Photo by Karen Bond, no reproduction without permission.
This behind the scenes photo is of the set of Good Morning Summer, from 1995. The series ran over the summer, when Good Morning with Anne and Nick was off-air. It went out from the set and conservatory in the courtyard of Pebble Mill. You can see the set, with the beach huts in the back of the photo. The series was presented by Will Hanrahan and Sarah Greene.
Copyright resides with the original holder, no reproduction without permission.
This title’s grab is from Good Morning Summer, a summer version of the daytime magazine show – Good Morning with Anne and Nick, but this time presented by Sarah Greene and Will Hanrahan. It went out in 1995. There was a different, brighter and more summery set, with the conservatory in the courtyard, and the courtyard itself, used much of the time.
Thanks to Ian Collins for making the grab available.
Copyright resides with the original holder, no reproduction without permission.
Crew and production team of the last Pebble Mill show, May 1996. Pebble Mill was an entertainment magazine show which went out before the lunchtime news on BBC 1 Daytime.
The show was presented by Alan Titchmarsh, Sarah Greene amongst others.
Here are a few of those in the photo:
Front row, left to right: Mark Kershaw (director),?,Kate Hillman, Crispin Evans , Alan Titchmarsh, Sarah Greene, Ross King, ?, Ronnie Butt, ?, Annie Gumbley-Williams
2nd row, l to r: Royston Horsley, Nick Harris, Shirley Benson,? , ?, Gill Thompson, Sarah Reddi, Melissa Feather
3rd row, l to r: ?, ?, Caroline Marshall, ?
1st row standing: Belinda Essex, ?, ?, ?, Vicky Jepson, Anya Francis, ?, Helena Taylor, Claire Chambers, Jane Benham, Clara Hewitt, Sue Lowe, ?
2nd row standing: Merrick Simmonds, Geoff Nawn, Andy Frizzell, (further across) Roulla Xenides, Janice Rider
Next to back row: (fourth and fifth from the right) John Carney (Tech manager), Mike Lee (Vision supervisor), in front of these row is Ian Cull (Vision engineer)
Back row: Dave Brazier, ?,?,?,?,?
(Thanks to Roulla Xenides, and Stuart Gandy for adding in some names).
Please add a comment if you can name some of the others!
Thanks to Ronnie Butt for sharing the photo.
Pattie Coldwell, Harry Greene, Gilly Love, Rick Ball
Steph Silk & Andy Meikle – On The House
Copyright resides with the original holder, no reproduction without permission.
The On The House publicity shot includes Harry Greene on the left, Pattie Coldwell above with the wallpaper, Rick Ball with the tape measure and Gilly Love with the drill.
Harry Greene died in March 2013 after collapsing at home. He was in his ninetieth year.
Harry Greene is best known as one of the presenters of On The House, the popular late 1980s DIY television series. Harry made DIY popular and accessible. He began with a career in theatre and television as an actor, and was married to actress, Marjie, with whom he had three children. He wasn’t in fact called ‘Harry Greene’, until he changed his name by deed poll in 1950, from Henry Howard Greenhouse.
Harry was always keen on DIY, but became the first TV DIY presenter in the 1980s when he made a series for Greg Dyke at TV-AM, about the renovation of a neglected house. TV-AM bought the house for the series, and filmed the whole conversion. The completed house was given away in a competition.
Presenting on Pebble Mill’s On The House, was a natural extension for Harry. On The House was the brainchild of Andy Meikle, with Stephanie Silk the programme editor given the task of turning the idea into a successful returning series on BBC 2. The On The House, house was a timber framed building situated in the back garden of BBC Pebble Mill. The house operated as a TV studio, and demonstration area for the series, and you had to remember that there was no plumbing in the house!
For more information about Harry Greene see his son in law, Mike Smith’s blog: http://mikesmithinlondon.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/harry-greene.html?spref=tw. Mike is married to Harry’s daughter, TV presenter Sarah Greene, who presented Pebble Mill’s Good Morning Summer, although she’s probably best known as a Blue Peter presenter.
I worked as a researcher on the last series of On The House in 1989, and enjoyed working with Harry. I remember he kept changing his mind about the size of screws he wanted, and as I’d bought what he’d originally asked for, we didn’t have the right size on location!
Vanessa
The following comment was posted on the Pebble Mill Facebook group:
Julian Hitchcock: ‘What a nice man. The screw size anecdote rings true.
I worked on the first series in, I think, 1986. I’d proposed a DIY series to David Waine, on the basis of the then explosion in DIY shares following the Thatcher reforms and boom in home ownership. David told me that Andy Meikle wanted to do the same thing and that a budget had been scraped together. Stephanie Silk joined to keep order and give the programme glossy lifestyle values etc. Andy was, however, very much the engine of invention. I just gave it its name (prize: one bottle of champagne) and directed gripping items on the installation of damp courses, latest trend in door mats and hammers (leading to the slogan, “On the House, the only programme with hammer glamour).
My recollection is that Andy revered Harry Greene because of an ancient connection with the previous icon of television DIY, Barry Bucknell. Incredibly, Bucknell’s heyday was in the 1950s. There had been nothing in between at all, so we had the satisfaction of breaking new ground, but I think Andy wanted to show the baton being passed on. Our first programme, as I recollect, looked back to Barry Bucknell. We found old footage of Barry boxing in a beautiful spindle staircase (planing off the rounded edges the better to support his streamlined hardboard) and various others acts of vandalism. I’m not sure that Harry quite got the joke (surely Barry had done a good, professional job?) but he was a lovely chap. I also credit Andy, Steph and BBC Birmingham in giving the job to someone of Harry’s age and, frankly, inexperience. He had great warmth, which viewers plainly appreciated.’
Margaret Thatcher produced two autobiographies, ‘The Downing St Years’ and ‘The Path to Power’; it was this second book that brought her to Pebble Mill in June 1995 to be interviewed by Sarah Greene and Will Hanrahan round the kitchen table on Good Morning Summer. I booked her and had the responsibility of researching her and looking after her on the day.
Beforehand, the building had to be checked by plain clothes detectives and sniffer dogs because the IRA was still deemed a risk to her. We couldn’t give her a dressing room near the crush bar or in the basement, so we had to locate her in a room adjacent to the radio complex, which was re-decorated and dressed accordingly with oil paintings and sofas from the props store in Selly Oak, thanks to Julie Knee.
You didn’t mind when some guests arrived early, but she arrived at 9.30am, hair perfectly coiffured and in full make up, she required no time in hair and make-up. The thought of making small talk with Margaret Thatcher was daunting, particularly when your political views were diametrically opposite, but I somehow managed to get through the next two hours, at one point physically holding her back behind the doors in the radio complex, with her handbag on her elbow ready to go on, because she just wanted to get on with it.
The thing I will always remember was Sue Robinson, who was directing that day, calling down to say that I should warn her about the loud intro to the music number that followed directly after her interview. We had the Tribute to the Blues Brothers on and they were playing ‘Everybody Needs Somebody’ with a huge brass section and Sue couldn’t move her out of the interview area before they started. I began to explain the situation and then the film and then the type of music and then a list of the legends of soul who appeared in the film and I knew she didn’t have a clue what I was talking about.
I’ve actually found the 1995 interview on YouTube – here’s the link
Caroline Officer
The following comments were left on the Pebble Mill Facebook group:
Jane Mclean: ‘I did Good Morning Summer and don’t remember Her Maj being on! Hysterical you looking after her and Sue directing!! Got through half of it then found myself thinking of all the spoof Maggies. Don’t believe you found it on You Tube. Think you have your own copy….’
Sue Robinson: ‘I have NO memory of this! I obviously decided to erase it from my memory in case it gave me nightmares!’
Jean Thomas: ‘On her visit there was a request over the tannoy for a welcoming commitee in the foyer. I was somehow at the front thanx to the guys from the 7th floor. She had fierce looking security guys who came in first who stood in the front staring at us. You guessed she came in and headed straight for me. Cameras popping everyone watching, I wanted to dissapear. She was lovely………’
Caroline Officer: ‘Sue Robbo, you can’t remember this one?? And Jane, yes I probably do have a copy but I stupidly dumped all my Pebble Mill stuff on to a D3 tape before I scarpered to Ready Steady Cook.’
Andy Bentley: ‘I was on the roof during the visit with Police Marksmen so they could view the whole area.’
Raymond Lee: ‘Don’t remember the Good Morning visit, but do remember her at Pebble Mill during the Pebble Mill at One era. Sadly I can’t remember what year, but likely to be late seventies, or early eighties. She came with Dennis, and I remember them both being in the production gallery at one point in proceedings. It’s likely that it was before she had engendered much of a reputation.’
Sarah Dunning: ‘I can remember her visiting pebble mill, as when she was walking around the bottom quadrangle corridor we were weren’t allowed anywhere near her by the security guards incase anybody did anything untoward!!’