EVERYTHING AND THE KITCHEN SINK

I love the films from the 1950s and 1960s and this new book, Everything And The Kitchen Sink - UK Film, Music and TV Before The Beatles, written by Simon Matthews, looks in detail at a period whose movies, and TV programmes, have been classed as 'Kitchen Sink Drama'.

The term 'Kitchen Sink Drama' comes from a British cultural movement from the 1950s/1960s that used social realism to depict the gritty and everyday lives of working-class people. It focussed on many themes including social inequality, poverty, pregnancy, abortion, domestic struggles and created the disillusioned, rebellious working-class heroes who, frustrated with the hand they had been dealt in life, became 'Angry Young Men.'

The term originated from a 1954 article by an art critic on young painters who concentrated on mundane domestic scenes. The movement began in British theatre but soon spread to film and TV. 

Over seven main chapters Matthews gives the reader a detailed look at the many films released during the 1950s and 1960s including such classics as A Taste Of Honey, Saturday Night And Sunday Morning, Room At The Top, The Leather Boys, Look Back In Anger, Billy Liar and A Kind Of Loving.

There are details about how many of the films started life as books and stage plays, including where the plays were first performed. Problems finding distributors and the different actors who were considered for the lead and supporting roles are covered in comprehensive detail and make for fascinating reading.

The list of people mentioned in the book reads like a who's who with authors and playwrights (John Osborne, Alan Sillitoe, Shelagh Delaney), actors (Albert Finney, Alan Bates, Rita Tushingham, Leonard Rossiter) and producers and directors (Michael Winner, Richard Lester and Ken Loach) all featured.

There are too many other movies to list here but A Place To Go, The L-Shaped Room, Idol On Parade, The Loneliness Of The Long-Distance Runner, Lucky Jim and Only Two Can Play are just a few that are covered in similar detail to the rest.

Both Tony Hancock and Peter Sellers  work on TV, radio and films is covered with a look at Hancock's Half Hour, The Rebel, The Goon Show, Carlton Browne Of The F. O. and I'm Alright Jack among others.

During the late-1950s and throughout the 1960s there were many 'pop' musicals that featured the top artists/groups of the time. Most were simply vehicles to bring together a selection of current hits wrapped up in flimsy plots. However, they were very popular at the time and I have fond memories of many of them.

The book looks at a few of these... It's Trad Dad! (Helen Shapiro), Play It Cool (Billy Fury), What A Crazy World (Joe Brown), Serious Charge (Cliff Richard) and Expresso Bongo (Cliff Richard), the two Cliff Richard movies having a more serious storyline than many of the others. This all leads to The Beatles and A Hard Days Night.

A number of TV productions are also included, many of which I remember watching as a youngster... Z-Cars (one of my favourites), Dixon Of Dock Green, Danger Man, Coronation Street, The Avengers and Steptoe & Son.

As well as the 'Pop' musicals discussed earlier, a number of music programmes also get a mention... Oh Boy!, Six-Five Special, Ready Steady Go and Top Of The Pops.

One of my favourite movies from this period is Beat Girl, set in the Soho scene and starring Adam Faith, Gillian Hills, Noelle Adam and Christopher Lee with music by Adam Faith and The John Barry Seven and I was pleased to see it covered.

The book includes a foreword by Sir Tom Courtenay, a detailed list of commercially released music related to the films, theatre and TV productions mentioned in the book with details of singles, extended play releases and long playing albums and a comprehensive index to the books content.

There are so many great stories throughout the book and I'll leave it to the reader to find out more. However, I do want to mention one that I found very interesting, regarding The Beatles and their first film role. I have added additional information to that covered in the book.

In 1964 A Hard Days Night was released and became an instant and major success, as did the accompanying soundtrack album and singles that were released.

However it could all have been so different. The Beatles were first offered a chance to appear in the 1963 film The Yellow Teddybears, a slice-of-life drama whose plot was described as... 'A clique of girls in an English school who wore small yellow teddy bears on their uniforms to signify that they were no longer virgins!' The leader of the girls, Linda, fears she might be pregnant by her boyfriend, with the name 'Kinky', a wannabe singer.

The movie, directed by Robert Hartford-Davis with a script by Donald Ford and Derek Ford, had a cast that included Jacqueline Ellis, Georgina Patterson, Annette Whiteley, Jill Adams and Iain Gregory.

In the movie The Beatles would be required to sing six songs, none of which would be written by them. It was also going to be released with an alternate, and less-appealing, title... Gutter Girls!

Manager Brian Epstein, and no doubt the band themselves, turned the offer down. Paul McCartney, in later interviews said, "We were excited but it turned out that the fella involved was going to write all the songs, and we couldn't have that." John Lennon also had a few words of his own, "We didn't even want to make a movie that was going to be bad, and we insisted on having a real writer to write it." Fortunately Alun Owen wrote a screenplay that did appeal to the band... A Hard Days Night and the rest, as they say, is history.

Taking a slight detour I wanted to mention a Hidden London Tour I went on a few years ago... Euston Underground - The Lost Tunnels. What has this to do with the book I hear you say. Well, the tour included walks along old running tunnels, passenger walkways and old lift shafts, all of which hadn't been accessed by passengers for many years.

One tunnel was a fascinating trip into the past with the walls covered in adverts and original movie posters from the 1950s and 1960s. One poster was for 1962's A Kind Of Loving and is shown above. There were many others advertising titles like West Side Story, Psycho and The Terror Of The Tongs, although none of these fall into the 'Kitchen Sink Drama' category. 

I really enjoyed this book and it bought back so many memories and has prompted me to add many of the films mentioned in the book to my Blu-Ray collection. I also learnt so much more about the films, directors, authors, artists, screenwriters and fascinating background to the making of the films, especially locations used.

If I had one minor complaint, and it takes nothing away from the text in the book, is the lack of illustrative material. Yes, there are a handful of great black & white, period photos but a book like this would have benefitted from more images including original posters, lobby cards, advertising material, cinema ads and publicity photos. I have included a collage of several of these above to help illustrate my review/article.

Despite the above comment, this book gets five-stars from me and is highly recommended... I'm now off to watch A Kind OF Loving.