#Dixon of Dock Green

[mariocki]

RIP Kenneth Cope (14.4.1931 - 11.9.2024)

"Michael Pratt and I just gelled. We had never met previously but we got on so well. Michael wrote, and we had such a great relationship that we would just change lines, and we were both on the same wavelength. That was such a lucky, lucky thing."

[helmstone]

Dixon of Dock Green comes to Talking Pictures TV — Evening all!

Dixon of Dock Green comes to Talking Pictures TV — Evening all!

If you’ve checked your Talking Pictures TV (TPTV) newsletter, you’ll know Dixon of Dock Green comes to the channel at 7:20 pm Saturday 13 January. Here’s what they have to say: First shown on 6th June 1955 and running all the way through to 1976 for an incredible 432 episodes, the series starred Jack Warner as a bobby dealing with crimes in London’s East End while mentoring the fresh faced PC…

[glitter-studs]

Study in Columbus Example of a small transitional medium tone wood floor and brown floor study room design with gray walls

[scotianostra]

Happy 92nd Birthday veteran Scottish actress Phyllida Law, born on May *8th 1932 in Glasgow.

Wiki has 8th July on the first line of their page on Phyllida, but on the side panel has May 8th, so who knows!?

There is very little about her early life except she was born in Glasgow, the daughter of Megsie “Meg” and William Law, a journalist. She said once of he Glasgow upbringing “When you grow up in Glasgow with a Glaswegian granny, you’re taught that pride is a wicked thing. I still feel a bit like that.“ Phyllida grew up in Glasgow’s west end, just off Great Western Road, but war broke out when she was just seven and she found herself evacuated to places such as Lenzie, in Dunbartonshire, and Skelmorlie, Ayrshire.

That gave her a love for the Scots countryside which means she now splits her life between her home in London and a family cottage in Argyll. Phyllida would fit in well with the Scottish & Proud ethos, in an interview she says:

“I’m passionate about my Scots heritage. How could I not be? I can’t live without it. There’s no way I could live without those hills and it’s got to be the west coast. “I sometimes travel to Edinburgh then go up to Pittenweem or somewhere and I think to myself, ‘This isn’t Scotland.’ It’s a wonderful coastline but it’s not Scotland for me.

“When my parents lived in Glasgow they were always looking for a cottage to which they could retire. They found one in Ardentinney, so I visit that a lot.

She joined the Bristol Old Vic in 1952, from what I can gather she was first in the wardrobe department, the first pic shows her standing, from a 1952 photo. Heron screen acting credits start in 1958 and are very extensive, the pick of them are Dixon of Dock Green and a stint as the storyteller in the great children’s show Jackanory in the 60’s. It must have been during her time in the BBC’s children’s TV department she met her husband to be The Magic Roundabout narrator Eric Thompson, She has previously stated that the character of Ermintrude the cow was modelled on her.

Angels in the 70’s and of course Taggart in the 80’s as well Thomson, the variety series hosted by actress Emma Thompson in 1988, Emma just happens to be her daughter. Heartbeat, Hamish Macbeth and Dangerfield in the 90’s, Waking the dead and Doctors in the noughties has kept her busy, now in her 86th year she has still been appearing on the small screen, in The Other Wife and New Tricks during the past 8 years. Film roles include She is known for her work on Much Ado About Nothing , The Time Machine and The Winter Guest.

Phyllida spends most of her time in Argyll in a house she shares with her daughter Emma. who is spending more time looking after her mother, as she was diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease in 2915.

Phyllida constantly needs the support of a wheelchair and even assistance when washing due to the effect the condition is having on her.

Due to the progressive nature of the condition, symptoms tend to gradually worsen over time. It is common for individuals to struggle both with walking and talking at the height of the condition.

Phyllida herself spoke about the burdens of looking after an infirm parent, she looked after her mother, Meg who suffered with Alzheimer’s disease. Mego died in 1994 aged 93 after almost 20 years of being cared for by Ms Law at her mother's home in the village of Ardentinny on the west coast, near Dunoon.

Emma said of her mother “Mum is quite lame so it's a case of taking her out in a wheelchair, and making sure she takes her medication. The meds are amazing."

[lady-jane-asher]

New! Jane Asher as Joan Lane and Donald Webster in BBC’s Dixon of Dock Green episode called The High Price of Freedom, aired on october 13th, 1962. 🌼

Picture posted by Sam Czopanser on twitter!

[everything-maxriemelt]

Brett: “We did our first gig in 1989 around the time of baggy and shoegaze. When you’re young and impressionable, you want to sound like whatever’s fashionable, but we weren’t musically competent enough to be one of those bands. We carried on rehearsing three times a week and playing to three people, and slowly we got really good at being Suede, something with its own identity…

Bernard [Butler, guitarist] came up with the chords for Animal Nitrate and gave me a cassette of them with a drum machine on. The working title was Dixon, because it sounded like the theme for Dixon of Dock Green. I took it away but I just couldn’t write anything that I thought was any good. One night I was at a gig at the Powerhaus in Islington and overheard what I thought was “animal nitrate” in a drunken conversation. I wrote it down, forgot about it, opened my notebook the next day and there it was. It unlocked the song for me. All of a sudden I had the lyrics.”

Matt: “I first heard Animal Nitrate on a tape at the Premises in Hackney where we rehearsed. The music was completely formed. Bernard – when he wants – can do really interesting jazzy chords but this is much more straightforward and direct. He was listening to a lot of Nirvana at the time and you can hear that in the spiciness of the guitar line. The rhythm of the middle eight is very Smells Like Teen Spirit. I think we all knew it was a big song, almost a distillation of what we’d been doing to that point. It was the first song we wrote with an audience in mind – we knew people were listening. I don’t know if that’s why it has an element of call and response in the chorus, but when we played it at the 1992 Reading festival you could see the audience responding.”

from theGuardian

[blackswaneuroparedux]

Life as a barrister never was terribly real to me, and courtrooms were always a place of fantasy to me. They had nothing to do with discovering the truth, really, of course.

- John Mortimer

John Mortimer the barrister and writer died in 2009 and many felt we had lost a national treasure, which he certainly was. Much like Arthur Conan Doyle and his creation Sherlock Holmes, Mortimer became identified with his comic creation, Rumple of the Bailey, an ageing wit and hack barrister trudging along working the criminal courts for the defence. Such was the shadow of Rumpole that Mortimer’s legal achievements were often overlooked - of which were considerable.

His own father was a doyenne of the divorce courts and Mortimer followed his father’s footsteps into the legal profession at the bar, but to undertake civil liberties cases and censorship cases.  

As a campaigner he helped to achieve abolition of the death penalty and of the censorship of the theatre by that doltish establishment figure, the Lord Chamberlain. The cases he took as a barrister, defending Last Exit to Brooklyn, Oz, The Little Red School Book and finally Inside Linda Lovelace are credited with abolishing censorship of the written word (although the iconic Page Three semi nude model appeared in the Sun shortly after his victory in the Oz appeal).

It is interesting to consider how his insights, expressed in his plays and books, influenced progressive law reform. Rumpole of the Bailey had a particular impact on the reception by juries of police evidence. It came at a time - the late 70s - when the Vaudeville routine of the police "verbal" was still in vogue. Hardened villains, immediately on their arrest, would always say "It's a fair cop, guv" or "You've got me this banged to rights this time" or make other incriminating remarks. At least, police would tell this to juries as they read from their concocted notes. Juries would believe them, having been led by television fare like BBC tv series, Dixon of Dock Green.

Rumpole of the Bailey presented a different picture. It showed how bent or overzealous police could secure convictions by forensic trickery. Many lawyers who laboured in the criminal courts often in very unsexy settings credited the series with the new willingness of juries to acquit in such cases. In due course the law was changed and all police interviews had to be tape recorded or video taped.

Rumpole can also be credited with helping to change the culture of the bar. Mortimer was always amused at the prejudice against criminal law amongst the legal establishment - as one senior judge had put it, "the Old Bailey is hardly the SW3 of the legal profession". Lawyers who practised in crime were looked down on and students who showed any interest in human rights (then called civil liberties) were warned that they might ruin their career. Rumpole helped the public – and the bar – to understand that the need to protect the liberty of the subject is the main justification for the profession, and certainly for its independence.

Photo: John Mortimer, the creator of Rumpole of the Bailey book series, poses with Leo McKern who made Rumpole a cultural icon.

[lboogie1906]

Johnny Sekka (Lamine Sekka, July 21, 1934 – September 14, 2006) was a Senegalese actor.

He was born in Dakar, Senegal, the youngest of five siblings; his Gambian father died shortly after his birth. When he was still young, his Senegalese mother sent him to live with an aunt in Georgetown in the Gambia, but he ran away to live on the streets in the capital.

During WWII he found employment as an interpreter at an American air base in Dakar. He then worked on the docks. When he was 20, he stowed away on a ship to Marseilles, France, and lived for three years in Paris.

He arrived in London, England in 1952, and served for two years in the Royal Air Force, where he first received the nickname “Johnny”, but then Caribbean actor Earl Cameron persuaded him to become an actor, and he attended RADA. He became a stagehand at the Royal Court Theatre and appeared on stage in various plays from 1958.

He had a small part in the 1958 film version of Look Back in Anger. He took a leading role in the 1961 film Flame in the Streets. He met his future wife, Cecilia Enger.

He continued in British films during the 1960s, portraying stereotypical roles, such as a manservant in Woman of Straw, and in other films, such as East of Sudan, Khartoum, and The Last Safari. He appeared on television, in programs such as The Human Jungle, Z-Cars, Dixon of Dock Green, Gideon’s Way, Danger Man, and an episode of The Avengers.

He played the lead role in a West End production of Night of Fame. This was the first time that a Black actor had played a role written for a white man in English theatre.

He moved to the US to get better roles. He had a minor part in the films A Warm December and Uptown Saturday Night. These roles led to the role in Good Times, where he portrayed Ibe, Thelma’s African love interest. He starred in the movie Mohammad, Messenger of God. He appeared in Hanky Panky and played Banda in Master of the Game.

He secured a role in Roots: The Next Generations, playing an African interpreter. He is known among science fiction fans for his role as Dr. Benjamin Kylein in The Gathering. He was survived by his wife Cecilia and son. #africanhistory365 #africanexcellence

[ludmilachaibemachado]

Jane Asher as Joan Lane and Donald Webster in BBC's Dixon of Dock Green episode called The High Price of Freedom, aired on october 13th, 1962🌺🌻🌺

Picture posted by Sam Czopanser on twitter!🌻

[mariocki]

RIP Stephen Greif (26.8.1944 - 23.12.2022)

"I think [Blake's 7] was character-driven, and that’s really what counts in the end. The fact that the effects were fairly – you know – not slick in the way that Star Wars was…but then they had a hundred times more budget than we did, and rightly so. That doesn’t really come into it. It’s the stories, really, and the interrelation of characters which I think always interests people.

Oh I loved it. I loved every minute of it. I loved it because of the people. We all became great friends and we all wanted it to work. We all worked very hard on it. The director was great, the producer was a good guy, and yes, I loved it. It was good fun."

[helmstone]

Z Cars is coming to Talking Pictures TV this September

Z Cars is coming to Talking Pictures TV this September

Following their run of Dixon of Dock Green, Talking Pictures TV will be showing Z Cars from September 28. This is another classic police series everyone would have been aware of at the time. The BBC’s summary of the show is: The first episode of Z Cars – broadcast on 2 January 1962 – brought a new type of police drama to British screens. It showed modern police in squad cars – Ford Zephyrs –…

[culttvblog]

The Long Chase

Taking a little break from The Prisoner to rush into print about this show which I have only just found out about in case there is anyone who hasn't sussed that it is currently available in its entirety on YouTube (on the magnificently named Major Dolby's Cat channel); in fairly poor quality but nonetheless as far as I can tell that is the only place you will be able to see this much-loved children's show. And while you're watching it, use one of those YouTube downloaders to save your own copy, because the more copies there are the more these things can be made available. According to t'internet because it was made on film the BBC still have it but have shown no interest in releasing it or repeating it since its onlly repeat in 1974.

Perhaps I should stress that I am talking about the 1972 children's TV series and not the 1971 film of the same name. I swear this drives me crazy.

The premise is fairly simple: John Corby is fishing with his dad, a police officer who got thrown out of the Met after getting too close to an international assassination organisation, when John spots a girl in distress in the water off the cliff and goes to help her. When he comes back he finds that his father has vanished. The rest of the series is their chase to find the father, with the elaboration of the reasons he got kicked out of the Met and what happened. The chase goes right the way up the country into Scotland and includes loads of nail-biting action as they get embroiled ever deeper into the world of espionage.

I should say that this is such a 1970s set-up for this show, when every police officer they speak to assumes the father is a bent copper (even by the standards of the notoriously bent Metropolitan police) but John of course knows that he wasn't. The whole scandal of corrupt police in the 1970s (and still) and don't forget that 1972 was before TV drama turned to show police realistically as utterly criminal in shows like The Sweeney. This is about trust and truth, and not giving up in the face of intimidation.

Well, you would know it would be a nuanced and perceptive drama when you know The Long Chase was written by the prolific NJ Crisp, who also wrote episodes of Dixon of Dock Green, Dr Finlay's Casebook, Doomwatch, Enemy at the Door, and the whole of The Brothers, Colditz, and Secret Army. Basically I can almost guarantee you've seen something else he's written.

One of the reasons I'm posting about it is that I'm very pleased because normally when I write about a show I have a poke around online and find that I disagree with the reviews I read. In this case I found that there is vanishingly little about it online, but there are a number of older reviews (from before 2010, say) by contemporary viewers who were all very struck by it at the time and wanted to see it again. I was sufficiently moved by the sheer strength of feeling in those reviews to write this blog post! I haven't even seen it all the way through myself but love it already. The criticism I've also seen that those middle aged men wanted to see it again for the reason that they wanted to see Jan Francis (who played Susan Fraser, the girl) again. I know this isn't true because they could equally well see her in any of the other 75 films and shows IMDB says she has been in!

In fact that is my only criticism, which I'm not sure is justified, because in the show Simon Fisher-Turner was 17, the age of John his character, but Jan Francis was more like 24 and it shows. The problem is that even though it's only seven years, in reality there is a huge age difference between 17 and 24 but they act like they are the same age. They're both acting like they're 17, and it doesn't seem quite right. I wouldn't want you to run away with the idea that this is a fatal criticism, though.

Pictured: women's charity Refuge dumping 1,071 bad apples (that we know of) outside New Scotland Yard. Legends.

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[scotianostra]

Happy Birthday veteran Scottish actress Phyllida Law, born on May 8th 1932 in Glasgow.

There is very little  about her early life except she was born in Glasgow, the daughter of Megsie “Meg” and William Law, a journalist. She said once of he Glasgow upbringing “When you grow up in Glasgow with a Glaswegian granny, you’re taught that pride is a wicked thing. I still feel a bit like that.“ Phyllida grew up in Glasgow’s west end, just off Great Western Road, but war broke out when she was just seven and she found herself evacuated to places such as Lenzie, in Dunbartonshire, and Skelmorlie, Ayrshire.

That gave her a love for the Scots countryside which means she now splits her life between her home in London and a family cottage in Argyll. Phyllida would fit in well with the Scottish & Proud ethos, in an interview she says:

“I’m passionate about my Scots heritage. How could I not be?  I can’t live without it. There’s no way I could live without those hills and it’s got to be the west coast. “I sometimes travel to Edinburgh then go up to Pittenweem or somewhere and I think to myself, ‘This isn’t Scotland.’ It’s a wonderful coastline but it’s not Scotland for me.

“When my parents lived in Glasgow they were always looking for a cottage to which they could retire. They found one in Ardentinney, so I visit that a lot.

She joined the Bristol Old Vic in 1952, from what I can gather she was first in the wardrobe department, the first pic shows her standing, from a 1952 photo. Heron screen acting credits start in 1958 and are very extensive, the pick of them are Dixon of Dock Green and a stint as the storyteller in the great children’s show Jackanory in the 60’s. It must have been during her time in the BBC’s children’s TV department she met her husband to be The Magic Roundabout narrator Eric Thompson, She has previously stated that the character of Ermintrude the cow was modelled on her.

Angels in the 70’s and of course Taggart in the 80’s as well Thomson, the variety series hosted by actress Emma Thompson in 1988, Emma just happens to be her daughter. Heartbeat, Hamish Macbeth and Dangerfield in the 90’s, Waking the dead and Doctors in the noughties has kept her busy, now in her 86th year she has still been appearing on the small screen, in The Other Wife and New Tricks during the past 8 years. Film roles include She is known for her work on Much Ado About Nothing , The Time Machine and The Winter Guest.

Phyllida spends most of her time in Argyll in a house she shares with her daughter Emma. who is spending more time looking after her mother, as she was diagnosed with Parkinson's Disease in 2915.

Phyllida constantly needs the support of a wheelchair and even assistance when washing due to the effect the condition is having on her.

Due to the progressive nature of the condition, symptoms tend to gradually worsen over time. It is common for individuals to struggle both with walking and talking at the height of the condition.

Phyllida herself spoke about the burdens of looking after an infirm parent, she looked after her mother, Meg who suffered with Alzheimer’s disease. Mego died in 1994 aged 93 after almost 20 years of being cared for by Ms Law at her mother's home in the village of Ardentinny on the west coast, near Dunoon.

[jbird5by5]

Saddened to hear of the Passing of Actor/Writer Richard Franklin (1936-2023)

Doctor Who and Emmerdale star Richard Franklin has died.

He was 87 years old.

He passed away peacefully on the morning of Christmas Day after fighting a long-term illness.

Franklin is best known for for portraying Captain Mike Yates of UNIT in Doctor Who from 1971 until 1974.

He also appeared in Crossroads and played businessman Denis Rigg in ITV's Emmerdale.

The long-time stage actor made his TV debut in a 1966 episode of the British series Dixon of Dock Green, before his screen breakout in a nine-episode run of ITV soap Crossroads. He would go on to appear in The Doctors, Little Women mini-series, and The Borgias in one-off appearances, alongside more recent film appearances, including in 2016’s Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.

Franklin will be remembered by Doctor Who fans for playing the recurring character of Captain Yates, a companion of the Doctor who helped to repel alien invasions of Earth during classic episodes in the 1970s.

Born in Marylebone in 1936, Franklin authored the book Forest Wisdom: Radical Reform of Democracy and the Welfare State.

Franklin also founded the Silent Majority Party and stood as a candidate in the 2005 general election in the Hove constituency receiving 78 votes.

My Condolences to his Family Members and Friends.

#R.I.P. 😔🙏🥀

[thejohnfleming]

What are we going to do about Julie Samuel, actress and much much more?

Julie starred in the movie Ferry Cross The Mersey with Gerry and The Pacemakers. (Photograph by George Elam/ANL/Shutterstock -1355671a) Julie Samuel has been around a bit, done most everything in showbiz. She was an actress in well over 100 British TV shows – The Avengers, Coronation Street, Dixon of Dock Green, Z Cars et al… in movies including The Day The Earth Caught Fire, The Long Ships and…