2013-06-20T04:27:07-04:00 Larry Jaffee http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/author/index.php?author=larry-jaffee Copyright 2008, HuffingtonPost.com, Inc. HuffingtonPost Blogger Feed for Larry Jaffee Good old fashioned elbow grease. tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.3380198 2013-06-03T15:42:27-04:00 2013-06-04T08:55:31-04:00

Larry Jaffee http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-jaffee/
Luckily, Hitchcock has managed to maintain a healthy recording (certainly one of the most prolific artists since the 1980s) and performing career on both sides of the Atlantic that needn't sacrifice his artistic vision. The 'Englishman in New York' was present, as he was served a cuppa just as he was about to begin performing.

Always quirky, Hitchcock's the epitome of the "alternative" genre, his latest album Love From London (Yep Roc) delivers a musicality that sometimes is missing from his body of work, most likely thanks to its producer Peter Noble, exemplified by the baroque feel of "My Rain."

Providing some muscle to the concert was (former REM-er) Peter Buck on guitar, and his former bandmate Mike Mills and Sean Nelson (lead singer and co-songwriter for the Seattle-based indie pop band Harvey Danger) provided some background vocals. Buck has been a frequent Hitchcock collaborator for the past two decades. He played an angry, raw opening set.

On stage, the Hitchcock set list borrowed heavily from the latest album with the standout being the Beatles-ish "Strawberries Dress," and also peppered with the would-be hits "So You Think You're In Love" from the album Perspex Island (1991) and "Adventure Rocket Ship" (from Ole Tarantula (2006).

His surrealistic, comic banter, such as pointing out a moving garbage can near the bar in the back of the hall, which he said he played once before on Yom Kippur in the late 1980s, made the case for Hitchcock continuing the work of Pink Floyd founder Syd Barrett, who apparently let psychedelic drugs get the best of him. (See Hitchcock talk about Barrett.) Who can say where Hitchcock gets his strange ideas about insects, food and metaphysics, but he delivers it all in stride -- with no two concerts alike.

Tapping his Soft Boys catalogue for the first encore, "I Wanna Destroy You," which he introduced as being "chosen for Margaret Thatcher's funeral." He then remembered he was playing New York by playing the Velvet Underground's "Waiting For The Man" (which he said "is in all the storybooks") and inviting favorite son Lenny Kaye to help out on guitar.
And what show would be without a Beatles cover, the Fab Four at their most trippy, "She Said She Said." (I have a great bootleg of Hitchcock playing the entire White Album and channeling intermittently Lennon, McCartney & Harrison.)

Getting back to his comments about physical music formats, it's obvious that if Hitchcock had his druthers, everyone would be listening to his music on vinyl, as an artifact of history.

I had a bit of a revelation two weeks after the Webster Hall show, at a record show in Massapequa, Long Island, when I shelled out $15 for a five-track Hitchcock EP entitled Eaten By Her Own Dinner (Midnight Music, Dong 2) on vinyl, a 12-inch, 45-rpm London pressing. At the time of purchase, the tracks weren't familiar.

I got so much enjoyment listening to each track, especially the hypnotic voice/harmonium elixir on "The Abandoned Brain." and then realized I had four of the five long-lost songs in my psyche on other compilation CDs, including Groovy Decoy and Invisible Hitchcock. He's right -- vinyl's a far more enjoyable experience.

Speaking of reliving an enjoyable vinyl experience, kudos to ABKCO for re-releasing on May 28 the Rolling Stones' Beggars Banquet, Let It Bleed and Hot Rocks 1964-1971 on 180-gram LPs, pressed on clear vinyl.

Sure the label is trying to capitalize on the band's 50th anniversary and '50 and Counting' tour. These three initial releases launch a projected series titled "The Rolling Stones Clearly Classic," reflecting the group's formative years and transformation into "The World's Greatest Rock and Roll Band" at the end of the 1960s and into the early 70s. All three albums have been meticulously mastered from high-resolution audio files sourced from the original master tapes, assuring optimal sound quality that exceeds both conventional CD audio and digital downloads.

While I really have no desire to see the Stones live any more, I don't mind at all to listen to them on a turntable. The clear vinyl obvious enhances the records' collectability.

My worn-out vinyl copies of those three albums, were long ago re-bought on CD and since transferred to my iPod. Of course, the music is impeccable, and it's especially nice to have the original gatefold, 12-inch cover of Beggars Banquet depicting the graffiti-strewn, filthy public restroom instead of the staid substitute we Yanks had to put up with until the miniscule CD.]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.3128787 2013-04-21T18:10:50-04:00 2013-04-24T11:44:38-04:00

Larry Jaffee http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-jaffee/

I was saddened to learn of the recent passing of the influential album cover designer Storm Thorgenson, with whom I spoke in 2005 during a short transatlantic phone call.

Ultimately unsuccessful in my quest to land him as a keynote speaker of a media packaging conference that I chaired, I found Thorgerson polite and humbled that I thought so highly of his work.

Storm told me that it would take "an insane amount of money" for him to get over his fear of flying and consider a plane ride from London to Los Angeles.

I told him, unfortunately, my budget would only allow a $1,000 honorarium and a first-class plane ticket. "That's not insane enough," Storm quipped.

Attempting to change the subject, I segued to Syd Barrett, and Storm calmly told me "That's not funny." I quickly apologized for my insensitivity regarding his college chum, and he forgave me.

I also failed to impress him when I enquired whether he thought the minimalist cover of Coldplay's then current album X&Y, depicting geometric shapes and color scheme behind a black background, might have been an homage to Dark Side of the Moon's prism. Storm didn't think so. We hung up soon thereafter.

Obviously, Thorgerson's legacy is wrapped up in his iconic Pink Floyd covers (e.g., Wish You Were Here's man on fire, Animals' pig hoisted above London's Battersea Power Station) he masterminded while running his design studio Hipgnosis, which set the creative bar for music packaging design in the early to mid 1970s.

Thorgerson also embraced the digital age, such as putting a blinking LCD light in the spine of the Pink Floyd double-live CD Pulse.

And of course, besides Pink Floyd, Hipgnosis maintained a diverse client roster including other superstar bands such as Led Zeppelin, as well as others who didn't quite make it.

(My personal favorite Hipgnosis cover was Al Stewart's Modern Times, which looked like a still from a Bogart movie, a line from "Year of the Cat," his breakthrough single and LP of the same name a year later, also designed by Thorgerson.)

Thorgerson and business partner Aubrey Powell's 100 Best Album Covers, published in 1999, still sets the mark in terms of insight and sleeve trivia for this type of coffee-table book, the best of many about his work. They ran the company together for 15 years, and the book provides hilarious insight, circa the days of 'Swingin' London', into how they produced transcendent images in their dump of a studio decades before the advent of Photoshop. Trial by error was how they usually worked.

Dark Side of the Moon's endurance 40 years after its release struck me last week when I was visiting my son at the University of Mississippi. A few days before Thorgerson's death, the airline lost my luggage and I bought at Walmart a Pink Floyd t-shirt to have something to wear the next day. At least a half dozen 20-year olds stopped me on campus to talk about the album and the band. What generation gap?]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.2821384 2013-03-06T14:47:09-05:00 2013-05-06T05:12:01-04:00

Larry Jaffee http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-jaffee/ Hit & Miss, the miniseries that played on Sky last year in the UK and on DirecTV in the US, hit North American DVD this week, thanks to the Canadian label BFS Entertainment.

The six-part drama's main protagonist is a transgender Irish hitwoman named Mia, played by American actress Chloe Sevigny, who clearly relished playing the part.

Paul Abbott, one of Britain's favourite dramatists (Shameless, Cracker, State of Play), explains in the extras that he ended up creating Hit & Miss by combining two stories that were sitting on his desk, one about a hitman and the other about a transsexual's family life.

What I found most interesting about Hit & Miss was how it is reminiscent of other TV series - on both sides of the Atlantic - about dysfunctional families, as well as Neil Jordan films.

To wit:

• [the aforementioned] Shameless: Both the Gallaghers and Mia's new family are left without the mother who raised the children. Mia reluctantly becomes a mother figure when she learns that Wendy, her former girlfriend when she was male, has died of cancer and her last wish was for Mia to be their son's and his three half-siblings' guardian in rural Yorkshire. The oldest sister Riley, 16, is very similar to Shameless's Fiona; neither wants to be raising their brothers and sisters, but feel a certain responsibility to do so.

• Weeds: Another mum with an odd job, Nancy (Mary-Louise Parker) the southern Californian pot dealer vs. Mia the hit-woman. They both constantly have to watch their backs, and protect their families.

• The Crying Game & Breakfast On Pluto: The former was essentially an IRA story, in which Fergus, an already ambivalent soldier played by Stephen Rea, falls in love with Dil, a girl with something extra. Jordan then revisits the subject with transgendered Patrick "Kitten" Braden (played by Cillian Murphy) unwittingly gets caught up in the IRA cross-fire (she just wants to be loved), and is sensationalized by the British tabloids as an IRA terrorist disguised as a woman.

• The Riches: In Eddie Izzard's tour de force, two-season series (2007-2008), as a grifter, he's not the one in drag, rather his youngest son flirts with cross-dressing, as does Mia's progeny in Hit & Miss.

• The Crying Game and Hit & Miss: There are pivotal karaoke bar scenes in both with Dil mouthing the words to the title torch ballad in the former, and Sevigny nailing Morrissey's "Let Me Kiss You," a performance that connects with her new hunky friend Ben, the same effect that Dil had on Fergus in The Crying Game.

Despite all the derivative bits & pieces, Hit & Miss is a rich drama that deserves to be seen on its own terms. One is hopeful that it returns for another series, especially with the cliffhanger of Mia about to be blown away by her kingpin boss.]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.2567600 2013-01-28T12:48:37-05:00 2013-03-30T05:12:01-04:00

Larry Jaffee http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-jaffee/ Imagine. Out on bail, he was getting arraigned that morning at Manhattan Supreme Court.

The morning of the arraignment was a complete media circus. All the tabloids, paparazzi, radio and TV correspondents were there in force to report on the British punk rocker, formerly of the notorious band the Sex Pistols, who allegedly killed his American girlfriend Nancy Spungen.

Before the hearing began, a bunch of reporters realized that Sid's mother, Anne Beverley, was in the hallway waiting to enter the courtroom like everyone else. She darts into the ladies room. I distinctly remember one female reporter following Beverley into the restroom, probably thinking "I can get an exclusive; you boys are stuck out here. Hah!"

Once the court session began, the prosecution made its case against Vicious, who pleaded not guilty in an unintelligible voice before Acting Justice Betty Ellerin. A few token punks were in the courtroom to show support for the defendant, who for the most part remained silent, and only occasionally spoke to his mother.

F. Lee Bailey had been commissioned to handle the defense for Vicious, whose real name was John Simon Ritchie. However, Bailey's associate and senior member of his staff, James M. Merberg, appeared with Ritchie in court at his indictment and arraignment.

"Our defense cannot be disclosed but I can say that it is a point away from Mr. Ritchie," Merberg added.

In his opening remarks, the prosecuting attorney, identified as "Mr. Sullivan," stressed that the 21-year-old Vicious was a drug addict who "had no value to the community. Mr. Ritchie has a record of misdemeanors back in England, including an assault on a police officer, which consequently led to his 'Vicious' nickname," said Sullivan.

Merberg's defense revolved around the fact the Vicious had been on a methadone program at the Lafayette Street Clinic regularly and is showing signs of improvement. "His dose has decreased from 90mm to 45mm since he began the program," said Mr. Merberg.

After about 90 minutes of mostly dry legalese, the judge adjourned for lunch. After gobbling down a hotdog on the street, I hustled back up the stairs of the courthouse.

I just missed a packed elevator; everyone else made it in. Another one just showed up, and I was the only person waiting for it, and hear someone yell, "Hold that elevator!" And in walks a guy in a business suit, who I recognize to be Merberg, and none other than Sid himself. The doors close.

Sid was perspiring heavily, and had quite a lot of acne on his face. He was a few inches taller than me, and less than a year older. His lawyer notices Sid's punk-style necklace, which might have been made out of razorblades, shakes his head (perhaps thinking, how did I did not see that earlier; not going to make a good impression on the judge), and tucks it under his client's button-down shirt.

With being the only reporter present (even though I was still in college), I figure I can't let this opportunity go. I think [wisely] against enquiring, "Did you do it, Sid?"

Instead I blurt out, "Sid, have you heard the new Clash album? (Give 'Em Enough Rope recently had been released.) Before he could respond, Sid's lawyer tells him not to answer. I'm thinking, "Oh man!"

The afternoon court session contained none of the color of the morning.

Justice Ellerin continued bail at $50,000 and set three conditions for Vicious to adhere to: "(1) Continue to report daily to the methadone clinic before 2 p.m., (2) report daily to the Third Homicide Zone officers before 1 p.m., and (3) do not leave the confinements of the New York City limits." She set December 12 to begin pre-trial motions.

As far as I know, that hearing never took place because Vicious was already imprisoned at Rikers by early December for cutting up Patti Smith's brother Todd with a broken glass at the club Hurrah's.

Sgt. Thomas Kilroy, of the Third Homicide Zone, who made the homicide arrest, was quoted as having said, "After an investigation, Vicious admitted killing Miss Spungen during a dispute." However, when I spoke with Sgt. Kilroy around the time of the arraignment, he denied ever saying that. According to Kilroy, Vicious was "high" when he was arrested.

A few years earlier, Spungen attended Devereaux, a high school in Philadelphia for students with emotional problems and high intelligence. A classmate of hers who was at my college told me, "Nancy was the most hateful person I've ever met."

Sid ultimately succumbed to his heroin addiction on February 2, 1979, purportedly to keep his death pact with Nancy. Earlier that day, he was released from prison.

Reminiscing about this stuff gives me a yearning to watch once again Alex Cox's Sid & Nancy and Julien Temple's Rock 'n' Roll Swindle.]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2013:/theblog//3.2471351 2013-01-14T09:18:16-05:00 2013-03-16T05:12:02-04:00

Larry Jaffee http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-jaffee/ campaign to get everyone's favourite London cabdriver, Tony Walker, to New York to attend the premiere of 56Up was a success.

As in the UK, the film has received universally rave reviews from US critics.

Walker appeared at three showings of the film at Greenwich Village's IFC Center. At the sold-out first exhibition, Walker and series director Michael Apted did their double act, talking about their 50 years together.

Before the Manhattan audience, Apted asked Walker how appearing in the series changed his life? Walker replied that it didn't really: he remained the same happy-go-lucky individual depicted at seven years old. Walker clearly doesn't mind the fame, unlike some of the other Up participants, and even has put up a website to capitalise on it.

For the uninitiated, the Up series is a sociological study of growing up and the UK's class system. Back in 1964, Granada dispatched a film crew to various primary schools around Britain. Apted was a researcher, who had a hand in selecting 14 seven-year-old pupils to interview, including Walker, a cherubic East End boy who had aspirations of being horse jockey.

The UK television public fell in love with the programme, and seven years later in 1971 Apted went back to the then-awkward teenagers, who spent most of the time looking at their feet rather than answering questions about how they feel about the opposite sex.

Fast forward several decades, and we learn of the twists and turns of life that the participants have gone through. The film's original premise - what you're born into largely determines who you will be - largely holds true.

Perhaps it's a huge difference between the UK and the US. Could Bill Clinton and Barack Obama become prime minister of Britain? Probably not, although Margaret Thatcher was a shopkeeper's daughter, also overcame class-system adversity, bulldozing her way to the top.

Back to 56Up. A few of the participants vent about the ridiculousness of the project's attempt to sum up in 15 minutes what they had done in the last seven years, and that the viewer can therefore understand what that person is all about. In 56Up, more than the other releases, Apted relies on spouses and their offspring to talk about their somewhat famous husbands and wives, sons and daughters. There are lots of grandchildren literally in the picture now. Several of the original group have gone through divorces and working on second marriages.

This edition demonstrates what a rough time two of the three east end gals have had being working-class single mums: one with health problems (Sue); the other recently made redundant as a librarian in a job she loved (Lynn). It's obvious from watching 56Up, the privileged don't have the same problems and pressures that working and middle class endure.

Several became teachers. Nick, a scientist, would have much preferred to pursue his research in the UK, but Thatcher forced him to cross the Atlantic, where he has happily lived since being 35.

Although he "would have given my left arm to be a jockey", Tony remains a cab driver, and holds family above everything else, while observing the demographic changes of the east end. In a somewhat tense moment that interrupts the fairly restrained flow of interview proceedings, Apted enquires whether how Walker describes immigration patterns could be construed as racist. To his credit, Tony takes great umbrage of the director's suggestion - and states for the record that he loves all people, and always has done so. To Apted's credit, he left in that bit of drama, knowing that it's part of the storytelling process.

I am still most fascinated by the articulate, middle-class chap Neil Hughes, who admits to have developed emotional problems while in college. Since then, he has been at times homeless, wandering around Britain mostly unemployed. Apted probes why Neil hasn't had a lasting romantic relationship; the subject notes that he was never the one to leave.

As with the other films, Apted must rely on earlier footage so that the viewer can see the contrasts. The end result is that for the series faithful, there is relatively little new information. But one sequence repeated here and one I will never tire of - and I believe to be among cinema's most poignant moments - is when Neil explains during 42Up:

"I always told myself I would never have children, because children inherit something from their parents. And even if my wife were the most high-spirited and ordinary and normal of people, the child would still stand a very fair chance of being not totally full of happiness because of what he or she would've inherited from me."

Today, Neil still benefits from government handouts to supplement the paltry sum he receives as a local councilman from the Liberal Democrat party. He is shown pounding on a typewriter, and he tells Apted that he writes every day. Despite the exposure participating in the series has brought him, such as being preposterously introduced at an Australian political conference as being Britain's next prime minister, no publisher has ever shown any interest in his writing. Shout out to Neil: I'll give it a read.

Distributed in the US by First Run Features, 56Up will be televised on American television this summer by PBS and released on DVD some time after.

•••

Last month I wrote about the mystery of 'Rotten Cotton', in which a poster found on London's Carnaby Street depicted EastEnders characters Dot Cotton and her no-good son Nasty Nick. Neither June Brown nor John Altman, the respective actors, knew anything about how their images showed up on the poster when the Walford Gazette contacted them.

Since the last post on 7 December, Jamie Evans, of Pontypridd, Wales, solved the riddle of 'Rotten Cotton', which was for a project/film called Dirty White Gold, depicting the bad working conditions and problems faced by cotton farmers in India.

The film's London-based director, Leah Borromeo, explains to the Huffington Post:
"Dr D is the artist behind the posters. Our film it's still in production."

Regarding EastEnders: "Both D and I have watched it at various points of our lives. Wouldn't say we're die-hard fans but it's definitely a part of pop culture that's affected us. The 'Cotton' link was because our film is about cotton farmer suicides and the debt that drives these farmers to do it. It's a poverty and a debt that we as consumers have a direct influence on. So 'Rotten Cotton' is to do with corporate greed and corruption that is causing farmers to die."]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2012:/theblog//3.2340254 2012-12-20T14:54:57-05:00 2013-02-19T05:12:01-05:00

Larry Jaffee http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-jaffee/ Up series is a British telly institution that endures 56 years after it debuted on Granada in 1964.

Every seven years, award-winning director Michael Apted goes back to interview on camera the same group of individuals when they were seven years old. Oh my, have they all grown.

One of the participants who has stuck with the series since the beginning is Tony Walker, the precocious seven-year-old who wanted to be a jockey but by 21 was destined for the life of a cabbie.

The latest edition, 56Up, debuted on ITV in May to rave reviews, and in a few weeks is crossing the Atlantic.

Walker, whose mug adorns the forthcoming DVD cover would like to attend the New York premiere. A crowd-funding campaign is underway to finance his trip.

Huffington Post UK's television critic Caroline Frost wrote in her 56Up rave review earlier this year of Walker: "Talking of his love for his wife and children, Tony welled up, and it would take a heart of lead not be moved by this everyman's failings and his gratitude for redemption at the hands of family unity."

The financing campaign expires on 28 December for anyone to contribute.]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2012:/theblog//3.2253822 2012-12-06T19:05:03-05:00 2013-02-05T05:12:01-05:00

Larry Jaffee http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-jaffee/

It might very well require the services of Sherlock Holmes.

While visiting London in early November, EastEnders enthusiast and New Yorker Cary Portway stumbled upon a poster on a street lamp dubbed 'Rotten Cotton', adorned with a photo of Albert Square icons, son and mum Dot and 'Nasty Nick' Cotton.

The poster adopts the title and lettering of the classic punk rock album by the Sex Pistols, Never Mind the Bollocks, and then asks provocatively, "Who's Behind The ... Rotten Cotton." That's a very good question, indeed!

"We were in Carnaby Street to see the Rolling Stones Christmas decorations (did you ever think there would be such a thing?!)," Portway explains. "And that's the only place in all of London (and I was everywhere!) that I saw them. Let me know if you ever find out what it's all about."

Combing the Web to solve the mystery of its existence, we came up empty-handed, other than the surely dumbfounded California-based, heavy-metal band t-shirt company (www.rottencotton.com), which apparently doesn't have any EastEnders connections; they didn't respond to our enquiring email.

The Walford Gazette then checked with Jim Vogiatzis, personal assistant to June Brown (Dot), who reports: "I have not been able to find out anything about the poster ... just as much a mystery to us."

And it was the first time that John Altman (Nick) had seen it, too. "I have no idea what that poster is about. Do let me know if you find out. All the best, John," writes Altman, in an email between rehearsals for the panto, Aladdin, in which he plays 'Abanazar' at Stockport Plaza from 7 December 2012 to 6 January 2013.]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2012:/theblog//3.2175822 2012-11-22T13:14:36-05:00 2013-01-22T05:12:01-05:00

Larry Jaffee http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-jaffee/ EastEnders on public television in the US, which is about eight years behind the storyline you lot see in the UK. Yes, I'm in a time-warp.

Despite being the editor & publisher of the world's only quarterly newspaper dedicated to EastEnders (www.wgazette.com) for the past 20 years, I am somewhat ashamed to admit that I haven't seen all that much of the show in the past month, partly due to Hurricane Sandy knocking power out for a week.

Last week I was fortunate to catch the last few minutes of the second episode in which Minty finally expressed his unrequited love for Samantha, unsuccessfully convincing her to marry him instead of Andy. (It's nice to see Cliff Parisi in Call The Midwife (also on PBS these days), in a supporting role not all that different than Minty, although set five decades earlier).

But last night's two EastEnders episodes were different, and demonstrated a rare creative flourish in juxtaposing of storylines. True, on the eve of an Albert Square wedding, the production team usually notches up the storylines, as they did last year for Kat & Alfie. But Sam & Andy aren't exactly Kat & Alfie in the tug-at-the heart, sympathy department. Andy is a piece of work (shameless plug: Michael McCarthy has worked up a great analysis of the character for the next Walford Gazette), and Sam means well, but let's face it, she is just lost. She's so desperate to finally find love with a good-looking bloke. Sorry Minty, Andy has you beat in that department even if you're right about the creep.

Back to the scenes on the screen, we move from bedroom to bedroom - Sam and Andy; Martin and Sonia; Dennis and Zoe (or Sharon); and Kat and Alfie - all discussing last-minute details about the wedding, as well as their own love and/or marriage. A guilty-looking Martin's all jumpy when the mobile rings, thinking it's his one-night stand who refuses to leave him alone; Sonia senses something is awry and lets it go.

Dennis inexplicably agrees to be Andy's best man, and frisky Zoe is about to fool around with her boyfriend when Andy barks about Dennis making sure that the wedding transportation is all set. Sharon manages to pull Dennis into her bedroom for a snog, Zoe none the wiser.

Andy then calls Alfie to make sure the Vic will be ready for the reception. Kat's somewhat reticent about Andy getting married, which Alfie misinterprets that she still has feelings for her former fiancé.

Meanwhile, Sam finally expresses to Andy her doubt about getting married to him, and how maybe Minty had a point about him. Andy calls her bluff, and says if she can't trust him, he's calling it all off. Of course, Sam - so desperate to get married - recants, dismisses it as prenuptial jitters and fretting about her impossible-to-please mum Peggy. It's also worth noting that Andy isn't about to made the fool again at the altar, and is as desperate to get married as Sam.



The second episode, the morning of the wedding, revolves around the return of Peggy, the undisputed Queen of Albert Square. Boy, she has been gone a long time, as we realize she missed Kat and Alfie's wedding. Alfie gives her a big "DUCHESS!" greeting. Peggy can't believe Sam hadn't invited them to the wedding, and insists they come any way, as she also did with Patrick and Yolande, making her away around the Square.

Andy does his best to impress Peggy, who seems smitten that her daughter has made a good choice. Meanwhile, Minty keeps on missing Peggy, and you could only guess he would let her know what he really thinks of Andy.

Best line comes from Aunt Sally, who hopes her niece doesn't cock it up again like she did "with that donut Ricky." It's hard to believe that the teenage runaways eloped more than 20 years ago.

In any case, these two episodes reinforced how thankful I am of EastEnders at its best.]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2012:/theblog//3.2076100 2012-11-05T09:05:38-05:00 2013-01-05T05:12:01-05:00

Larry Jaffee http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-jaffee/ Mother's Little Helper. More like Grand Dad's Walker.

But how many of the geriatric set pushing 70 can still do what they do? With four sold-out shows in Newark and London, they're rumored to be planning a world tour tour next year, dubbed 'GRRRR! 50 and Counting'? You've got to hand it to the Rolling Stones, even if their motivation these days more likely is money for their families than creating great music.

Let's face it, the Stones have mostly sucked as a recording act since Exile On Main Street. Okay, Some Girls and even Tattoo You had moments of greatness, but they paled in comparison to the glory years of 1968-1972 when they used to be introduced on stage as 'The World's Greatest Rock 'n' Roll Band,' and they truly were.

As a performing act, since the '72 tour nothing in the new set material had ever been 'must listening' compared to say Gimme Shelter or Midnight Rambler. The new songs played live were retreads of riffs they've played countless times before, and not to mention they were nicked from Chuck Berry.

I thought they hit the nadir in 1989 with the 'Steel Wheels' tour and album, but 2005's 'A Bigger Bang' showed how low low can be.

But as long as there are babyboomers with disposable income, there will be always Stones product to purchase and $1,000 concert tickets, boxed sets, coffee-table books, DVDs, etc.

Apparently, there's plenty in the archives to mine, such as the newly released Charlie Is My Darling documentary $72 boxed set (ABKCO) chronicling the Stones' 1965 tour of Ireland. It's truly a time capsule, capturing their youthfulness and creativity urging to burst out, a band nearly at its prime. (The documentary alone is available a la carte on DVD/Blu-ray or digital download; the deluxe set also includes two soundtrack CDs, commemorative book, replica poster, film still and 10-inch vinyl record of the same soundtrack.)

http://theseconddisc.files.wordpress.com/2012/08/charlie-is-my-darling-super-deluxe.jpg?w=700

Barely out of their twenties, you see how the band was every bit important as the rival Beatles. Charlie is their answer to A Hard Day's Night. However, legal disputes prevented its release until now, and Allen Klein's daughter Robin has done a masterful job in producing a keepsake for those who care about this stuff.

Directed by Peter Whitehead, the documentary provides thoughtful interviews with Jagger and Brian Jones about fame, the youth movement, and entertainment. Jagger says what they do is "ephemeral," while Jones honestly responds that he cannot contemplate a Rolling Stones future with any degree of certainty. Maybe he was foreshadowing his death-wish.

There's an amazing scene of the band playing It's Alright on stage, and a riot ensues, as the unruly mob literally mauls the band members. Another revelatory moment is Mick singing and Keith on an acoustic guitar working out Sitting On a Fence in a hotel room. These London blokes knew, back then at least, how to craft a tune.

You see at the airport a disgusted Keith getting ticked at a teenage girl trying to snatch a piece of his hair from behind, and instead of giving her a shove just walks off briskly. Perhaps he was fully conscious of the camera watching his every move.

Having recovered and restored in recent years similar Stones curios as The Rock 'N' Roll Circus and Get Yer Ya Yas Out in deluxe packages, ABKCO, I've got a question: What's next? Cocksucker Blues?

•••

Perhaps not coincidentally, there's other Stones-related product to piggyback the current media attention on the band. The Rolling Stones Under Review 1975-1983: The Ronnie Wood Years Part 1 on DVD, out 20 November courtesy of MVD, an in-depth documentary covering the career and music of the Rolling Stones between 1975 and 1983, rounds up various pundits, such as respected music scribe and rocksbackpages.com chief Barney Hoskyns.

Key to the story is how Wood gave the band new lease on life, and Richards' drug problems allowed Jagger to take the reins business-wise and creatively. There's a consensus that the band missed Mick Taylor's musicianship.

Album by album, they dissect the band's output. There are moments of insight that would only appeal to an aficionado, such as how Goat's Head Soup (1973) was recorded in Jamaica, but did not reflect the Glimmer Twins' love for reggae, which would emerge on later tracks like It's Only Rock 'n' Roll's Luxury and Black and Blue's "Cherry Oh Baby."

The critics seem especially kind to Black and Blue, which, to my ears, only had two redeeming tracks, Memory Motel and Melody, the latter which was helped especially by Billy Preston's influence and soulfulness. The album's lack of cohesiveness may be explained by the band auditioning Taylor's replacement during the recording. Among those who auditioned included Wood, Wayne Perkins, Harvey Mandel, Steve Marriott and Peter Frampton, but only Wood, Perkins and Mandel made the final cut of resulting tracks.

I remember having a conversation with a record-store owner as the album's Fool to Cry came on the radio at the time of its 1976 release, and me opining that Queen was a much-better band at the moment. There are some seldom-seen videos, such as Undercover of the Night, most of which no doubt are on YouTube.

The harmonica player Sugar Blue offers some firsthand insight to the making of "Miss You" and how the Stones operated in the studio.

•••

Finally, Philip Norman's biography Mick Jagger (Ecco) appears to be almost an answer to Life, Richards's strangely lucent 2010 autobiography that spurred the countless classic rock memoirs which have been since published (e.g., Steven Tyler, Rod Stewart, Pete Townshend, et. al). Norman's weighty analysis at 622 pages shows his exhaustive research, as he had done with the Beatles. Just starting to dive into it, so stay tuned for a "holiday gift guide" review from me in the coming month.]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2012:/theblog//3.2039404 2012-10-29T12:03:53-04:00 2012-12-29T05:12:02-05:00

Larry Jaffee http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-jaffee/
This year the festival's main attraction was local boy-done-good/indie filmmaking veteran Edward Burns (The Brothers McMullan, 1995), who screened his most recent film, The Fitzgerald Family Christmas, about the lives and loves of a dysfunctional Irish-American clan, familiar territory for the auteur.

Concluding right before Hurricane Sandy was to strike, Gold Coast during the prior week showed at various venues in the vicinity 25 new and classic full-length features, including the US debut of Dustin Hoffman's first-time directorial effort, Quartet, which previously was screened last month at the London Film Festival, as well as Toronto International Film Festival.

Quartet touts an all-star British cast headed by Maggie Smith (Jean), Billy Connolly (Wilf), Tom Courtenay (Reggie) and Pauline Collins (Cissy), who all play retired opera singers living in a home for aged musicians.

Michael Gabon plays their pretentious, quick-tongued director. Connolly's womanizer steals the movie with his non-stop witty repartee. Reggie, who never quite recovered from his former wife Jean's infidelity years ago, is jolted (think Ingrid Bergman and Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca) when she suddenly arrives as the latest permanent guest of the facility. With her glory years way long gone, the standoffish Jean is on National Health and in need of a hip replacement.

Adapted from his stage play, Ronald Harwood's script allows the main characters to reminisce about past rivalries, love affairs and good times at what is essentially a music conservatory with a medical staff on hand. The hierarchy that existed when they were stars remains, even though aging is the great equalizer. Jean, who hadn't sung in years, needs coaxing from Reg, Wilf and Cissy to recreate their definitive recording of Verdi's Rigoletto at a benefit gala to financially save the old-age home from closing.

The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, which also featured Smith in its all-star cast, earlier this year tackled similar geriatric territory but not as well as Quartet. Not surprisingly The Weinstein Company picked up Quartet for general US release this 28 December (4 January for UK), coinciding with the third series of Downton Abbey premiering on American PBS.

Why did Hoffman choose a British story for directing his first feature at 75? Apparently, the American actor can relate to the story given his age and is something of an Anglophile; he owns a house in the Kensington area of London, and he once was photographed with the cast of Coronation Street. Among his filmography as an actor is Straw Dogs (1971), set in Cornwall, England.

Besides the films, the Gold Coast festival also featured several special events, including a chat at NYIT's de Seversky Mansion in Old Westbury with Hollywood agent Budd Burton Moss, who promoted his new memoir, ...And I Only Got Ten Percent! Moss grew up in Tinseltown. His father was a film editor, and his uncle was the director Sam Zimbalest, in whose swimming pool young Budd would find himself amid the likes of Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn and Rita Hayworth before he knew who they were.

Moss would later represent Hayworth, and Moss told of accompanying her in 1976 to London for a press junket. In mid-flight, the actress suddenly thought she was talking to Gary Cooper instead of her agent; she soon decked a flight attendant, who was trying to give the actress back her mink coat as the plane was making its descent to Heathrow. The mercurial Hayworth, who was later found to be suffering from Alzheimers, was convinced the stewardess was trying to steal her beloved coat.

Moss regaled the audience with other tales of other clients including Sidney Poitier, Cyd Charisse, Mia Farrow, Dyan Cannnon, Tom Bosley (during his Happy Days TV heyday).
In his book, Moss dedicates a humorous chapter to hanging with Richard Burton during the making of Bitter Victory in 1957 in the south of France. Among the WWII picture's cast was Moss's then-wife Ruth Roman. Burton, back in the news for his recently published diaries, befriended a bunch of strippers at a notorious nightclub and invited them down to be his new "leading ladies" in the film, whose producer was not amused; the burlesque dancers ended up being used in the background.

Also on hand at the NYIT event was Kiera Chaplin, granddaughter of London-born Charlie Chaplin, who explained how honoured she is carrying on the famous surname and show biz legacy as a model and actress. She is also a descendant of the Irish playwright Eugene O'Neill.

Kiera Chaplin, who was born in Northern Ireland and grew up in Switzerland before launching her modeling career in New York at 17, tells Huffington Post UK that in the 1930s Chaplin kept a house in nearby Great Neck to write.

The Gold Coast Film Festival plans to present in 2013-2014 a retrospective of all things Charlie Chaplin, commemorating the 100th anniversary of his venerable screen character The Little Tramp.]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2012:/theblog//3.1953075 2012-10-09T21:26:39-04:00 2012-12-09T05:12:02-05:00

Larry Jaffee http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-jaffee/
Fifty years later, she used as a backdrop of her new film the threat of a nuclear war between the US and USSR through the eyes of two BFFs, the title characters of Ginger & Rosa, which played the New York Film Festival earlier this week.

Ginger (Elle Fanning) is the more politically committed, innocent and sensitive of the two friends, while Rosa (Alice Englert) is a bit more streetwise and sexually curious, wasting no time to flirt with her best friend's handsome narcissist of a father Roland (Allesandro Nivola). Rosa's mom Anoushka is single. At the beginning of the film, both girls are rebellious, bent on not making the same mistakes as their mothers.

Ginger feels sorry for her mother Natalie (Mad Men's Christina Hendricks), and idolizes Roland, even making excuses for his philandering ways. It's only after Ginger comes to the realisation that her best friend is carrying on with her father can she empathize fully with her mom.

Far more effective, An Education a few years ago tackled similar territory of a young woman in pre-Beatlemania England yearning to grow up too soon. Ginger and Rosa's parents are bohemians who play jazz on their record player and stay up late, quite a contrast to the squares who played Jenny's (Carey Mulligan) middle-class parents.

Seen through the eyes of Ginger, Potter's film focuses on what effect an unhappy marriage can have on offspring, amid a political posturing by the superpowers.

Although made with British money (bfi, BBC), the cast is overwhelmingly American (Fanning, Hendricks, Nivola all showing off British accents), also including Annette Bening and Oliver Platt in supporting roles, both playing Americans living in Britain. Potter explained during a press conference that an extensive search was underway in Britain for the leads (looking at 2,000 girls on Facebook) and seeing in person 200 of them. Potter said it made no difference to her what passport the actors carried. Instead, all she was interested in was whether they embodied the roles.

Ginger & Rosa is slated for a general cinema release in early 2013, and Oscar qualifying screenings before then.]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2012:/theblog//3.1895451 2012-09-25T19:00:00-04:00 2012-11-25T05:12:01-05:00

Larry Jaffee http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-jaffee/
A fairly disappointing big-screen version of The Inbetweeners, a great telly comedy for three series about four misfit high school mates will do boffo domestic box office (record-setting for a British comedy), but the indie works of art that get screened at the London Film Festival are hardly seen anywhere else.

Thirteen months after it took the British box office by storm, The Inbetweeners movie opened this month with a limited theatrical release in the States (two screens in Manhattan), coinciding with an MTV American version of the TV show.

Firstly, the British TV series, which made it to the usually clueless BBC America, works if you're into sophomoric humour about male teens' obsessions with the opposite sex. That undercurrent runs through every episode on the surface. But dig deeper, there's a fascinating dynamic about how friendships form during adolescence. This quartet is composed of four individuals who really have nothing in common with each other.

You have the ultra-nerd Will, who carries a briefcase and behaves as if he's in an MBA program. His "friends" aren't nearly as ambitious. Jay is a bit of a bully and a complete sexist who is a womaniser only in his dreams and Internet porn relationships. Simon appears to be the most normal and presentable, except when he's not talking incessantly about his sort-of girlfriend Carly, who doesn't seem to completely reciprocate his affections. Neil is a gawky dumb jock, an uninhibited dancer with not much going on upstairs.

Why did they bond? Who else would have them? Hence, the title of the series.

This isn't exactly new territory for Britcoms. In the mid-1980s, The Young Ones' similarly poorly matched four flat mates purportedly attended college. Despite a few years older, they were just as antisocial and awkward with women.

So that's the framework. The original Inbetweeners TV show is extremely funny because of the chemistry among the four characters and actors. Will pulls off classic Woody Allen-worthy male anxiety. That cerebral cleverness - he has a hard time censoring his thoughts - is propelled by excellent comedy writing.

The best line in the film when an attractive young woman says to Will. "You're not normal, are you?" Will has to agree. Unfortunately, those moments are far and few between, and generally The Inbetweeners doesn't fare as well on the big screen.

The franchise's failure to make the cinematic leap might have something to do with a TV show like this falling into the 'guilty pleasure' category. It's hard to resist stuff that no responsible adult should find funny as long as it's delivered in small doses.

Once catapulted to full-length status, the script better be crack all the way through, and unfortunately the movie doesn't have the crispness of the half-hour episodes that lack the awkward transitions between scenes that plagued the movie, which occasionally is boring and predictable. The plot revolves around the boys' post-graduation holiday to a Greek island, and their pathetic attempts to get laid. Midway through, there's some reflection of what's going wrong, how they're getting on each other's nerves, and finally some redemption.

Watching the first three MTV episodes of the American version, let's just say that this is one show that has not crossed the ocean successfully, unlike last year's Skins, the high school drama that MTV unfortunately gave up on prematurely, despite having six more British seasons to tap. The Inbetweeners' failure to catch fire in the US might be commerce driven, and underscores the vast difference between the US and UK television industries. Yank cable networks don't hesitate to pull the plug if ratings fall short.

The scripts between the US and UK shows are nearly identical, but to no avail. Perhaps the biggest problem is poor casting. While the UK version couples four seemingly incompatible individuals, they somehow find a common ground. The supposed US pals are not believable on any level.]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2012:/theblog//3.1895460 2012-09-21T22:49:03-04:00 2012-11-21T05:12:01-05:00

Larry Jaffee http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-jaffee/
The three-piece version of Karl Wallinger's World Party that played New York's quaint City Winery on 17 September no doubt will pale in comparison in about six weeks to the wall of sound sure wallow through the sacred London music house.

Wallinger's exquisitely crafted songs most certainly deserve such lush orchestration. Yet
this rare gig - broadcast live over New York radio station WFUV and archived on the station's website for all to hear - allowed the live audience a glimpse of how great songs get written. Just a few instantly recognizable acoustic guitar chord strums materialized into a would-be hit in a perfect world, such as a "Put A Message in the Box." But midway through the hour-long set, Wallinger slumbered over to the electric piano and the same thing happened as he hit a few keys, conjuring out of thin air "She's The One."

Wallinger was in fine voice, his first local appearance in some time, and evidence enough that the London-based singer/songwriter fully recovered from the aneurysm that he suffered in February 2001, forcing him to learn how to speak again, let alone sing.

Releasing a solid [fifth] album, Dumbing Up, just months before, he needed that life-threatening curve ball like anyone could use a hole in the head; World Party never was that wildly prolific in the first place as a recording artist. I put Wallinger/World Party in rare company: not wildly prolific but when he puts something out there's little filler among the originals, think Velvet Underground, Nick Drake, The Smiths, etc.

A successful gig at South By Southwest last March cemented the itch to get back on the road, and he and his two accompanists - David Duffy on fiddle and John Trumbull on guitar - have since played a few small shows around the U.S. before hitting UK stage for the first time in a decade. The support musicians provided a countrified feel to some of the dozen and change songs knocked out in an hour, although oddly no covers, which are in bountiful supply on Arkeology, a generous, five-CD compilation of unreleased material issued a few months ago.

Capturing his eclectic, impeccable tastes, Wallinger not only can mimic the Beatles, channeling either Lennon or McCartney, he also sends-up Prince and Sly Stone, showing his funky side and not bad for a pasty white guy from Britain. His renditions of "Like A Rolling Stone" and "Sweetheart Like You" makes you wish Dylan had as good a singing voice.
Wallinger's mostly an unsung (albeit critics' favourite) Welsh treasure, who helped make the best early Waterboys records.

One of my favorite moments on the five discs is when there's some in-studio banter, and Wallinger apologizes for the real musician calling it a day. "You're stuck with us," he apologizes to the engineer, in a totally needless lament. The song is so perfectly crafted that any instrumentalist with basic licks can slay it.

About a decade ago I picked up a two-disc bootleg of unreleased World Party, and thing is most of those tracks - curios, outtakes, live tracks - aren't even on the sprawling Arkeology. Karl, thanks for helping me be a completist!]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2012:/theblog//3.1892009 2012-09-19T19:00:00-04:00 2012-11-19T05:12:02-05:00

Larry Jaffee http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-jaffee/ EastEnders fans apparently have been misled believing that EastEnders was Princess Diana's favourite TV programme.

No, that honour instead went to another Brit soap, Brookside, Paul Burrell, former royal butler to Diana, Princess of Wales, tells Huffington Post UK and the Walford Gazette in an exclusive interview.

He apologises for refuting the often-repeated tale of her fandom), but at EastEnders' broadcast times of 7:30 p.m. or 8 p.m., "I was often pushing a trolley with meal for one, so that she could sit in front of the TV and watch it. So I can tell you this is definitely the truth. It was just me and her."

Coinciding nearly a month after the 15th anniversary of Diana's death, Burrell will be speaking later this week at three university fundraising events sponsored by the New York Institute of Technology (NYIT) under the umbrella "A Royal Experience." A gala dinner costs $150 a plate, utilising a grand palace menu. Two other events, priced at $75 a ticket, will feature Burrell speaking about the lost traditions of etiquette to an audience of hotel, restaurant and hospitality professionals, and leading a Buckingham Palace-style fancy tea.

In his 21 years of royal duty, Burrell first served Her Majesty the Queen as personal as personal footman from 1976 to 1987 when he moved to Highgrove to become butler to the Prince and Princess of Wales. It was in 1992, following the couple's separation, that he moved to Kensington Palace at the personal request of Princess Diana. He then spearheaded a fundraising campaign for her official memorial fund that raised £100 million.

NYIT CFO Len Aubrey explains that Burrell was invited for his considerable service expertise, which the school thought would be useful to expose to students in its hospitality studies programme. An additional draw, he notes, was Britain's recent omnipresence, including Andy Murray winning the U.S. Open men's tennis championship, this summer's 2012 London Olympics, the Diamond Jubilee celebration in June and last year's Royal Wedding. The proceeds from the NYIT fundraising events will be used for hospitality scholarships.

Back to the soap revelation, I point out to Burrell that when EastEnders first was broadcast in the US in late 1987, the Washington Post and numerous other newspapers led their articles about how Diana was a fan. "Maybe in the very beginning she did tune into it, but it wasn't something that she would want to watch regularly," Burrell says.

"Brookside was her favourite and she met most of the cast. She went to the set of Brookside and got to know some of the cast very well, especially Dean Sullivan, who played Jimmy Corkhill on the show. He became a friend, who she regularly telephoned."

At some point, Diana most definitely also visited the EastEnders set, as retold by the late Wendy Richard, in her 2000 autobiography. The princess was invited by EastEnders founder Julia Smith, and stayed for several hours. "Diana revealed that Den and Angie were her favourite characters and so she especially enjoyed chatting to Leslie [Grantham and Anita [Dobson]," wrote Richard, who died in February 2009.

Burrell points out that he was at Buckingham Palace when EastEnders debuted on 19 February 1985, and vividly remembers the night. "It was a firm favourite of Buckingham Palace from the word 'Go'. Everything would stop, and everyone would watch EastEnders - and Dallas that you could not miss."

"All the staff got together to watch it in someone's room on the very top floor of the palace. It was a huge thing for Britain - EastEnders' first episode . A momentous
Burrell mentions two of his own EastEnders connections. "When Barbara Windsor first joined EastEnders [in 1994], she used to read bedtime stories to my boys at Kensington Palace. She used to come to see my boys when they were about 10 and 7. They were fully aware of who she was. She's charming. Barbara is still a good friend of mine. We've had a lot of fun."

Windsor explains in her 2000 autobiography All of Me that she attended "one of the best charity nights I'd ever attended: a masquerade ball in the aid of the Princess of Wales Memorial Fund, organised by Paul Burrell. Since the Princess died, Paul and I had become friends: he had been to my home and I've been to his in Kensington Palace, and met his wife, Maria, and his sons."

Burrell says he was also good friends with Wendy Richard. "It wasn't easy to be friends with both; they weren't the best of friends. I went to the book launches of both of their autobiographies, and I had to be very diplomatic. I've got nothing but nice to things to say about Barbara and Wendy. Wendy always was the queen of EastEnders, and then suddenly Barbara turns up and she thought she tried to usurp her position. I think they saw each other as rivals."

Burrell's memoir, A Royal Duty, sold 2 million copies worldwide and was a No. 1 New York Times bestseller. The book recounts how he was accused of stealing Diana's possessions, then acquitted following the intervention of the monarch.

Of his time serving the Queen as a footman for 11 years, and then Prince Charles and Diana and their boys, as well as Diana after the royal couple's split, Burrell tells the Walford Gazette: "I'm just an ordinary man; I've been through extraordinary circumstances."

He answered some other questions about life with the Royals:

WG: Are you surprised how interested Americans in British culture?
PB: Many Americans view Britain as the mother country so it does not surprise me that they are so interested in their history.

WG: In the 21st century, do you find Americans lacking more than the British in terms of respecting tradition and etiquette?
PB: The British have a strong sense of tradition and etiquette which would be hard to match anywhere in the world but Americans do have a respect for them.

WG: Had Princess Diana not died do you think she would have moved to the U.S., and would have you and your family joined her as she suggested?
PB: She was certainly looking at a home in the US and had shown me details of properties in which she had indicated accommodation for my family so I do think that we would have joined her.
WG: Downton Abbey captured Americans' fancy earlier this year, the most popular programme in PBS's history. I realise it's a period piece, circa World War I, and does not depict the same level of Royal life that you experienced, but how well does the show capture the relationship between the upper classes and their servants?
PB: Downton captures the two worlds very well. It mirrors the relationships that still exist in Royal households today. Much in Royal service remains as it was in Victorian times.

WG: Regarding your nightmarish prosecution, once you were exonerated did you receive back the gifts that you were accused of stealing?
PB: Yes, the majority of items were returned to me and those I held in trust for the Princes were passed to them.

WG: Did you write your book to clear your name (i.e., set the record straight)?
PB: When my trial collapsed and the charges against me dropped, only the prosecution had been heard and I had not given my version of events and felt the need for my side of the story to be told. In addition, I had no money whatsoever with which to support my family as I been unable to work from the day my house was raided by the police some two years previously and had been dependent on the goodwill of family and friends.

WG: While you were unfairly being accused, as the Queen's footman, as well as Charles and Diana's butler, weren't you privy to private telephone numbers that could connect you directly to Her Majesty herself or the Prince, or do they never answer their own telephones? Granted, your service to them was long before mobile phone became ubiquitous.
PB: It was impossible to reach members of the Royal family direct. Her Majesty, for instance, would ask the operator on the palace switchboard to connect her to whomever she wanted. Likewise, all calls to Her Majesty were first passed to a member of her staff who would connect the call to the Queen.

WG: Have you had any contact with Prince William since his wedding?
PB: I have had no contact but I have nothing but good wishes for the Prince and Princess.

WG: Had Diana ever talked about her boys getting married some day?
PB: The Princess always assumed that her boys would be married some day and would often remark to the boys that they should be kind, thoughtful and considerate to the opposite sex.

WG: Any comment about Prince Harry's recent Las Vegas transgression?
PB: Prince Harry is only a young man enjoying life and he was at a private party. The only question I would ask is: Where were his security who are there to protect him?

WG: How has it felt being portrayed by an actor in the upcoming film about Diana starring Naomi Watts?
PB: I know nothing of the film but it will be very strange to see an actor portraying me in circumstances to which only I was privy.]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2012:/theblog//3.1673791 2012-07-14T19:24:27-04:00 2012-09-13T05:12:07-04:00

Larry Jaffee http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-jaffee/ EastEnders castmember Anna Wing, MBE, the original matriarch of the Beale family,
was brought out of retirement to play an East End gangland boss in a music video going viral by the funk band called Quarrel.

You can see the video on YouTube here:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BbKk44PlxAU&feature=youtu.be

Quarrel leader Rich Lawrence tells the Walford Gazette and Huffington Post UK that he managed to get Ms Wing, who will be celebrating her 98th birthday this coming 30 October, to appear in the video through his girlfriend's ex-landlady, a former EastEnders staffer still in contact with the veteran actress.

Wing plays a gang leader whose intent to rid the world of funk music, recently attended a video launch party. Reports Lawrence: "She was in fine form and enjoyed both our live performance and the debut screening of the video."

Of the video he adds: "It was amazing to have Anna appear in it! She was incredible to work with - she was just able to flip a switch and suddenly turn from a lovely lady into
a terrifying angry gangster! A true professional, and an honour to have her appear."

Wing comments: "They really were lovely to work with and it's nice to support talented
young people who are being creative. It was tremendous fun."

In an interview I did with her for the Walford Gazette back in 1996, she explained she implored to the BBC producers that she must have the role of 'Lou Beale' because of her authenticity as a real Cockney. She grew up in Hackney, as did her parents and grandparents.

"I have the pedigree. I succeeded in the end [convincing the producers that she should play Lou Beale]. I remember the [East End, circa early 1900s] children, all the sounds, the noise, the market. It's part of your birthright."

Wing was instructed by the show's creators in developing the Lou Beale character "to bring something from your background." As it turned out, the name of Wing's father was "Albert," the name of Beale's deceased husband and fictional neighborhood Square.

Wing's son, Mark Wing-Davey, told me in September 2010 during a visit I had with him at New York University where he chairs the graduate acting programme, that his mum at the time still climbed every day six flights of stairs to get to her flat. I wouldn't be surprised if she still does so!

***

EastEnders Watch: Finally catching up on DVD with Series 2 of The IT Crowd, I was amused to hear show creator Graham Linehan (Father Ted) mention during the commentary track that he was inspired by EastEnders in a scene focusing on the smoking habit of Katherine Parkinson's character Jen Barber. "I wanted to turn her into Dot Cotton," Lineham reveals, amid a cut-in to Jen's smoke-hazed bed-sit and a brief soundtrack of an electro rendition of the EastEnders theme song.]]>