Photos by Paul Balmer, no reproduction without permission.
‘Trinity Tales’ was produced in Pebble Mill by David Rose in 1975. The six part drama was written by Alan Plater. It was a contemporary take on Geoffrey Chaucer’s ‘Canterbury Tales’. The series followed a group of rugby fans, who swap stories on their way to the Cup Final at Wembley.
Please comment if you can identify which of the ‘Trinity Tales’ these photos are from.
Bob Jacobs was the 1st Assistant Director on Trinity Tales. The Pebble Mill series, which went out in 1975, was written by Alan Plater as a contemporary take on Chaucer’s ‘Canterbury Tales’. It follows the stories of a group of fans on their way to the Rugby Cup Final at Wembley. As in the ‘Canterbury Tales’ they swap stories along the way.
David Rose was the Producer and Michael Simpson and Tristan de Vere Cole the Directors. It starred: Bill Maynard (Stan the fryer); Francis Matthews (Eric the prologue); Colin Farrell (Nick the driver); Gaye Brown (the wife of Batley Alice); John Stratton (the man of Law Smith); Susan Littler (Judy the Judy); Paul Copley (Dave the joiner); Peter Benson (Reuben)
Trinity Tales cast
Here are a few photos of Studio B taken in 2003. They include the Studio B production area, sound desk, vision and lighting desk, Calrec mixer, and Midlands Today Studio. This was my final tour of Pebble Mill. The building looked quite run down. It seemed such a shame that Pebble Mill was being demolished.
Studio B was used for News and Current Affairs. Midlands Today was broadcast seven days a week from here. On Sundays The Midlands at Westminster broadcast live.
The Multicultural Programmes Unit also used Studio B for recording interviews and music.
Studio B gallery was open plan to enable easy communication between production and the technical crew.
I starting working for the Film Unit in 1976. Back then Film was used for most location shooting. The sound was recorded on a Nagra tape recorder. One of my jobs was to copy from the tape to 16mmSepmag film. The film editor then synchronised this with the picture. After editing the sound and picture it was taken to the Dubbing Theatre. The edited Sepmag would now be on 3 or 4 rolls. The Dubbing mixer would balance speech, sound effects and music to produce the final mix. My job also sent me on location to assist the sound recordist. After a few years I moved to Milton Keynes. I helped set up the Dubbing Theatre at the BBC Open University Production Centre. After 2 years I was missing Pebble Mill. I moved back to Birmingham and joined the Audio Unit. I worked on many TV and radio programmes. I spent much of my time working on Midlands Today. I left the BBC in 1997. Pebble Mill was a very special place to work. I feel very privileged for working for the BBC at Pebble Mill.
Studio B Midlands Today Set
In this video Bob Jacobs talks about working as 1st Assistant Director on the 3 part drama series – ‘Vote for Them’, written by David Edgar. The photos were taken by Bob Jacobs and Bev Dartnall.
The series was set in Egypt as the Second World War was coming to a close. It was a political drama set amongst Allied troops as they consider what sort of world they want after the war and form “parties”, holding debates and elections.
The series went out in June 1989. It was shot on location in Cairo, with a sand quarry in Dorset also doubling as Egypt. The interiors were recorded in Pebble Mill Studio A.
Carol Parks was the producer, James Ormerod the director, with Michael Wearing as Executive Producer.
On location in Egypt
Photos by Lynda Kettle, no reproduction without permission. Lynda Kettle was a Production Designer at BBC Pebble Mill, working on factual, entertainment and drama shows in studio and on location. The photos were taken as records of the sets and locations.
Howard’s Way was produced by BBC London, but hosted out of Pebble Mill. It was recorded on location in Southampton, and the south coast, and in Studio A. The Sunday night drama series ran between 1985-1990, and was the BBC’s answer to Dynasty. The storyline follows Tom Howard who after being made redundant invests his time and money in a run down boat building yard. It starred Jan Harvey as Jan Howard, Stephen Yardley as Ken Masters, Glyn Owen as Jack Rolfe, Maurice Colbourne as Tom Howard and Kate O’Mara as Laura Wilde in later series. John William, Keith Salmon, Paul Woolston, Keith Froggatt, Dave Doogood, David Evans and Don Cooper all worked on the camera side. Lynda was production designer on 15 episodes in 1989-90.
These photos include several ‘before’ and ‘after’ shots of the initial locations (undressed), with the dressed version following on. The Southampton Civic Centre, re-dressed as Malta Airport is particularly impressive! The tank shots are really interesting. There are shots of the empty tank for the special effects storm, with shots of the full ‘storm’ and yacht in trouble!
Production Designer, Lynda Kettle also worked as a theatre designer and an artist, and now runs courses from her art studio http://www.lynda-kettle.com. She is a member of the Royal Birmingham Society of Artists, Birmingham Water Colour Society. Midland Pastel Society and Birmingham Art Circle . She exhibits her paintings several times a year at selected galleries.
