DAVID SOUL (1943-2004)

 

Goodbye, Hutch! 

 

Ah, dear, sweet David Soul... Here he is, on the left (looking, as ever, cool in black and tan) as we knew and loved him, before he scared the bejesus out of us with Salem's Lot. By his side: trusted fellow crime-fighter, Starsky – co-star in Starsky and Hutch, Paul Michael Glaser, surprisingly hip in a previous year's Christmas jumper.

 

Thus passes another of my boyhood crushes from those innocent days before they'd invented phrases like 'homoerotic tropes'... 

 

Mind you, on Instagram, a couple of years ago, Glaser posted this 'other' photo of himself and his chum from a time gone by; "Everyone needs a Hutch to their Starsky," he wrote – so who knows...

 

GLYNIS JOHNS (1923-2024)

 

 

 

Farewell to Glynis Johns, aged 100: beautiful lady (with amazing eyes) and exceptionally talented actress, equally skilled at playing dramatic, romantic or comedic roles. Daughter of veteran Welsh actor Mervyn Johns (himself a considerable talent), Glynis was at home on stage or in front of the camera, but it was the movies that elevated her career to star status.

Glynis made her film debut in 1938 in South Riding and success was quickly followed with Powell and Pressburger's 1941 war drama 49th Parallel in which stepping into a role vacated by Elisabeth Bergner in a very starry cast (Leslie Howard, Laurence Olivier, Anton Walbrook and Raymond Massey) and for which she won a National Board of Review Award for Best Acting. In 1948 she had a triumph as the titular mermaid in the screwball comedy, Miranda which also featured David Tomlinson with whom she would later co-star in Mary Poppins as Mrs and Mr Banks.

  

Other films that followed included The Card second-billed to Alec Guinness and Flesh and Blood co-staring alongside Richard Todd; Walt Disney would subsequently cast Johns and Todd in two historical pictures: The Sword and the Rose and Rob Roy, the Highland Rogue. She provided a glamorous foil to Danny Kaye in his glorious medieval musical-romp, The Court Jester; and co-starred with Deborah Kerr, Robert Mitchum and Peter Ustinov in The Sundowners, with Dan O'Herlihy in The Cabinet of Caligari and with Peter O'Toole, Burton and Taylor in Under Milk Wood.
 

On stage, Glynis was the first actress play the role of Desiree Armfeldt in Stephen Sondheim's 1973 Broadway hit, A Little Night Music, in which she introduced – in her hallmark, husky voice – what would become one of Sondheim's most best-loved and enduring songs, 'Send in the Clowns'.  

 

 
This performance won Glynis a Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical and Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actress in a Musical. Sondheim likened her voice to a "rumpled bed", which is less of an insult than an acknowledgement of her seductive delivery.

The song's construction (now so famously known) was solely dictated by the musical ability of his leading lady. As Sondheim once described the structure:

 

"Isn't it rich (breathe-breathe),

Are we a pair (breathe-breathe),

Me here at last on the ground (breathe),

You in mid-air (breathe-breathe),

Send in the clowns."

Writing in The New York Times, music critic Anthony Tommasini perceptively said of the song: "Stephen Sondheim composed his most famous song, 'Send In the Clowns,' for an actress with virtually no voice ... and few genuine singers have performed it as effectively." Which is unquestionably true.

Of course, Glynis had already sung a roistering number in Walt Disney's 1964 film triumph, Mary Poppins, delivering 'Sister Suffragette', a militant battle-cry for women's rights in Edwardian England in the role of Jane and Michael's mother Mrs Winifred Banks. As the story goes, Walt invited Glynis to the studio, planning to offer her the role of the mother of the two children, Jane and Michael; however, the actress (already a Disney leading lady) assumed she was going to be offered the film's title role. 

To sell the supporting role and mollify the disappointed star, Walt called Poppins composers, Richard and Robert Sherman, and told them that he was taking Glynis to lunch and, afterwards, would be bringing her to the music room so they could play the new song they had composed for her. The Sherman Brothers, decoding Walt's unexpected call, worked through their own lunchtime and rewrote an abandoned song for Mary Poppins – 'Practically Perfect in every way / In ev'rything I do and in everything I say...' as a suffrage mission statement that now began, 'We're clearly soldiers in petticoats / Dauntless crusaders for women's votes!' The ruse (and the song) worked the necessary magic and Miss Johns accepted the role. 

FAREWELL PARKY!

 

The death of Sir Michael Parkinson at the grand age of 88 is a reminder of a lost art-form – or at least (if you disagree with 'art') then a lost aspect of premier journalism. He was the doyen of the TV 'chat-show': a true successor and refiner of the art of the television interview, previously pioneered on America's The Dick Cavett Show and, in Britain, on John Freeman's Face to Face.

 

'Chat-show' is too trivial a term for Parkinson's achievement as telly's Torquemada. It's true that 'Parky, as he was affectionately referred to be legion of viewers, was a man with the sharply honed mind of a seasoned inquisitor, but his mode of torture was invariably tempered with a genuine fascination with (and, often, admiration for) his 'victims'!. Above all, he was more intent on exploring the thoughts and views of his interviewees than in promoting his own; more determined to showcase his subjects than in ever pushing his own ego.

 

We worked together, for a few years, when I was a regular TV/Radio critic on his Sunday morning Radio 2 programme. I loved our easy, warm conversations and an annual joy for our group of reviewers (news, sport, film, TV etc) was to be invited to a delightful, intimate Christmas lunch hosted by Michael and where we each received an 'Award' for our work over the preceding year – all with wonderfully absurd category titles and, on at least one occasion, the opportunity to form an impromptu orchestra with kazoos and swanee whistles!

 

Not so long ago, I wrote to Michael to congratulate him on the BBC's then recent Parkinson at 50 series: an anthology of memorable moments (and there were so many!) from fifty years of the show: hilarious chats with Peter Ustinov, Dudley Moore, Kenneth Williams and Billy Connolly; delightful exchanges with James Cagney, David Niven and Ingrid Bergman; unforgettable encounters with Orson Welles, Muhammad Ali and Kermit and Miss Piggy; and, in what was his all-time favourite interviewee, an intense and incisive intellectual conversation with mathematician and philosopher, Jacob Bronowski.

 

Responding to my email, Michael replied:

 

Dear Brian

 

Many thanks for your charming letter which stirred lots of wonderful memories. It served as a reminder of how much I enjoyed doing our show on Radio 2. It was a very happy time for me made more so by a group of colleagues, including yourself, who just happened to be very good at what they did.

 

I am glad you enjoyed PARKINSON AT 50. We had a lot of great reactions and if I am allowed an opinion I think it was a marvellous reminder of a great team I worked with through the years and of the time when you were allowed to do a talk show without performing like a halfwit.

 

With every best wish

 

Michael

 

"A reminder of ... the time when you were allowed to do a talk show without performing like a halfwit."

 

Yes, Michael that just about sums it up! I won't say, in Hamlet's words: "I shall not look upon his like again", because I hope I may, but to reflect on Parky's career is to look with unqualified admiration on the absolute gold-standard for what being a chat-show host should be: a person who is on top of his research; not bound by pre-planned questions, but always open to seizing the opportunity of the moment and – above all – not just an 'asker' but a 'listener'. 

 

Art: 'Parky', a pastel portrait of Sir Michael Parkinson by Glyn Overton. Check her other artwork HERE

REMEMBERING JIM KORKIS

 

I am deeply saddened to learn the news of my friend and fellow Disney fanatic, Jim Korkis at the age of 72. How to sum of the life and prolific work of this popular and much-loved Disney historian?

I made an attempt in 2013 in contributing this commendation for the back cover of his then latest book, The Vault of Walt Volume 2: Other Unofficial Disney Stories Never Told. I wrote:

In Disney’s world of mice and ducks, the indefatigable Jim Korkis is a veritable terrier: tracking down juicy stories, sniffing out intriguing incidents and digging up forgotten facts! His encyclopaedic knowledge and dedication to research are matched by an incomparable narrative skill that effortlessly educates and enlightens in the most enthusiastic, engaging and entertaining way.

Of course it would have been better if I'd started  by saying: "In Disney’s world of mice ducks and dogs..." but it's too late now. 

Jim and I had a long-running correspondence that touched on many matters Disneyesque: specific films and characters obviously, but also Jim's former career within the Company and his, often feisty, commentaries of the changing face of 'Disney Inc.'; mostly however, we corresponded about our shared passion for 'Classic Disney', by which we meant the life and work of the Man Himself.

As I wrote today on the 'Disney History Institute's' Facebook page:

...Jim was a wonderful human being and an indomitable enthusiast; he poured his humanity and enthusiasm into everything he did and wrote. I have read, used and contributed to his many volumes and I have enjoyed them for their diligent research, clarity of storytelling and, most of all, their HUGE sense of fun and delight. Jim had a passionate love of all things Disney and he never wearied of passing on his passion and knowledge with the rest of us who shared that love. Thank you for your work, Jim, and your friendship. I will miss you and whatever your next few books would have been...

Remembering Jim prompts me to share the Foreword I wrote to his  2017 book, The Vault of Walt: Volume 6: Other Unofficial Disney Stories Never Told... 

 

FOREWORD

 

I have something to get off my chest: despite having spent a disproportionate part of my life collecting and writing about all things Disney, my earliest encounter with the Mousetro’s work proved deeply traumatic for me and acutely embarrassing for my parents.

 

What ended as a nightmare had begun as a treat for my fourth birthday: a visit to a now-long-gone British institution, the News Theatre on London’s Waterloo Station. Open daily, from 9 a.m. to 11 p.m., the News Theatre screened a continuous program of newsreels, comedy one-reelers and cartoons. On this particular day, the bill featured the vintage 1938 Disney short, Brave Little Tailor, in which Mickey Mouse, in the title role, tackles an enormous Giant in order to win the hand of the Princess Minnie. At a crucial point in this drama, Mickey hides in a cart laden with pumpkins and, when the giant grabs a handful as a snack, Mickey finds himself being hurled into the Giant’s mouth. Dodging the pumpkins as they hurtle by him like bowling balls, he only avoids being swallowed by hanging onto the Giant’s uvular. These antics were, naturally, greeted with hilarity by every other youngster in the cinema – but not, unfortunately, by me! Terrified at the mouse-threatening scenario unfolding before me in the dark, I screamed and screamed until my humiliated parents bundled me out of the theatre and rushed me off to the nearest café to pacify me with tea and buns.

 

I make this confession as it may help to explain the fixation with Disney that has obsessed me virtually ever since that harrowing day! Without that shock to my young system, that jolt to my nascent psyche, would I have co-authored several books on Disney topics (from Mickey Mouse and Snow White to Mary Poppins) or made several dozen hours of radio programmes for the BBC about Uncle Walt, his company and movies? Probably not.

 

One of the by-products of this career (of which I’ve only provided the sketchiest of detail since I’m taking up space in somebody else’s book on Disney) is the occasional invitation to write a foreword such as the one I’m just about to get down to writing here.

 

Within the annals of cinema history there is a small but growing coterie of dedicated scribes who are dubbed Disney Historians. There is an urgent imperative to chronicle the life and times of Walt Disney and the achievements of his studio because it is the story of many people, most of whose contributions have only begun to be recorded in the past 50 years since the death of the man whose internationally recognised signature came to represent the combined talents of an army of artists, writers, musicians and technicians.

 

Some of us of a certain age can still recall when there were scarcely more than a handful books about the art and industry of Disney. Today there are shelf-loads of such books – representing a wide range of approaches from the academic and authoritative via the critical to the anodyne and scurrilous. Nevertheless, there are still first-hand recollections needing to be recorded and new chapters of the story waiting to be written – not to mention the tedious task of correcting inaccuracies and remedying misconceptions.

 

One of the most prolific of these Disney historians is the indefatigable Jim Korkis (“At last!” you say, “This Foreword is finally getting to the point!”) whose Disney Vault you are about to enter.  

 

I first met the Vault Keeper sixteen years ago, on 5 December (Walt's birthday) 2001. We were in the VIP lounge of the Norway pavilion in EPCOT and, whilst I no longer recall the reason for that choice of venue, I mention it since the fact that EPCOT has a Norway VIP lounge will be, for some, an irresistible piece of Disney park trivia eagerly learned.

 

After signing a book of mine for Jim (despite my protestations that the only valuable copies are the unsigned ones) he gave me a cracking interview for one of my radio shows as a result of which I immediately had the measure of Jim’s talent: he was, like Shakespeare’s clown Autolycus, "a snapper-up of unconsidered trifles", by which I mean that he collected a wealth of information that others had overlooked or disregarded and stored it away in his vast memory-bank – or, you could say, vault! 

 

Korkis books are always filled with these discoveries, fashioned together so as to create a series of diverse narratives of varying – but satisfyingly appropriate – length where the whole is always greater than the sum of the parts.

 

Jim is a born teller of tales, able to engage, excite, intrigue and amuse us with stories that reveal not just his talent for research but also his gift of infectious enthusiasm. If something fascinates Korkis he will make sure we share his fascination. This is not surprising since he has met and talked with dozens of Disney animators and those theme park wizards known as ‘Imagineers’ and has been writing about them and their genius boss for three-and-a-half decades.

 

Looking through the table of contents I can’t quite decide where I’ll start: maybe with the stories about Walt’s enthralment with Abe Lincoln and Charlie Chaplin; or, perhaps, with the appreciation of Disney Park Dinosaurs; or, possibly, with the articles on the Oscar-winning documentary, Seal Island, and the zany comedy that introduced the world to car 53 – Herbie, the Love Bug. Wherever I start, I can guarantee to be riveted and end up knowing immeasurably more than when I started.

 

In view of the distressing recollection with which I began this Foreword, I was wondering if an essay on Disney Giants might be on offer; but it really doesn’t matter because Jim can always add it to the possible contents list for his next foray into the Disney Vault; meanwhile (since I’ve detained you far too long already), you can start enjoying this one. Right, then! Off you go…

 

Well, what are you waiting for? Off you go to your bookseller-of-choice and get your hands on one of Jim's many books on Disney, maybe this one, published last year when he knew he was battling the disease that has finally taken him from us to that enchanted Neverland that created by the Dream-merchant whose work he loved and ceaselessly celebrated.

 

 

FAREWELL DORIAN GRAY

Helmut Berger (1944-2023), Austria's electrifying, androgenous screen Adonis: The Damned, Dorian Gray, The Garden of the Finzi-Continis, Ludwig II, Conversation Piece – was a sex-symbol and pop-icon (courtesy of Helmut Newton, David Bailey and Andy Warhol) of the 'swinging sixties'. 

Hailed as 'The most handsome main the world' and 'The It-Boy of the European jet-set', he was the muse and lover of Luchino Visconti and an object of desire for (among others, it is alleged) Rudolf Nureyev, Britt Ekland, Ursula Andress, Tab Hunter, Linda Blair, Jerry Hall and both Bianca and Mick Jagger. He was, for many years, a true imbiber of life and love and the epitome of elegant animality.

GOODBYE, MRS LOVETT AND MRS POTTS

The death of Dame Angela Lansbury is sad news, albeit at the grand old age of 96. Vibrant, elegant, funny, magnetic, impeccably stylish and superbly talented, she was the very epitome of what it means to be a 'Star'. 

On stage, film and television, she created unforgettable characterisations: from the devious maid, Nancy Oliver in Gaslight, her debut role, aged 19, that earned her an Oscar nomination) and Sibyl Vane (The Picture of Dorian Gray) to Mrs. Eleanor Iselin (The Manchurian Candidate, perhaps her finest film roles) and Miss Jane Marple (The Mirror Crack'd); on stage she starred in Jerry Herman's Mame playing Patrick Dennis' wildly unorthodox aunt, an exuberant Mother Rose in Gypsy and the first – and surely the greatest – of the many Mrs Lovetts who have aided and abetted the Demon Barber of Fleet Street in Sondheim's Sweeney Todd.

She gave stand-out supporting roles in dozens of films – musicals, comedies and epics – including The Harvey Girls, Till the Clouds Roll By, The Court Jester and Samson and Delilah and, years later, created the long-running TV sleuth, Jessica Fletcher. 

For Disney she was both the amateur witch, Eglantine Price, in Bedknobs and Broomsticks and the voice of the cosy-comfy Mrs Potts, the talking (and singing) tea-pot in the original animated Beauty and the Beast. 

Angela enjoyed a huge late success when she returned to Broadway and the West End as Madame Arcarti in Noel Coward's Blithe Spirit and she made (as it turned out) a farewell cameo as the Balloon Woman in the film Mary Poppins Returns.    

I met and interviewed Angela many years ago now for radio series on Disney and the history of cinema and I hugely enjoyed the encounter, finding her charming, witty, smart and, unsurprisingly, razor-sharp. When I was reckless enough to ask whether the Cockney Mrs Lovett had, perhaps, a kinship with Mrs Potts, she looked momentarily aghast and replied very decisively (even severely): "I really don't think Mrs Potts has anything in common with the accomplice to a serial killer!" Happily, she then laughed and we moved on...

I can also testify that Angela Lansbury was the perfect hostess at dispensing the most English tea-and-biscuits I've ever enjoyed in Hollywood!

 

 

After our interview she signed a cinema lobby-card from Bedknobs featuring Miss Price intoning her magical incantation beginning "Treguna Mekoides...".

As you can see, she inscribed the image: "For Brian, I said What? Love, Angela Lansbury". 

The world is very much the poorer for her departure, but our entertainment heritage is hugely the richer for her having passed among us. 

[Photo of Angela Lansbury and BS by Malcolm Prince]

 

DAVID WARNER (1941-2022)

 

I am deeply saddened to hear of the passing of David Warner. It is a sign of our lazy times that he is described in several obituary headlines as 'OMEN and TITANIC actor'. Yes, he was especially excellent in The Omen as the sympathetic investigating photographer who meets an particularly nasty end, but he gave an extraordinary range of performances in many other movie: Tom Jones, Morgan: A Suitable Case for Treatment, The Ballad of Cable Hogue, Straw Dogs, Cross of Iron, Time After Time, The Man With Two Brains, Time Bandits and Tron to mention but a few.

He played many villainous characters but also capable of great sensitivity as can be seen in his portrayal of Bob Cratchit in the US American TV film of A Christmas Carol opposite George C Scott's Ebenezer Scrooge. But (more easily overlooked in our film/tv orientated times) he was also a stellar member of the one of the all time great RSC companies and, under the direction of Peter Hall, was unquestionably the Hamlet of his generation.

 

I was privileged to work with David on three of my BBC radio epics, beginning with my 1985 Sony Radio Award-winning dramatisations of Mervyn Peake's Titus Groan and Gormenghast in which he portrayed a tragic, languid and melancholic Lord Sepulchrave, 76th Earl of Groan. Then, in 2011, when I tackled Peke's trilogy of novels afresh as The History of Titus Groan, he played "The Artist": storyteller, character and what might, perhaps, be best described as a possible 'ghost of Mervyn Peake'; he was wonderfully moving – haunting in fact – and the series won me the BBC Radio Drama Award. I viewed David as my lucky talisman.

 

So, in 2014, I requested the directors of my six-hour dramatization of T. H. White's The Once and Future King to cast David as the mercurial Merlyn: a role he relished and played to perfection – by turn, wise, funny, solemn and playful; He was T. H. White's living-backwards-through-time wizard to a 'T' ('H' and 'W'!).

 

Had any other radio drama commissions come my way, I would have moved heaven and earth to have found him a role! I adored his acting and I loved the man. 

 

With his resigned, lived-in (almost world-weary) features, he was modest and self-effacing, but – to the delight of any dramatist or director – he was a player with a phenomenal, always surprisingly and intriguingly nuanced, talent and it was always a talent that was but lightly worn. He was, I believe, one of the great (and seriously underrated) actors of our time.

 

The signed photo below is one I took of him in the BBC drama studio during the recording of The History of Titus Groan.

 

 

RON MILLER – THE UNDERVALUED DISNEY GIANT

It is with great personal sadness that I note the passing of Ron Miller at the age of 85. Ronald William Miller was an American businessman and former professional American football player. Married to Diane Disney Miller, Walt Disney's eldest daughter, he worked for his father-in-law on numerous film projects and later became President and CEO of The Walt Disney Company from 1978 until 1984, when he was ousted following an internal power struggle that saw the company pass into the control of Michael Eisner, Frank Wells and Jeffrey Katzenberg supported by Walt's nephew Roy E. Disney.

Ron Miller's achievements, during the difficult years following Walt's death were hugely significant and have yet to received their due credit. As his father-in-law had done before him, he pushed the Company to expand and explore, creating, in 1983, the Touchstone label (with its first stand-out hit, Splash!) and launching the Disney Channel. He was an innovator (although, again, unacknowledged), experimenting in early computer animation in Tron (1982); funding an unlikely collaborator, the renegade Tim Burton, for stop-motion animation shorts Vincent (1982) and Frankenweenie (1984); and sowing the seeds for several future hit projects, among them Who Framed Roger Rabbit? (1988).

Following the 1984 company coup, Ron and Diane left Hollywood and settled in Nappa Valley where they had already established the now internationally successful Silverado Vineyards.

Ron was a gentlemanly giant, a man of great personal charm and graciousness whose company I enjoyed on several occasions. The first in the late '80s – in company with my friends Richard Holliss and his wife, Chris – on a visit to the Miller's then home in Hollywood and later, on various visits to San Francisco. He will be remembered (apart from his valiant attempts to reinvigorate the Disney studio following Walt's death) for his service to the Disney legacy, tirelessly supporting Diane's various projects devoted to her father's memory, including the documentary film, Walt: The Man Behind the Myth (2001) and the visionary project, The Walt Disney Family Museum created in 2009 in San Francisco where the Millers had a penthouse apartment overlooking the Bay. Following Diane's tragic death in 2013, Ron became president of the Museum's board of directors.

He had agreed to write an introduction to a book of Walt Disney's letters that I am currently editing and I am saddened that this will, now, never be the case.

I am pictured below with Diane and Ron in 2001 at the premiere of Walt: The Man Behind the Myth, in which I made a cameo appearance.

[Photo: Barb Nicholson]

YOUNG AT HEART

Farewell to Alan Young (1919-2016) that engaging actor whose many roles on stage, film and television include Wilbur Post, the klutzy owner of a loquacious Palomino horse in one of the wackiest of the goofy '60s TV sitcoms Mister Ed (1961-66) and, later, the voice of Disney's Scrooge McDuck in Mickey's Christmas Carol and numerous TV animations.

Anyone thesp who can share the screen with a talking horse without being totally upstaged and can speak like a stingy Scottish duck is, surely, an actor with genuine talent!

THE COUNT AND I

I consider myself fortunate to have so many personal memories of the late Sir Christopher Lee – mainly through our joint association with The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit film trilogies: a mere handful out of his astonishing 206 movie appearances...

We first met in 1973, when I was a guest of Peter Cushing at Pinewood Studio where he was filming Nothing But the Night with Diana Dors and Christopher Lee. I remember Peter introducing me to this imposing figure who was as austere and as intimidating as you might expect him to be from so many of his roles.

Not long after, my best friend and I (confirmed film nuts) bought tickets for a BAFTA award ceremony at the National Film Theatre and found ourselves sitting behind Christopher. Eager to impress my chum, I accosted the actor as we were getting up to leave the theatre and sought to remind him of our meeting at Pinewood. Of course, he had absolutely no recollection whatsoever of the occasion and I should have let it go at that, but – in a vain attempt to prolong the non-conversation – I stammered: 'So, how is Peter Cushing?' Raising his busy brows and giving me a withering look, he replied snappishly: 'We don't live together, you know.'

When, many years later, over lunch at my then London club, I plucked up the courage to recount this exchange, he was graciously penitent about the put-down. Another memory of that lunch was listening to Christopher, an exceptional linguist (who had just been quoting J R R Tolkien to me – in Elvish), conversing with the club's Cypriot maître d' in both Greek and Turkish. On that and other occasions, he shared his seemingly inexhaustible fund of anecdotes including personal memories of Tolkien and two other shared literary heroes, C S Lewis and M R James. 

One prickly encounter occurred at Cannes early in 2001, where the preview footage of The Fellowship of the Ring was being screened. I was showing the proofs of my first Official Movie Companion to members of the cast for them to check the biographical details. Having read the entry on himself, Christopher looked up, frowning: 'I don't believe I have actually played Dracula as many times as you say here.' Standing my ground, I replied: 'I think you did...' He glowered and, handing back the proof, said: 'Well, even I did, I don't think we need to say how many, do you?' So, of course, we didn't!

Then there was Dominic Monaghan's 26th birthday party (coinciding with the December 2002 premiere of The Two Towers) at an expensive restaurant in Paris. Cast and other talent were present and I was seated with WETA Workshop's Richard Taylor on one side and Christopher and his wife, Gitte, on the other. After the first two courses, Christopher and Gitte decided to slip away, in order to be rested for the following day's premiere exertions. Getting up from his seat, Christopher murmured: 'Settle up what we owe when the bill comes, there's a good fellow and I'll sort it with you tomorrow.' I had what was an anxious hour, uncertain whether – if I ordered desert and coffee – I would have enough euros for the Lees' dinners and my own! Mercifully, when the bill did arrive, it was instantly snaffled by producer Barrie Osborne, who paid for all present.

I spent a good number of hours interviewing Christopher for The Lord of the Rings DVD bonus discs, invariably getting into trouble from Gitte for keeping him too long in front of the camera; although, in truth, I was never to blame since, whenever I made an attempt to wrap the interview, Christopher would always embark on yet another round of stories. 

Our most memorable interview, however, was a remote one, via telephone. It was 2008 and David and I are having lunch in our local pub when my mobile rings. I answer and hear the familiar basso profundo tones: 'Is that Brian Sibley?'  

'Hello, Christopher.'

'How did you know it was me? I was disguising my voice!' 

He has just finished reading my biography of Peter Jackson in which PJ relates a story about directing Christopher's death scene as Saruman in The Return of the King. Pete had asked Christopher to give a great scream when Grima stabs him in the back, but Christopher had explained that somebody stabbed in the back would never cry out, but would simply give a sharp exhalation of breath. So, PJ wanted to know, how come Christopher knew this? The answer: because he had been in the Special Air Services (SAS).

'Peter,' says the voice on the phone, 'was incorrect in telling that because I was, in fact, in the SAS Reserve.'

I apologise: 'I should have checked with you...'

'It's alright,' he replies, 'I have spoken to the Head of the SAS this morning and explained the situation and that you are not to blame.'

I am then treated (not for the first time) to a detailed analysis of why Peter was wrong to have cut the aforementioned scene from the theatrical release of The Return of the King ('Saruman has been established as a nemesis for two movies and then simply disappears?!') This complaint, in turn, prompts a tirade about the fact that his recent appearance in Tim Burton's film of Stephen Sondheim's Sweeney Todd has also been cut. The intention had been for the film to begin with Christopher singing the musical's opening song, 'The Ballad of Sweeney Todd', which, in the stage show, establishes Todd's character and the narrative style.

'You know the number, I presume?' he enquires, but before I can reply he has launched into the song with great gusto. I thought to myself, I will never forget this moment: I am sitting in a pub, eating pie and mash, while Christopher Lee sings Sondheim to me down the phone!

He was, of course, noted for his idiosyncratic discography: from Mussorgsky's 'The Song of the Flea' to Frank Sinatra's 'My Way' – not forgetting his memorable Heavy Metal version of 'The Little Drummer Boy'! A pity then that the world at large was denied his screen rendition of the Sweeney Todd song, but I can hear it still...

That marathon telephone conversation (though it was more of a monologue than a conversation) ran for over an hour, until the 'low battery' warning on the phone was flashing with increasing rapidity. Just before finally defeating my Nokia's endurance levels, Christopher made a surprisingly unguarded comment about someone connected with The Lord of the Rings and, when I laughed, added sternly: 'And you will not repeat that, Brian Sibley, do you understand? Remember, I still have a number of very good friends in the SAS!'

Farewell, Christopher, the world is an immeasurably duller place for your passing...

Sir Christopher Frank Carandini Lee

(1922–2015)

Caricature by Bast

THE LATE LORD OF DISCWORLD

“Where did you say your business was?” said Lezek.

“Is it far?”

No further than the thickness of a shadow, said Death. Where the first primal cell was, there was I also. 
Where man is, there am I.

When the last life crawls under freezing stars, there will I be.

Farewell, Terry Pratchett!

You had a rare genius for storytelling and myth-making that had its roots deep in the centuries-long history of fantasy and legend but which produced exotic flowers blooming in a riot of contemporary satire...

The Discworld is flat and rides on the back of four giant elephants

who stand on the shell of the enormous star turtle...

and is bounded by a waterfall that cascades endlessly into space.
Scientists have calculated that the chance of anything
so patently absurd actually existing are millions to one.

But magicians have calculated that million-to-one chances

crop up nine times out of ten.

You could be prickly and curmudgeonly and woe-betide the idiot who tested your endurance of folly...

They say a little knowledge is a dangerous thing,

but it is not one half so bad as a lot of ignorance

You battled the demon dementia with courage and humour and gave the bastard a run for its money...

The pen is mightier than the sword... 

if the sword is very short, and the pen is very sharp

We had several memorable encounters including these two conversations for the BBC World Service...

"There are times when you realise that events are so far out of your control that it is a relief to just sit back and see what happens next – that lovely sense of crystalline relief that there is nothing you can do about it. So, if Death walked in now and put his bony fingers on my arm, I think a sense of hopeful expectation would be about the most I could muster; but there's no point in saying 'Excuse me, there's something I want to finish'! One should take life as it comes ––– that's what Death always does."

"The only reason for walking into the jaws of Death

is so's you can steal his gold teeth."

Terry Pratchett

(1948-2015)

"THAT CERTAIN THING CALLED THE BOYFRIEND"

News comes of the death of British composer and playwright, Sandy Wilson, aged 90.

Wilson is best-remembered for his enduringly popular musical, The Boy Friend, written in 1953 as an affectionate, light-as-air spoof on the theatrical musicals popular in the 1920s.

Beginning life at London's Players' Theatre Club, The Boy Friend opened in the West End, in an expanded form, in 1954 and ran for 2,078 performances, making it, briefly, the third-longest running musical in West End or Broadway history after Chu Chin Chow and Oklahoma! until its record was broken by Salad Days.

The Broadway production, opening in 1954, starred Julie Andrews as Polly Browne, the central character who is search of the eponymous boy friend. It was Andrews' American debut and established her true star potential.

I interviewed Sandy Wilson, a few years ago, when I was researching and writing a BBC Radio 2 series on 'The Musical' . To be precise, I interviewed him twice!

The first 'attempt' (that's the only way I can describe it) did not go well: he was ill-at-ease, took offence at some questions, baulked at answering others, was generally reluctant to discuss the musical genre in general and refused point-blank to comment on the contemporary scene. In short, the interview was a complete and utter disaster. The man who'd written the song 'I Could Be Happy With You' was obviously anything but – and nor was I!

At the end of this uncomfortable encounter, Wilson grudgingly signed my copy of his autobiography (ironically, under the circumstances, entitled, I Could Be Happy) adding the inscription: "Well, I tried!"

The following day, I decided I wasn't going to leave it at that... I found a period greetings card in the shape of a fan featuring '20s 'flappers' in a carnival setting, wrote an abject note asking whether he might possibly consider giving me a "second chance", because I couldn't possibly conceive of our making a series of programmes for the BBC on the musical without his involvement.

He instantly replied, graciously saying that the failure of the interview was entirely his fault and, yes, he'd "be happy to try again"! So, we did: he was a pussycat and I knew what pitfalls NOT to fall into! The interview was a success and our second meeting ended with his sitting at the piano playing me some of his numbers...

Those two visits to Sandy Wilson's London flat will, for completely different reasons, long live in my memory...

In 1971, The Boy Friend was filmed by Ken Russell, starring Twiggy and Christopher Gable. The movie proved to be less about spoofing 1920s stage shows as the Busby Berkeley film musicals of the 1930s and, to Wilson's understandable chagrin, included songs written by other composers including 'You Are My Lucky Star' from Singin' in the Rain. But for all that, it had all the usual, unpredictable Russell extravagances, some brilliantly staged numbers and a top-flight cast giving terrific, high-energy performances.

Here, from that film, are the legendary Tommy Tune with Antonia Ellis and the Boys and Girls singing and dancing their way through Sandy Wilson's effervescent 'Won't You Charleston With Me?'

Alexander Galbraith "Sandy" Wilson

1924-2014

LAST WORDS ON DIANE

Today's edition of the BBC Radio 4 obituary programme, Last Word, featured a tribute by me to Diane Disney Miller.

 

The programme is repeated on Radio 4 on Sunday (20:30) and remains available on iPlayer afterwards.

And here are links to my article on Disney, Poppins and Travers for Wednesday's Evening Standard...

...and, on the same day, my appearance on Radio London's Robert Elms Show.

REMEMBERING DIANE

You can read my obituary to Diane Disney Miller in the Guardian newspaper here.

DIANE DISNEY MILLER

I was deeply saddened to hear of the passing of Diane Disney Miller following complications following a recent fall.

The eldest daughter of Walt Disney and his wife, Lillian, Diane was intimately involved in her father's career: with her sister, Sharon, she introduced him to the Mary Poppins books of P L Travers and, in the years following Walt's death, stalwartly defended her father's reputation in the face of assaults by adversely critical journalists and biographers.

A generous benefactor and philanthropist who furthered her father's commitments to the arts, she worked tirelessly to see the creation of Los Angeles' Disney Concert Hall and in recent years brought into being the acclaimed Disney Family Museum in San Francisco.

Married to Ron Miller, former CEO of the Disney Company, they had seven children.

I had the great pleasure and privilege of knowing Diane for thirty years and collaborating with her on a major series for BBC Radio 2 celebrating Disney's Women – both real and fictional who featured in Walt's life and movies.

Here is the first of those programmes...

 You can read more about a couple of my encounters with Diane here.

DIANE DISNEY MILLER

(1933-2013)