Well here we are again to stroll down Memory Lane, but even old fossils like me can still get down with the dudes and meet young people.
My colleague Bob Redman from our volunteer group Elstree Screen Heritage and me were invited by Woodlands School in Borehamwood to talk to 10 or 12-year-old kids about our film and television heritage. I salute both their teacher Jordan and the youngsters for making it a wonderful two hours. In 60 years’ time they will be my age and heaven knows what the world will be like but their innocence and joy of life should make us old timers ashamed of what is happening today. If only as we get older we could hold onto being young.
Lecture over and I watched the final episode of Holby City shot at the BBC Elstree Centre with sadness. I know from private conversations that despite good ratings and a 60,000-signature petition handed to the BBC it was doomed. The series needed two floors of the old 1960 office block and exteriors. Alas, I am told it would cost over £7 million to repair that office block as bits are falling off and as the BBC are reviewing the future of the BBC Elstree Centre that is the real decision behind cancelling a still popular series.
I have just found the draft of my first book written in 1972 entitled The End Of An Era, which was about film stars who had died up until that time. In those days it was nice to have a foreword written by a star of yesteryear. I sent a draft to Dennis Price who had been a star in British cinema with films like Kind Hearts And Coronets but was now living as sadly a drunk in the Channel Isles. We exchanged letters but he felt nobody would remember him so he declined and sadly died shortly afterwards.
I then read that Bruce Cabot , the star along with Fay Wray of the original 1930s King Kong movie was over here to appear in the James Bond film Diamonds Are Forever. I sent a draft copy to him and he wrote back that when he went back to America he would show it…
Source : times
