Alan Bell - Last of the Summer Wine: From the Directors Chair

The colour of summers gone,
Of golden days when I was young,
Of girls who came but soon moved on.
Is in my summer wine.

The perfumes of earth and vine,
Of meadows when the rain has gone,
Of women with their finery on.
Is in my summer wine.

The memories I can see,
Here in my cup,
Of sweet short days, bitter days,
Now all drunk up.

The taste of the life that slips,
From day to day through fingers blind,
The honey from the womans lips,
Is in my summer wine.

Lyrics to Last of the Summer Wine By Roy Clarke

It was a privilege to work with such a wise and creative director as Alan Bell. He had the gift of lifting Roy Clarkes wonderful writing off the page bringing it to life. He would capture stunning and beautiful backgrounds and place the actors in front where he would bring out the best performances in us all. He knew every scene; he made them warm and he made them funny. His work was a joy to watch - great fun for all ages. Thank you Alan, I would say you were The Best of the Summer Wine.

Russ Abbot

The legendary Alan J W Bell directed two of the Ripping Yarns. He will say they were the best two, and few would disagree with him, owing to his powerful muscular build and violently aggressive tendencies. I actually think they were pretty good, and I very much enjoyed working with him despite his powerful muscular build and violently aggressive tendencies. What I liked about Alan was that he was always prepared to spend as much of the BBCs money as possible. Both Terry and myself felt it very important that Ripping Yarns looked like small cinema films and Alan was definitely up for this. Whether footballing in Yorkshire or driving perilously close to the cliff edge in Cornwall, he helped make Light Entertainment look like drama and we are both very much indebted to him for this.

Can I go now please, Alan. Youre hurting my arm!

Michael Palin

Alan produced and directed Last of the Summer Wine for 29 years, and his account of that time is a MUST READ for all Summer Wine lovers.

Alans knowledgeable direction and ability to discover so many beautiful locations in Yorkshire created a great atmosphere in which to work. He was, like all of us, surprised and disappointed when some new blood at the BBC decided to cancel a show which gave such pleasure to millions of viewers all over the world.

June Whitfield

Foggy, Compo and Clegg in Bicycle Bonanza (1995).

From the Directors Chair

by Producer and Director
Alan J W Bell

First published in 2012 by

Tomahawk Press
PO Box 1236
Sheffield S11 7XU
England
www.tomahawkpress.com

Alan J W Bell 2012

The right of Alan J W Bell to be identified as the author of this work is hereby asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or other information retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

ISBN 13: 978-0-9566834-2-7

Proofread by Kenneth Bishton
Edited by Bruce Sachs
Designed by Tree Frog Communication 01245 445377
Printed in England by bookprintinguk.com

All photographs used in this book are Alan J W Bell with acknowledgement to Malcolm Howarth

LAST OF THE SUMMER WINE is BBC Television

To my wife Constance and my daughter Cheraine

It seemed that I had no sooner completed the first television series of The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy (1981), when that spring I was given the sixth series of Last of the Summer Wine to produce and direct. I suppose it was obvious that my treatment of those Galactic adventures was exactly what was needed for a gentle series about three elderly gentlemen wandering around the Yorkshire countryside.

Little did I know then that, 29 years later, I would still be making Last of the Summer Wine for the British Broadcasting Corporation, and that, as a career move, it had failed miserably. Well, in truth, not at all miserably for although I had got myself into a sort of rut, it was a hugely enjoyable rut.

I was the fourth producer to be charged with making what would become a milestone in the history of television comedy. For 38 years, Last of the Summer Wine had a large and enthusiastic following, and holds the record as the longest-running situation comedy series in the world. Even the hugely successful Lucille Ball series in America (in three different formats) only ran for 18 years. And besides that formidable record, each and every one of the 284 scripts was written by only one man Roy Clarke who, in my opinion, is the finest writer of comedy in the history of television.

Truly, Alvin and Clegg at Yateholme Reservoir

In my telling of the background to making some of the 250 episodes of Last of the Summer Wine that I personally produced and directed, there are quite a few instances where I took Roys funny ideas and adjusted them to make them visually stronger or, sometimes, just to make them practical to film. It is easy to improve an idea, but the hard bit is writing the scripts initially - which Roy Clarke did with all the confidence and ease of a master craftsman. Roy keenly protected his work from interference, and any of my suggestions (mostly visual) that were used were always with the consent of that master of comedy. However, I have to confess that it gives me a great deal of personal pleasure to hear someone say that they especially liked the episode where a mangle demolished a police car or when Compo was in a home-made submarine.

The fact is that visual comedy is always more memorable than the words, but - without any doubt whatsoever it is the strength of Roy Clarkes funny scripts that kept the series so popular and fresh for nearly 40 years with young and old alike.

I have always considered it an honour to have produced a comedy series that was described in The Daily Telegraph in 1996 as being the favourite programme of none other than Her Majesty the Queen:

Those who come down for dinner at Sandringham before the titles have rolled are warned not to blunder into the drawing room where she is watching it.

However, it always puzzled the cast that, shortly after this Royal accolade was published, the Queen made an official visit to the BBC, whereupon she was taken to meet the cast of the ever-popular serial EastEnders. Somehow, I just cant imagine Her Majesty bolting the doors to her drawing room to enjoy the latest squabble at the local Laundromat as engrossing as it may be. Of course, it is possible that Her Majesty was pleased that EastEnders honoured her great ancestor by naming its local public house The Queen Victoria.

It has to be accepted that, in recent years, there was always a faction within the BBC that resented the brilliance of those creative executive producers way back in 1972 (namely Duncan Wood and Bill Cotton) who commissioned Roy Clarke not yet a comedy writer - to write a series about three older men in their second youth, and their spirited exploits in the countryside. Never before and I doubt if ever again, has there been a comedy series which was so popular for so long.