Pat Heigham
I remember one, perpetrated on Duncan Wood, so it must have been a “Steptoe and Son” and round about Christmas time, during the audience warm-up.
All the departments took part to send him up during his warm-up. As he walked on, he was lit by a green spot (Lighting) to a fanfare that went on for long minutes (Grams).
He said: “I’m Duncan Wood, the Director of this show …” and the Monitor above his head switched to a caption with a downward arrow: “And the WoodenTops” (Vision).
As it was near Christmas, the Wardrobe girls came on and dressed him in a Santa Clause outfit and beard! We suspected that he would struggle out of it, whereupon Grams played “The Stripper”.
At that point there was a commotion at the back of the audience rostrum – Duncan said: “Oh for goodness sake, what now!”
It transpired that a member of the audience had laughed so much that he had a heart attack, and the disturbance was the St. John’s brigade or the studio attendants shipping him out on a stretcher!
All went a bit quiet after that!
Alan Stokes
I was on Grams in Studio D at Lime Grove. We were recording some sort of chat show for an American network, with no intended transmission in the UK.
It had been rather a ‘silly’ day with everyone in high spirits. I can’t remember why it was thus (Chris Maurice was probably the SAI!) but it led to:
Production team arrive quite close to recording time. Secretary hands me a 1/4″ tape box with the title music therein. She said, “Here’s the music tape. It’s at 15 ips”. For some reason, I responded with, “Is it at 50 or 60Hz mains frequency? We are 50Hz in this country and the USA is 60Hz?”
The next thing I know is the sound of fast departing footsteps and, “Oh, sh*t, Where can we get hold of a converter?”
I had to run after her to explain.
On a similar line to Albert Barber and VT –
I was in a Sypher dubbing suite and my Gram Op was Nick Wey (Way?).
He was editing 1/4″ tape like it was going out of fashion and on the floor was a pile of scrap tape. In walks the Production Manager and stands in the pile of scrap. Nick, who still has his head in the splicing block, realises what has happened and mumbles, “I hope you didn’t stand in that tape. It’s the closing titles.”
The PM went a very strange colour before Nick began to laugh and then there was some name calling!
Postscript: A while later the PM got a job in Bristol. As a ‘welcome to your new job’ gift, Nick filled a cardboard box with scrap tape and sent it via Internal Mail, to the guy in BS. We never heard from him directly but heard via the grapevine that there was much hilarity in his new office.
Albert Barber
One great wind up I remember hearing about was slicing through a whole roll of VT tape (that obviously didn’t matter) and adding the leader on top. The young operator lined up the tape and thought all was well until he got to the programme ON TRANSMISSION when the whole lot fell apart. The rest of VT was in the wings with the real transmission tape and a glass of water and aspirin was at the ready for the young trainee on his first network transmission.
Brian Curtis
I recall a “wind-up” accomplished by Mike Jones (when he was SA1 on Crew 5 – I think). We were all in the sound control room during one of the breaks and had been told that an “over run” had been booked for the play we were recording.
One of the sound crew decided to ring his missus to tell her he was going to be rather late home. No sooner had he got through than Mike (who was Tape and Grams Op for the play) began to play a variety of “party” sound effects grams and tapes!
The more the hapless SAG tried to “shush” Mike, the louder Mike played the effects and the more strenuous the SAG was in trying to explain that he was not at a party and it was a programme “over run”.
I’m not sure whether the lady concerned was really convinced!
John Hays
The story starts with a request from a book publisher–I know not who–which was circulated asking for studio staff to submit interesting tales of life in the studios.
It so happened that morning our crew were rigging the PA and a minor altercation occurred between me and the SS Keith Mayes, nothing serious, but I duly wrote all about it. I’ve no idea if it was ever published. Unknown to me our ace windup merchant Chris Maurice got to hear of this and produced a totally convincing letter from Mrs Mayes accusing me of insulting her husband and that she would contacting management. This was bad enough but shortly afterwards an equally convincing memo arrived asking me to explain myself to management.
Alan Stokes
I recall a story concerning a London Sound Supervisor. At some stage during the day, probably lunch time, the talkback loudspeaker in the Sound Gallery was overplugged with that from the studio next
door! Said SS mixed and recorded a full “Play School” programme, completely oblivious to the wrong director saying the wrong things.
Peter Neill
Another story concerning the same SS. Studio D. EMI desk. Someone over plugged the PPM with a feed of the mic group. Result: when he tried to line up outside sources he could hear the tone, but not see it on the meter.
Well, we thought it was funny at the time.
Tony Crake
This same Sound Supervisor was the butt of many practical jokes.. A certain SA1 who I worked with for many years built a small oscillator which churned out about 40 Khz! ( well above human hearing range ) Feeding it in through the tape machine replay line he would switch it on at irregular intervals. The PPM would hit the end stop causing much meter tapping and frenzied reseating of odd modules!!
The rest of us had to leave the control room!
(It was removed for transmission however…. ).
Alasdair Lawrance
The news studio (Studio C) in Cardiff was on the same floor level as the control room, with a large window between the two. The set was so arranged that the news reader could be seen from the Director’s chair.
Production always came in at the last minute for the regional opt-out, and when a new PA appeared the sound supervisor would feed the presenter’s mic through a tape machine, so making the announcer visibly out of sync with him or herself. We’d all be watching “The Magic Roundabout” (that dates it!) and pay no attention to the anguished cries from production until it went to air.
John Howell
There was a similar jape we played during “Play School”. The musician accompanying the presenters was out of vision playing a piano or celeste, his headphones would have a feed of the presenters’ vocals so we put this through a tape machine to give a delay. I remember poor old Patrick Harvey playing slower and slower to match the presenters’ pace, eventually grinding to a halt and a little echoey voice was heard apologising for not getting the tempo right.
Geoff Fletcher, John Howell, Tony Crake
Also on “Play School”, we had a new young female director one day whose woeful ineptitude was only matched by her arrogance and complete lack of a sense of humour. Crew members’ hackles rose as the day wore on. For some reason, the Sound guys were particularly on the receiving end of her barbed comments. I was doing the clock camera, starting on the clock face and zooming out then zooming back in again to whatever was on the little rotating platform at the bottom. This was always timed to fit with a little jingle of music. When the director cued the music, the tape had been edited so that all the notes were back to front but the tune was the same. “Nyeep nyep nyep, Nyeep nyep nyep…” and so on it went. We all thought it was very funny and much mirth ensued on the studio floor. When everything ground to a halt, all the director said was “There’s something wrong with that music.”
The culprit was John Howell in Riverside 2, 104 edits. A wonderful test for Razor Blade skills!
Individual notes reversed ….
The story continues. After the line from the arrogant director, “There is something wrong with that tape! I know”, she said, “It’s back to front! Play it the other way round!”
Someone in the Gallery said, “Sound, you’ve got the tape on backwards” So John dutifully turned the tape over and played it. There was then much muttering along the lines of “…have we brought the wrong tape?” But much hilarity in Sound ! and complete collapse of studio and gallery!
… and then the whole played backwards …
A very clever and witty jape.
Alec Bray
Talking of tape edits – the sound guys in Bush House (BBC World Service) seemed to have plenty of time on their hands – and a couple of spare tape machines. These tunes were going the rounds of TV Tech Ops in the mid sixties: rumour has it that the “William Tell” overture version got played on Radio Caroline. Actually, there were two versions of the “William Tell” – one with the words “Hiho Silver!” near the end.
Sabre Dance:
I Got Rhythm:
Rudio Nasereel:
William Tell – Gallop:
———
(To the sound guys: sorry about the quality – 15 ips to 7.5 ips (not sure how many generations) to domestic tape recorder to Cassette recorder to MP3 and then again to MP3 (codecs in the HTML audio tag).)
Peter Neill
Another “Play School” jape.
One item involved Chloe Ashcroft who had to feel around in a deep sand tray and identify objects by touch before pulling them out to reveal them. Someone knew that Mary Dudar (at that time Secretary to Sound Org.) had a large pink dildo in her desk drawer (don’t ask)! For the final run-through this was added to the objects in the tray. Chloe handled it (the situation, that is) with great aplomb and gave a detailed description with a perfectly straight face. Unfortunately, on the take the memory was just too much for her and she collapsed in a fit of giggles – much to the bewilderment of the executive producer – who hadn’t witnessed the rehearsal.
Peter Hider
Johnny Ball became the victim during the final run-through of a “Play School”. His task was to mimic the sounds of various zoo animals to match the captions. We inserted a giraffe!
Alec Bray
Many of the episodes of (the original) “Softly Softly” involved a pub set of some sort. Often this was constructed out of a photo blowup of a pub bar: sometimes the bar was “practical” (this meant that there was a real beer engine that pulled real pints – and often with enough left over in the barrel to help with the derig).
Now, many sets in TV studios were constructed to show two walls (cameras shooting from the supposed position of the other two walls): others were constructed to show three walls (the cameras being the third wall).
On this occasion, the WC in the large pub set was unusual in that it had all four walls. The story line was that the rear window of the WC was left open and the criminal was to use this – he would come from the bar, open the door of the WC cubicle and do something with the window, to be featured later in the story. I suppose to show the confines of the WC cubicle, it had all four walls: door shut.
Stagger through on first day rehearsal, must have been getting towards half-past nine at night (21:30 – ish). The criminal walks to the WC opens the door – and there was Sergeant Watt (Frank Windsor) sitting on the china with Constable Box (Dan Meaden) sitting on his knees. Absolute hilarity in the studio – we had to stop the stagger for a goodly few minutes.
Now Constable Box was not a small person by any means. Sergeant Watt and Constable Box must have been in their position for a good half an hour, since it had been a relatively complicated scene on a large set, and no one had seen them go to the loo.
This was the most well set up practical joke that I ever saw in the TV studios.
Bill Jenkin
When I was at the Grove doing PSC for “London Plus” (or ‘London Bus’ as it was often known) I knew that one of the crews kept a specially doctored tape (U-Matic cassettes in those days). This was reserved for rooky reporters/directors. When the shoot had finished the real tape would be removed from the recorder and concealed and the doctored one accidentally dropped on the pavement where it would burst open and the tape fly out spilling all over the place. I heard that on one occasion the recordist rubbed the crunched bit of the tape on a kerb stone and said to the horrified reporter, “If we smooth it out it might be OK”.
Going back a bit further I remember once we had to play host in studio D to a Public Schools Appointments School visit – remember them? We are probably in the 1960s when Joe Public knew absolutely nothing about how television was made. The EMI 203s (The green EMI) cameras had a door at the back for access to the tube etc. We got hold of some unexposed 16mm film and hid it just inside the door with the latch just off. When we were showing them the camera they would focus back, the tube would move to the back of the camera and push the film out through the door spilling all over the floor. “Oh my god what have you done” etc.
Of course we now realise that all this is just cruel work place bullying and harassment and should be condemned as highly unprofessional and a hark back to a bygone and unenlightened working environment…
Graeme Wall
… at Evesham … the Radio Rentals “engineer” was installing a new TV for one of the lecturers. On asked if this model had a black level clamp he replied “No guv, all our sets got legs.”
Peter Cook
I did hear a story about a trainee who was told that the weights on all the peds had been condemned because of the lead gas they gave off. Said victim was left all day to tape them all up with gaffer tape. Colleagues would have happily paid for the gaffer tape had it not been available from stores.
John Nottage
All this talk of wind-ups reminded me of my favourite stage direction, which was in a “Play School” script in the late 1960s.
Basic hand puppetry – script stage direction for the presenter:
“Hold arm across chest and stick 2 fingers up behind.”
Chris Maurice
Certain members of the Sound department were quite adept at producing ‘spoof’ memos in the days when television was ‘fun.’
The incident in question occurred on “Saturday Superstore” when a microphone had to be placed rather hastily on a female guest (Kim Wilde??) using the traditional ‘up and under’ technique! I believe she referred to it in her interview, and hence the opportunity for the memo.
Careful forgery of the signature, a few internal envelopes, a few moments on the photocopier, and out it went to all the pigeon holes. Great fun, but on this occasion – if memory serves me correctly – a discarded copy was left on a boom platform in TC1 where “Sports Review of the Year” was being transmitted. The story then appeared in the press who didn’t get the joke! The perpetrators (I couldn’t possibly reveal their names) were subsequently summoned to the presence of H. Tel Sound (Gordon Mackie?), who no doubt pointed out the error of their ways in his own inimitable fashion!
Alan Machin
Yes it was Kim Wilde who was the female guest on “Saturday Superstore” and the headline in the Sunday paper was ‘KIM WILD OVER BEEB BUG BOOB’. The spoof memo was a classic.
Gordon was H. Tel. Sound and bless him, I think he saw the funny side, though he would never admit it.
Michael Cotton, Dave Plowman, Chris Maurice
Michael’s recollection was that Noel Edmonds asked the Kim Wilde why she was smiling and she replied that the sound man had cold hands, which led to the memo reminding sound operators to warm their hands before fitting microphones and to the piece in the National Press about the Sound Supremo issuing the warm hands edict.
Mike Jones abetted by Jo Buick were great exponents of the spoof memos.
When Joe Ellis guested on the crew we had to call one Josiah as one was ” ‘igher” than the other – sexist, at the least non PC so I apologize, but then I then they did push me round the studio in a bath chair wielding my fishing rod when I still could stand up.
Early personal mics were dynamic. Rumour has it that Hugh Barker plugged a BK6B, when being worn by a certain Maudie Edwards at the TV Theatre (TVT), into a talkback amp *output* and spoke down the line. This little voice coming from her bosom was said to near cause a faint…
During the Scottish play, ‘The Master of Ballantrae’, Dave Plowman and Les Mowbray complained loudly that they couldn’t understand the assumed Scottish accents of the cast!
Dave Buckley
When Studio E at Estree was built for TV Training, due to its size, there was no way that a boom could be used (or even got into the studio). This meant that for any dramas, we used radio mics.
In one production, one actress was wearing a negligee – enough said! A few years later, I was giving a talk about types and use of microphones at a conference for talking newspapers, and told the story of how I spent a day putting on and taking off the radio mic on this actress. In the audience was a Scottish lass, who turned to her friend, who worked for Radio Scotland, and asked what did I do at the BBC. A couple of years later she found out as we got married!!
Bill Jenkin
There was once a massive sense of humour failure in News management, well there would be wouldn’t there? There had been an official note to floor managers about not leaving staples from de-stapled scripts (for presenters) lying around on the studio floor. One of the floor managers then produced a fake memo purportedly from a manager which stated that at the end of each bulletin the floor managers had to count the number of scripts which had been de-stapled and count the number of loose staples to ensure there was a matching number and note it in the log (it was probably worded better than that). Well, I think one of the floor managers took it seriously and went storming in to see their boss who then read the riot act to all and sundry.
Alasdair Lawrance
Sense of humour failures are not uncommon. I once worked at a place where the viewfinder mixed feed had to be the same for all cameras, so what one wanted, everyone got. I wrote the requisite memo requesting this to be modified (not rocket science, just a bit of work at the back of a MuSA patch panel), and when nothing happened after a year the “Franklin Mint Celebration Edition” of this memo was published, suitably adorned with Gothic print and flourishes from LetraSet (that dates it). Some weren’t amused, but many were.
John Howell
One publication that I heard about but never saw is an explanation for the steel straps that had appeared around the pillars supporting the South Hall staircase. This came, I believe, from a Central Area engineer and it went into much detail about the damping of structural resonances etc. The bands were in fact to minimise damage from passing trolleys etc.
Peter Cook
When I was a raw trainee, I was following swimmers, full length, off a diving board. (At Swiss Cottage) It was probably rehearsal, but the Vision Supervisor would occasionally invert vertical scans. Inevitable result really! He is the one with his arm on the camera lens.
Chris Harnett
When we had PC80 colour cameras, the tricks the sound dept could play were somewhat reduced but as a boom op. I had a scene where I had to leap off the platform and use a fishpole. We had been winding up the Camera Dept. on the stagger run and they took the opportunity to place at least half a dozen ball bearings of large size inside my fishpole. The result on the next rehearsal when I grabbed the pole was that it had suddenly become awfully heavy and on getting it horizontal the balls ran with a hell of a clatter along the tube and I overbalanced into the set, only to find several cameras recording the event! Merry Christmas VT, it seems the rest of the crew and artists were all in on the jape: historically it was the pilot of “Pobol Y Cwm”, the longest running TV soap opera.
Alec Bray
On the final run though of one “Dixon of Dock Green”, as the credits roller started, the studio heard the usual signature tune but the crew heard “The Archers” theme…
The Love of Three oranges
Peter Fox
Two events, both potentially disastrous in different ways. First a derig event, not at the end, but a set change and a certain Scene Master was on the hoist and dropping a gauze that was in front of the cyc. After detaching the rail, it was time to clear the hoists but the panel had limited viewing, although it was only just behind the end of the cyc, So it was a peep round the end to check it was all clear, and turn back to the panel to press the button. All very mundane until someone on the crew, actually me I think, standing in tech store and close by the panel, noticed that a spare Fulmar ped had lifted off and was hovering 10 foot off the ground at the far end of the studio.We approached cautiously, and could see that a hoist hook had dropped between the ring and the ped top gear and turned to exactly 90 degrees. It was just holding on the back of the hook. There was nothing that could be done that wouldn’t take hours to arrange and it would probably have broken free by then. The ultimate sword of Damocles. The only thing to do really was let the hoist in again and hope it didn’t twist out with the jolt. We stood back, held our breath, and waited for the crash. Never was a scene master, or crew, more relieved than when it touched down again without disengaging. It seemed to work ok so nothing more was said, (except perhaps to complain that the guards needed straightening!) At need, we all scrupulously did two man hoist operations after that!
One of the features of the “Love of Three Oranges” were three oranges, about six foot in diameter, one of them operational, and large enough to contain a fairy (female with wings, in case you ask). We, Mr Green, Mr Tivers, Mr Fox and Mr Poole, put one of these enormous fibreglass oranges on Tony Abbey’s desk. It was re-assembled in the office late that night. It bolted together from four segments, so it couldn’t go back through the door or the window in one piece. Apparently Tony took it on the chin, next morning, but thinking “How the f… did that get in here? Laurie Dulay, bless him, went apeshit, “Breaking in to our (very important) office, with all the confidential reports around. I am going to get to the bottom of this!” John Linton nodded half heartedly, but said nothing, because he was the one who had left the window unlocked for us. Tony quickly came and warned us to keep schtumm and suggested the orange disappeared pronto (he had guessed the source, not too difficult) , as it had sadly stopped being a joke. Obviously he liked it really but couldn’t say so now.
He told us the office was going to empty for an hour while they were at a meeting, and hoped it wouldn’t be there when they got back. And the orange was swifted away. Laurie reappeared in due course, after stirring things up elsewhere, and came storming back into the office with a security man. “Oh my gawd it’s gawn” he said, according to Pauline, doing a very passable Laurie impression
Tony said later “No-one knows anything about oranges, ok?
Mind you I already had one of the three at home for the kids to play in, and after this, so did Tony Poole.
Graham Maunder
As I recall we also left a real orange on his desk! Not that I ever had anything to do with any wind-ups or pranks …
Peter Fox
Indeed not. Especially not driving a Nike crane through Red Tea Bar: at least we didn’t try and drive through the scenery lift.
Simon Morris
I’m also sure that Red Tea Bar incident never happened … along with the handheld (KCR40?) on the Nike …..
Tony Grant
I remember the “Love of Three Oranges”, but for an entirely different reason. I think it was on the final day that I had a 5+ minute shot on a fulmar at its lowest, crabbing backwards and forwards several times, following the action, along a set on a raised podium. I’m not sure who the director was, it may have been Brian Large, but it was one of those who you would be prepared to do anything at all if asked, a really nice guy. I have no idea why, but we ended up doing at least five if not six takes, and I had been doing the shot on my hands and knees, more or less. By take three I was absolutely knackered, and at least I was offered a few minutes respite (probably a bit of wardrobe and/or make-up intervention) but after the final take, I was totally out of it. I was probably completely useless for the de-rig and any other memories of the production thereafter.
Ian Norman
I took some photographs at the time.Orange in office:
I had forgotten there was an allocations office orange. Does that imply two teams with an office each or the whole crew pounding up and down the stairs to both offices? (Peter Fox)
The real orange:
Other photographs:
The crew bus
Working hard …
