1.
Musical film
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The musical film is a film genre in which songs sung by the characters are interwoven into the narrative, sometimes accompanied by dancing. The songs usually advance the plot or develop the characters, though in some cases they serve merely as breaks in the storyline. The musical film was a development of the stage musical after the emergence of sound film technology. Typically, the biggest difference between film and stage musicals is the use of background scenery and locations that would be impractical in a theater. Musical films characteristically contain elements reminiscent of theater, performers often treat their song, in a sense, the viewer becomes the diegetic audience, as the performer looks directly into the camera and performs to it. The 1930s through the early 1950s are considered to be the age of the musical film. Musical short films were made by Lee de Forest in 1923–24, beginning in 1926, thousands of Vitaphone shorts were made, many featuring bands, vocalists and dancers. The Jazz Singer, released in 1927 by Warner Brothers, was the first to include a track including non-diegetic music and diegetic music. This feature-length film was also a musical, featuring Al Jolson singing Dirty Hands, Dirty Face, Toot, Toot, Tootsie, Blue Skies and My Mammy. Historian Scott Eyman wrote, As the film ended and applause grew with the houselights and she saw terror in all their faces, she said, as if they knew that the game they had been playing for years was finally over. Still, only isolated sequences featured live sound, most of the film had only a musical score. In 1928, Warner Brothers followed this up with another Jolson part-talkie, The Singing Fool, theaters scrambled to install the new sound equipment and to hire Broadway composers to write musicals for the screen. The first all-talking feature, Lights of New York, included a sequence in a night club. The enthusiasm of audiences was so great that in less than an all the major studios were making sound pictures exclusively. The Broadway Melody had a plot about two sisters competing for a charming song-and-dance man. Advertised by MGM as the first All-Talking, All-Singing, All-Dancing feature film, it was a hit, there was a rush by the studios to hire talent from the stage to star in lavishly filmed versions of Broadway hits. The Love Parade starred Maurice Chevalier and newcomer Jeanette MacDonald, written by Broadway veteran Guy Bolton, Warner Brothers produced the first screen operetta, The Desert Song in 1929. They spared no expense and photographed a large percentage of the film in Technicolor and this was followed by the first all-color, all-talking musical feature which was entitled On with the Show
2.
Michael Winner
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Robert Michael Winner was an English film director and producer, and a restaurant critic for The Sunday Times. Winner was a child, born in Hampstead, London, England, to Helen and George Joseph Winner. His family was Jewish, his mother was Polish and his father of Russian extraction, following his fathers death, Winners mother gambled recklessly and sold art and furniture worth around £10m at the time, bequeathed to her not only for her life but to Michael thereafter. She died aged 78 in 1984 and he was educated at St Christopher School, Letchworth, and Downing College, Cambridge, where he read law and economics. He also edited the student newspaper, Varsity. Winner had earlier written a column, Michael Winners Showbiz Gossip. The first issue of Showgirl Glamour Revue in 1955 has him writing another film and showbusiness gossip column, such jobs allowed him to meet and interview several leading film personalities, including James Stewart and Marlene Dietrich. He also wrote for the New Musical Express and he began his screen career as an assistant director of BBC television programmes, cinema shorts, and full-length B productions, occasionally writing screenplays. In 1957 he directed his first travelogue, This is Belgium and his first on-screen credit was earned as a writer for the 1958 crime film Man with a Gun directed by Montgomery Tully. Winners first credit on a short was Associate Producer on the 1959 film Floating Fortress produced by Harold Baim. Winners first project as a lead director involved another story he wrote, Shoot to Kill and he would regularly edit his own movies, using the pseudonym Arnold Crust. In the early 1960s, Winners films followed fashion and his second project, Some Like It Cool, is the tale of a young woman who introduces her prudish husband and in-laws to the joys of nudism. Filmed at Longleat, he was afraid the sight of bare flesh would offend the magistrate for the area so he confided his worries to the landowner, ‘Don’t worry, ’ said the Marquess, ‘I am the local magistrate. It was preceded by the Billy Fury-led musical Play It Cool and his first significant project was West 11, a realistic tale of London drifters starring Alfred Lynch. Winners film The System began a partnership with actor Oliver Reed that would last for six films over a 25-year period, Winner and Reed closed out the 1960s as a pair with The Jokers, comedy-drama Ill Never Forget Whatsisname, and the World War II satire Hannibal Brooks. A non-Reed comedy, You Must Be Joking. with Denholm Elliott, Hannibal Brooks drew notice in Hollywood and Winner soon received an opportunity to direct his first American film, which was Lawman starring Burt Lancaster and Robert Duvall. The following year, Winner cast Lancaster again in the espionage drama Scorpio, in 1974, Winner and Bronson collaborated on Death Wish, a film that defined the subsequent careers of both men. Based on a novel by Brian Garfield and adapted to the screen by Wendell Mayes, the commitment of Lumet to another film and UAs questioning of its subject matter led to an eventual production by Dino De Laurentiis through Paramount Pictures
3.
Billy Fury
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Ronald William Wycherley, better known by his stage name Billy Fury, was an English singer from the late 1950s to the mid 1960s, and remained an active songwriter until the 1980s. Rheumatic fever, which he first contracted as a child, damaged his heart, an early British rock and roll star, he equalled the Beatles record of 24 hits in the 1960s, and spent 332 weeks on the UK chart, without a chart-topping single or album. Others have suggested that Furys rapid rise to prominence was due to his Elvis Presley-influenced, hip-swivelling, ronald William Wycherley was born at Smithdown Hospital, Smithdown Road, Liverpool. He commenced music lessons on the piano before he was a teenager, Wycherley fronted his own group in 1955, but simultaneously worked full-time on a tugboat and later as a docker. He entered and won a talent competition, and by 1958 had started composing his own songs. Wycherley first attended a concert at the Essoldo Theatre in Birkenhead, run by impresario Larry Parnes, instead, in an episode that has become pop music legend, Parnes pushed young Wycherley up on stage right away. He was such a success that Parnes signed him, added him to the tour. However, his sexual and provocative stage performances received censure. In October 1959, the UK music magazine, NME, commented that Furys stage antics had been drawing much press criticism and he released his first hit single for Decca, Maybe Tomorrow, in 1959. He also appeared in a televised play Strictly for Sparrows, in March 1960, he reached No. After securing more hits and jettisoning his band Georgie Fame and the Blue Flames, Parnes held auditions in Liverpool for a new group, among those who auditioned were the Beatles, who at this time were still calling themselves the Silver Beetles. They were offered the job for £20 a week on condition that they sacked their bassist Stuart Sutcliffe, John Lennon refused and the band left after Lennon had secured Furys autograph. The Tornados were recruited as Furys backing band and toured and recorded with him from January 1962 to August 1963, the Puppets were another band that backed Billy on a couple of gigs for 12 months. Fury concentrated less on rock and roll and more on ballads, such as Halfway to Paradise. Fury confessed to the NME that I wanted people to think of me simply as a singer – and not, more specifically, Im growing up, and I want to broaden my scope. I shall continue to sing songs, but at the same time my stage act is not going to be as wild in the future. It was Deccas decision to mould Fury into a teen idol after his last self-penned song, the years 1961 through 1963 were Furys best years chartwise. In 1962 Fury appeared in his first film, Play It Cool and it featured Helen Shapiro, Danny Williams, Shane Fenton and Bobby Vee, who appeared with the Vernons Girls
4.
Michael Anderson Jr.
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Michael Joseph Anderson Jr. is an English actor. He was born in Hillingdon, Middlesex, into a theatrical family and his grandparents and great-great-aunt were actors. His father is the film director Michael Anderson, Sr and he is the stepson of actress Adrienne Ellis, and stepbrother of actress Laurie Holden. His brother is producer David Anderson, Anderson trained at the Arts Educational School in drama and ballet. In the 1966–67 season Anderson co-starred as Clayton Monroe with Barbara Hershey and he guest starred as well in episodes of ABCs Stoney Burke and Love, American Style along with Hawaii Five-O on CBS. Child and Youth Actors, Filmography of Their Entire Careers, 1914-1985, Michael Anderson Jr. at the Internet Movie Database
5.
Bobby Vee
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Robert Thomas Velline, known professionally as Bobby Vee, was an American pop singer who was a teen idol in the early 1960s. According to Billboard magazine, he had thirty-eight Hot 100 chart hits and he had six gold singles in his career. Vee was born in Fargo, North Dakota, to Sydney Ronald Velline and Saima Cecilia Tapanila, in a family of Norwegian and his followup single, a cover of Adam Faiths UK number-one What Do You Want. Charted in the reaches of the Billboard pop chart in early 1960. His fourth release, a revival of the Clovers doo-wop ballad Devil or Angel and his next single, Rubber Ball, made him an international star. Vees recording of Take Good Care of My Baby in the summer of 1961 went to one on Billboard magazines U. S. pop chart. When Vee recorded Come Back When You Grow Up he was joined by a called the Strangers. He also recorded, in 1961, a version of the song Lollipop, originally by Ronald & Ruby, Vee had a total of ten hit singles in the UK, ending with Bobby Tomorrow in 1963. Vee was also a pioneer in the music genre, appearing in several musical films. He received the North Dakota Roughrider Award in 1999 and he is mentioned in the film No Direction Home regarding his brief musical association with Bob Dylan and Dylans suggestion that he was Bobby Vee after Vees regional hit. The Very Best of Bobby Vee, released by EMI/UK on May 12,2008, on January 17,2011, EMI/UK released Rarities, a double-CD package with 61 tracks, many of which were previously unreleased. Others included were alternate takes and first-time stereo releases as well as tracks from the album Bobby Vee Live on Tour, on March 28,2011, he became the 235th inductee into the Rockabilly Hall of Fame. In 2014 he was inducted into the Scandinavian-American Hall of Fame, Vees career began in the midst of tragedy. It crashed near Clear Lake, Iowa, en route to the show on the tour itinerary, in Moorhead. Their performance there was a success, setting in motion a chain of events led to Vees career as a popular singer. In 1963, Vee released an album on Liberty Records called I Remember Buddy Holly. In the liner notes, he recalled Hollys influence on him, Ive been a fan ever since and I guess I always will be. I remember a few years ago when Buddy was scheduled to appear at a dance in my town of Fargo
6.
Beaconsfield Film Studios
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Beaconsfield Film Studios is a British TV and film studio in Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire. The studios were operational as a site for films in 1922. Britains first talking movie was recorded there, as were films starring British actors Gracie Fields, Peter Sellers, from 1971 it has been the home of an internationally recognized postgraduate school for film and TV production, famous as the birthplace of animated characters Wallace and Gromit. Construction began on the studio in 1921, producer George Clark and actor/director Guy Newall had been making films at a small studio on Ebury Street in Central London. They outgrew this and raised financing for a new, larger, the studio opened in 1922, and Clark and Newall made several films there such as Fox Farm. They also leased it out to independent companies to make films, the whole industry was badly hit by the Slump of 1924, and filmmaking at Beaconsfield ceased almost entirely. Clark and Newall later sold the studios to the British Lion Film Corporation, in the late 1920s, British Lion took over the studios producing a number of Edgar Wallace adaptations. Following the conversion to sound films in the 1920s, the company concentrated on making quota quickies with the occasional higher-budget film. Following the outbreak of World War II, the GPO Film Unit became the Crown Film Unit, the Crown Film Unit was based at Beaconsfield Film Studios. Fifty-one productions are credited to the Crown Film Unit between 1940 and 1952 - when it was disbanded - although it is not known how many were filmed at Beaconsfield Film Studios. IMDB lists a further sixteen productions credited to Beaconsfield Productions in the late 1950s, the studios are now exclusively the home of the National Film and Television School, whose alumni have won numerous BAFTA awards and Oscars. It was renamed the National Film and Television School in 1982, NFTS students still use the original 1930s sound stage and 1960s TV studio building. To modernise and expand the teaching and administrative space, the NFTS commissioned Glen Howells Architects to design a three storey building, upon its completion in 2008 it won a RIBA prize. In June 2009 it was formally named The Oswald Morris Building in honour of veteran cinematographer Ossie Morris, British Film Studios, An Illustrated History
7.
Lionel Blair
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Lionel Blair is a British actor, choreographer, tap dancer and television presenter. Blair was born in Montreal, Quebec, Canada and he is the son of Myer Ogus and Deborah Greenbaum. His father was a barber, he emigrated from Russia to Canada to start a new life, Blair came to Britain when he was two years old. He attended the Royal Shakespeare Theatre in Stratford in 1944, Blair eventually rekindled his passion for musical theatre and began working in the West End. He gave up acting for dancing in 1947 although he appeared in the fringe production Out of the Blue. He took his name around this time, later changing it by deed poll just before he married in 1967. Blair came to the fore in the 1960s when, with his dance troupe, in addition, he choreographed films such as Jazz Boat and The Magic Christian. In 1972, Blair wrote a musical based on War and Peace and it toured around the UK for six months. Blair was one of the captains on the game show Give Us a Clue from 1979 until the early 1990s. He published his autobiography Stagestruck in 1986, in 2005, he took part in the Channel Five reality series, The Farm. Until 2005 he appeared extensively in pantomime, for which he earned up to £15,000 a week, in July 2010, Blair appeared in the Great British Dog Walks feature on ITVs This Morning with his dog Lola. Also in 2010, he took part in the BBCs The Young Ones, in December 2010, he appeared briefly in a sketch with Ronnie Corbett and Rob Brydon in BBC Ones The One Ronnie. Blair also appeared as the celebrity darter for charity on Bullseye, on 24 December 2011, he appeared on the ITV program Text Santa with Ant & Dec. In 2012, he was cast in the version of Ray Cooneys farce Run for Your Wife. On 3 January 2014, he entered the Celebrity Big Brother house with Made in Chelsea media personality Ollie Locke after being handcuffed together as part of a set by Big Brother. He became the housemate to be evicted on 17 January 2014. Blair continues to work as an actor, having filmed an episode of BBC Ones medical soap opera Doctors in 2014 and he also played a main character in the British short film Evils Evil Cousin in 2016. On 14 December 2016, Blair appeared as a guest on the ITV panel show, Loose Women, to announce, the panellists presented him with a personalised cake
8.
Alvin Stardust
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Bernard William Jewry, known professionally as Shane Fenton and later as Alvin Stardust, was an English rock singer and stage actor. Performing first as Shane Fenton in the 1960s, Jewry had a successful career in the pre-Beatles era. Bernard William Jewry was born 27 September 1942 in Muswell Hill and he made his stage debut in pantomime at the age of four. In the early 1960s, Shane Fenton and the Fentones were an unknown teenage band who recorded a demo tape, while awaiting a reply from the BBC, the bands 17-year-old singer Shane Fenton died as a result of the rheumatic fever he had suffered in childhood. The rest of the decided to break up, but then unexpectedly received a letter from the BBC inviting them to come to London to audition in person for the programme. Theakstones mother asked the band to stay together, and to keep its name, Jewry, who was a roadie with them at the time, was asked to join the band and to use Shane Fenton as a pseudonym. The combo had a handful of hits in the UK Singles Chart, Im A Moody Guy, Walk Away, Its All Over Now and their biggest hit and these and their subsequent misses were all on Parlophone Records. Jewry later also appeared in Billy Furys movie Play It Cool and he was managed by Larry Parnes. Jewry disappeared from the spotlight for a decade after the break-up of the Fentones, working in management and performing at small venues with his wife Iris Caldwell. During the early 1970s, however, he acquired a new persona, Alvin Stardust and his new name was given to him by Peter Shelley, the co-founder of Magnet Records. Shelley originated the persona of Alvin Stardust, writing, recording and singing the first Stardust single, My Coo Ca Choo, hal Carter, Jewrys manager, suggested his client as a substitute. Jewry took over as Stardust in time to lip-synch My Coo Ca Choo on its first Top Of The Pops appearance, All further Alvin Stardust records were sung by Jewry. Stardust had further successes with the hits Jealous Mind, You, You, You, Red Dress. In total, he amassed seven Top Ten entries, in a chart span lasting almost 25 years, Stardust was part of the Green Cross Code road safety campaign Childrens Heroes, which saw him instructing children to look both ways before they crossed the road. Pretend was a hit in the United Kingdom in 1981, reaching number four in the UK Singles Chart and it reached number one in the Dutch Top 40 in November,1981. The song was successful in Portugal in 1983. Alvin Stardust was a guest act on the Morecambe & Wise Christmas Show in 1981, the singles I Feel Like Buddy Holly, written and produced by Mike Batt and I Wont Run Away reached number 7 in the UK Singles Chart, in 1984. So Near To Christmas was a hit, No
9.
Julian Wintle
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Julian Wintle was a British film and TV producer who battled with haemophilia throughout his life. Wintle was a member of the Bryanston Consortium from 1959 to 1963, for several years, in the early 1960s he was head of Beaconsfield Film Studios, and a director of Independent Artists Ltd. which produced Lindsay Andersons This Sporting Life among other projects. His sons are the musician and publisher Christopher Wintle and the writer Justin Wintle and he was the subject of a biography by Anne Francis, Julian Wintle. This contains an extensive filmography with many films listed for which he was executive producer, the Human Jungle The Avengers Julian Wintle at the Internet Movie Database
10.
Helen Shapiro
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Helen Kate Shapiro is an English pop singer, jazz singer and actress. She is best known for her 1960s UK chart toppers, You Dont Know, Shapiro was born at Bethnal Green Hospital in the East End district of Bethnal Green, London. Her early childhood was spent in a Clapton council house in the London borough of Hackney and she is the granddaughter of Russian Jewish immigrants, her parents, who were piece-workers in the garment industry, attended Lea Bridge Road Synagogue. The family moved from Clapton to the Victoria Park area of Hackney, on the Parkside Estate and it was, and remains, a beautiful place, she said in a 2006 interview. Although too poor to own a record player, Shapiros parents encouraged music in their home, Shapiro played banjolele as a child and sang with her brother Ron occasionally in his youth club skiffle group. She had a deep timbre to her voice, unusual in a not yet in her teens. Aged ten, Shapiro was a singer with Susie and the Hula Hoops, at 13 she started singing lessons at The Maurice Burman School of Modern Pop Singing, based in Londons Baker Street, after the school produced singing star Alma Cogan. I had always wanted to be a singer, I had no desire to slavishly follow Almas style, but chose the school merely because of Almas success, she said in a 1962 interview. Burmans connections eventually led her to a young Columbia Records A&R man named John Schroeder, who recorded a demo of Shapiro singing Birth of the Blues. In 1961, aged fourteen, she had a UK No.3 hit with her first single, Dont Treat Me Like a Child, the latter did not top the UK chart until 19 October 1961, by which time Shapiro had reached 15, on 26 September. She had a No.2 in 1962 with Tell Me What He Said, most of her recording sessions were at EMIs studios at Abbey Road in north west London. Her mature voice made her a sensation, as well as the youngest female chart topper in the UK. Shapiros final UK Top Ten hit single was with the ballad Little Miss Lonely, Shapiros recording manager at the time was Norrie Paramor. Before she was sixteen years old, Shapiro had been voted Britains Top Female Singer, the Beatles first national tour of Britain, in the late winter/early spring of 1963, was as one of her supporting acts. During the course of the tour, the Beatles had their first hit single and John Lennon and Paul McCartney wrote the song Misery for her, but Shapiro did not record the composition. In 1995, during a This is Your Life highlighting her life and career, Shapiro revealed, It was actually turned down on my behalf before I ever heard it, I never got to hear it or give an opinion. Shapiro lip-synched her then-current single, Look Who It Is, on the British television programme Ready Steady Go. with three of the Beatles, on 31 December 1969, Shapiro appeared on the BBC/ZDF co-production Pop Go The Sixties, singing Walkin Back to Happiness. By the time she was in her teens, her career as a pop singer was on the wane
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