Ronnie Cogan having a cigarette with one of the Supporting Artistes. Terry Smith the Wardrobe Master is going below in the background. photo: Martin Neville.
It was a glorious summer day to film on Windermere. Conditions were perfect. My father had been asked to appear as a film extra in the scene in Swallows and Amazons when the the crew of Swallow narrowly miss colliding with a Lakeland steamer, that transporting tourists up and down the lake.
Martin Neville wearing 1929 costume aboard MV Tern on Windermere in 1973
He was the tall dark native in a blazer and white flannels aboard the elegant MV Tern. A lovely way to spend a sunny morning in the Lake District. Until your daughter nearly drowns.
MV Tern on Windermere was built in 1890 with a steam engine, converted to diesel in the 1950s, and is still operating today.
Simon West, Suzanna Hamilton, Sten Grendon and I were sailing the Swallow, on our voyage to the island. The twelve-foot dinghy was laden with camping gear and had no buoyancy. We did not wear life jackets.
At the start of the day, Swallow was attached to the camera pontoon so that Claude Whatham, the film director, could capture our dialogue on film. The camera crew then went aboard the Tern and we sailed free, with the safety boat some distance away, behind the camera. Other boats were keeping modern boats clear of the shot.
In the script Roger is down to say, ‘Steamship on the port bow’. I think what came out was, ‘Look John! Over there – steamer ahead!’
The Tern had a young, inexperienced skipper who was coping with a notch throttle, as you can see if you watch the movie.
The screenplay of David Wood’s adaptation of Arthur Ransome’s classic book ‘Swallows and Amazons’ set in the Lake District in 1929
My mother, who normally looked after us, had been obliged to drive to Bristol as she presented a weekly programme for HTV with Jan Leeming called Women Only and had been summons to promote the channel at the Bath and West Show. Dad must have been acting as our chaperone, responsible for our safety. A sailor with years of experience racing on the Solent, he took a keen interest in all the boating scenes, but I’m sure he didn’t have a chaperone’s licence. As we sailed towards him, on an intentional collision course, he foresaw that the larger vessel would take our wind.
Three men of Cumbria who were happy to have short-back-and-sides haircuts on the deck of the MV Tern on Windermere in 1973 ~ photo: Martin Neville
My father watched from above as we only just turned in time, missing the steamer by a mere nine inches as her bow wave bounced us away and we sailed on. Ronnie Cogan had to buy him a whisky. They knew Sten could hardly swim, that any of us could have been entangled in the ropes and camping gear if Swallow had gone over. Clinker-built dinghies can sink quickly. It was a sunny day but the water was icy and very deep.
We did not know it at the time, but Dad nearly took me off the film. He had a meeting with the producer when he tested the BOAC life jackets we rehearsed in. Mine did not inflate.
Phil Brown, who belongs to the Arthur Ransome Group, said: “Tern was re-engined in 1957 with two diesel engines. Interestingly she was to have been named SWALLOW, but after a last-minute change, she was launched in June 1891 as TERN.”
It is said that children bounce. The next day, I sat school exams: geography, science and maths.
…‘Carry on Matron’. I wonder what near disasters they had on that film.
You can read more in the ebook ‘The Secrets of Filming Swallows and Amazons (1974)’ available from Amazon Kindle, Kobo, iTunes and all other online retailers:
In Arthur Ransome’s book Swallows and Amazons Titty is left keeping watch on an island, so small it is little more than a rock, whilst the Swallows sail into Rio Bay in search of the Amazons. Luckily for me, this is not so in the film. Susan declares, ‘They must be making for Rio’ and the scene cuts to a band playing in the municipal park at Bowness-on-Windermere. John rows into the bay pretty sure that the Amazons have given them the slip, Susan suggests that we could explore Rio and I happily declare, ‘We could buy rope for the lighthouse tree.’ And that is what we did – leaving the boy Roger in charge of Swallow. It was such a hot day I whipped off my grey cardigan before I leapt out of the boat, no doubt causing havoc for the Film Editor.
The Swallows approach the jetty in Rio. Empty camera boats are moored in the foreground beside a period launch. Are those green boatsheds still standing today?
Simon Holland, the Set Designer on Swallows and Amazons had transformed the busy Bowness of 1973 into a Lakeland town of 1929. To do this he must have had a huge amount of glass fibre boats moved. These were replaced by the beautiful wooden launches and skiffs of the period.
You can see my father in white flannel trousers, his dark hair cut short, standing on the jetty in front of the lovely old green boathouses that then overlooked the bay. He is talking to the owner of the launch with the green and white striped awning.
Much of the first part of this sequence was filmed from the grey punt used as a camera boat. It seems that Simon West, who played John was towing this as he rowed up to the jetty. It was a hot day and for once we were all feeling the heat.
Kit Seymour and Jane Grendon watch the filming on the jetty whilst Tamzin and Perry Neville eat ice creams with the one man in Cumbria willing to have a short-back-and-sides. You can just see the period cars parked in the background
Although the Swallows spurned the conventional attractions of tripperdom, we spotted the Stop-me-and-by-one ice cream cart like lightening. I was entranced by the old cars, the pony and trap and the number of people dressed to populate Rio. They were organised and directed by Terry Needham, the Second Assistant Director. To our delight we found Gareth Tandy, the Third Assistant, was dressed in period costume too, his Motorola hidden under a stripy blazer so he could cue the Supporting Artists and keep back the general public without having to worry about appearing in vision himself. To his dismay he had had to have his hair cut. We all thought this a distinct improvement. He looked so handsome! I’m not sure if you can see him in the distance when we are climbing out of Swallow. You can just see my sisters walking towards the town at this point with Pandora Doyle, Brain Doyle’s daughter.
The Price children, Perry Neville, Jane Grendon, Tamzin Neville and Pandora Doyle in their 1929 costumes on the shore of Lake Windermere at Bowness in 1973 ~ all photos on this page : Martin Neville
Jane Grendon, our chaperone looked fabulous in her 1929 costume. It was the one and only time I saw her in a dress.
Jane Grendon as a Passer-by with her pram in Rio Bay ~ photo: Daphne Neville
She was wonderful. Being in costume enabled her to keep an eye on all the children playing on the beach. I know she would have kept them going and maintained safety as they flung pebbles into the water or rushed about with the donkeys that were giving rides along the shore – no one wearing helmets of course.
Another excitement of the day was that Claude Whatham had given Mr Price, the owner of the Oaklands Guest House where we were staying, the part of the native. The native who says, ‘That’s a nice little ship you’ve got there.’ Mum said that Kit Seymour, Suzanna Hamilton and Lesley Bennett had spied him, pacing the garden at Oaklands trying out every possible way of saying this line. ‘That’s a nice little ship you’ve got there.’ Then, ‘That’s a nice little ship you’ve got there,’ leaving the girls in fits of giggles.
John Susan and Titty walking past the hotel
After we leave the general stores, me clutching bottles of grog, you can see Tamzin in a pink dress and straight back riding a chocolate coloured donkey along the beach while Dad is pushing out a rowing skiff with a log oar. Roger looks on from the Jetty to see Perry riding another donkey in a yellow dress while Tamzin walks by in the opposite direction with none other than Mr Price, in his striped blazer, who is walking along towards the boathouses holding a little boy’s hand. I am sure it was one of his own children but it looks a bit dodgy because while Roger watches my sisters and Pandora throwing stones into the lake from the beach were the skiffs are pulled up, David Price comes walking along the jetty and delivers his line: ‘That’s a nice little ship you’ve got there.’ It’s shot in rather a creepy way. John did warn Roger to ‘Beware of natives.’
The film crew of ‘Swallows and Amazons’ wait with Swallow and Stephen Grendon at the end of the jetty while Simon West, Suzanna Hamilton and Sophie Neville line up by the launch
A moment later Pandora and my sisters are surrounding the ice cream man while John, Susan and Titty return, striding along the jetty like the three wise men, carrying rope, buns and bottles of grog.
My father’s all time passion in the form of a very graceful steam launch passes, almost silently, in the foreground. A happy, happy day. They only sad thing was that we didn’t have time to film inside the bun shop, which was such a pity as it looked glorious. Claude had been obliged to re-take a scene when some ladies – real life ladies in 1970’s garments and bouffant hairdos – had come scootling out of the Public Conveniences in the middle of a take.
What none of us knew was that is was nearly our last day on earth. The same Supporting Artists, including my father, had been booked for the next morning…
My father added:
‘George Pattinson, the man who revived the steamboat world, along with Roger Mallinson, was the character in Elisabeth the little steamer.’
George Pattinson in his steam launch Elisabeth ~ photo: Martin Neville
‘The Bowness skiffs were not like the Thames version. The outriggers caught the oars and allowed a fisherman to let go of the grip if and when he caught an Arctic char, the Windermere fish, the oars were retained. A heavy boat.
I remember the rope was huge, fat and unsuitable! Daphne was not around as she had to go south to present Women Only for HTV. She was devastated to leave the donkey scene.’
You can read more about our antics in the paperback or ebook of ‘The making of Swallows and Amazons’ available from online retailers, good bookshops, and libraries worldwide. You can read more on Amazon here.
Simon West and Sophie Neville on Peel Island in 1973 Costumes designed by Emma Porteous
We had another rather wet day in the Lake District, but what they did shoot was excellent. In the story, it was the day John and I discovered the Secret Harbour and rowed Swallow around from the Landing Place. It must have been worth waiting for the weather to clear in oder to capture those limpid, watery scenes.
The Secret Harbour looks very different over the course of a year. It is at its most dramatic when the water levels are low and more rocks are exposed, but one thing is certain, it is always a safe haven for a dinghy. I was sad that the sequence in the book where Titty watches a dipper from her rock was never included in the film, but then I have never seen a dipper there. I rather think they prefer shallow, fast flowing streams were caddis fly lavae can be found but if Arthur Ransome wrote about a dipper there must have been one there in 1929.
Simon West as John and Sophie Neville as Titty bring Swallow into Secret Harbour. Photography by Albert Clarke for Theatre Projects and Anglo EMI’s film ‘Swallows and Amazons’
Albert Clarke did not achieve horizontality with this particular photograph but it somehow gives one an idea of Titty’s tippy task. Albert was a sweet man. His task was to take stills of the film and for the film. This must have been tricky as his large format camera clicked. He had to grab shots while not intruding on the sound track. He was later the Stills Photographer on The Hound of the Baskervilles when Ian Richardson played Sherlock Holmes, Return of the Jedi, and Porridge. Porridge, which starred my all-time hero Ronnie Barker who inspired me to go into television production. When I was a nineteen-year-old student I appeared in Charlie Farley and Piggy Malone, a sort of serial within The Two Ronnies, which he directed and appeared in as both anti-hero and baddie. To my great delight, and his surprise, I put on round glasses, a yash-mak, a Southern American accent borrowed from Molly Friedel and learnt that anything was possible if you really wanted it to happen.
But then some things happen anyway. I never knew that bringing small boat neatly into shore would result in being on the cover of an LP. You can still buy it all these years later from Amazon. The only question is – Do you have a gramophone or turn-table to play it on?
The mfp Vinyl LP of ‘Swallows and Amazons’ with Sophie Neville and Simon West bringing Swallow into her harbour
I can’t believe Terry let me travel in the front on his white Range Rover, let alone change the gears. I can only think that Simon and I were taken back after the other children had gone home, and can just imagine us swinging around the lanes on that beautiful road back to Ambleside.
Terry Smith was our Wardrobe Master who must have had an annoying day if gas had been leaking into his bus. He was the distinctive man with curly red hair and strong, freckled arms in charge of our costumes. Goodness knows where he laundered them. Terry went on to work on some amazing costume dramas, movies that included Chariots of Fire, Lady Jane, Willow and Restoration. Mum’s tame otter Bee was auditioned to be in Willow. I’ve written about it in my book Funnily Enough. Mum was most indignant becasue they wanted her otter to wear a tutu. She didn’t know that Terry Smith was to be the Wardrobe Assistant. It might have made a difference. Instead they featured Val Kilmer in dialogue with a possum.
Phil Brown, who belongs to the Arthur Ransome Group, said: “Tern was re-engined in 1957 with two diesel engines. Interestingly she was to have been named SWALLOW, but after a last-minute change, she was launched in June 1891 as TERN.”
Sophie Neville 