the actors died on the set of the play Underground, just before a scene in which he was supposed to appear. Meanwhile Kotcheff used a commercial break to reorganise the cast and cover the loss. At the age of 28, she became the youngest producer at the BBC and the drama department's only woman producer when Doctor Who began the day after President Kennedy was assassinated in November 1963. After 18 months Lambert moved on to produce the first eight episodes of the twice-weekly serial The Newcomers (1965-69), about a London family adapting to life in a small East Anglian town, and then supervised production on Adam Adamant Lives! (1966-67). 24 Nov 2007 12:27:01 GMT http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;?&xml=/news/2007/11/24/db2401.xml Frank Cox was the identical twin of Fred Cox who, as the Cox Twins, were one of British variety's most enduring acts. Stalwarts of the RAF gang shows during the Second World War, they played four instruments, sang, tap-danced and performed acrobatics. After the war and until their retirement in 2000 they were regulars at the London Palladium, notably supporting Johnny Ray, starred in summer seasons and pantomimes and made several films, including the 1972 version of Alice in Wonderland with Peter Sellers, in which they appeared as Tweedledum and Tweedledee. The twins had irresistible, ebullient personalities. Sporting huge black frizzy hairstyles, they wore brightly coloured garish suits (complete with red or yellow socks) and were liable to burst into song at the drop of a hat. They were virtually impossible to tell apart and in conversation one twin would start a sentence while the other would finish it. In the 1960s they complicated matters further by getting married on the same day to the variety artistes Estelle and Pauline Miles, who were also identical twins. 22 Nov 2007 11:12:56 GMT http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/obituaries/article2909594.ece As an actress, Moira Lister was once compared to the American comedienne Lucille Ball, because of her way of turning glamorous women into witty commentators on life. Whether it was in a play, musical, film or television drama or even as a guest on such TV shows as What's My Line?, Call My Bluff and Life Begins at Forty, she stood apart with her slim figure, bright blue eyes and delicate, upper-class voice. She was an accomplished actress whose regal bearing found her often cast in patrician roles, though she also had a splendid sense of humour and a versatility that ranged from acclaimed performances in Shakespearean tragedy to her award-winning display of farcical expertise in Move Over, Mrs Markham. In 1954, Moira first teamed up with Tony Hancock in the second series of "Star Bill". She was brought into "Star Bill" to replace Hancock's previous lady foil of the first series, Geraldine McEwan. With considerable film experience behind her, Moira's strong personality proved her to be an ideal match for Hancock. Her distinctive, husky voice made Lister a radio stalwart in such series as Simon and Laura and A Life of Bliss, and in South Africa her radio roles included the leading parts in Rain, The Deep Blue Sea (she had earlier played a supporting role in the film version) and The Millionairess. On television, she was a sparkling critic of record releases in Juke Box Jury, and she was a guest on such shows as Danger Man, Call My Bluff and The Avengers. For three years, 1967-69, she starred in her own series, A Very Merry Widow. In 1971 she was the subject of This Is Your Life, and her autobiography, A Very Merry Moira, was published in 1969. 29 Oct 2007 19:38:44 GMT http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;?&xml=/news/2007/10/30/db3002.xml Deborah Kerr was the unfadingly ladylike and prototypical English rose whose red-haired, angular beauty and self-possessed femininity distinguished more than 50 films in four decades of cinema. She made serenity dramatic; and though her poise might be ruffled at critical moments in scenes of passion (most famously exemplified by her encounter on the beach with Burt Lancaster in From Here to Eternity in 1953), her well-bred airs and social graces made her a model of British womanhood in Hollywood. Her best-known film was probably The King and I, in which she played a haughty governess opposite Yul Brynner's Siamese monarch; and her principal problem as an accomplished actress was to convince Hollywood of her sensual potential. Although she herself was a more spirited, relaxed and informal person than her image on the screen suggested, producers were reluctant to cast her in passionate roles. 19 Oct 2007 08:29:41 GMT http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;?&xml=/news/2007/10/18/db1804.xml Sooty is going on sale. TV rights to the mischevious puppet bear, who never speaks, are being sold by his owners Hit Entertainment. The puppet, famous for his magic tricks and water pistol, has been on British TV since the Fifties, alongside his friends Sweep the squeaky dog and Soo the panda. Hit Entertainment, which also produces Bob the Builder, Pingu and Thomas the Tank Engine, is said to have lost money after buying it in 1996 for £1.4 million from presenter Matthew Corbett. A new series of Sooty was cancelled by ITV last year. 5 Oct 2007 19:42:24 GMT http://media.guardian.co.uk/broadcast/story/0,,2183312,00.html Wearing white face paint, soft shoes and a battered hat topped with a red flower, Marceau played the entire range of human emotions onstage for more than 50 years, never uttering a word. Offstage, however, he was famously chatty. "Never get a mime talking. He won't stop," he once said. A French Jew, Marceau survived the Holocaust and also worked with the French Resistance to protect Jewish children. His biggest inspiration was Charlie Chaplin. Marceau, in turn, inspired countless young performers. Michael Jackson borrowed his famous "moonwalk" from a Marceau sketch, "Walking Against the Wind." In 1949 Marceau's newly formed mime troupe was the only one of its kind in Europe. But it was only after a hugely successful tour across the United States in the mid-1950s that Marceau received the acclaim that would make him an international star. Marceau performed tirelessly around the world until late in life, never losing his agility, never going out of style. In one of his most poignant and philosophical acts, "Youth, Maturity, Old Age, Death," he wordlessly showed the passing of an entire life in just minutes 24 Sep 2007 21:58:50 GMT http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;?&xml=/news/2007/09/24/db2402.xml Scott was an award-winning producer behind many classic television series of the 1960s and 1970s including The Avengers, The Prisoner, The Troubleshooters and The Onedin Line; he was also a talented director in television and films. An energetic perfectionist, Scott was one of the pioneers of television drama, joining the BBC as a trainee after the war before moving to ITV when it launched in 1955. Scott had cut his teeth with Associated-Rediffusion during ITV's early years, directing, in Battle of Britain Week 1956, an acclaimed live production of Richard Hillary's Second World War classic The Last Enemy. Scott secured, for cash, the television rights to The Quare Fellow after an evening's heavy drinking with Brendan Behan in a London pub; it was broadcast live in November 1958, one of many plays Scott produced and directed during what he considered "the best years of ITV". Scott had begun his career as a film editor on Brighton Rock (1947), starring Richard Attenborough, and later worked on other films such as The Perfect Woman and Landfall (both 1949), Shadow Of The Eagle (1950), The Small Miracle (1951) and River Beat (1954). As a writer, Scott scripted Sing Along With Me (1952), which he also directed, The Big Chance (1957) and, in 1979, the ITV serial Kidnapped, which he also produced. His producing credits also included The Citadel (1960), The Curse Of King Tutenkhamun's Tomb (1980), Arch Of Triumph and Jenny's War (both 1985). 11 Aug 2007 21:33:02 GMT http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;?&xml=/news/2007/08/11/db1101.xml Peter Tuddenham's earliest television appearances included parts in Clara, The Maid of Durham: Or Home Sweet Home (1955) and the BBC's "Musical Playhouse" Ivor Novello productions The Dancing Years (as Franzel, 1959) and Perchance To Dream (as Lord Failsham, 1959). He also had several roles in soap opera, on radio in Mrs Dale's Diary (as Dr Mitchell, who famously once sat on Mrs Freeman's cat) and Waggoners' Walk, and as George Banham in ITV's East Anglian vets serial Weavers Green (1966). On television, Tuddenham was a regular as the pub landlord in Backs to the Land (1977-78) and as William in Double First (1988). He also guest-starred as priests in the sitcom Nearest and Dearest (1968) and the P.D. James thriller A Mind To Murder (1995), and played doctors in Quiller (1975), The Lost Boys (1978) and Nanny (1981, 1982) and an auctioneer in Lovejoy (1986). At the age of 60, after spending more than half his adult life as an actor, Peter Tuddenham became most familiar to television viewers as the voices of three computers in the cult science-fiction serial Blakes 7. 9 Aug 2007 09:39:10 GMT http://news.independent.co.uk/people/obituaries/article2846531.ece