Wales Feed

With a future and a past to create, Doctor Who thrives in South Wales

2015-10-13T11:37:17+00:00

Doctor Who producer Derek Ritchie explains the challenges and successes of shooting the new series.

The joy of working on Doctor Who is that every story brings unique creative challenges with it that you wouldn’t find anywhere else, and which that very talented behind-the-scenes team are always willing to meet! So it was with delight we plunged (pardon the pun) into the realising of an underwater world for the spooky two-parter Under the Lake / Before the Flood, written by Being Human scribe and Doctor Who stalwart Toby Whithouse. And where else would you want to film an underwater world? Well, in Cardiff Bay, obviously!

Scene from Series 9, Episode 5: The Girl Who Died

Okay, so we weren’t filming in the actual bay, but at Roath Lock Studios where we decided to build the base – The Drum – in all of its glory. We had several sets, the centrepiece of which was the huge Hangar which housed the sinister spaceship dredged up from the depths of the lake, and which at one end we placed the all-important Control Room. Putting these two sets together meant we made the most of our Hangar, as shooting towards the windows in the Control Room meant shooting the full depth of that impressive space. And in the middle of that set was the spaceship itself…

Early on director Daniel O’Hara, designer Michael Pickwoad and myself decided that building the spaceship in full was a sensible approach – it had a huge role to play in the story, had to be fully interactive, and be used both in studio and on location. In addition, having an actual object to light, to dress, and to augment with SFX such as steam and water, gave it a much more real texture than we might have achieved purely with CGI.

We used surprisingly few water elements on the base set. Ingenious effects from the seasoned Doctor Who lighting team proved incredibly effective, and DoP Richard Stoddard found inventive ways to include that sense of water moving and reflecting throughout all of the sets - such as using ‘skylights’ in the corridors to create shimmering pools of watery light. This naturalistic approach worked well in the context of what we were making – a classic ghost story given the unique Doctor Who twist!

Although most of the haunting took place on the base itself, the story ultimately moves back in time to before the base existed, when the submerged town was a much drier military training base in the north of Scotland in 1980. But where would we go to film a military training base in South Wales? Well how about the military training base at Caerwent?! Frequently used for filming, this proved to be an ideal location – easily adapted for our needs, with superb infrastructure. All we were missing was a dam and some mountains, which some post-production trickery from Milk (VFX) and Gareth Spensley (colourist at Molinaire) deftly added. And there we had it – a fake Russian town in the Scottish Highlands in 1980! With a spooky spaceship parked slap-bang in the middle!

Doctor Who is without a doubt, the most challenging and rewarding of productions. But what really makes bringing to life the endlessly disparate and surprising worlds of the series a real pleasure, is the hugely talented and passionate crew that work on the show, and who through Doctor Who have put Wales on the map as a place where the highest quality television and film can be very successfully produced.

Doctor Who, Saturday 17 October, BBC One

Performing at the Best Classical Music Festival in the World

2015-07-28T08:08:25+00:00

I’ve worked with the Chorus for the past 9 and 3/4 years (yes, I've been here that long!), and of all our concerts there's something about The Proms at the Royal Albert Hall that's a little bit special. Standing on the stage of such a grand place, representing our nation, you get an overwhelming sense of pride.

BBC Proms Ten Pieces concert at the Royal Albert Hall. Photo: Guy Levy

Having performed last year at the First Night of the Proms, the Chorus were chuffed to be invited back this year. The BBC choral family - BBC Singers, BBC Symphony Chorus and BBC National Chorus of Wales joined forces for the first time and with just a short rehearsal before the concert, broadcasting live to tens of thousands of people on television and radio, it’s was an exciting and nerve-wracking time. There were over 400 of us performing Belshazzar's Feast (by William Walton) and the sound that filled the Royal Albert Hall was phenomenal.

There was no rest for me as we went straight into a Prom the next night. Over the last year our Orchestra has engaged with thousands of children through the Ten Pieces project, which culminated in two Proms. With a life sized Firebird (inspired by Stravinsky) flying through the Royal Albert Hall, trolls causing chaos and our Principal Conductor Thomas Søndergård teaching Dick & Dom to conduct, you could see and hear the excitement of some the Orchestra’s youngest fans.

BBC Proms - Ten Pieces: The Firebird. Photo: Guy Levy

Outreach work is another part of my role so just before we started the Proms, the Orchestra, a few Chorus members and I introduced these Ten Pieces to schools in North and Mid Wales. Teaching the children to sing Zadok the Priest (by Handel) and creating thunderstorms with our hands was lots of fun!

With a few more Proms ahead of us it's a very busy time of year but for the Chorus and Orchestra it’s definitely a highlight, and of course bringing some of the magic of the Proms back to Wales at Proms in the Park in Swansea is the perfect finale for us.

The author leading a choral workshop at Ten PIeces concert in Deeside. Photo: Celynnen Photography

Find out more about BBC National Orchestra and Chorus of Wales at the Proms on the bbc.co.uk/proms website.

And you can see all of BBC National Orchestra and Chorus of Wales’s latest Proms at bbc.co.uk/programmes/b007v097/episodes/player

Ryan Davies, Welsh entertainer

2012-02-24T10:30:00+00:00

There are many people who can lay claim to the title of Wales' best loved entertainer but, surely, no-one has more right to that title than the mercurial Ryan Davies.

Ryan Davies

Between 1971 and 1973, with his fame and success already assured in his native Wales, Davies and his comedy partner Ronnie Williams performed for three BBC One television series. Ryan and Ronnie were star names, not just in Wales but across the whole of the UK, earning for themselves the, probably, unwanted but nevertheless accurate description of the Welsh Eric and Ernie.

Ryan Davies was born in Glanamman on 22 January 1937. After a two year National Service stint in the RAF he went to Bangor Normal College, followed by the Central School of Speech and Drama in London. Then followed a period of five years working as a primary school teacher in Croydon.

Acting and entertainment were in Davies' blood, however, and in 1965 he left the school to become a full-time professional actor. It was not long before his wonderful singing voice and comic talent were finding him work across the country. He also wrote songs and scripts and was soon, after appearing at large scale events such as the 1966 National Eisteddfod, being regarded as an emerging talent.

Davies' big break came when he teamed up with Cefneithin-born Ronnie Williams. As a double act they made Welsh language TV shows and performed live at many Welsh venues. As a combination of comedy, singing and light drama, it could not be beaten. When their act was seen by Billy Cotton Jnr, then head of BBC light entertainment, they were commissioned for an English language version of Ryan And Ronnie on BBC One.

The shows gave them national exposure, something that was soon being eagerly anticipated by viewers across Britain. For a long time people had been asking why England, Ireland and Scotland had produced great comedians but Wales had not done the same. Ryan And Ronnie certainly provided the answer to that conundrum.

The comedy show was well received, three separate series being broadcast in the early 1970s. One of the highlights of each episode was Davies' portrayal of a "typical" Welsh housewife in a sketch entitled Our House. Davies played his part of Mother in drag while Williams appeared as the father.

After several years of huge success the duo split in 1975, supposedly due to Williams' poor health. Davies, who had always pursued a complementary solo career, continued to work in cabaret, TV and film. He was always something of a workaholic, never seeming to slow down or take a break.

In 1972 he had appeared as Second Voice - even though he played the part as a mute - in the big screen adaptation of Dylan Thomas' Under Milk Wood, alongside Richard Burton, Elizabeth Taylor and Peter O'Toole. It was a misguided adaptation but Davies' portrayal was one of the few highlights of the film.

For many, however, Ryan Davies is best remembered for his appearances on the legendary Poems And Pints series of programmes, an unlikely but hugely successful combination of poetry and song that was sometimes felt to sum up Welsh entertainment and culture in the early 1970s. Davies' recitations along with the poetry of Harri Webb were the highlights of the show. Poems And Pints, incidentally, gave early air time to a young singer/songwriter from Glynneath, Max Boyce.

In 1977 Davies was in Buffalo in New York State, visiting friends. At a barbecue in his honour he suffered a serious asthma attack and, despite being rushed to hospital, died of a heart attack on 22 April. He was just 40 years old.

Davies' death came as a dreadful shock to family and friends, and to the thousands of fans who loved his music and comic ability.

His body was brought back to Wales and he was buried in the graveyard at Hen Bethel Church, just above Glanamman. He is commemorated by a bust that holds a place of honour in the foyer of the BBC Wales headquarters in Llandaff.

He left a wife, Irene, and two children but, significantly, a legacy of comic genius that is still spoken about throughout Wales. Nobody who ever saw Ryan Davies perform can ever forget the experience.

Buffalo Bill in Wales

2012-01-12T09:14:25+00:00

Imagine the scene. It's 1903 and the streets of Ebbw Vale or Aberdare or Bangor are filled, not with steel workers, coal miners or farmers wives out to do their weekly shopping, but with whooping cowboys and shrieking Indians, gaily but terrifyingly daubed in their war paint.

There is a smell of gunsmoke in the air, the thunder of horses hooves echo down the roadway. Buffalo Bill and his Wild West Show have come to town.

At this distance it's hard to know what Welsh men and women would have made of the spectacle. It was not just outside their experience, it was light years away. They may have read about cowboys, perhaps even seen pictures in the popular papers, but to meet them face to face? It must have been a mind-blowing experience.

William Cody came three times to Britain, firstly in 1887 to help celebrate Queen Victoria's Golden Jubilee. His visit was so successful that returned four years later in 1891 and then again in 1902. The British, and the Welsh in particular, could not get enough of Buffalo Bill.

Cody was undoubtedly a man of action. By the age of 15 he was riding for the fabled Pony Express. By 1864 he was a scout for General Phil Sheridan and three years later had become a buffalo hunter for the Kansas Pacific railroad. It was said that he shot over 4,000 buffaloes in a two year period, which was how he got his name.

International fame came with a written report telling how he acted as a guide for the Grand Duke Alexis of Russia on his tour of the west. This was soon backed up by a lurid "penny dreadful" novel, written by Ned Buntline, called Buffalo Bill, King Of The Border Men.

In 1883 Cody decided it was time to make a little money out of his experiences. He would, he thought, show people what the American West was really like and formed his famous Wild West show. He was not the first to form such a band, the original Wild West shows having begun in the 1840s. But he was certainly the best.

When Cody was asked to come to Britain in 1887 he brought with him over 500 people - cowboys and Indians, back stage workers, grooms and so on. He also had 180 horses, 18 buffalo and numerous other animals including elks and Texas longhorn cattle.

Despite what many people believe, Sitting Bull - one of the victors over General Custer at the Battle of Little Bighorn in June 1876 - did not accompany him on this first trip to Britain. Sitting Bull did appear in the show in the USA in 1885 but did not travel across the Atlantic and by 1890 he was dead.

The famous Annie Oakley, sharpshooter and trick shot specialist was in the company, however, and, it was reported, she even shot a cigar out of the mouth of the German Kaiser who had come to help his grandmother celebrate her jubilee.

When Cody returned to Britain in 1891 he stayed for over 12 months and visited many different cities. Amongst them was Cardiff. He was clearly fond of the place as he made a six-day stopover, netting a cool £10,000 in the process. He set up camp in Sophia Gardens, creating an arena 175 yards long and 70 yards wide.

Here the people of Cardiff and the surrounding valleys could see Indian braves and their families resting outside their tepees and stare in wonder at the huge buffaloes that wandered peacefully around the park. A parade through the centre of Cardiff saw huge crowds thronging the roads and as a publicity exercise it was a dramatic success.

On the first day of the show over 20,000 spectators packed into Sophia Gardens. The next three days were just as popular and it was estimated that, overall, nearly 130,000 people came to watch Buffalo Bill and his showmen.

Cody returned to Wales, the trip lasting from 1902 to 1904. They stopped in Wales for several months and visitied places as diverse as Aberdare, Abegavenny, Cardiff (of course), Porthmadoc, Rhyl, Carmarthen and Pembroke Dock.

In all Cody gave 333 performances during this visit. One of the highlights was an attack on the Deadwood Stage, Cody himself holding the reins and with local dignitaries - even, if he could persuade them, members of the royal family - on the inside of the stagecoach.

This was Buffalo Bill's last visit, however. Ill health and a series of financial misfortunes prevented him returning. He may have made considerable sums of money from his shows but the vast retinue of animals and performers cost an awful lot to maintain.

When he died in 1917, William Cody was virtually bankrupt but his position as one of the most renowned showmen of the age - second only to the great Barnum - was assured.

He had many imitators, such as Texas Bill Shufflebottom and Bronco Billy, but, as the people of Cardiff and all of Wales would certainly have acknowledged, there was only ever one Buffalo Bill Cody and only one real Wild West show.

Welsh locations that hosted the Wild West shows:

Aberdare - 4 July 1903
Aberystwyth - 7 May 1904
Bangor - 29 May 1903
Barry Dock - 19 May 1904
Bridgend - 18 May 1904
Builth Wells - 12 May 1904
Cardiff - 20-26 September 1891, 6-11 July 1903 and 20-21 May 1904
Carmarthen - 13 May 1904
Caernarfon - 4 May 1904
Dolgellau - 6 May 1904
Ebbw Vale - 1903
Holyhead - 3 May 1904
Llandudno - 2 May 1904
Llanelli - 13 July 1903 and 16 May 1904
Neath - 17 May 1904
Oswestry - 11 May 1904
Pembroke Dock - 14 May 1904
Porthmadoc - 5 May 1904
Rhyl - 27 May 1903
Ruabon - 29 May 1903
Swansea - 14-15 July 1903

Harry Houdini in south Wales

2012-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

When legendary magician and escape artiste Harry Houdini visited Newport in 1905, he was already a star on both sides of the Atlantic.

Welsh audiences in 1905, 1913 and 1914 were treated to his usual programme of well-known feats, including the water torture cell, jail-breaking and an array of miraculous escapes.

He even accepted challenges from the locals, most notably a group of Newport joiners who built a series of wooden casks from which he would escape. According to contemporary newspaper reports, he complained on only one occasion, during a performance at the Newport Lyceum on 18 April 1905: "They had omitted to provide air holes, and as Houdini, who has his share of humour, quietly remarked that he needed air sometimes, there was little delay while the holes were made."

Harry Houdini

His programme would also include a company of popular vaudeville acts. Newspaper advertisements list performers including Vandinoff, "the lightening painter in oils"; Nelson "with and without a piano" Jackson; and, perhaps most impressively, Mr Bowmeester who "plays a pathetic sketch which includes a dozen parts, eight or nine of which are sustained by himself." Whether Bowmeester's performance surpassed the giddy heights of Billy French and his "wooden shoe dancing" can only be left to speculation.

Houdini amazed audiences in towns and cities across the country, but the magician's appearances in Newport were notable for his clashes with the authorities.

In 1905, during a run at the Newport Lyceum, he instigated court proceedings claiming to be the victim of an assault. By all accounts his courtroom audience was less receptive than the music hall crowds he was accustomed to.

The story follows that in April 1905 Houdini went to a nearby Cardiff theatre, the Empire, to see Hilbert, a local escape artist and music hall performer. The stunts Hilbert performed were so similar to those of Houdini that they shared a nickname in the Welsh press: "The Handcuff King".

Houdini, accompanied by his wife and mother-in-law, went to the theatre disguised as an old man, with talced hair, a moustache glued to his upper lip and carrying a walking stick. With the show about to begin, Houdini called out "fraud" and, brandishing a pair of handcuffs, yelled "I have a pair of handcuffs you can't get out of!"

Mr Lea, the theatre manager, had Houdini forcibly removed from the auditorium. He was grabbed by the throat and thrown into an alleyway outside. While Houdini alleged Lea personally assaulted him, Lea coolly denied involvement in the altercation. When asked by the alderman "if you had been there, would [Houdini], you think, have suffered even more than he did?", a smiling Lea replied: "Well, he would have run the chance."

The magician's case against Mr Lea was swiftly dismissed.

Challenge to Harry Houdini from member of the public in Newport

Houdini's second run in with the authorities occurred in 1905, when Chief Constable Sinclair allowed him "to try his luck" in escaping a cell in Newport Police Station, naked and handcuffed. The Weekly Argus newspaper, dated 22 April 1905, reported how an "astonished" Sinclair witnessed a fully-clothed Houdini emerge from the cell after merely four minutes. A throng of 1,000 people met Houdini on the Town Hall steps, where he received an ovation from the crowd.

When Houdini next returned to Newport in 1913, his relationship with the authorities was of a less amicable nature.

On Monday 3 March, while performing at the Newport Empire, he announced his intention to leap into the River Usk from the Newport Bridge pending the permission of the authorities. When permission was not granted, he devised a plan to bypass the authorities and perform the stunt regardless.

Two days later police and crowds of onlookers flooded the bridge. Houdini had anticipated the clamour and so placed a lookalike, along with the theatre manager and press representatives, in an open top car to act as a diversion.

The crowd, after an initial commotion, realised the magician was not in the car and began to disperse. The lookalike continued to engage the attention of the police while Houdini made his way to the opposite side of the bridge and, already stripped and handcuffed, lowered himself in.

Upon miraculously freeing himself from his bonds and swimming ashore, he returned to the Empire that evening and, according to the South Wales Argus, was greeted by a "magnificent reception" from his audience.

The press hailed the jump as a "triumphant vindication of Houdini's pluck and resource," praising him for outsmarting the police force in order "to keep faith with the public".

Indeed, the stories which have emerged from Houdini's appearances in south Wales are an enduring testament to the faith between a legendary performer and his mystified yet adoring audience.

Tommy Cooper, a great Welsh comedian

2011-09-22T12:48:57+00:00

It's often said that Welsh humour doesn't travel. People sometimes comment that while the Welsh might find something - a joke, a story or a sketch - hilariously funny, as a general rule nobody else does.

Tommy Cooper was born in Caerphilly

Quite apart from the fact that statement just isn't true, it also hides the fact that one of the greatest and best-loved of all post-war comedians was Welsh - it was just that very few of the people who watched him night after night on TV or in the theatre, ever realised it, at least not until after he died. The man in question was the incredible Tommy Cooper.

Tommy was born at 19 Llwyn On Street, Trecenydd in Caerphilly on 19 March 1921. His father was a Welshman, also called Thomas (Tom as he was known), working as a recruiting sergeant for the army. His mother, Gertrude, was English, coming from Crediton in Devon.

The Coopers did not own the house in Llwyn On Street and were merely lodging there. Apparently, in those pre-maternity hospital days, Tommy was born at home and the owner of the house acted as the midwife for the birth.

He was a premature baby and was underweight and scrawny - amazing, considering that, when he grew to adulthood, Tommy Cooper stood six feet four in his stocking feet! Indeed, for a long while the baby was not expected to survive and was only kept alive by a mixture of brandy and condensed milk. It may have started a lifelong and, ultimately, fatal habit as Tommy Cooper battled against the effects of alcohol all his life.

When Tommy was just three the family moved from Caerphilly to Exeter. They didn't like the pollution of the Welsh valleys; it was not good for young Tommy's health and, anyway, his father had been offered a job in the Devon city. They never moved back to Wales, although Tommy kept in contact with members of his family who remained in Caerphilly.

The story of Tommy Cooper's success is too well known to repeat here. But after finding his trademark fez (he apparently grabbed it off a passing waiter while performing in a NAAFI show in Egypt during World War Two) he went on to become one of the country's best loved comedians. Indeed, he had only to appear on stage and stand there for people to fall about laughing. He had that sort of personality and looks.

Cooper was a skilled magician and a member of the Magic Circle

And when his disastrous magic tricks invariably went wrong, the house would erupt. It was an act of course. Tommy was actually a very clever magician, a member of the Magic Circle and someone who had been fascinated by magic tricks ever since he was given his first conjuring set by an aunt when he was just eight years old.

The stories about Tommy Cooper's "tightness" with money are legendary. He would, it seems, lean across to taxi drivers, say "Have a drink on me" and slip something into their top pockets. When the men looked they found, not a £5 note but a tea bag. Whether or not such stories are true, they remain part of the Tommy Cooper legend.

Tommy died on 15 April 1984, performing live on television in a show called Live From Her Majesty's - not at the London Palladium, as is often reported. Of course, when he collapsed viewers at home and those in the audience thought it was part of the act.

A statue to the great Tommy Cooper was erected in Caerphilly, the town of his birth, in February 2008. Sculpted by James Done, the statue was unveiled by fellow Welshman Sir Anthony Hopkins, a self-confessed Cooper fan. It now stands in the centre of the town, in the shadow of the giant Caerphilly Castle, a more than suitable tribute to the man who is, arguably, the town's greatest son.

There is a footnote. In 2009, on Red Nose Day, when comedians from all over the country - professional and amateur alike - try to raise money for charity, a suitably large and bulbous red nose was placed on the statue. It went missing, stolen by someone who wanted a free memento of the day and of the man. Tommy Cooper would probably have understood.

Ivor Novello, the Welsh nightingale

2011-01-14T12:09:43+00:00

Most people have, at some stage in their lives, listened to the song Keep The Home Fires Burning. It was one of the most popular tunes in the trenches during World War One and still has the ability to bring a pang to the throat or a tear to the eye.

Ivor Novello

Yet how many people realise that this sentimental ditty was just one of dozens produced by a remarkable young Welshman who, at the time, was serving in the Royal Naval Air Service?

Ivor Novello was born in Cowbridge Road East in Cardiff on 15 January 1893. The house, just to the west of the River Taf, was called Llwyn Yr Eos (Grove of the Nightingales) and can be identified by a plaque on the front wall.

Ivor Novello's real name was David Ivor Davies; he was the son of Clara Novello Davies, a noted and renowned singer and teacher who had also founded the Welsh Ladies Choir. His father, David Davies, was by comparison a fairly staid and ordinary man - he was a tax collector.

Under his mother's influence the young Ivor Novello was performing at Eisteddfodiau across the country from an early age and, in due course, went on to Magdalene College, Oxford, to study for a degree.

However, the outbreak of war brought a sudden and dramatic change to his lifestyle. In 1916 Ivor joined the RNAS and began training as a pilot. It has to be admitted that he was not a very good airman. He completed his training on dual control aircraft but proceeded to crash during his very first solo flight. Given a second chance he did exactly the same again and, as a result, the RNAS grounded him for the duration of the war.

Ivor Novello's real contribution to the war effort, however, was not as a pilot but as a song writer. He was composing songs such as Keep The Home Fires Burning and We'll Gather Lilacs on a regular basis and, in 1917, while still serving with the RNAS, his show Theodore And Co was produced on the West End. It was the hit of the year. He went on to write, produce and act in many more stage shows over the coming decades.

Ivor Novello wrote all of the music for his shows and, as an accomplished dramatist in his own right, the librettos as well. By and large, however, the lyrics for his touching and catchy songs were written by his collaborator Christopher Hassall - a man who later went on to write the standard biography of the poet Rupert Brooke.

When the war ended in 1918 Novello was discharged and immediately took up a career on the stage and in the emerging film industry. This was the age of the silent movie and for a while he specialised in films with an underworld theme. The first of them was called The Rat and was a huge success. He also made two silent films for Alfred Hitchcock, the most famous being The Lodger. It was a film that Novello was to remake, this time as a talkie, in 1933.

Interestingly, Ivor Novello also wrote the dialogue and screen play for the first Tarzan Of The Apes talkie - although quite how much talking was involved is not really clear!

Despite his film work, despite several stints in Hollywood, Ivor continued to write and produce stage hits in Britain. The most notable of these is probably The Dancing Years, which was produced in the West End in 1939.

Despite his well known homosexuality - something to which the police seemed to have turned a blind eye - Novello was one of the early stage and screen idols. He was loved and idolised by people from all over the world and the depiction of him, and the way people felt about him, in the 2001 film Gosford Park seems to be a fairly accurate and realistic portrayal.

One of his gay relationships was with the war poet Siegfried Sassoon. It was not an easy or comfortable liaison and did not bring happiness to either man. Another of his relationships was with the actor Bobbie Andrews.

Novello may not have suffered from the repressive and draconian homosexuality laws of the time but he did serve an eight week prison term during the World War Two - for misuse of petrol coupons.

In 1951 Ivor Novello died suddenly, from a heart attack, at the relatively early age of just 58. He had continued to write songs and musicals almost to the moment of his death.

Cremated at Golders Green Crematorium, his ashes were, appropriately enough, scattered under a lilac bush.

Nowadays he is commemorated in the annual Ivor Novello Awards when the British Academy honours outstanding contributions to the performing arts. There is also a recently unveiled statue to him outside the Wales Millennium Centre in Cardiff, a fitting tribute from his home town to a man of great skill and talent.