Happy birthday Frankie!!
Wednesday 27 May 2015
Happy Birthday Frankie
As it was Frankie Manning's birthday and world lindy hop day yesterday, thought I'd share a a few of my favourite songs of the moment.
Happy birthday Frankie!!
Happy birthday Frankie!!
Wednesday 13 May 2015
London Lindy Exchange
A belated post about LLX over the May bank holiday weekend.
It was amazing. As ever. Gordon Webster was amazing. As to be expected. The Shirt Tail Stompers were amazing. Again, as to be expected. I was asked to dance loads. Amazing because despite fact I've been dancing for nearly four years I still get nervous asking for dances! Every dance I had was amazing. Total win.
There isn't much more to say. LLX is, and will always be one of my favourite dance events.
It was amazing. As ever. Gordon Webster was amazing. As to be expected. The Shirt Tail Stompers were amazing. Again, as to be expected. I was asked to dance loads. Amazing because despite fact I've been dancing for nearly four years I still get nervous asking for dances! Every dance I had was amazing. Total win.
 |
| The only two pictures my friend and I have from the event, clearly having far too much fun dancing to think about posing. How unlike me! |
There isn't much more to say. LLX is, and will always be one of my favourite dance events.
Happy Birthday Barts!
Last month speakeasy, Barts, in South Kensington celebrated their sixth birthday.
Barts was the first project from Inception Group (who also own Cahoots, Mr Fogg's and Maggie's) , and is credited with putting the American speakeasy trend firmly on the map in London, being one of the first of its kind to open in London.
I was lucky enough to go along to the evening and help celebrate by raising a glass (more like 6!) of Moët & Chandon.
The entertainment was provided by the fabulous Natty Bo who kept my guest and I swinging (I'm 99% sure that other than the band we were the only ones who were swing dancers) for the evening.
I love the small, intimate venue, which is packed to the rafters with unique and quirky curios. I would say this is a cocktail location and not one for dancing. Nonetheless, it's a fab venue!
Barts was the first project from Inception Group (who also own Cahoots, Mr Fogg's and Maggie's) , and is credited with putting the American speakeasy trend firmly on the map in London, being one of the first of its kind to open in London.
I was lucky enough to go along to the evening and help celebrate by raising a glass (more like 6!) of Moët & Chandon.
The entertainment was provided by the fabulous Natty Bo who kept my guest and I swinging (I'm 99% sure that other than the band we were the only ones who were swing dancers) for the evening.
I love the small, intimate venue, which is packed to the rafters with unique and quirky curios. I would say this is a cocktail location and not one for dancing. Nonetheless, it's a fab venue!
 |
| Just hanging out with 'Al Capone' |
Monday 11 May 2015
Keeping the HOME FIRES burning
Inspired by Julie Summers’s nonfiction book, Jambusters, ITV’s latest
drama Home Fires follows a group of women living in rural Cheshire – in
the looming shadow of war. As men and boys go off to fight, the women
are left to keep the fabric of the village, and indeed the nation,
intact. Banding together to form the Great Paxford Women’s Institute,
they acquire new skills, make new friends and learn how to survive in a
challenging new world.
And if the first episode is anything to go by, the series, starring Samantha Bond, Francesca Annis, Fenella Woolgar, Frances Grey and Ed Stoppard, is not to be missed.
‘When I got a phone call from my agent saying they were going to make a series about the Women’s Institute based on a book called Jambusters, there was a bit of my heart that fell,’ admits Samantha Bond.
Bond plays Frances Barden, one of the most active members of the Great Paxford WI. ‘I’ve been very vocal about the lack of parts for middleaged ladies,’ says Bond, ‘and then I thought, “They’re going to have us make jam.” But after I read the first two scripts I was captivated.
‘I actually can make jam,’ she continues, ‘but we used all the right props from the period. When you make jam at home on your stove with your saucepan, that’s one thing, but we had great vats of this boiling fruit, it really was incredibly hot and because of the sugar it would burn. So there was a level of high anxiety that afternoon.
‘We joke about making jam but actually there was a very strong, powerful reason why these women made it: to save lives.’
With up to two-thirds of Britain’s food being imported before the war, the government realised it needed to find ways to produce more food at home. The WI answered that call in the form of preserving surplus fruit (and vegetables). For many members of the WI, preserving was a skill they already possessed. Not only did they know where to look for fruit and how to make it into jam, but they were also keen to grab their spades and get involved with the growing and to contribute in other ways.
‘They spent a lot of time knitting socks, scarves, hats and gloves to send to soldiers. They were instructed by the government to be in charge of getting wrought iron so it could be melted down. They were consulted when it came to looking for suitable accommodation for evacuees because they had local knowledge. So it wasn’t just this trivial “let’s make jam and cakes”, it was a huge movement that gave support to the rural communities,’ explains Bond.
Of course, before filming began, not everyone knew how to make jam. But Claire Price and Daniel Ryan, who play village butchers Miriam and Bryn Brindsley, certainly picked up some new skills on set.
‘It’s very clever editing because I don’t know how to make jam or how to
knit but I’m hoping that the nation will believe that I can do both
once they’ve watched this series,’ says Price. ‘My beef-cutting skills
are quite something, though.’
Daniel Ryan explains: ‘We spent a day with a butcher… I can do anything now.’
One cast member who didn’t get the chance to pop on an apron and make jam was Ed Stoppard, who plays the village GP, Dr Will Campbell. And he was rather disappointed about it.
‘Sadly, I wasn’t around for the jam-making scenes,’ he says. ‘We have a little plum tree in our garden and so I make plum jam. My wife’s uncle is a child of the Second World War and his mum used to make damson jam when he was a child.’
Indeed, Stoppard recently made a particularly good damson jam – with a little help from his neighbour’s fruit tree. ‘Fifty yards up the road from us, in the front yard of our neighbour’s house, is a damson tree. So I grabbed a bowl and a stepladder and walked round, only to find my neighbours were not in. And I did ring the bell.
‘Evidently they were not interested in their damsons because they were all over the floor. So I collected several pounds and made, if I do say so myself, delicious damson jam.
‘I’m fairly convinced that the youth of today don’t know how to make a decent jam. As a jam maker myself, I can speak with authority,’ he smiles.
But jam aside, what else gives the drama its magic?
‘I think that when any of us are approached, the first thing is always the script and the story and Simon Block’s script leapt off the page… it’s been brought to life brilliantly by an extraordinary cast of actors and a spectacular crew. But it does always start with what’s written, what you’re being offered to work with,’ says Samantha Bond.
Fenella Woolgar, who plays local bookkeeper Alison, adds: ‘On a personal level, we did all just get on so well. We had such laughs. I can’t tell you the number of times someone would shout “cut” or “go again” because we were laughing.’
For Claire Price, it is the women’s stories: ‘They weren’t really being told so much at the time, and their stories are all bubbling to the surface now because we want to understand the whole picture more. No one talked about it then, they were all too busy making jam and running the country.’
For producer Francis Hopkinson, this television drama conveys another, bigger message.
‘I’d love people to watch it and be reminded of what community is… It’s about people having to stick together and rely on each other. We’re so sorely lacking that at the moment. I’d love people to watch it and feel that.’
Home Fires is on ITV on Sundays at 9pm.
And if the first episode is anything to go by, the series, starring Samantha Bond, Francesca Annis, Fenella Woolgar, Frances Grey and Ed Stoppard, is not to be missed.
‘When I got a phone call from my agent saying they were going to make a series about the Women’s Institute based on a book called Jambusters, there was a bit of my heart that fell,’ admits Samantha Bond.
Bond plays Frances Barden, one of the most active members of the Great Paxford WI. ‘I’ve been very vocal about the lack of parts for middleaged ladies,’ says Bond, ‘and then I thought, “They’re going to have us make jam.” But after I read the first two scripts I was captivated.
‘I actually can make jam,’ she continues, ‘but we used all the right props from the period. When you make jam at home on your stove with your saucepan, that’s one thing, but we had great vats of this boiling fruit, it really was incredibly hot and because of the sugar it would burn. So there was a level of high anxiety that afternoon.
‘We joke about making jam but actually there was a very strong, powerful reason why these women made it: to save lives.’
With up to two-thirds of Britain’s food being imported before the war, the government realised it needed to find ways to produce more food at home. The WI answered that call in the form of preserving surplus fruit (and vegetables). For many members of the WI, preserving was a skill they already possessed. Not only did they know where to look for fruit and how to make it into jam, but they were also keen to grab their spades and get involved with the growing and to contribute in other ways.
‘They spent a lot of time knitting socks, scarves, hats and gloves to send to soldiers. They were instructed by the government to be in charge of getting wrought iron so it could be melted down. They were consulted when it came to looking for suitable accommodation for evacuees because they had local knowledge. So it wasn’t just this trivial “let’s make jam and cakes”, it was a huge movement that gave support to the rural communities,’ explains Bond.
Of course, before filming began, not everyone knew how to make jam. But Claire Price and Daniel Ryan, who play village butchers Miriam and Bryn Brindsley, certainly picked up some new skills on set.
Daniel Ryan explains: ‘We spent a day with a butcher… I can do anything now.’
One cast member who didn’t get the chance to pop on an apron and make jam was Ed Stoppard, who plays the village GP, Dr Will Campbell. And he was rather disappointed about it.
‘Sadly, I wasn’t around for the jam-making scenes,’ he says. ‘We have a little plum tree in our garden and so I make plum jam. My wife’s uncle is a child of the Second World War and his mum used to make damson jam when he was a child.’
Indeed, Stoppard recently made a particularly good damson jam – with a little help from his neighbour’s fruit tree. ‘Fifty yards up the road from us, in the front yard of our neighbour’s house, is a damson tree. So I grabbed a bowl and a stepladder and walked round, only to find my neighbours were not in. And I did ring the bell.
‘Evidently they were not interested in their damsons because they were all over the floor. So I collected several pounds and made, if I do say so myself, delicious damson jam.
‘I’m fairly convinced that the youth of today don’t know how to make a decent jam. As a jam maker myself, I can speak with authority,’ he smiles.
But jam aside, what else gives the drama its magic?
‘I think that when any of us are approached, the first thing is always the script and the story and Simon Block’s script leapt off the page… it’s been brought to life brilliantly by an extraordinary cast of actors and a spectacular crew. But it does always start with what’s written, what you’re being offered to work with,’ says Samantha Bond.
Fenella Woolgar, who plays local bookkeeper Alison, adds: ‘On a personal level, we did all just get on so well. We had such laughs. I can’t tell you the number of times someone would shout “cut” or “go again” because we were laughing.’
For Claire Price, it is the women’s stories: ‘They weren’t really being told so much at the time, and their stories are all bubbling to the surface now because we want to understand the whole picture more. No one talked about it then, they were all too busy making jam and running the country.’
For producer Francis Hopkinson, this television drama conveys another, bigger message.
‘I’d love people to watch it and be reminded of what community is… It’s about people having to stick together and rely on each other. We’re so sorely lacking that at the moment. I’d love people to watch it and feel that.’
Home Fires is on ITV on Sundays at 9pm.
Tuesday 5 May 2015
Foyle, the 1940s and me
Only five minutes after meeting Honeysuckle Weeks, I think she is great.
Not just because she stars in the much-loved ITV series Foyle’s War
(playing Samantha Stewart, Christopher Foyle’s trusted ally), but also
because she had to learn to dance for the role (lindy hop, to be
precise). As a lindy hopper myself, I was particularly chuff ed when she
told me that ‘it was one of the most fun bits’.
As she says, ‘When there was dancing to be done – when the GIs came – I had to learn a lot. Not that I can remember it, it’s quite complicated, all that lindy hopping. It’s so sexy. ‘In our grandmothers’ day, they had all the dance halls to meet their husbands and have a great time in, but now they’ve turned them into bingo halls and nailed down the tables so no one can dance,’ she continues.
But back to Foyle’s War. Starring Honeysuckle and Michael Kitchen, and written by Anthony Horowitz, the detective series leapt on to our screens in 2002. It’s now on the nation’s list of essential viewing, alongside the likes of Poirot and Downton Abbey.
So as the ninth series – set in the late 1940s – begins, did Honeysuckle ever think the public would take the drama so much to heart? ‘No,’ she admits. ‘I thought I’d do one pilot and that’d be it. I’m extremely proud and very grateful.
‘It’s made me well known among a certain age group – mainly the over-80s,’ she laughs. ‘But, hell, they write good letters and I’d rather have those sorts of people than anyone else, frankly.’
Honeysuckle started on the series in her early 20s and now admits that her co-star Michael Kitchen, who plays Foyle, has become a father figure to her (he even read at her wedding in 2007 to Lorne Stormonth-Darling).
‘It’s a very similar dynamic to what you see in the show; in fact it’s almost identical,’ she says. ‘Initially, I wouldn’t speak unless Michael asked me a question or unless he spoke to me first. Now I’ve earned my stripes a bit I can actually just about aff ord to be cheeky here and there. We get on very well.’
It’s no secret that writer Anthony Horowitz researches meticulously for each series, often using real people and events as inspiration. So where does Honeysuckle think he will take her character, Sam, in future series?
‘To the top, right to the top,’ she exclaims. ‘Why not? She’ll have to get a bit more cut-throat first and cut out the chaos element of her character,’ she laughs.
After all, there have been female heads of the real MI5. Why not this fictional one?
‘Anthony does so much research and his storylines are often based on real people. You’ll often get at the back of a script a page detailing the historical facts and the people on which he based all the characters.
‘That’s why it’s so popular with historians and people who love that era in history because people who really know their stuff recognise the characters.’ A grasp of the period certainly helps her performance. ‘The more information you have at your disposal the more helpful it is in terms of choices you make [for your character]. You don’t want to be too jolly in a scene where there might be consequences.
‘For example, Sam can’t be quite as plucky in this era as she was initially. People have written to me and said, “Oh, we so miss the Sam of old who’s full of enthusiasm and young and always eating sandwiches”. And I think, “Well, okay, you might miss it, but it would be inappropriate for me to be like that in a situation where as a people, as a nation, we discovered all the things that were going on in Auschwitz”.
‘I just feel that I had to take it down a bit, given the environment in which the series is set. Also, it’s MI5 and I think anyone behaving like the Sam of old wouldn’t be taken seriously.’
Period drama also means fantastic costumes. So which pieces would she love to keep hold of? ‘The jackets and the skirts – the suits are lovely,’ she says. ‘The clothes are fabulous for a woman’s shape. They knew how to dress women despite the fact that cloth was rationed. It’s like the less they had, the better they produced it. The way they cut everything, it was so brilliantly designed.’
The hairstyle is also a big part of the character for Honeysuckle. ‘When I’m having my hair done, that’s the time I get into character. I love having my hair done, it’s so glamorous. It can really lift your cheekbones…’
Just don’t upset the wrong people, though – they may take revenge on your locks. ‘If you tick them off [the hair department], you can get some atrocious hairstyles. I’ve had some funny ones in the past – a sort of Heidi plait around my head… I obviously did something wrong in that series.’
A NEW CHARACTER’S VIEW OF THE SERIES
In episode one, John Mahoney plays Andrew Del Mar, an oil baron with possible connections to the American oil companies who worked closely with IG Farben (Germany’s biggest oil company) to provide fuel essential for Hitler’s war machine. The new series of Foyle’s War is set in 1946, when John was aged six.
‘I was born in Blackpool in 1940 because my mother had been evacuated from Manchester,’ John says. ‘But we actually came back to Withington when I was around three months old. I think she was only sent to Blackpool for my birth and until she got back on her feet.
‘I don’t have too many memories of the war and 1946. But I do remember playing in the bombed-out buildings in Manchester. We had an air-raid shelter in the back garden and we played in that. And I remember, of course, the rationing. But I don’t remember bombs falling, although my sisters did. They all had gas masks and said when I was born I had a gas pram, which were for children too young to wear gas masks. They told me how they used to love to decorate it and make it fun for me.
‘I’m a huge Foyle’s War fan. I’ve seen every episode and have given dozens of box sets of it away at Christmas to various relatives and friends. Now they’re all dying to see the new series because they’re big fans and they know I’m in it. It’s a special thing.’
AND SAM’S HUSBAND SAYS…
Daniel Weyman plays Sam’s husband, Adam Wainwright. At the end of the last series, Adam was a naive, idealistic MP. He’d worked at Bletchley Park during the war, is well educated and had risen quickly through the political ranks but had just been fired from his position as a Parliamentary Private Secretary after exposing his minister’s corruption. He’s a bit of a moral crusader.
He has also just found out that Sam is pregnant with their first child.
‘You hear eight or nine million people watch the show and you think you can’t possibly have an understanding of what that means; it’s far too big a number,’ says Daniel. ‘Then you go and film. When we filmed in Chester… a massive crowd of people gathered to watch. Lots of them clearly love Foyle and the characters. It’s very, very gratifying.
‘It reminds you that you need to do a bloody good job; you can’t mess around with something that is so close to people’s hearts. It was taken off the screen a few years ago and it was really only public opinion that brought it back. The last series was set in London and was a little murkier. It has taken the story a step forward; it’s really exciting and really gritty. The underworld stuff is thrilling.
‘It’s really interesting in the way corruption figures in Adam’s life and the fact that he is so moralistically bound. I think it would be interesting if he turned out to be an evil character after all. It would be great to play someone who seemed whiter than white and then turns out to be playing everyone all along. That would be really exciting. I’m not sure if it will happen but it would be great fun. You never know.’
As she says, ‘When there was dancing to be done – when the GIs came – I had to learn a lot. Not that I can remember it, it’s quite complicated, all that lindy hopping. It’s so sexy. ‘In our grandmothers’ day, they had all the dance halls to meet their husbands and have a great time in, but now they’ve turned them into bingo halls and nailed down the tables so no one can dance,’ she continues.
But back to Foyle’s War. Starring Honeysuckle and Michael Kitchen, and written by Anthony Horowitz, the detective series leapt on to our screens in 2002. It’s now on the nation’s list of essential viewing, alongside the likes of Poirot and Downton Abbey.
So as the ninth series – set in the late 1940s – begins, did Honeysuckle ever think the public would take the drama so much to heart? ‘No,’ she admits. ‘I thought I’d do one pilot and that’d be it. I’m extremely proud and very grateful.
‘It’s made me well known among a certain age group – mainly the over-80s,’ she laughs. ‘But, hell, they write good letters and I’d rather have those sorts of people than anyone else, frankly.’
Honeysuckle started on the series in her early 20s and now admits that her co-star Michael Kitchen, who plays Foyle, has become a father figure to her (he even read at her wedding in 2007 to Lorne Stormonth-Darling).
‘It’s a very similar dynamic to what you see in the show; in fact it’s almost identical,’ she says. ‘Initially, I wouldn’t speak unless Michael asked me a question or unless he spoke to me first. Now I’ve earned my stripes a bit I can actually just about aff ord to be cheeky here and there. We get on very well.’
It’s no secret that writer Anthony Horowitz researches meticulously for each series, often using real people and events as inspiration. So where does Honeysuckle think he will take her character, Sam, in future series?
‘To the top, right to the top,’ she exclaims. ‘Why not? She’ll have to get a bit more cut-throat first and cut out the chaos element of her character,’ she laughs.
After all, there have been female heads of the real MI5. Why not this fictional one?
‘Anthony does so much research and his storylines are often based on real people. You’ll often get at the back of a script a page detailing the historical facts and the people on which he based all the characters.
‘That’s why it’s so popular with historians and people who love that era in history because people who really know their stuff recognise the characters.’ A grasp of the period certainly helps her performance. ‘The more information you have at your disposal the more helpful it is in terms of choices you make [for your character]. You don’t want to be too jolly in a scene where there might be consequences.
‘For example, Sam can’t be quite as plucky in this era as she was initially. People have written to me and said, “Oh, we so miss the Sam of old who’s full of enthusiasm and young and always eating sandwiches”. And I think, “Well, okay, you might miss it, but it would be inappropriate for me to be like that in a situation where as a people, as a nation, we discovered all the things that were going on in Auschwitz”.
‘I just feel that I had to take it down a bit, given the environment in which the series is set. Also, it’s MI5 and I think anyone behaving like the Sam of old wouldn’t be taken seriously.’
Period drama also means fantastic costumes. So which pieces would she love to keep hold of? ‘The jackets and the skirts – the suits are lovely,’ she says. ‘The clothes are fabulous for a woman’s shape. They knew how to dress women despite the fact that cloth was rationed. It’s like the less they had, the better they produced it. The way they cut everything, it was so brilliantly designed.’
The hairstyle is also a big part of the character for Honeysuckle. ‘When I’m having my hair done, that’s the time I get into character. I love having my hair done, it’s so glamorous. It can really lift your cheekbones…’
Just don’t upset the wrong people, though – they may take revenge on your locks. ‘If you tick them off [the hair department], you can get some atrocious hairstyles. I’ve had some funny ones in the past – a sort of Heidi plait around my head… I obviously did something wrong in that series.’
A NEW CHARACTER’S VIEW OF THE SERIES
In episode one, John Mahoney plays Andrew Del Mar, an oil baron with possible connections to the American oil companies who worked closely with IG Farben (Germany’s biggest oil company) to provide fuel essential for Hitler’s war machine. The new series of Foyle’s War is set in 1946, when John was aged six.
‘I was born in Blackpool in 1940 because my mother had been evacuated from Manchester,’ John says. ‘But we actually came back to Withington when I was around three months old. I think she was only sent to Blackpool for my birth and until she got back on her feet.
‘I don’t have too many memories of the war and 1946. But I do remember playing in the bombed-out buildings in Manchester. We had an air-raid shelter in the back garden and we played in that. And I remember, of course, the rationing. But I don’t remember bombs falling, although my sisters did. They all had gas masks and said when I was born I had a gas pram, which were for children too young to wear gas masks. They told me how they used to love to decorate it and make it fun for me.
‘I’m a huge Foyle’s War fan. I’ve seen every episode and have given dozens of box sets of it away at Christmas to various relatives and friends. Now they’re all dying to see the new series because they’re big fans and they know I’m in it. It’s a special thing.’
AND SAM’S HUSBAND SAYS…
Daniel Weyman plays Sam’s husband, Adam Wainwright. At the end of the last series, Adam was a naive, idealistic MP. He’d worked at Bletchley Park during the war, is well educated and had risen quickly through the political ranks but had just been fired from his position as a Parliamentary Private Secretary after exposing his minister’s corruption. He’s a bit of a moral crusader.
He has also just found out that Sam is pregnant with their first child.
‘You hear eight or nine million people watch the show and you think you can’t possibly have an understanding of what that means; it’s far too big a number,’ says Daniel. ‘Then you go and film. When we filmed in Chester… a massive crowd of people gathered to watch. Lots of them clearly love Foyle and the characters. It’s very, very gratifying.
‘It reminds you that you need to do a bloody good job; you can’t mess around with something that is so close to people’s hearts. It was taken off the screen a few years ago and it was really only public opinion that brought it back. The last series was set in London and was a little murkier. It has taken the story a step forward; it’s really exciting and really gritty. The underworld stuff is thrilling.
‘It’s really interesting in the way corruption figures in Adam’s life and the fact that he is so moralistically bound. I think it would be interesting if he turned out to be an evil character after all. It would be great to play someone who seemed whiter than white and then turns out to be playing everyone all along. That would be really exciting. I’m not sure if it will happen but it would be great fun. You never know.’
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