Scenic Workshop
Photos by Willoughby Gullachsen (Gus), no reproduction without permission.
These photos are of the Pebble Mill Scenic Workshop, where the studio sets were made. The Scenic Workshop opened onto Studio A, so that sets could easily be moved into place. You can see the studio doors in the lower photo.
Scenic Workshop
Photos by Willoughby Gullachsen, no reproduction without permission.
‘Airbase’ was produced at Pebble Mill in 1988 by Keith Williams and Roger Gregory. The script was written by Malcolm McKay and directed by David Attwood. It was recorded in Studio A, and involved bringing a fighter plane into the studio.
The drama starred Anton Lesser, Clive Mantle, Catherine Russell, David Lansbury and Ricco Ross. Catherine played Madeline Kohler, a young female American Air Force officer, who is posted to the all-male world of a U.S. airbase in Britain. The drama follows four days in her life.
The BBC 1 drama raised considerable controversy with its unflattering portrayal of life on a U.S. airbase, particularly concerning drug use. It even caused questions to be asked in Parliament by Lord Chalfont.
These photos are probably by Willoughby Gullachsen, and have been given by Maggie Humphries from Film Unit. No reproduction of the photos without permission.
BBC Pebble Mill was home of the BBC’s multicultural programmes.
The photos show a location shoot for the Asian magazine strand: ‘New Life’. They date from the 1980s, when the inserts were still shot on film. The sound recordist shown is Alex Christison, and cameraman Steve Saunderson, the camera assistant Ian Churchill, and the PA Jayne Savage. Standing on the stairs in the tie is the director/producer, Waseem Mahmood. The programme was a documentary on the first Asian model, Safira. Nigel Pardoe-Matthews was the film editor.
The documentary was an occasional 30min special as part of the New Life strand. Waseem made three in the six years that he was at Pebble Mill: “Safira” about the model, a film about Asian Ballerina Nicola Katrak and a special where Marion Foster interviewed Ravi Shankar… the latter got a prime time slot on BBC2.
‘New Life’ from 1981 was called ‘Asian Magazine ‘- this must have been when Ashok Rampal took over as Executive Producer.
Please add a comment if you can identify other people in the stills, or can add more information.
The Battle of Waterloo
Photograph by Willoughby Gullachsen, no reproduction without permission.
The photo features (left) Martin Carthy, playing ‘Wolfhound’ and (far right) Peter Benson as ‘Sniffer’. Please add a comment if you can identify the middle actor. Other actors to star were Warren Clarke as ‘Slewpot’, Dave Atkins as ‘Bamber’, and Dai Bradley as ‘Ferris’.
‘The Battle of Waterloo’ was a live studio drama, written by Keith Dewhurst and produced at Pebble Mill in 1983. It was produced and directed by Robin Midgley, the production associate was Dawn Robertson, with Bob Jacobs as the production manager. Phyllida Lloyd (who went on to direct the film Mama Mia) was the AFM, Jenny Brewer the PA, Peter Ansorge & Roger Gregory the script editors, Roger Sutton the vision mixer and Dave Doogood the camera supervisor.
Photos by Willoughby Gullachsen, no reproduction without permission.
‘Kinsey’ was a drama which ran for 2 series about a maverick Midlands’ lawyer: Kinsey, played by Leigh Lawson. Peter Gibbs wrote the script, Richard Standeven was the director and Carol Parks the producer. Barry Hanson was the executive producer. ‘Kinsey’ was produced at Pebble Mill in 1991 and 1992.
The first photo features Kinsey, played by Leigh Lawson, with Minnie Driver. This still was taken during filming of the last episode: ‘Conflicts of Interest’, which went out on 8/12/92.
The second photo shows the crew recording a tracking shot. (Left to right) John Kenway (camera), Rob Southam (focus Puller), Kevin Williams, Herbie Donnelly (sparks), Monica Heath (1st AD), at the corner of the building Richard Standeven (director), Mike Hobson, & Andrew Smith.