That well-known bastion of truthful and accurate reportage, the Daily Mirra, has claimed Jodie Whittaker's swan-song Doctor Who episode - due to be broadcast, we now know, in October - will see her wearing 'many items worn in the TARDIS over the past six decades.' These will include, the Mirra alleges, the Second Doctor's checked trousers, the Fourth Doctor's scarf, the Fifth Doctor's stick of celery, the Seventh Doctor's question mark pullover and the Tenth Doctor's tie. Where, exactly, the Mirra obtained this alleged information from is anyone's guess since their accuracy in such matters has been notoriously rubbish ever since they stopped hacking people's phones on a regular basis. Remember, for example, their confident assertion in 2017 shortly before Jodie's casting was announced that an alleged - anonymous (and, therefore, almost certainly fictitious) - 'source' had, allegedly assured them Kris Marshall had been cast as Peter Capaldi's replacement and that he had already filmed the regeneration scene. Which, as Kris Marshall recently revealed (and, indeed, which everybody who has watched Doctor Who for the last four years already knew) he hadn't. So, perhaps, that's why this blogger is so suspicious of an alleged 'source' who, allegedly, told the Mirra that 'getting Jodie - and some others - to wear some of the best-loved items from The Doctors' wardrobes over the decades, seems a fitting and perfect way to mark the BBC's one hundred year anniversary.' Speaking, of course, in that hideous tabloid 'real people don't talk like that' fashion. Whether this suspiciously anonymous (and, almost certainly fictitious) alleged 'source' is the same suspiciously anonymous (and, almost certainly fictitious) alleged 'source' who allegedly gave the Mirra (they're, sadly, not 'alleged', they definitely do exist) all that fictitious crap about Kris Marshall back in 2017 is not, at this time, known. But, we can probably guess. The Mirra has also reported that the special will feature 'a host of cameo appearances' by 'former friends and companions,' to go along with the previously announced appearances of Janet Fielding and Sophie Aldred, reprising their roles as Tegan and Ace. This will, reportedly, play out in the form of a house party arranged by That There Bradley Walsh's character, Graham. In March the Mirra alleged that Huge Grant was going to be the next Doctor. Which, of course, he isn't. So, perhaps caution may, again, be in order in this particular regard.
And, speaking of the Mirra and the utter horseshite they choose to publish, they made an early bid for this week's From The North Headline Of The Week award with Doctor Who Star Cries As He's Banned From Driving For Speeding On Way To Film BBC Show. The sub-heading is equally risible: 'Colin Baker, seventy nine, who played the frizzy-haired sixth Time Lord in the 1980s fought back the tears after he was banned from the roads after being caught speeding in his Lexus.' It helps, of course, if you pronounce 'Lexus' the way that Alan Partridge does. Harry Rutter, the Mirra's Senior Showbiz Reporter and his colleagues Nathan Pynn and Sam Greenway are to be congratulated for this truly outstanding piece of journalism which included the suggestion that Baker 'was clocked travelling at fifty eight miles per hour in a thirty miles per hour zone in Shropshire.' Baker, who also appeared on I'm A Z-List Former Celebrity Desperate To Get My Boat-Race Back On TV ... Please Vote For Me To Stay Here As Long As Possible (I'll Even Eat Worms If You Want) in 2012, claimed he 'sped up after getting lost while following a BBC camera crew on 22 November last year. Baker, of Cadmore End, High Wycombe, fought back tears in the dock after he admitted speeding at Worcester Magistrates' Court on Friday.' The judge, seemingly, took pity on Baker and, whilst he was banned from driving for twenty one days and fined four hundred and eighty knicker, he wasn't sent, kicking and screaming, to The Joint as punishment for his performance in The Twin Dilemma. The quality of mercy, it would seem, is not strained. If it had been Judge Lionel Nutmeg on the bench, one suspects even the ultimate sanction may not have been out of the question.
Radio Times (which used to be written by adults) has, seemingly, become so desperate for anything to print in relation to Doctor Who that they've taken to publishing crass fan Twitter speculation based on nothing even remotely substantial. Take, Doctor Who Fans Think Rose Ayling-Ellis Is Joining Ncuti Gatwa As Companion, for instance. Do they? And, you've asked all of them, have you, Radio Times? Because, this blogger doesn't recall receiving that particular questionaire.
To be fair, dear blog reader, the Radio Times (which used to be written by adults) was not alone in reporting such nonsense. Den Of Geek, the Doctor Who TV website, the Daily Scum Mail (which has never been written by adults) and, of course, the Daily Mirra were also, seemingly, mad-keen to get in on the act. That is, until Rose her very self told Sky News that there was 'no truth' in the rumours. 'I think it ... started on Twitter and it just got bigger and bigger and now it's everywhere,' she moaned. Yes, love, that's the way it works these days. Twitter being, at least according to the Gruniad Morning Star, The Sole Arbiter Of The Worth Of All Things.
From The North favourite Armando Iannucci has opposed those - vile, sick, racist scum, basically - who have labelled recent casting choices of Doctor Who as 'woke.' Armando was speaking at The MacTaggart Legacy panel as part of the Edinburgh International TV Festival. Joined by writer and producer Jack Thorne, British historian and broadcaster David Olusoga and Channel Four's former Head of News and Current Affairs Dorothy Byrne, the writer discussed making programmes and films that feel representative of the UK. 'British television is great, we want it to be even better and it can only be better if it's much more reflective of who we are, as a country and as an audience,' he explained. In Armando's - superb - 2019 movie The Personal History Of David Copperfield, Dev Patel played the title role - a move which the creator described as 'colourblind casting' and something he found 'a liberating part' of the process. 'It was an enormous relief,' he told the audience. 'I felt liberated, I didn't feel I was ticking boxes. I just felt, "my God, why have I not had access to one hundred per cent of the acting community [previously]?" It's a really enjoyable step forward, it's not difficult. It makes what we make better.' Armando then made reference to Doctor Who as a prime example of a show which embraces diverse casting. Jodie Whittaker made her debut as The Doctor in 2018, while Ncuti Gatwa will take over the role next year. 'My worry is that there is now this word, woke, that the government has weaponised to try and stop all that,' Armando said. 'I want someone to ask Liz Truss, "Do you want Doctor Who just to be a white man?" I've got to see what her response is, because that's the thing that's referred to as woke, the Doctor Who debate.'
Meanwhile in Manchester, dear blog reader, all of the vampires are getting really nervous at or near bus stops.
Now, dear blog reader, it's review time. The Sandman: Dream Of A Thousand Cats/Calliope. Late one night, a feral cat speaks to a gathering of other felines in a graveyard. Long ago, she gave birth to a litter of kittens; this displeased her owners who callously drowned the kittens in a river. Traumatised, the mother cat dreamed of meeting The Cat Of Dreams and begged him for revelation. Morpheus presented her with the story of a parallel universe in which cats were the dominant species until their pets, humans, fought back. By enough of them dreaming of freedom and turning cats into the creatures that mankind sees them as now. The cat urges the others to spread the word amongst all cats so that they may reclaim their status as the rulers of the Earth. Meanwhile, struggling author Richard Madoc visits Erasmus Fry, an elderly writer who has imprisoned a Greek muse, Calliope, the mother of Morpheus's child, in his cellar. Madoc is given ownership of Calliope and discovers that raping her boosts his creativity to write his next novel, a best-seller. This pisses off Morpheus big-style; he punishes Madoc into receiving a non-stop supply of ideas until he has a nervous breakdown, frees Calliope and discovers that he now has no ideas at all.
'I'd like to see anyone - prophet, God or king - persuade a thousand cats to do anything at the same time.' So, here's the deal, dear blog reader. A few hours after this blogger had publicly sneered at a magazine which suggested that more Sandman had been filmed, Netflix went and pulled a bastard-trick like this. Which meant that Keith Telly Topping had to hastily edit the last From The North bloggerisationism update to acknowledge the episode's existence and, sort of, apologise to the author of the piece for thinking he'd gone insane (but, just for that. He's still not off the hook for describing comics as 'graphic novels'. Frankly, capital punishment is too tame a sanction for that heinous crime). Anyway, here is the eleventh episode of the ten episode series of The Sandman(!), an hour-long adaptation of two of the four short stories that made up the Dream Country collection and two, particular fan favourites. The first part is an animated adaptation of one of the most beloved Sandman comics. It features a voice-cast that includes Sandra Oh, Joe Lycett, David and Georgia Tennant, Michael Sheen, James McAvoy and Neil Gaiman his very self. It's a straight retelling and, it is beautiful.
The - live-action - story of Calliope (the astonishing Melissanthi Mahut) takes up the majority of the episode and also features Arthur Darvill who is perfect as the author with writer's block, desperate for an idea (any idea) reduced to lecturing and about to get dropped by his publisher and his agent. Derek Jacobi plays the aged Erasmus Fry ('an old writer with no one to talk to gets fond of the sound of his own voice'). 'Writers are liars' is the key central theme. Madoc is conflicted, frustrated and ... a truly despicable human being whom the audience should have absolutely no sympathy for. But, unlike in the comic - and, not least, because he's played by Arty Darvill - they actually do. We get the first reference to Morpheus and Calliope's long-dead son, Orpheus and a return of The Three Fates plus a really funny parody of the crass snobbery and rank pretentiousness of the literary world (this was, clearly, Gaiman having a bit of fun with his own chosen profession). This blogger thought it was great, dear blog reader and couldn't believe how beautiful this adaptation was (possibly Keith Telly Topping's second favourite episode after The Sound Of Her Wings). Two great stories, perfectly adapted in hugely different styles but both with love and skill. As a reminder of just what a superb actor Arty is, it works on its own. But taken as part of a bigger whole it's really something very special indeed. Now, hands up dear blog readers, who wants to read that proposed novel about two old women taking a weasel on holiday? This blogger's only complaint is that the best of Madoc's never-ending supply of story ideas in the comic ('an old man in Sunderland who owned the universe and kept it in a jam-jar') lost the Sunderland reference. Actually, if you've ever been to Sunderland, dear blog reader, maybe that's a good thing.
Having specifically avoided binge-watching The Sandman, as mentioned in a previous From The North bloggerisationism update when the series was released, doing one, two or (on one occasion) three episodes a day, on Sunday morning - because, again, this blogger was up at the crack of insomnia - Keith Telly Topping rewatched episodes one to six. Just to make sure that he wasn't hallucinating when he first viewed them. And that this is, indeed, the best TV series of the year so far. This blogger is happy to confirm that it works just as well, if not better, second time around. And that, whilst episode five is still jolly hard work, Dream A Little Dream Of Me, A Hope In Hell and, especially, The Sound Of Her Wings are still pure-dead total fantastic. No need to revisit The Dolls House or the bonus episode just yet as they're still fresh in the mind. The rest of the day, this blogger spent jiggered and flaked out on the couch. As usual.
Meanwhile, Neil Gaiman his very self has been interviewed, at length, about the overwhelming success of The Sandman, by David Remnick on The New Yorker magazine's Radio Hour podcast. Which you can listen to here. And, very entertaining Neil is, too. As usual.
There's also a lengthy Gaiman interview with Rolling Stain's Brian Hiatt, Neil Gaiman On The Secret History Of The Sandman, From Giant Mechanical Spiders To The Joker which is highly recommended. The biggest revelation from which is Neil confirming that it was he who leaked the script for Jon Peters' proposed - and, utterly risible - Sandman film to the Ain't It Cool News website in 1998 so they could agree with him that it was the worst film script in history. Which, happily, they duly did.
And now, dear blog reader, the latest example of an on-going - and very popular - Interweb feature, Neil Gaiman Makes Fun Of Brain-Damaged Morons (Or The Victims Of Cruel Medical Experiments).
Following that, dear blog reader, Monday brought forth the equally long-awaited House Of The Dragon: The Heir Of The Dragon. Two hundred years before some stuff happened, other stuff happened. Lots of it. During King Jaehaerys Targaryen's reign, with both of his sons dead, the succession to the iron Throne is undecided. A Council of Big Nobs is convened to choose Westeros's next ruler. Jaehaerys' grandchildren, Princess Rhaenys and Prince Viserys are the candidates. And Westerosi law gives a male heir precedence. So, it comes to pass. Nine years later, King Viserys's reign is threatened by an alliance of the free cities of Essos and by Visery's younger brother Daemon's brutality as King's Landing's City Watch commander. Viserys, certain that Queen Aemma will bear him a son, holds a tournament to celebrate the impending birth. But it all goes horribly tits-up when Aemma and her son die in childbirth. The Hand of the King, Otto Hightower, proposes that Viserys' only living child, the Princess Rhaenyra, be named heir to the throne. It, also comes to pass. Much to the nostril-flaring irk of Daemon. It's all going to kick-off big-style, one can just tell, leading to about seven or eight series of a small inter-family tiff getting, somewhat, out of hand and escalating into total bloody carnage. Much like the First World War, in fact. Only, with dragons.
'Take a bath, you stink of dragon!' Well, dear blog reader, that was ... bloody. And very violent. And spectacular (plus, you know, a fair bit of full-frontal nudity which is always welcome at The Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House). Whether it's got the legs of Game Of Thrones is yet to be decided (though, it's always worth repeating that it took this blogger five series before he started watching that series; at least with this one he's in on the ground floor). Nice to see three of From The North's favourite actors - Paddy Considine, Rhys Ifans and, obviously, yer man Smudger - all playing very much against type and all pretty much pulling it off. Especially Smudger. This one could run and run (and, it probably will).
The Hollywood Reporter has broken the news that the House Of The Dragon premiere brought in 'nearly ten million viewers across all platforms in the United States', making it the biggest series premiere in HBO history. The magazine notes that House Of The Dragon has also brought in the largest single-night HBO audience since the Game Of Thrones finale drew 19.3 million viewers in May 2019.
According to the Metro - so, not a real newspaper, then - House Of The Dragon Fans Aghast At 'Traumatising' Episode One Birth Scene In Moment 'More Disturbing Than The Red Wedding'. And again, clearly, they asked all of them, didn't they? And, also, From Penis Chopping To Birth Horror, Most WTF Moments From House Of The Dragon Episode One. Yes, dear blog reader, that is, indeed, a British newspaper (well, sort of) using the acronym for 'what the fuck' but being too cowardly to actually spell it out.
Just to continue with that last one, the dear blog reader who pointed this blogger in the direction of the Metro article in question - hi, Petra - told this blogger that she had sent a comment via e-mail to Metro saying 'I seem to be terribly out of touch with the acronyms used by Young People these days. What is a "WTF" moment?' She promptly received a reply informing her that her comment would not be published by Metro because it 'violated accepted standards.' True story.
Given the almost half-a-billion dollars Netflix spent to acquire the rights to director Rian Johnson's Knives Out follow-ups and the streaming service's plan to debut the first of the two sequels later this year, one would expect we would know more about Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery than merely its name. But at the very least, we now have a streaming release date. Along with a new photo of Glass Onion's cast members Daniel Craig, Edward Norton, Janelle Monáe, Kathryn Hahn, Leslie Odom Jr and Jessica Henwick, Netflix said that the film will be available to stream on 23 December. While we knew that Glass Onion was set to premiere at this year's Toronto International Film Festival in September, Netflix has also revealed that the film will have a theatrical run beginning on 'a date to be announced.'
How nice it was, this week, to catch the TPTV documentary Talking Pictures With Frazer Hines featuring From The North favourite Frazer looking back on his career. Particularly as it included clips of some of his less well-remembered roles in movies like Peril For The Guy, X - The Unknown, Witness In The Dark and Go Kart Go (loved the story about his cowboy boots in the latter movie).
If you happen to be a regular viewer of TPTV's current re-run of Van Der Valk (1972 to 1992), dear blog reader, you will be delighted to know that in this week's episode Arlette regenerated again, this time into Meg Davies.
And now, dear blog reader, another new From The North semi-regular feature, 'The Most Odd Uses Of Pop Songs In Film & Television Series.' Number one: Coati Mundi's 1981 hit 'Me No Pop I' cropping up in the background of a bar scene in episode five of Kessler. Because everyone knows those damned Nazis, they may be despicable genocidal scum, but they just can't resist a bit of the salsa.
With recent essays on British post-war B-movies, The Pleasure Girls, Hell Is A City and Cup Fever From The North has been in serious danger of turning into a film blog which sometimes discusses telly rather than the other way around. And, there seems little reason to stop such malarkey at this juncture. This blogger has long been a fan of The Edgar Wallace Mysteries since he first saw a number of them in the 1980s when Channel Four showed them in a late evening slot. The Edgar Wallace Mysteries were a British second-feature film series mainly produced at Merton Park Studios for Anglo-Amalgamated. There were forty seven films, which were, initially, released between 1960 and 1965. The series was syndicated - as The Edgar Wallace Mystery Theatre - on television in the United States and other territories and, later, in Britain (firstly on ITV circa 1968). Most of the films featured a title sequence, in which a shadowed bust of Edgar Wallace revolved against a backdrop of swirling mist, accompanied by the 'Man Of Mystery' theme, written by Michael Carr. 'Man Of Mystery' was later covered, very successfully, by The Shadows and the later films of the series used a speeded up version of the title music in the style of The Shadows. Producers Nat Cohen and Stuart Levy had acquired the movie rights to all of Wallace's novels and short stories in 1960. The original intention was that thirty of the films would be produced by Independent Artists at Beaconsfield Studios whilst a further twenty would be made by the Film Producers Guild at Merton Park Studios. In the event, Independent Artists' only contribution to the series was one of the earliest films, The Malpas Mystery (1960), whilst more than double the intended number were made at Merton Park. The resulting adaptations were somewhat loose from the source texts. Like the concurrent Rialto Film series then being produced in Germany, there was no attempt to set them in the period settings of Wallace's original stories. A 1962 article in Scene magazine quotes twenty two grand as a typical budget per episode. The majority of the films played as supporting features on the ABC Cinemas circuit, which was Anglo-Amalgamated's usual outlet. However ten of them were allocated to the rival Rank circuit, with screenings in their Odeon and Gaumont cinemas.
Several of the movies were genuine classics of their kind. These included Partners In Crime (1961), Solo For Sparrow, Playback and Death Trap (all 1962), Ricochet and Accidental Death (both 1963), We Shall See and Act Of Murder (both 1964) and the superb Game For Three Losers (1965, previously featured on this blog). A few other - similar - films, not shot as part of the series, were subsequently included in the TV syndication package, including Gerry Anderson's Crossroads To Crime (1960) and Seven Keys (1961). According to the critic Kim Newman, insufficient episodes had been available for American television when they first purchased the series; hence, the distributor, Anglo-Amalgamated, attached the 'Wallace Mysteries' credits to a handful of its other contemporary crime films - such as House Of Mystery (1961). The Radio Times described the series as 'Brit-noir at its best, updating some of the author's stories to more contemporary settings and blending classic B-movie elements with a distinctly British feel.' At the time, they were considered excellent box office and were among the most successful films of their type being made in Britain, almost all of them making Anglo-Amalgamated a small profit. Brian McFarlane and Steve Chibnall in their book The British B Film (BFI Palgrave Macmillan, 2009) referred to The Edgar Wallace Mysteries as, 'the most substantial and probably the most successful, of all and even constituted a primary attraction for some cinemagoers.' The reason that Keith Telly Topping mentions all of this is that this week, Talking Pictures reached one of the very best films of the series, one that McFarlane and Chibnall regarded as 'among the finest of [the] British Bs,' John Llewelyn Moxey's Face Of A Stranger (1964).
With a quality cast - Jeremy Kemp, Rosemary Leach (in her film debut), Bernard Archard, Philip Locke, Elizabeth Begley, Jean Marsh, Ronald Leigh-Hunt, Mike Pratt and Keith Smith - and a screenplay by John Sansom (Hammer's Jimmy Sangster writing under a nom-de-plume), Face Of A Stranger is a tense and intelligent little thriller with more than a few unexpected twists. In prison, two inmates are due for release; one (Locke) has been sent down for his part in a heist of several thousand knicker, which is still unrecovered. The other (Kemp), who is getting out first, pumps his cellmate for details on his home life so he can get to the loot first. It helps, of course, that Locke's wife (Leach) is blind so Kemp, effectively, assumes the other man's identity. Admittedly, when you describe it thus it doesn't, entirely, stand up to logical analysis without a bit of necessary suspension of disbelief. But it's a really good piece of work from all concerned, nicely shot despite its limited budget and with all of the cast giving it one hundred per cent. If you ever get the chance to see it, dear blog reader, it's an hour of your life you will not regret spending.
Another movie shown relatively recently on Talking Pictures remains a particular favourite of this blogger, 1956's Yield To The Night. As a fine article about the movie on the Film Ink website notes: 'There is something particularly poignant about the notion of someone owing a great deal of their success to their spouse, then betraying that spouse, emotionally, sexually and professionally ... and paying for it, at least on a creative level. Such was the case of J Lee Thompson and Joan Henry.' Most movie fans will likely be well aware of Thompson, the writer-director whose hits include The Guns Of Navarone, the original Cape Fear and Ice Cold In Alex. Henry is less well-remembered today, although intriguingly at one stage her fame (or, notoriety) outstripped that of her future husband. She was born in 1914 in Belgravia and was descended from two Prime Ministers (John Russell and Robert Peel). Her mother's cousin was the philosopher Bertrand Russell. Despite being from a well-to-do family, Joan had some tough early breaks; her father deserted the family when she was young, causing her mother to have a nervous breakdown. Joan and her twin sister, Diane, were brought up by their grandparents in Ireland and Diane died when Joan was twenty one. Joan was a society debutante it the early 1930s and she married an army officer in 1938. They had a daughter but the war put the marriage under strain and they eventually separated. Henry started writing romance novels (reasonably successfully) to make money but developed a serious gambling habit. After getting into debt she accepted a forged cheque from a friend as a loan. She was convicted at the Old Bailey in 1951 and sentenced to twelve months in The Slammer (the Daily Torygraph's obituary of her claimed that 'she was naïve enough not to realise that the cheque had been forged'). She eventually served eight months stir, most of it in Holloway. As one might imagine, former debutante turned novelist who've also done a Little Richard were not that common in the 1950s. It was suggested by her publisher that Joan write a memoir about her experiences, which she did. The result, Who Lie in Gaol, became a bestseller on its publication in 1952, drawing attention to the harsh treatment of female prisoners in the prison system. The book was read by J Lee Thompson, who wanted to adapt it into a movie.
Thompson was also born in 1914 and had been something of a child prodigy, claiming to have written over forty plays by the time he was eighteen, the year he married his first wife. One of those, Double Error, had a short run in the West End in 1935, which helped Thompson break into the film industry, initially as a writer. He rewrote Double Error as Murder Without Crime which had success on the stage in London and Broadway in the 1940s. After war service as a tailgunner in the RAF, Thompson returned to writing but when he sold the film rights to Murder Without Crime, he persuaded Associated British Pictures to allow him to direct it as well. The film was released in 1950 and Thompson soon established himself as a solid talent of well-made b-movies such as The Yellow Balloon (1953) and For Better Or For Worse (1954). He was impressed by Who Lie In Gaol and Associated British agreed to finance a movie version, which became The Weak & The Wicked (1954), starring Glynis Johns as (essentially) Joan Henry and co-starring Diana Dors, a young Rachel Roberts, Sid James and From The North favourite John Gregson.
The movie was a pretty good women-in-prison melodrama: powerful, realistic and not without some dark humour. Diana Dors, up until then famous purely as a kind of British version of Jayne Mansfield ('pretty girl, massive tits, can't act'), was a revelation and it was Thompson's most acclaimed movie to date. Joan co-wrote the adaptation with Thompson and Anne Burnaby and was on-set throughout as an advisor (along with her friend and mentor, the prison reformer Mary Size). She later said that she thought Glynis Johns was an excellent actress but that her portrayal of the central character (Jean) was 'a bit goody-goody.' Nevertheless, the movie was a big hit at the UK box office and helped to put Thompson into the A league. Rank offered him the comedy As Long As They're Happy (1955) and Associated British gave him a big budget for An Alligator Named Daisy (also 1955). Diana Dors was cast in both. Whilst he was making those movies, Thompson - who was stridently anti-capital punishment - told Henry that he wanted to make a movie about a man on death row. Henry suggested they make it about a woman instead, so she could draw on her own prison experiences. She quickly wrote the novel, Yield To The Night (published in late 1954), about a woman awaiting execution for murder. Henry also co-wrote the movie script (with John Cresswell) whilst Dors starred, in the process giving the best performance of her career. The result was a Brit-noir masterpiece, an astonishingly fine drama, where Dors played a character who, as Film Ink said, 'never asks for [the audience's] sympathy but gets it anyway: she's guilty of the crime, isn't friendly to her family or death penalty protestors [and] still loves the louse who drove her to murder.' The movie was full of touches that reflect Henry's personal experiences - the routine of changing guards, the banal conversations as the shadow of the noose constantly hovers in the background, the way that time drags, the small privileges, the overwhelming pressure of longing for a reprieve. It is, frankly, one of the best British movies of the entire decade. Some critics claimed that the film was inspired by the real-life case of Ruth Ellis, the last woman to be hanged in Britain. However, the novel was actually published a year before Ellis committed her murder and the film was being made at Elstree in the period following her trial, but before her execution. (Ellis was hanged at Holloway on 13 July 1955. There have been several dramatisations of her life and death, most famously 1985's Dance With A Stranger starring Miranda Richardson and also a 1980 episode of the ITV series Lady Killers with Georgina Hale.) Dors - who had been briefly acquainted with Ellis, then an aspiring actress, on the film Lady Godiva Rides Again in 1951 - said that 'it wasn't about Ruth Ellis at all. Everybody thinks it was but the script was written two years before Ruth Ellis committed the murder. It's a fascinating syndrome that all this was put down on paper before it happened.'
Overlooking this, ironically, serves to downplay the skill of Joan Henry's work on Yield To The Night; her story did have some parallels with Ellis' case, but that was due more to Henry's own insights into the prison system. Dors added that this was 'the first time I ever had a chance to play such a part. I was very thankful to Lee Thompson for having faith in me. Until then everybody thought I was just a joke and certainly not an actress to be taken seriously, even though I knew within myself I was capable of playing other roles. The big problem was trying to convince other people.' Her co-star, Michael Craig, said that Thompson was 'a small, very intense man with a violent temper, which could be provoked by practically anything or nothing. He had a nervous habit of tearing sheets of paper into long thin strips.' Craig was much taken with his co-star describing Dors as 'terrific ... one of the most free-spirited and professional actresses I worked with.' Despite a sniffy review from Variety ('a grim form of entertainment') the movie, Britain's entry to the 1956 Cannes Film Festival, was a massive hit - though not in the US where it was released under the horribly crass title Blonde Sinner. It was controversial too, both in its subject matter and also when a nineteen-year-old Australian woman, Rosemary Veale, reportedly committed suicide hours after watching the movie. Despite the film's success Dors never worked with Thompson again.
Joan Henry had provided the material for Thompson's two best early movies - both of them passionate, clever, witty and chilling. The two clearly had rapport on a personal level too, Thompson left his wife of twenty years and two children and married Henry once his divorce was granted in 1958. The next few years were the golden period of Thompson's career - he went on to make The Good Companions (1957), Woman In A Dressing Gown (1957) from a script by Ted Willis, the classic Ice Cold In Alex (1958), North West Frontier (1959), Tiger Bay (1959), the thriller that introduced Hayley Mills to the screen, No Trees In The Street (1959), another collaboration with Willis and I Aim At The Stars (the 1960 biopic of Werner Van Braun). Then he got a call from Carl Foreman asking him to replace Alexander Mackendrick on The Guns Of Navarone (1961), the expensive all-star action movie based on the best-selling novel by Alistair Maclean. Thompson's classy work at such short notice impressed his star, Gregory Peck, who promptly hired Thompson to direct his next movie, Cape Fear (1962). Most of these films were hits and The Guns Of Navarone was a genuine blockbuster. The success seems to have come at a domestic cost, however. By 1962, the director was frequently seen in the company of Susan Hampshire and Thompson told the press that he was unable to make up his mind between Hampshire and Joan. Later that year, it was reported that he had broken up with both of them and was now dating Shirley Ann Field. Thompson would eventually divorce Henry and marry for a third time in the late 1960s. His work, sadly, never matched the impact and velocity of those early movies and he made more than a few absolute stinkers in his later career (several with Charles Bronson) although Eye Of The Devil (1967), Conquest Of The Planet Of The Apes (1972), The Passage (1979) and The Ambassador (1984) have, at least, some merit. Joan's subsequent career included writing the screenplay for Passionate Summer (1958). A film for Rank starring Virginia McKenna and Bill Travers, it had little impact at the time but, with hindsight, has became well-regarded. She wrote for the stage - Look On Tempests (1960), the first play dealing explicitly with the subject of homosexuality to be passed by the Lord Chamberlain. And, she also wrote some TV plays, the 1962 Play Of The Week Rough Justice for ITV and 1967's Person To Person for the BBC's The Wednesday Play strand. She died in 2001, a year before Thompson.
'You know, he's doing the rabbit image no good at all!' Dear blog readers will, perhaps, be shocked - shocked and stunned - at just how near this blogger came to including this particular line from the masterpiece that is Dougal & The Blue Cat in From The North's on-going Memorably Daft Lines From British Horror Movies Of The 1970s section. On account of the fact that Buxton utterly terrified this blogger when he was naught but a youngling. Ultimately, however, he thought better of it.
On a similar 'close, but no cigar' theme, another one that nearly went into the regular Horror Movies dialogue strand was, Geoffrey Hughes: 'Look, it's a school of whales.' Paul Angelis: 'They look a little bit old for school.' Geoffrey Hughes: 'University then.' Paul Angelis: 'University of Wales?' John Clive: 'They look like dropouts to me!' Yellow Submarine. Purely on the grounds that if The Blue Meanies aren't scary, then nothing is. Remember, dear blog reader, 'it's all in the mind.'
Which, as if by the magic roundabout, brings us nicely to Memorably Daft Lines From British Horror Movies Of The 1970s: Number Seventy Three: Angharad Rees: 'They were not all dreams ...' Danny Lyons: 'What are dreams? And what's real, Anna? I've never known.' Hands Of The Ripper.
One of Hammer's most sumptuous-looking films of the era (particularly that stunning climax) although, whisper it, but when all is said and done it's a bit melodramatic and slow-moving.
Nevertheless, that bit where Lynda Baron gets one in the eye for socio-realism (with a hat-pin) is, admittedly, thigh-slappingly hilarious! If you're going to do Jack The Ripper, at least have the courtesy to put Sherlock Holmes into the mix!
Memorably Daft Lines From British Horror Movies Of The 1970s (Or In This Case, The Early 1980s): Number Seventy Four: Jenny Agutter: 'I'll be perfectly honest with you David, I'm not in the habit of bringing home stray, young American men.' David Naughton: 'I should hope not.' Jenny Agutter: 'I find you very attractive ... and a little bit sad!' An American Werewolf In London. A beautiful, funny, scary, groundbreaking and brilliant film. Plus, Jenny Agutter in a naughty nurses uniform which is definitely something worth standing in the street and applauding every Thursday at 8pm.
Memorably Daft Lines From British Horror Movies Of The 1970s: Number Seventy Five: John Cater: 'A brass unicorn has been catapulted across a London street and impaled an eminent surgeon. Words fail me, gentlemen.' The Abominable Doctor Phibes.
Memorably Daft Lines From British Horror Movies Of The 1970s: Number Seventy Six: Christopher Plummer: 'Watson, what are you doing?' James Mason: 'I'm trying to corner the last pea on my plate ... You squashed my pea.' Christopher Plummer: 'Well, now you've got it cornered.' James Mason: 'Yes, but squashing a fellow's pea ...' Christopher Plummer: 'Just trying to help.' Murder By Decree. If you're going to do Jack The Ripper at least have the courtesy to include Sherlock Holmes. Oh, hang on, they did! Well, that's all right, then. Another particular favourite of yer actual Keith Telly Topping with the Plummer/Mason partnership right up there with the very best of Holmes/Watson duos.
Memorably Daft Lines From British Horror Movies Of The 1970s: Number Seventy Seven: Ingrid Pitt: 'Don't you want to see me young and happy again?' Nigel Green: 'So you can make love to young officers? I'd rather have you as you are than see you parading yourself like some jaded young slut from the whorehouse. At least there is dignity in age.' Ingrid Pit: 'You are cruel. You have never loved me.' Countess Dracula.
This blogger thinks it was the comedian Emo Phillips who once noted that there are many things one experiences early in life that one doesn't fully appreciate until adulthood ('like, being spanked by a middle aged woman!') Countess Dracula is very much a case in point. This blogger never really rated it and always thought it was one of Hammer's weaker conceits, tame when compared to contemporary movies like The Vampire Lovers or Twins Of Evil. This blogger deliberately excluded it from his Vault Of Horror for exactly that reason. Then, about a year ago, Keith Telly Topping saw it again, quite by chance one night on what was, then, The Horror Channel. It's actually quite good - unlike Ingrid Pitt's character in the movie, it has aged rather well. The make-up on the old Ingrid is still woeful, of course, but the film fair rattles along at a decent pace and Nigel Green is a terrific co-star in it. A definite case of 'just because you think something is wank as an sixteen year old that doesn't mean it'll always be so.'
Memorably Daft Lines From British Horror Movies Of The 1970s: Number Seventy Eight: Jon Finch: 'Thou wast born of woman!' Macbeth.
Very much a game of two halves, this one dear blog reader. Positive points (and there are a lot of them): Polanski's direction is stunning; the location work, much of which was done around Bamburgh and Lindisfarne Castles, is spellbindingly gorgeous - the North East coast has never looked so pretty and so desolate at the same time; Ken Tynan's script is one of the best ever Shakespeare screen adaptations; Martin Shaw is terrific as Banquo; there's surprising subtlety in the handling of Francesca Annis's full-frontal somnambulism scene (From The North favourite Francesca is, also, superb); John Stride as a sinister, duplicitous Ross almost steals the film. And, oddly, there's Jon Finch himself, an actor whom this blogger has often had problems with in other roles but here, his curiously detached, rather fey performance actually works.
On the other hand ... well, Keith Chegwin as Fleance. 'nuff said. More than a few of the minor roles are played with scenery-chewing very much to the fore (and not in a remotely good way); this blogger's biggest problem - and he admits this is an entirely personal thing - Keith Telly Topping usually has a major issue with the way The Weird Sisters are played in most Macbeth adaptations and this is no exception. That dreadfully cod, clichéd 'aged and haggard and bent old crone' ('ship's cook and hedgehog')-type thing. With all of the dialogue - which, in the play is effing menacing - interrupted by cackling and sounding about as sinister as a chicken vol-au-vent (often - and this is a prime example - appearing more than a bit fake-Jewish. Which could be considered anti-Semitic if it were just a fraction more stereotypical: 'By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes. Oy vey! My life!') None of which is there in the source text. This blogger must confess at this point he did once play First Witch in a school production of The Scottish Play when he was about fifteen. True story - they couldn't get enough girls interested in playing all the parts so, for a brief run we became The Two Weird Sisters and Their Really Weird Brother! And this blogger was bloody good in it as well - no one could do the 'a sailor's wife has chestnuts in her lap' soliloquy as well as he.)
The other aspect that this blogger finds rather disturbing about this version of Macbeth is the amount of blood used in some of the murder scenes which seems almost to the point of parody. Well, okay, this is Macbeth after all, it's a story about, ahem, 'bloody murder.' But that takes on a slightly different context when one realises this was the first movie Polanski had made after Sharon and their unborn child were horribly hacked to pieces by Manson's own off-their-bloody-skull(s) Weird Sisters. There is an infamous (unconfirmed) story that when one of the crew suggested, perhaps, the film was too unrealistically gory for its own good, Polanski replied: 'I know violence. You should've seen my house last summer.' It's also said that the little girl who played Macduff's daughter was chatting with Polanski just before a take whilst blood was applied to her face and he was telling her how to 'act dead.' He asked her what her name was. 'Sharon' she replied and, without betraying any obvious emotion he, allegedly, turned to his AD and bellowed 'she needs more blood on her. Get more blood.' Both are probably apocryphal tales but there's something about this version of Macbeth that invites such strange associations. It is, this blogger thinks, a genuinely great film (possibly Polanski's best - certainly one of his best two or three - and Keith Telly Topping is a big fan of most of his work) but it's also - at least in part and for many of the 'wrong' reasons - one that's hard to actually like.
This blogger should add that the Weird Sisters aspect which so bothers him is not unique to this particular version, it's - to a greater or lesser degree - also present in Orson Welles's version; it's in the BBC's 1970 adaptation (which is, otherwise, one of the best); it's in the BBC's 1983 adaptation (which is also terrific). It just always seems that whenever The Weird Sisters are depicted in period adaptations of Macbeth, they're always played as cackling hags. There are some exceptions - there is, for example, a brilliant modernist adaptation, again for the BBC, from the late 1990s called Macbeth On The Estate with Ray Winstone at The King (a drug dealer), James Frain as Macbeth and David Harewood as Macduff. There's also a very weird Australian adaptation from about 2006 which isn't very good but The Weird Sister are played as really sinister feral schoolgirls. That works really well. Interestingly, according to legend the one bit of Polanski's version that does come, directly, from his own childhood is the massacre of Macduff's wife and children by his men which is said to have its violence rooted in Polanski's memories of witnessing an SS raid on a neighbour's home in Warsaw when he was about six.
Following that, brief, English Lit A-Level syllabus diversion - Memorably Daft Lines From British Horror Movies Of The 1970s (Or, In This Case, The Mid-1960s): Number Seventy Nine: Jacqueline Pearce: 'I'm cold!' The Reptile. Filmed back-to-back with The Plague Of The Zombies (same director, same sets, several of the same actors) and, frankly, not half as good. But, still a sinister, nasty little tale, well told and with some really daft bits in it.
Memorably Daft Lines From Anglo-Canadian Horror Movies Of The 1970s: Number Eighty: Chloe Franks: 'Lucy, please make me big again. I won't tell Mommy about the cat. I won't tell her about anything.' Katrina Holden Bronson: 'You're not such a big girl anymore are you, Angela? Why, you're no bigger than a mouse!' The Uncanny.
Which is also, by a considerable distance, the Oscar-winner for 'the most utterly pointless usage of a still from You Only Live Twice in cinema history.' This one, in fact. Remember, dear blog readers, 'the cat did it!'
Memorably Daft Lines From British Horror Movies Of The 1970s: Number Eighty One: Julie Christie: 'Your bishop makes me feel strange.' Donald Sutherland: 'I imagine he makes God feel less than immaculate.' Don't Look Now.
Memorably Daft Lines From British Horror Movies Of The 1970s: Number Eighty Two: Frank Finlay: 'When does a man die? Who knows what happens in the moment of death? The soul doesn't die, simply leaves the body. But what if it didn't? If it went on living in a dead body? A prisoner, in a body decaying around it. Is it possible? What is possible?' Susan Hampshire: 'Hugh was not dead.' Frank Finlay: 'If it weren't for you, this would never have happened. He's possessed, isn't he? Possessed by you. You're a witch, trafficking with the Devil. You have conjured an evil spirit into his dead body!' Susan Hampshire: 'My love for him has given him life.' Neither The Sea Nor The Sand.
Many horror movies, this blogger has noticed, feature people trying to survive the aftermath of a zombie apocalypse, dear blog reader. This blogger has never really understood why. Surely it's much easier to just let yourself get bitten and then try to change the system from within? It's more practical and kinder, in the long run, as less zombies have to die.
This blogger doesn't know about any of you lot, dear blog readers, but he totally would. All of them. Even Ringetta.
From that, dear blog reader, to this new semi-regular feature. The From The North Where Are They Now? section.
The world's most embiggened space telescope has revealed unprecedented views of Jupiter. The James Webb Space Telescope took the pictures of the Solar System's largest planet in July. The images show auroras, giant storms, moons and rings surrounding Jupiter in detail that astronomers have described as 'incredible.' The infrared images were artificially coloured to make the features stand out. 'We've never seen Jupiter like this,' said planetary astronomer Imke de Pater, of the University of California, who played a key role in the project. 'We hadn't really expected it to be this good, to be honest,' she added. NASA said that in the stand-alone view of Jupiter, created from a composite of several images from the telescope, auroras extended to high altitudes above both the Northern and Southern poles of Jupiter. Auroras are light shows in the skies above the planet caused by interactions with particles streaming away from the Sun. Meanwhile, the Great Red Spot, a famous storm so big it could swallow Earth, appeared white. This was because it reflected a lot of sunlight.
Premier League champions Shiekh Yer Man City produced a fightback as they came from three-one down to draw with this blogger's beloved (and now, thankfully, sold) Magpies in a pulsating match at St James' Park featuring six goals and an overturned red card. Newcastle were two goals ahead after just before the hour mark but Erling Haaland and Bernardo Silva scored within four minutes of each other to preserve City's unbeaten start to their title defence. City took a fifth-minute lead as Ilkay Gundogan was left unmarked in the box from Silva's pass and was able to take a touch before slotting past Nick Pope. The England goalkeeper made a number of excellent saves before the hosts equalised with Miguel Almirón sliding in to meet Allan Saint-Maximin's far post cross, with the goal given after a video assistant review overruled an original offside flag. The excellent Saint-Maximin ran at the City defence before finding Callum Wilson, who shot United into the lead soon afterwards. The visitors had a chance to equalise but Pope finger-tipped Haaland's effort onto the post and Kieran Trippier, sold by City in 2012 after coming through their academy, then grabbed a brilliant third with a stunning twenty five-yard free-kick early in the second-half. Haaland pulled one back, finishing from inside the six-yard box after Rodri's pass, before Silva equalised following Kevin de Bruyne's superb through-ball. Newcastle thought they had gone down to ten men with Trippier shown a straight red card for a trip on De Bruyne. But referee Jarred Gillett downgraded it to a yellow after watching the incident again on a pitchside monitor - and both teams finished with a thoroughly deserved point. City began the weekend in top spot and knew a two-goal victory would take them back there, above The Arse. Pep Guardiola's side made the perfect start with Gundogan scoring after five minutes - the first goal that Newcastle's defence had conceded this season sp far. City then should have stretched their lead, Pope saving with his legs to deny both Haaland and Phil Foden and keeping out an effort from De Bruyne as the visitors increased the pressure and struted around liked they owned the gaff. Newcastle started to get back in the game after quarter-of-an-hour and Saint-Maximin had an effort parried by Ederson with Wilson unable to convert a chance as he lost his balance. But it became one-all in the twenty eighth minute as Saint-Maximin crossed from the left and Almirón, who had an earlier opportunity, flung himself at the ball, which bounced off his thigh and into the net. It was originally ruled out for offside by the linesman but a VAR check showed Joao Cancelo and Kyle Walker had played Almirón and Joe Willock onside - to the delight of Almirón, who celebrated his first goal of the season. It would have been a satisfying moment for Miggy as he had been mocked by City's floppy-haired over-rated ponce Jack Grealish - mysteriously absent at St James' after, allegedly, picking up an injury in City's win over Bournemouth eight days previously. During City's title celebrations in May, the England forward joked that his teammate Riyad Mahrez had played 'like Almirón' in their final-day victory over Aston Villains, but the Paraguayan silenced his full-of-his-own-importance critic in the best way possible and made Grealish look like the drunken fool he, clearly, was on that day. Newcastle scored again just before half-time when Saint-Maximin played a ball into Wilson, who produced an excellent first touch to evade both Ruben Dias and John Stones before putting his side ahead. City, facing their first away league defeat since August 2021 when they lost at Tottenham, fell further behind with Trippier's excellent curling free-kick. But with the home fans ecstatic at their side's advantage, City showed why they have been champions in four of the past five seasons, producing a spirited recovery. Neither side could find a winner in the final half-hour as a frantic afternoon ended in a draw with both maintaining their unbeaten league starts, City second on seven points, two more than sixth-placed Newcastle. After the match, Almirón acknowledged the disgraceful comments made by Grealish. Spotting a young Newcastle fan with a sign which read: 'Miggy, can Grealish have your shirt?' the twenty eight-year-old obliged and was seen giving the supporter his Toon top. A fine gesture and a marvellous example of how to slap-down ignorant, half-arsed comments by over-entitled prima donnas with, admittedly, a bit of talent at kicking a ball around but, seemingly, no abundance of either brains nor tact.
Th' Toon are also set to sign Real Sociedad striker Alexander Isak for a club record fee of about sixty million smackers. The twenty two year old Swedish international would boost The (now, thankfully sold) Magpies' attacking options given the injury record of Callum Wilson, who is awaiting results of a hamstring scan. Ex-Borussia Dortmund player Isak has forty four goals in one hundred and thirty two appearances for Sociedad and nine in thirty seven for his country. United's transfer record is currently the forty million snots they paid for Joelinton in 2019. Which, after eighteen months of looking like the biggest waste of money in the club's history is now starting to pay dividends. The Brazilian striker-turned-midfielder was signed from German club Hoffenheim. The club also paid thirty five million knicker plus add-ons for fellow Brazilian midfielder Bruno Guimarães Rodriguez Moura last January but Isak's signing would be a significant shift from Newcastle's new owners, who took over the club in October and have taken a considered approach to the transfer market. Isak's signing would double Newcastle's spending this summer to just short of one hundred and twenty million quid after the previous signings of Matt Targett, Sven Botman and Nick Pope and bring the total to around two hundred million knicker since the new owners took over the club in October 2021.
At this juncture, dear blog reader - and with a terrible inevitability of the terribly inevitable - we come to the part of From The North dedicated to this blogger's on-going medical shenanigans. For those dear blog readers who haven't been following this on-going fiasco which appears to have been on-going longer than ... a very long thing, it goes something like this: Keith Telly Topping spent some weeks feeling rotten; had five days in hospital; was discharged; received B12 injections; then more injections; somewhat recovered his missing appetite; got a diagnosis; had a consultant's meeting; continued to suffer fatigue and insomnia; endured a second endoscopy; had another consultation; got (unrelated) toothache; had an extraction; which took ages to heal; had another consultation; spent a week where nothing remotely health-related occurred; was given further - painful - B-12 injections; had an echocardiogram; had more blood extraction; did another hospital visit; saw the insomnia and torpor continue; returned to the hospital for yet more blood letting; had a rearranged appointment to get his latest note from his doctor; suffered probably his worst day yet in terms of fatigue. The depressing, fatigue. The never-ending fatigue.
Between bouts of the never-ending fatigue, however, this blogger did get the odd thing done around The Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House. This, for instance, was one Sunday Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House chore successfully gotten out of the way nice and early.
Tuesday, though, that was most definitely another really deserved three-sausage day. And, it was glorious in this blogger's sight (and, in his tummy).
A question, dear blog reader. Is anyone able to work out what one is actually paying £1.90 for in this particular scenario?
That said, compared to the previous example of huh? this one is the British, Commonwealth and All-Comers record holder for, 'sorry, run that one by me again, would you?' This blogger thinks it's the use of the word 'slightly' that makes it art.
Having discounted the Mirra's Colin Baker blubbing 'exclusive' on the grounds of, you know, taste and decency, the From The North Headline Of The Week award nominations kick off with-one from the Gruniad Morning Star, Seal Breaks Into New Zealand Home, Traumatises Cat & Hangs Out On Couch. Less a headline, more the sort of short story that Morpheus gave Richard Madoc a surfeit of in Calliope, one could suggest.
Next, the Coventry Telegraph which also paints a vulgar picture with Drunk Passenger Who Caused Chaos After Flight Mix-Up Rejects Airport's 'Prank' Claim.
It's been a while since From The North's Headline of The Week award had a nomination from any media organ vaguely local to this parish. So, congratulations are therefore due to the Northern Echo for Darlington ASDA Was The Scene Of A 'Wild West' Brawl.
Meanwhile, the Evening Chronicle reports that Former British Soldier Takes Down Nazi Flag Outside His Walker Home Following Community Backlash which concerns an incident that took place scarily close to The Stately Telly Topping Manor Plague House. A 'community backlash' against the displaying of fascist paraphernalia in a city which had the shit bombed out of it during 1940 and 1941 by the Luftwaffe? Who'd've expected that? This blogger also really enjoyed the following quote: 'Another local resident, who did not want to be named, said: "Other neighbours are as disgusted as I am, it gives the street a bad name as we'll all be tarred with the same brush. Walker is a lovely mix of people [this blogger's italics] so there will be a lot upset at seeing this bigoted flag. They have been singing loudly songs in German but, as I do not speak German, I do not know if they were Nazi songs or something else."' Kraftwerk, possibly? Just a guess, you understand. Quality reportage from 'multi-media [alleged] journalist' Kristy Dawson, there. 'Walker is a lovely mix of people'? Has anyone actually bothered to tell the people who live there? This blogger has resided in the East End of Newcastle his entire life, dear blog reader. It is many things - some of them good, some of them not so good - but the word 'lovely' does not apply to any of them!
Next, Lincolnshire Live which covers many angles with Former UK Eurovision Contestant Angered By 'Appalling' Lincoln Pavements.
There was also a late bid for bloggerisationism immortality from the Northamptonshire Telegraph and their Police Looking For Mobility Scooter Riding Man Who's Been Throwing Condoms At People In Corby. Particular as it included the line 'Police are unsure at the present time what the condoms were filled with.'
The Southern Daily Echo isn't normally the sort of media organ where you'd expect to see a headline like Snake Escapes From Home In Chandler's Ford. It slipped through the bars, apparently.
According to the Belfast Telegraph, South Belfast Residents To Receive Extra Security After Being 'Traumatised' By Ed Sheeran Fans. Because, obviously, there's little more 'traumatising' than screaming schoolgirls. 'People living on Lislea Avenue said people returning from the Sheeran gig in May trashed their street and used it as a toilet, without a sign of a security guard or council official,' the piece alleges. Yes, security and the council are probably into something more tuneful, one suspects.
Staying across the Irish sea, the Independent claims that Wexford Councillor Urges Minister To 'Call In The Army' Over School Bus Crisis. Sounds like a plan.
The BBC News website also got in on the act this week with Lidl To Sell Misshapen Drought-Affected Vegetables. 'Potatoes, onions, carrots, apples and Brussels sprouts are likely to be worst-affected, experts say.' So, not much chance of getting a turnip shaped like a thingy, then? Pity.
And finally, dear blog reader, this stunner from the Dundee Evening Telegraph.
