Rex Palmer
How about [tales of old shows like] “The Grove Family” from Lime Grove, “Compact” from TVC, and “Dr Finlay” from Riverside?
Dick Hibberd
There are still some of us who worked on “The Grove Family”. I was a Tech Op. on Crew 1, with Ted Langley, Dickie Ashman, Geoff Rimmer, Mike Wooler… A very nice cast, and a very pleasant programme to work on.
I could go on about the Goons in Shepherds Bush Empire … And of course there was MacDonald Hobley, and the dash up to AP for the news, etc…
John Summers
I guess I go back to May 1946 – before we started up again “after the war”. For a few weeks we had a programme permanently in Studio A called “They Flew Through Sand”. It was a working up exercise – the actors performed the same lines day after day, whilst we all tried to work out how to make television programmes. Directors and floor managers were changed every so often to give production staff experience. I have an idea that Kenneth More was there. I was a lowly tracker on Ted Langley’s crew. We could say the lines as well as the actors could after a while. I think the production went out live early on when transmissions started, but that honour went to Colin Clews on Shift 2.
Photo of Shift 2, Ally Pally, 1948
Bill Jenkin
It must have been very special being around then – or maybe only seems so in retrospect?
Potts once told me that when (before the war) he was informed that he was being sent to Ally Pally from London Control Room he went to his EIC and said he didn’t want to go. He was given a compromise, that if after two months he still wanted to come back he could do so. Of course he never went back.
John Howell (Hibou)
I remember watching an episode of “Compact”, (probably in my first year, 1962) and a scene was taking place in Ian Harman’s office when a cameraman plus camera passed by the window. Said cameraman then looked in, saw he was in shot, and promptly reversed back out. The scene ended and the next was cued. It was very obvious that some shots were missing until the aforementioned camera arrived. I’m pretty sure this happened on-air, it may have been in rehearsal but it did happen. I refuse to name the cameraman but he was known for short sharp intakes of breath through his teeth as he adjusted his shots!
Here is the “Compact” signature tune.
Alex Thomas
with John Howell and Bill Jenkin
“Compact” was done live on a Tuesday and recorded on the next day for TX on Thursday. One of the cameraman, Don Cameron, proposed marriage to an actress, Louise Dunn, playing a character named Iris.
This clipping is from the (London) Evening News of 2nd December 1963:
The same cameraman decided that Tech Ops was not for him and, after a full and frank discussion with Engineering Establishment, asked if he could be promoted to New York or Washington correspondent. I have watched the American correspondent’s list for many years and his name is yet to appear.
Alec Bray
I was Vision Control for the last episode of “Compact” 30 July 1965 (Phew! I can date something!) Actually, if I recall correctly, I was Vision Control for the last couple of episodes. It was interesting looking down from the Gallery to the Studio – it was done in TC2 and the studio was quite crowded. The layout was something like this: down the centre of the studio a line of equipment, Camera, Boom, Camera, Boom, Camera, Boom, Camera, and sets around the perimeter of the studio, all set out so that there were at least two cameras available for each scene. So most action between scenes involved a camera (and boom) doing a 180 degree turn from one side set to the other. It was something like this:
TC2 layout for “COMPACT”.
I seem to remember at the end of the last episode Carmen Silvera (as Camilla Hope) packing up her things in her office (at the far end of the studio) (marked as the “Editor’s Office” above, but that might be wrong) and walking out and dimming the lights ..Ahhh … . It was quite a shock when she turned up as Edith in “’Allo ‘Allo”!
See also:
John Hayes’ Compact material – http://www.tech-ops.co.uk/page156.html
The Musical Time Machine (1975, 1977)
Dave Mundy
This is the front cover of a very satirical (14pp.) view of this Stewart Morris epic involving Vince Hill and the Nolans with such ground-breaking technical innovations as green CSO and ‘Scene-Sync’.
I well remember Stewart Morris trying to get Coleen Nolan into the show, although she was only 14 at the time. Now she is the ‘Agony Aunt’ at the Daily Mirror !
