Smoggie Queens – a fabulous comedy for BBC Three and iPlayer – launched late last year. It was filmed and set in Teesside, and we celebrated the launch with a spectacular “pink carpet” screening in Middlesbrough – surrounded by the local people who made the show a glamorous reality.
From regional South Australia to Plymouth and becoming Chair this year of the RTS Devon and Cornwall centre, my journey has been a long one. After arriving in South West England from Australia in 2006 on a late-bloomer’s gap year that is still going, I’ve been freelancing in the region as a camera operator, working in news graphics and floor managing, but primarily plying a trade as an offline editor.
The waiting cruise boat on the Seine could be seen clearly but, perplexingly, there was no obvious route down to board it from the embankment by the Eiffel Tower.
This was not for a Sky News team’s Champagne-fuelled sightseeing tour. We were attempting to show how, in July, a floating parade of athletes would be part of the most ambitious opening ceremony conceived by an Olympic city.
If you look at the schedules, it would be reasonable to assume that everyone in Yorkshire goes about their day-to-day life followed by a camera crew. It seems we have every profession covered, including vets, farmers, midwives, shepherdesses, auctioneers and airport workers.
In addition, Yorkshire continues to inspire writers like me to write shows such as Gentleman Jack, Ackley Bridge, Hullraisers, Happy Valley and, of course, Emmerdale, which recently celebrated 50 years of being filmed in the region.
It felt good to be in a room full of people at the RTS Cambridge Convention last month: great sessions and speakers, brilliantly curated by Ben McOwen Wilson of YouTube. Of course, there was much drama when John Whittingdale stepped in for outgoing culture secretary Oliver Dowden, but this was a great way of demonstrating to the UK broadcasting industry that the Government knows better than most what constitutes great drama.
As Bristol City Council’s new senior film manager, I have finally reached a position where I can support and promote my two main passions – Bristol and filming in the West Country.
My role is to oversee the work of the Bottle Yard Studios and Bristol Film Office, and make sure that Bristol can build on its past successes and deliver a single, complete and consistent offer encompassing studio and location filming. And, despite the pandemic, there has never been a better time.
Robson Green has done it. Professor Alice Roberts has also given it a go. Darcey Bussell tried it in Scotland recently. Kate Humble did it naked. Susannah Constantine took an axe with her when she did it. Barely a week goes by without someone from either Countryfile or The One Show doing it. And Port Talbot resident David Bryan credits it with helping to save his life.
I have never before been gifted with such an abundance of natural beauty.” The words of Steven Spielberg when asked his thoughts on Devon when he was here filming War Horse on Dartmoor in 2011.
Cinema has long held a fascination with Devon and Cornwall. Some of Hollywood’s most celebrated directors have shot here. Ang Lee filmed Sense and Sensibility in South Devon. Roger Mitchell shot My Cousin Rachel there, too, and Tim Burton has used both counties as a backdrop.
Barring an unexpected – but probably unsurprising – large asteroid impact, the most tumultuous year in living memory is finally limping to its end. At this time of year, we would normally compile a review or two but who wants to relive 2020?
It seems the biblical equestrian quartet has been riding roughshod for months; countless losses and the unending upheaval of the pandemic; acts of violent racism; raging wildfires, floods and even a locust plague in East Africa. As a result, we’ve all changed this past year.
This is the fourth version of this piece that I’ve written. I scrapped the previous three as “the news” made them immediately out of date. I’m going to plough on with this one, although I fear that, by the time it is published, it will be entirely irrelevant thanks to world events, but hey ho. Like everyone, I’m resigned to the fact that there’s no way of predicting anything this year…
