Crossroads – Sophie Neville

David Moran playing Kevin Banks with Sophie Neville as his sister in Crossroads for ATV May 1981 — David Moran with Sophie Neville in Crossroads for ATV

Nolly – streaming on the new ITVX – features Helena Bonham Carter celebrating the fabulous 1980’s fashions worn by Noele Gordon when she starred as Meg Mortimer in the long-running ATV soap Crossroads. It can be revealed that forty-two years ago, a bright pink and purple polyester costume was being made for me. My real-life sister and I played Kevin Bank’s younger sisters, appearing as bridesmaids when he married Glenda Brownlow in the Spring of 1981.

Glenda Barlow’s wedding to Kevin Banks. We played his younger sisters dressed in pink.

I kept copies of my contracts signed by Margaret French for the three episodes we appeared in . We had a REHEARSAL & RECORDING on 27th March at the ATV Centre in Birmingham, before which I’m sure we had at least one costume fitting. My sister and I had a 7.00am call for Make Up and Wardrobe before an 8.00am Outside Broadcast on Monday 6th April and we shot the wedding scene in episode 3457 on the afternoon on Friday 17th April.

I earned £50.83, less National Insurance and was given £1.70 towards expenses and subsistence, for appearing in three episodes itemised as PROGRAMME TITLE: XROADS EPS3455/6/7 It was much appreciated. I’d only earned £10 for a whole week working as a promotions girl selling Monster Munchies at a wholesale supermarket the year before. My college fees at Durham University, with food and accommodation, were £350 for the term.

We shot one episode at the Barlow family home before being taken to the Church of St Laurence in Alvechurch clutching our fake flowers. A crowd of excited fans began to gather, virtually mobbing Paul Henry who played Benny Hawkins the handyman. He was obliged to scamper through the graveyard, pursued by screaming middle-age ladies in crimplene.

David Moran, Perry Neville, Lynette McMorrough and Peter Hill - 14th May 1981 — David Moran, Perry Neville, Lynette McMorrough and Peter Hill – 14th May 1981

My sister and I were bemused by the whole experience. I remember being interviewed for the part by a female producer with a pretty cut-and-dried attitude. She stared at my feet, horrified by the summer shoes I was wearing. ‘Never wear white shoes,’ she said as I left the room. ‘They make your feet look large.’

The costume designer rang a week later to ask if we could bring our own white shoes.

We were suddenly centre of attention, part of the growing Banks family. I was ‘taken unawares,’ as Glenda might have said, but am ashamed to say that my motivation was not to rock the nation’s consciousness or promote church weddings, but simply to earn enough to pay for my college fees at Durham University.

I was slightly in awe of the Crossroads cast. They didn’t know me from a flatfish but David Moran was enthusiastically inclusive, hugging us at every opportunity.

Most of the other actors arrived dressed as wedding guests. It should have been a joyful gathering but the atmosphere seemed strained. Noele Gordon, famous for playing Meg Mortimer since 1964, sat in the congregation next to Tony Adams but looked grim. She learned she was to be axed a month later.

Crossroads was well known for being recorded live in studio. I had returned to college by May 1981 when our episodes were broadcast. The ladies serving dinner looked at me and asked how I’d managed to drive up from Birmingham to Durham so quickly. Our sequences on location had been prerecorded.

Here is the actual continuity photo taken at the ATV studios by the costume designer.

I wrote about the floral polyester being somewhat brighter in reality in an article for our university magazine, The Idler, edited by Nick Archer, Charles Stewart-Smith, and Alastair Fothergill whose new book Wild Isles has become a bestseller. Looking back, it must have been my first article I ever published. I wrote another on appearing in the Two Ronnies and began working on the cover design.

There was more pink: You can see photos of other productions that I appeared in if you scroll down here and read more in The Secrets of Filming Swallows and Amazons, available as an ebook.

Ronnie Corbet with Sophie Neville filming ‘Charley Farley and Piggy Malone’ at Southampton Docks for the BBC comedy series ‘Two Ronnies’

When I was a little girl, I was an avid viewer of Blue Peter, BBC Television’s flagship series for children. My favorite items would be profiles that were run from time to time about life behind the scenes at Television Centre. It was only later, whilst working for the BBC as a researcher, that I was told the terrible truth. The set designer Bruce Macadie said that such items were produced when the editor of Blue Peter was unexpectedly let down by a guest or couldn’t think of anything more newsworthy. I didn’t care a hoot. I was interested in how films were made from the age of about nine.

‘What a peculiar girl!’ I hear my friend Nac saying.

The reason was that I had rather a peculiar upbringing. I once described myself in an application for a job as a television director as a ‘Child of the studio floor’. The reason was that in 1969, when I was about eight years old, my mother became an in-vision announcer, reading the regional News and appearing on our crackly black and white set to brightly declare what would be shown that evening. She worked at the Harlech Television Studios in Cardiff, alongside Martyn Lewis and Liz Carse. She would also descend in an oval wicker basket chair from which she would present a one-woman Children’s programme on called It’s Time For Me. This looked liked magic, and I wanted to know how it was achieved.

‘I was paid the same amount as a short-hand typist.’ The men were paid more than the women and her schedule was gruelling. On top of this she would drive 72 miles to the Cardiff studios in a rusty Mini van. Even though this was replaced she went part-time. Having become an expert on how long script bites took to read in different accents she would ‘whizz down to Bristol’ to read the letters on Any Answers for the producer Carol Stone.

‘But how did the basket come down?’

‘Oh, the rope was attached to a pulley on the studio lighting rig and lowered by three prop men.’

Daphne Neville making a radio commercial — My mother working in a radio studio in the 1970’s. Please not the producer’s cigarette and plastic cups.

I would often travel down with my mother to be shown around various studios. I remember sitting behind the Dalek-like cameras watching a live afternoon programme called Women Only being recorded at HTV Bristol. Mum presented it with Jan Leeming and a rotund TV cook called Tony. He had to wear a bright yellow chef’s hat and top so that they would come across as ‘chef’s whites’ rather than weirdo glowing garments on everyone’s black and white television sets. Mum spent ages looking for clothes to wear in vision as she was not allowed to wear either spots or stripes since they were liable to strobe. Dresses made from crimplene were all the rage but (luckily) she was banned from wearing this as TV screens would pick up on any static that it might exude. Sparkling garments were a no-no.

You wouldn’t think that Gloucestershire would be a hot spot for the film industry in the UK but in 1971 I was able to watch a film crew making a drama on location in Slad near Stroud, when I was chosen to play Eileen Brown in the BBC adaption of Laurie Lee’s memoir, Cider with Rosie directed by Claude Whatham. It had nothing to do with luck. I was the only little girl they could find with long hair who could play the piano.

Sophie Neville on the set of Cider with Rosie — Narrowly avoiding a collision with the BBC wardrobe mistress outside Slad village school where BBC TV were filming ‘Cider with Rosie’ in 1971. A tripod, camera cases and scenic props are stacked up by the blackout curtain.

In 1972 I was given a tiny non-speaking part of a ‘Woodchild’ in Arthur of the Britons that was made near Woodchester by HTV. I had forgotten all about this until I saw a Youtube clip. I gather the serial has become cult viewing in the States.

Filming Arthur of the Britons — ‘Arthur of the Britons’ being shot on two 16mm cameras at my parents’ farm in 1972

Around this time the BBC made an adaptation of Jane Austen’s Persuasion, shot on location in Bath. We went down to be film extras in this and in a BBC drama called Song of Songs.

Sophie with the Panavision — Sophie Neville in 1973 with a 35mm Panavision camera

By the time I was cast as Titty in Swallows & Amazons I was relatively experienced. Later that summer I was in a Weetabix commercial and the next year I was invited to appear on a number of magazine programmes to publicise the movie. I remember being interviewed on Nationwide and profiled at home on Animal Magic.

Watching a television commercial being made in 1973

Inevitably one thing leads to another and I was soon asked to audition for a number of subsequent films. Inflation was roaring at 17% in the mid-1970s and I don’t think any of these were ever made but it was good interview experience. I ended up at Shepperton Studios doing a screen test for a musical version of The Old Curiosity Shop. This was serious stuff, shot on a film stage in Victorian costume. My music teacher spent ages teaching me to sing All I Want is a Room Somewhere but despite endless discussions nothing more came of it. However looking around Shepperton had been amazing. At some stage I had also auditioned at Pinewood Studios. I had been shown around the set of the latest James Bond and even had a go on the swing featured in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. Mum wouldn’t let me tell anyone at school about it, as I might had come across as swanky. But as film studios were not open to the public then it did add to my education.

Sophie and Vic Armstrong in Copter Kids — Jonathan Scott-Taylor, Sophie Neville, Sophie Ward, Vic Armstrong and Michael Balfour in ‘The Copter Kids’ – a movie for CFF shot on location in 1975

Although lanky, and focused on GCSEs, I managed to gain a leading role in an adventure film when I was fifteen. This proved interesting it involved working with stunt men including Vic Armstrong, who later became Harrison Ford’s double. We got to shoot from helicopters. At times the camera literally showed me shooting from a helicopter with a bow and arrow.

Sophie Neville in Crossroads for ATV — Playing Kevin’s sister, Glenda Brownlow’s bridesmaid, in a couple of episodes of ‘Crossroads’, the ATV soap opera that ran for 24 years

And then there was an opportunity to be in Crossroads. What an experience! I was various wedding scenes and the crowds who turned out to watch were unexpected. I was eighteen by then and did it purely for the money. I’ll see if I can find the article I wrote about it for my university magazine. Please let me know the name of the actor playing Kevin. I was meant to be his sister.

To see more about Mum’s career please see her website