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First thing, this is in Wales not England. But having re-discovered the original transparency I had to share it with you. In 2004 I was working on the book to go with the second BBC Restoration television series. I went everywhere from a salt works in Cheshire to a gaol in Armagh, and must be the only person who has ever been to the Orkneys by ship just for an afternoon. (Apart from the crew, obviously.) But that's another long-winded story. I had the immense privilege of seeing things few people will see, mainly because all the buildings shown would've benefitted greatly from the exposure and been 'restored'.
I do hope this collage of film posters and star pictures is still on the wall of a back room in the Celynen Working Men's Institute and Memorial Hall in Newbridge, Caerphilly. Celynen had a large coal mine that employed over 1,700 men who produced around 10,000 tons of coal a week. This was the centre of their relaxation, opened in 1908, and by the early 1920s boasted a dance floor, cinema and theatre. So the films would have arrived with their posters, and I like to think of a movie buff snipping pictures from magazines and creating this collage over the years. Although I can't help wishing that the Casablanca poster, and one (out of shot) for The Ladykillers had been kept intact and hidden up in the projection room which I also photographed, complete with the spare bulbs for an immense projector.
I was wondering how D.H.Lawrence's classic would fare at the hands of the BBC on Sunday. Part of a season of films that will include Cider With Rosie and, heart in mouth, The Go-Between. And all I could think was: Everyone's a loser. We the audience in particular, because an hour and a half is simply just not long enough for this bucolic tale of pheasant rearing near coal mines. Ken Russell did a very creditable job back in 1993, but then he had nearly three and a half hours. This attempt should really have been called something different, like Coal 'n' Camisoles, based on an idea by D.H.Lawrence. Because the second loser was the author himself. The whole point of his novel is total honesty in sexual matters, but our two lovers lost out because from where I was they didn't even get a decent shag. And didn't say any earthy Nottinghamshire endearments to help it along either, which was the whole point of 12 days in the Old Bailey for Penguin Books in 1960.
I think that when you have limited time to tell a story as good as this you should try and stick to most of the 'facts' of the book you're adapting. As far as I remember, gamekeeper Mellors wasn't in the army under Clifford Chatterley, and having glossed over this after it was established at the outset it didn't rear its head again until the end. And then used just to make a cheap political point when Mellors came with Constance to the mine in order for her to ask for a divorce. (Oddly in a very expensive car driven by the pheasant rearer.)
However, there were at least two good things: Stirling performances from both James Norton as Clifford Chatterley and his eccentric invalid carriage made from an upturned bath. But what will happen in a low budget The Go-Between? Leo Colston just having to run back and forth across the lawn to a greenhouse? Cider With Rosie in a Gloucestershire pub yard with a bottle of Woodpecker? Let's see, I don't want to be hasty.
