Copyright resides with the original holder, no reproduction without permission.
‘Children in Need’ has had all kinds of merchandise over the years. This ‘Children in Need’ knitting pattern dates from around 1987.
Thanks to Marie Phillips, former Pebble Mill ‘Children in Need’ co-ordinator.
Copyright resides with the original holder, no reproduction without permission.
Thanks to Ian Collins for making these grabs available.
I think these stills are from a ‘Look! Hear!’ special called ‘College Rags’. ‘Look! Hear!’ was a regional teen orientated music, entertainment and fashion show, presented by Toyah Willcox. The shows were transmitted on BBC Midlands between 1977-81.
The title card and catwalk shots were taken in the concourse outside Studio A, and I’m presuming that Studio A itself was used for the interviews.
The following comments were left on the Pebble Mill Facebook Group:
Stuart Gandy: ‘Look Hear was one of the first programmes I worked on when I started at Pebble Mill in 1980 in vision ops. On one occasion I remember we needed to get an overhead shot, looking down on one of the bands. Now these days that wouldn’t be too difficult with the small size of today’s cameras, but back in 1980 when the cameras were EMI 2001’s it was altogether more involved. The camera had to be mounted horizontally on a sturdy board with a mirror in front of the lens angled downwards. The whole thing was then lifted up above the stage using four hoists. The scans on the camera were suitably switched to get the picture the right way round because of the mirror. The shot worked though, so worth the enormous amount of time needed to set it up! ‘
Keith Brook: ‘I directed that programme!! It was full of problems during the planning and even more when a strike was called for the recording day. This will be a subject for one of my missives!! The recording went swimmingly and I finished at 4 seconds before 9. It took the whole of the following day to edit and just made transmission. I didn’t watch it go out, I went to the bar!!’
Copyright Sue Robinson, no reproduction without permission.
‘Good Morning with Anne and Nick’ did a live outside broadcast from Berlin, to celebrate the fifth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall in Nov 1994. The show was transmitted from the Radisson Hotel in Berlin. The presenters included Anne Diamond, Nick Owen, Will Hanrahan, Tania Bryer, and Jeni Barnett.
The photos include: Sue Robinson, Sangeeta Modha, Katie Wright, Will Hanrahan, Nick Owen, Nick Thorogood, Marco, Steve Pierson.
The furniture for the broadcast was delivered to the hotel – but it was flat-packed, which meant that the first job was to literally build the set!
The following comments were left on the Pebble Mill Facebook Group:
Conal O’Donnell: ‘The Doolan programme did a show out of the former GDR studios in Liepzig a year after the wall came down .Strangely we still had a sort of old style communist minder with us who got terribly drunk over dinner & talked endlessly about the ghastliness of the fallen regime. Ashen faced & hung over the next morning he approached in tears begging us not to repeat anything he’d said the night before “it could ruin my career”(!)It was apparent that the old cultural cringe at saying anything remotely controversial was very much still there.Impressed too at our free wheeling ” anything goes” broadcasting style were the former GDR broadcasters who watched the show go out in some awe.A pleasant reminder of a time when the BBC was regarded as a free speech beacon to the world not a Saville style cess pit..’
Katie Wright (now Cooper): ‘God…memories! Yes it was the 5th Anniversary. The furniture arriving ‘flat’ was unbelievable but in the way of Pebble Mill folk, everyone just got on with building the stuff. I’m amazed it lasted the two hours…there were a lot of bits left over?! It was a great show with some very moving memories from Andrew Sachs. Then we all had to pile onto a rather ancient chartered aircraft to get back in time for the next day’s show……’
Labour MP Denis MacShane stepped down as MP for Rotherham last week after an investigation into expenses irregularities. Before he went into politics he worked as a journalist in radio, and was at BBC Pebble Mill for a while.
The following comments were contributed via the Pebble Mill Facebook Group:
Pete Simpkin: ‘He was one of the original News reporting team at Radio Birmingham. Sad to hear of his demise when so many Radio Birmingham people went on to great jobs in Network Radio and TV……….and politics.’
Keith Brook: ‘he also, surprisingly, did stuff for Midlands Today because I remember trying to teach him the etiquette of walking in front of a camera.’
Michael Fisher: ‘On the Saturday Night show RTE1 tonight one of the guests will be Edwina Currie a former Tory politician turned broadcaster who got plenty of radio experience on the breakfast show Heart of the Nation at Pebble Mill when she was a Birmingham councillor.’
Norma Scott: ‘I remember Denis when he worked for the Sunday Mercury!’
Conal O’Donnell: ‘Denis was born Denis Matyjaszek apparently changing his name at the behest of the BBC because it was too hard to pronounce (!) A legend amongst phone-in producers Denis enlivened one of his flagging shows by posing as a caller himself -unethical you might think but hey what do u do when the lines are dead?Trouble is he went on to compound the deception by calling Tory politician Reginald “reggie” Maudling a crook on air .Well he was of course but taking full advantage of our rapacious libel laws Maudling sued the Beeb for muchos sponduliks.One can’t help but smile!’
Copyright resides with the original holder, no reproduction without permission.
Thanks to costume designer Janice Rider for making this TX card available.
‘Fair Game’ was a 1994 BBC 1 screenplay written by Stephen Bill, directed and co-produced by Alan Dosser along with Carol Parks. Michael Wearing was the executive producer. Rob Hinds was the designer, the film editor was John Stothart, and Steve Saunderson the camera man.
Here is the synopsis from the BFI database:
‘It is 1970, there is World Cup and General Election fever. Marco, a wealthy Italian has come to England to discover his true identity. Carl, a student is torn between canvassing for the Labour party, watching the World Cup or going on a walking holiday with his girlfriend Ellie. Their paths cross in Preston library and the three take an epic journey across the Pennines.’
http://ftvdb.bfi.org.uk/sift/title/495778?view=synopsis
The drama starred: Lena Headey as Ellie, Julian Kerridge as Carl, Massimo Bellinzoni as Marco, Prunella Scales as Marjorie.