Some of the studios below are primarily film studios but have been used to make television programmes. Others are loosely associated with the history of ITV or Channel 4. However, they were not directly connected with them - each coming into service for its own unique reason. In some cases they have been around for many years and continue to provide useful facilities to the industry.
studios listed below in the order they originally opened:
Walton Studios (Hepworth, Nettlefold, Sapphire)
Elstree (British National, BIP, ABPC, EMI, EMI-MGM,Thorn-EMI, Cannon, Goldcrest, Elstree Film and TV, Elstree Studios)
Shepperton (Sound City, British Lion, Lion International, Lee International, Scott brothers, Pinewood-Shepperton, Pinewood Studios Group) includes Lion Television
Crystal Palace (Baird Television Ltd)
Pinewood (Rank, Pinewood-Shepperton)
Windmill St & Whitfield St (TVR/TVI)
Dean Street (Intertel, Trilion)
Wandsworth Studios (Ewarts, Capital, Manoto TV)
Battersea Studios (ILEA, independent)
New Malden (Fountain, Presteign, Musflash, Revelation TV)
Wimbledon (formerly Merton) (talkbackTHAMES, Panther/Unitbase)
Technicolor Studios, Chiswick Park (Disney, Technicolor Network Services)
Stephen Street (Pearson, talkbackTHAMES)
(Riverside Studios are covered on the old BBC studios page)
(Fountain and MTV studios are covered on the old ITV studios page)
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NB - I have where possible given the dimensions of the studios. This can be a bit of a minefield. BBC studios, Fountain, Teddington, Riverside and even Pinewood TV have their plans drawn in metric 50:1 but for some reason The London Studios (LWT) still use the very similar 1/4 inch to the foot scale. This slight but significant difference can cause problems if a set moves from one studio to another with plans of a different scale as it might not fit! Also, for marketing purposes the size of a studio is often quoted wall to wall. However, most of them have fire lanes running round each side so the available space for cameras and sets is somewhat smaller. Where possible I have quoted sizes within firelanes and in feet or 'metric feet' where applicable. This curious measurement was invented by the BBC and is 30cm in length. (If you think back to your old school rulers, they had 12 inches on one side and 30cm, which is very slightly less, on the other.) It does mean that a studio that is marked as 90 metric feet long is actually 88ft 6ins long. Most TV studios have their length and width within the firelanes clearly marked along the walls and/or on the floor in feet or metric feet. This enables the scene crew to put the set up exactly where it was drawn on the designer's plan. This very useful facility is never seen on film stages which, incidentally, are always still measured in feet and inches. |
Walton Studios - film studios with a huge influence on the early years of British television
1899 - 1962
In order to reduce the enormity of the mountain I have given myself to climb in creating this website, I have not included studios that weren't actually equipped to make programmes on multicamera video - even if they have produced programmes shown on television. Ealing Studios are, for example, not included. However, I have broken my own rule by including Shepperton and of course Elstree Film and TV Studios and my history of Pinewood strays beyond the two television studios there. One of my regular correspondents, Mitch Mitchell, is a great fan of old TV dramas and in the nicest possible way he put some pressure on me to include a reference to Walton Studios. Since he did take the trouble to write to me with huge amounts of useful info on all kinds of other studios - I feel obliged to acquiesce....
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The studios were in Walton-on-Thames, not far from Shepperton. They started life back in 1899, when Cecil Hepworth leased a house for £36 a year and built a 15ft x 8ft 'stage'. Hepworth was an inventor of exhibition and photographic equipment who had decided that he wanted to try his hand at film making. He created a production company - Hepwix - and began by making 'actualities', or local newsreels. He then moved on to making films using trick photography in his tiny studio. By 1905 Hepworth had added a large glass stage - using frosted glass to diffuse the light. Thus Hepworth Studios were created. He seems to have been a man full of imagination - as well as probably filming the first slow-motion footage, he also devised a system of mounting a camera dolly on a short length of railway-type track - thus probably creating the first tracking shots in cinema. Unlike other studios, production continued at the studio through the First World War, both by making propaganda films and by renting to visiting companies. Many films were made by the Hepworth company and several actors became stars as a result. Perhaps the best remembered today is Ronald Colman. However, following the Great War, British film companies were all struggling to survive and in 1923, despite some critical successes, both Cecil Hepworth and his film company were declared bankrupt. By then there were two stages and the studios were very well equipped. However, the receiver was a man who knew nothing of the value of all this and it was all sold off at a pittance - the library of old films made by Hepworth melted down to make dope for aircraft wings. In 1926 the studios were purchased by Archibald Nettlefold, a theatrical producer and recreational farmer who was part of a family of industrialists from Birmingham. Now there's a combination. (His surname was in fact the 'N' in the engineering company 'GKN.') The newly renamed Nettlefold Studios made a few comedy silents which were not hugely successful and were one of the last studios to convert to sound in 1930. However, they quickly caught up and in 1932 were the first studio in Britain with the new 'high fidelity' sound system. Nettlefold acquired further land at the rear of the studios and expanded Hepworth's original site, enjoying a fruitful relationship with Butcher's Films. The next few years saw Nettlefold Studios concentrate on making quota quickies. These were paid for by the big US film companies at the rate of £1 per foot so they had to be made very cheaply and quickly. Like most film studios around London, Nettlefold was commandeered by the government for the duration of the Second World War. Initially this was for storage but following a direct hit to their factory at Kingston-upon-Thames only five miles away, the Vickers-Armstrong aircraft company moved here and built two new hangars. It is not clear what happened to Nettlefold himself but by 1947 the studios were owned by Ernest G. Roy and had three stages, including the two new aircraft hangers. A modest string of films was produced but the studios lacked the driving force of Nettlefold. By the mid 1950s they had succumbed to the overall decline that saw many studios go under. However, rather than close - their saviour was the newly emerging world of commercial television.
Television saves the day... In 1955 Sapphire Films began hiring studio space, eventually buying the studios and renaming them Walton Studios. The company was owned by the powerful American producer Hannah Weinstein. In order to avoid the anti-Communist persecution and hysteria of McCarthyism sweeping the US in the early 1950s, Weinstein had moved her family to Europe in 1950 and established her own production company, Sapphire Films, in London in 1952. She pre-sold the idea of a Robin Hood series to an American flour company with the same name (they would sponsor the series in America) but because her politics were known to be left-wing she was unable to make the series in the US. England was no problem of course and since the series was made here she also did a deal with Lew Grade's ITC company to sell initially 39 half hour episodes of The Adventures of Robin Hood. Over the following four years no less than 143 episodes were made on 35mm film. The series made a star of Richard Greene, and the opening musical sting and theme tune were sung by small boys in playgrounds all over the country for many years. Dozens of well-known English actors performed in the programme - some playing more than one part over the years. The scripts were of an unusually high quality because Weinstein made use of McCarthy-era blacklisted American screen writers, working under assumed names. Often stories contained themes exploring social justice - the subject matter was of course highly suited to that. Ironically, it became as popular in the US as it was in Britain. Each episode took only four and a half days to shoot. Of course, to make that many episodes so quickly involved revolutionary film-making techniques. The most original was that the scenery was made in sections that could be re-arranged in any order and almost everything was on wheels. It was said that they could change a set and be ready to shoot in six minutes. The man responsible for devising this technique was Peter Proud, an art director with 28 years of film experience. Setting and striking is normally very time-consuming but lighting a set can take even longer. Proud's solution at Walton Studios was to have a pre-lit area and simply move the set into the light. Bushes and lightweight canvas tree trunks were trucked about to form various parts of the forest and 'stone' walls and doorways instantly became different rooms or corridors within a castle. There was one enormous hollow tree that appeared in almost every episode in a different place. Viewers must have assumed that Sherwood Forest was riddled with hollow trees. There were sometimes a few exterior shots and these were mostly done around Runnymead and Windsor Great Park, just a few miles up the river Thames. They were usually shot by a second unit, often using stunt riders rather than the leads and rarely involving any dialogue. The series developed a visual style of its own and was hugely popular. So much so that Lew Grade decided to make something very similar himself. Thus at his newly acquired National Film Studios in Elstree, ITP (the production arm of ITC) began to make The Adventures of William Tell. The two series were almost identical in style and were shown by ATV around the same time. Most people would have assumed they were made by the same company but no. Sapphire Films sold the programmes to ITC who sold them to ATV. Sapphire made several more series employing the same excellent screen writers: The Adventures of Sir Lancelot (1956), The Buccaneers (1956), Sword of Freedom (1957) and detective/spy series The Four Just Men (1959). For many people of a certain generation these programmes made by Sapphire at Walton-on-Thames epitomise some of the best of British television from the late 50s/early '60s. One would have thought that the success of this work would have guaranteed the longevity of the studios. However, several things combined to bring it all to a close. Apparently, Weinstein's new husband mortgaged the property and assets of the studios for the promise of a fortune in Florida. The fortune never came and he did a runner. Meanwhile, The Four Just Men was received with glowing reviews by critics in Britain and America. However, the 39 episode series was not deemed suitable by the US networks and was only syndicated by local stations. The income from US sales was therefore much less than had been anticipated. As distributors, ITC did their best to sell it around the world and had some success. Not enough to counter the lack of an American sponsor, however. At the same time, ITC were said to be driving a very hard bargain with regard to the amount they would pay Sapphire for any further shows they might make. The sums would simply not add up and the bank foreclosed. In 1962 Walton came into the hands of a liquidator once again and much of the equipment went to Shepperton. Stage 1 (the Robin Hood stage) was apparently sold off to be dismantled and re-erected at Bray - to become used by successful horror film makers Hammer Films. On the other hand, Shepperton also claim to have received this stage which became their I stage. Maybe more than one stage was dismantled and sold - after all, there were two hangers built during the war that were later turned into stages. No doubt the salesman claimed to both studios that the one they were buying was the actual 'Robin Hood Stage.' The studio lot was sold to the local Council and became Hepworth Way and part of the 1960s Walton-on-Thames shopping centre (now itself demolished.) The flats at Hepworth Way and the shopping centre apparently feature in the film Psychomania. I am told that it was also the location for Monty Python's 'Can housewives tell the difference between...?' sketch. In 1962 Weinstein returned to America, where she continued her political concerns. The only remaining part of the studios is the old power house, which was converted into a theatre some years ago and is used by the local amateur drama group.
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1925 - present
Boreham Wood was, in the 1920s, an area of fields and woodland with a single main road running through it. Near the station were a couple of pubs, a few shops and a scattered collection of houses owned mostly by commuters using the nearby Elstree railway station. The station is actually not even close to Elstree village which is a mile away at the top of a hill. It was, however, the nearest village when the station was opened. Thus, Elstree railway station is now in Borehamwood town centre. When the various studios were opened here they took their name from the station - not the wood, and so we had the various 'Elstree' studios which were actually in Borehamwood. Borehamwood expanded over the years - largely thanks to the film industry - and is now a large town whilst Elstree has remained a small village. Is that any clearer? No, I thought not.
The town of Borehamwood has over the years been home to six film studios (seven if you include ELP's Millennium Studios) and has often been dubbed the 'British Hollywood.' There is sometimes confusion amongst those not well-informed as to which films and TV programmes were made in which studio. By 'studio' I mean a site containing several film stages. This chapter deals with the site that is currently known simply as 'Elstree Studios'. (The only other studio still in operation in the town is the BBC Elstree Centre where EastEnders and Holby City are made.)
It was originally created in 1925 by a trio of entrepreneurs - J D Williams, W Schlesinger and Herbert Wilcox and was called British National Studios. There was a stormy two years of operation which ended with the company being taken over by John Maxwell, who had been called in to help by the original three. He renamed the company British International Pictures in 1927.
BIP produced dozens of films - many of them 'quota quickies' - in the years leading up to the war. In 1928 Maxwell began to create a cinema chain - Associated British Cinemas - which by 1930 had grown to 120. By the end of the 1930s BIP had evolved into the Associated British Picture Corporation (ABPC). The Elstree Studios still retained the name of BIP Studios, however, and when war broke out in 1939 they were commandeered by the Royal Ordnance Corps and used for storage. Maxwell died in 1940 and control of ABPC passed to Warner Bros.
Following the war, the stages were completely rebuilt, along with an impressive production block that faced the main road. The studio was then known as ABPC Studios. Four large stages were constructed and Hitchcock was one of the first directors to use the new studios with Stagefright. Our subject is television and the history of film-making here is well documented elsewhere. However - it is worth recording that the '50s, '60s and some of the '70s were particularly busy and many successful movies were made here ranging from Summer Holiday to Star Wars.
The four stages were joined by another - stage 5 - in the mid '50s. This was not particularly well soundproofed and apparently can be seen in the On The Buses films doubling as the exterior of the bus garage. In the late '50s one of the original stages was divided in two - thus creating stage 6. Some years later, following the construction of stages 7, 8 and 9 in 1966, this division was removed. In 1978 another stage 6 was constructed at the back of the site. This was huge - about 100ft x 300ft in fact - and was built for The Empire Strikes Back. Interestingly, there are currently plans to build a new stage of similar floor area.
However - we are getting ahead of ourselves. ABPC was somewhat reluctantly drawn into the new enterprise of commercial television in 1956. Its subsidiary, ABC Television, took over Warner Bros' studios at Teddington to make television programmes on video but there was plainly a market to make drama series on film too.
The photo above shows Elstree Studios in 1982 - then known as 'Thorn-EMI Elstree Studios.' At that time there were 9 stages. The large block in the centre of the picture with the zig-zag roofs contained stages 1-4, constructed in 1948. The roof of the one top left had been rebuilt and was stage 3. It was severely damaged by fire in 1979 during the completion of filming of The Shining - hence the new roof. The huge one at the back was stage 6 and was built for The Empire Strikes Back in 1978. It was about 275 feet long! Its size is roughly similar to 7, 8 and 9 together, which form the block on the centre left of the picture. Stage 5 was the square-shaped building with the pitched roof in the upper centre.
The triangular shape top centre was the outdoor tank which was built in 1955 for Moby Dick, starring Gregory Peck. For the last few years it has been where the Big Brother house is situated.
The studios look quite different now. The red line through the middle of the site indicates approximately where the divide was between the remaining film studios on the left and what became Tescos and its car park on the right. Thus, 6 stages were lost in 1989.
Today 7, 8 and 9 still remain. The three long buildings with dark roofs that can be seen centre left were were replaced with new offices and workshops in the late 1980s. When the site became Elstree Film and TV Studios in 1996, stages 5 and 6 were created out of space within these buildings. Most importantly, stages 1and 2 (The George Lucas Stage) were opened in 1999. They are situated at the back of the site on the lot and dominate the skyline. Thus against the odds, in recent years the studios have transformed themselves into a busy and successful enterprise.
Shepperton Studios
1932 - present
Strictly speaking, Shepperton should not be included as part of this history as it has no fully equipped television studios. However, from 1955 - when Associated-Rediffusion started to film programmes here because they feared that their Wembley studios would not be ready - to the present day, since television dramas are still filmed here - these studios have played a part in our television history. As well as single camera drama, the stages have also from time to time seen various shows recorded on tape using outside broadcast units.
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Shepperton currently has the largest number of sound stages of any studio site in Europe. However, it began many years ago - like several UK film studios - growing up around a grand house and estate. In this case, Littleton Park - a 17th century manor house surrounded by 60 acres. The house has changed considerably over the years and was extensively rebuilt at the end of the 19th century following a fire. In 1928 Norman Loudon bought the estate. He was a camera manufacturer but also made a small fortune selling 'flicker' books that gave an impression of movement when flicked with a thumb. His ambitions were rather greater however and in 1932 he founded Sound City Film Producing and Recording Studios. Two stages were constructed in the grounds - one at 110ft x 80 ft and later a second stage 80ft x 45ft. Both of these were destroyed during the Second World War although the larger stage was rebuilt to become L stage. This is now 100ft x 65ft and is due to be demolished eventually as part of the planned redevelopment of the site over the next ten years. In 1936 stages A/B and C/D were constructed. (A and C are 150ft x 120ft; B and D are 100ft x 120ft) These still form the hub of the site. They were superbly designed, with excellent sound insulation and ventilation plants. They form two pairs that are separated by connecting doors, so a very long set can be constructed if necessary. The ability to link two of the stages was, incidentally, used for the 2008 series of Gladiators - made for Sky 1. The show was made on stages A and B and was shot in HD using an OB unit for facilities.
During the war the four large stages were used at first to store sugar, later to manufacture bomber parts when the Vickers-Armstrong factory a few miles away suffered a direct hit. Meanwhile, thousands of decoy aircraft, tanks and guns were built in the scenery construction workshops. These were used to help confuse the pilots of enemy aircraft both in the UK and in North Africa. Following the war in 1945 Sound City reopened, with all four large stages plus the smaller L stage. A year later Shepperton was bought by successful film maker Alexander Korda, who renamed it British Lion Studio Company. In 1948 the huge H stage was moved here from Isleworth Studios. At the time it was the largest stage in Europe at 250ft x 120ft or 30,000 sq ft. It is probably the ugliest film stage in the UK but my word, it is big! (Nevertheless, it is only about half the size of the latest 007 Stage at Pinewood, which is 59,000 sq ft.) It has a small tank but what makes the H stage unique is that the entire floor area can be flooded! The H stage is due to be demolished in the next few years under current plans and replaced with another on a different part of the site. My guess is that this is at least five years away as it comes well down the list of proposed phases in the redevelopment of Shepperton. It is currently equipped with an enormous 360 degree green screen cyclorama. Its ability to be flooded was made use of in 2004 when it housed the huge set for the Bat Cave in Batman Begins, complete with flowing river. Further investment was made in the studios and in 1953 E, F and G stages were built. (E and F are both 72ft x 44ft; G is 94ft x 72ft) These three stages came into their own in 1955 when Associated-Rediffusion needed a bank of programmes shot on film to get them through the first few weeks of broadcasting. Their Wembley television studios were only just going to be ready in time for the first transmission date. In Derek Threadgall's excellent book 'Shepperton Studios, an independent view' he quotes Peter Graham Scott...
Korda was one of the greats of the British film industry and under his stewardship several successful films were made. However, the company's finances were built on shaky ground. In 1955 the company was wound up and British Lion Films took over the assets of its predecessor. Sadly Korda died of a heart attack in 1956. In 1957 the four main stages were modernised with new grids but 1961 was the year that saw huge investment here. A new dubbing theatre was built, as were new wardrobe blocks for stages A/B, C/D and E F G. A 'new' stage - I (124ft x 57ft) - was moved here from Walton Studios where it had been used in the filming of The Adventures of Robin Hood which had been made for ATV. Interestingly, I have also read that a stage was moved to Bray Studios from Walton where it also became known as the 'Robin Hood Stage'! Can both stories be right? Walton did have more than one stage so - maybe. Controversially, in the same year the old stable block and distinctive clock tower were demolished along with the restaurant and bar in the Old House to make way for stages J and K. These were considerably smaller than the present J and K. J was 80ft x 36ft and K was a tiny 36ft x 35ft. They were built specifically for screen tests and to be used for television commercials and dramas - although it is not recorded how much of this use they actually had. Certainly, J was too small to be used for anything that needed more than a simple set or two and K was too small to be used for much at all other than pack shots. These stages were adapted into a three story admin building in 1996 when the new J and K were built. This was named the David Lean Building.
In 1965 Stanley Kubrick made a relatively brief return visit to Shepperton. Here's a snippet that might be of interest to film buffs of a certain age and disposition. The first day's shooting on 2001: A Space Odyssey was on the H stage. The set was the excavated site on the Moon where the monolith had been discovered. The 'hole' was 150ft x 50ft x 20 ft deep and at one end had an area representing the Moon's surface. The first day of shooting this extraordinary film was December 29th 1965, some three and a half years before a man would actually step onto the Moon itself. (The majority of the film was shot at the MGM studios in Borehamwood, where it occupied most of the stages there for several years.) Oh well - I think it's interesting, anyway. British Lion's success grew during the 1960s but they were constantly fighting the overall decline in the British film industry as a whole. Nevertheless, investment continued - in 1965 L stage was re-equipped. In fact, between 1958 and 1966 half a million pounds (a great deal of money at the time) was spent on new buildings and equipment. Unfortunately, during the '70s the decline began to seriously affect the viability of British Lion. In 1972, the company was taken over by Barclay Securities. They intended to redevelop much of the site (a familiar story unfortunately) but fortunately and rather surprisingly, tree preservation orders prevented them from carrying out their plans. A campaign was begun to save the studios which resulted in a deal in 1973, whereby the original studio backlot would be sold off but twenty acres would be retained, which included all the existing stages. Barclay Securities was at this time taken over by J H Vavasseur and Co., who became the new owners of Shepperton Studios. A new deal was struck that increased the site by another two acres but the plans included the proposal to move H stage (again) to another part of the site. It didn't happen. By 1974 the studios were said to be in a run-down state. Studio equipment was sold off to pay for the rebuilding of some roads and the rewiring of several of the stages. Yet another owner arrived in June 1975 when British Lion (by then called Lion International) was bought by Spikings and Deeley. They shortly afterwards changed the name to Mills and Allen International. I hope you're keeping up with all this. In 1977 some of the site including the original entrance was sold off to be used for housing. This saved the studios from closure. Another part of the site was also threatened but was leased by a company owned by The Who. They took over six acres including Littleton House and J and K stages. The redevelopment of that part of the site was thus prevented. In 1984 a major upturn in the fortunes of Shepperton began when the whole site, including The Who's land was purchased by the Lee brothers for £3.6m. They also later took back ownership of the land occupied by the old H stage, which you'll remember had been threatened with demolition to make way for more housing. Lee were running Wembley studios at the time and had had some success there with a mix of commercials, filmed TV drama and one or two major feature films a year. Shepperton became Lee International Studios and a programme of investment began. In fact, they also kept Wembley on until July 1986 - which at the time rather confusingly also had the name 'Lee International Film Studios.' During 1985 stages L and M were upgraded and new workshops surrounding stages A/B and C/D were constructed. These included smart new lighting stores - not surprising considering the new owners! The following year a stylish new art department building adjoining a large workshop block was completed. All seemed to be going very well. The company was so confident in fact, that in 1987 Lee International bought the Panavision company. This stretched the finances considerably but it looked like a good idea at the time. Sadly, very shortly afterwards came 'Black Monday' and huge amounts were wiped off the value of shares worldwide. The company was in difficulties and other problems began to emerge which led to a serious fraud office investigation. Not only that, but film making dried up thanks to a strike by the US Screen Writers' Guild. American investment bankers Warburg-Pincus bought out the company, and the Lee brothers lost the influence they had enjoyed over the industry for many years. The studios continued to operate under the Lee International name, however. I have read that the emphasis of operations at Shepperton focussed on television production around this time, but I have yet to establish any typical examples of dramas or series. The new owners continued with the steady programme of investment. In 1994, R and S stages were opened on the northern edge of the site alongside H stage. (R is 120ft x 85ft and S is 100ft x 100ft) They were constructed using the steel from the old stage 6 at Elstree, previously built for The Empire Strikes Back. The original Elstree stage had been dismantled to make way for a Tesco superstore and sold to Shepperton. R and S are a different shape from the one they were built from and in fact some steel remained - it being used on the later construction of the W stage. In 1995 a new chapter began when Ridley and Tony Scott bought the studios. They immediately brought an experienced and fresh eye to the studios which became known simply as 'Shepperton Studios'. Within a few months they began to develop much of the site with new facilities. In 1996 three stages were built. W is 130ft x 80ft and the double stage J & K are larger - J is 150ft x 100ft and K is 120ft x 100ft. When it opened, the building was one single very large stage and was used for the film Lost in Space. After that movie wrapped it was divided into the present two stages - J & K. The earlier much smaller J and K were adapted to become The David Lean Building. The next five years saw a period of stability during which the studios were used for many big British and international movies. By now, Shepperton was equipped with many good sized stages and a useful back lot that were attracting film makers. However, they were in direct competition with Pinewood which was not helping either of them financially. Each studio was also having to turn movies down because they weren't quite big enough to fit in all the potential work. The answer was to combine assets so on 11th February 2001 a merger with Pinewood was announced and a new company - Pinewood-Shepperton plc - was formed. They are still known as Shepperton Studios but are now part of the Pinewood Studios Group that can now offer facilities to production companies at this site as well as at Pinewood and Teddington. Shepperton is purely a film studio complex with no dedicated TV studios at present. However, in May 2004 they submitted a planning application to carry out a major rebuilding programme over ten years. (See www.spelthorne.gov.uk/env_shepperton_studios.htm) This will increase the amount of square footage of stages and supporting areas by more than twenty percent. Interestingly, the application is to 'provide additional film and television accommodation including: studios/stages...' (my emphasis) It is not clear whether the intention is to build fully equipped television studios but that could be implied. This would be an interesting development for the industry although it appears that under the proposed phasing of construction any new stages will not be built for some years yet. Frankly, I think the construction of any TV studios at Shepperton is unlikely - with any such development being far more likely to be undertaken in due course at Pinewood.
In September 2006, Pinewood Shepperton plc announced that it had entered into a joint venture with Morley Fund Management Limited on behalf of Aviva plc Life Funds. The 50:50 joint venture, called Shepperton Studio Property Partnership, acquired the 999 year leasehold interest of Shepperton Studios with a view to further developing the studio in line with the planning consents achieved by the company. Thus, the new partnership will release the funding necessary to begin the ambitious construction plans mentioned above. The construction of 'I block' began in late 2006 - the John Mills building being completed in 2007 and the 60,000 sq ft Gainsborough Building opening in June 2008. The latter block contains offices and facilities for media companies and additional space for productions currently shooting on the Shepperton stages.
I have hardly mentioned any films made here in the history of the studio site above. The list is almost endless and is easily found in several excellent books about Shepperton. However - it would be wrong not to mention any so here are a few notable ones from the post-war years... An Ideal Husband ('47), The Third Man ('49), The Wooden Horse ('50), The Sound Barrier ('52), The Colditz Story ('54), Hobson's Choice ('54), Richard III ('55), Room at the Top ('58), Our Man in Havana ('59), I'm All Right Jack ('59), The Angry Silence ('60), The Guns of Navarone ('61), The L-Shaped Room ('62), Dr Strangelove, Or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb ('63), Becket ('64), The Spy Who Came in From The Cold ('64), Darling ('65), A Man For All Seasons ('66), Oliver! ('68), The Day of the Jackal ('72), Young Winston ('72), Return of the Pink Panther ('75), Alien ('78), Privates on Parade ('81), Ghandi ('82), Nineteen Eighty-Four ('83), The Company of Wolves ('84), Passage To India ('84), Out Of Africa ('85), Cry Freedom ('86), 84 Charing Cross Road ('86), Gorillas in the Mist ('87), Henry V ('88), Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves ('90), The Crying Game ('91), Mary Shelley's Frankenstein ('93), Four Weddings and a Funeral ('93), The Madness of King George ('94), Sense and Sensibility ('94), Shadowlands ('94), Braveheart ('95), Evita ('95), Elizabeth ('96), Sliding Doors ('97), Shakespeare in Love ('98), Notting Hill ('98), Gladiator ('98), The End of the Affair ('98), Billy Elliot ('99), Spy Game ('00), Chocolat ('00), Possession ('01), Love Actually ('02), K19: The Widowmaker ('02), Finding Neverland ('02), Calender Girls ('02), Troy ('03), Stage Beauty ('03), Mrs Henderson Presents ('04), Batman Begins ('04), The Da Vinci Code ('05), His Dark Materials: The Golden Compass ('06), Black Book ('06), Inkheart ('08), Moon ('08), The Boat that Rocked ('08), FAQs About Time Travel ('08), The Young Victoria ('08), Robin Hood ('09), Nine ('09), Chatroom ('10), Captain America ('10), Hugo Cabret ('10), 47 Ronin ('11), Last Passenger ('11), A Fantastic Fear of Everything ('12) The list above is very impressive and what strikes me is the continuing consistency of the high quality of the films over the years. It is also nice to see that the studios have produced so many excellent British films. Shepperton has been used for several multicamera TV productions over the years. These include You Bet ('88-'95) the later series of Red Dwarf ('91-'99) The National Lottery Big Ticket ('98) and all the episodes of The Vicar of Dibley ('94-'06). I had the pleasure of lighting the Christmas and new year episodes for 2004/5 on stage B. As mentioned above, Sky 1's Gladiators ('08) was recorded here too - series one on A and B stages and series 2 just on the A stage. In 2011 ITV's Dancing on Ice moved to the J and K stages at Shepperton from its previous home at Elstree but it will return to Elstree in 2012. I hope to add a list of single-camera television drama and comedy shot here in due course but I have noted that Blackadder Back and Forth was shot here in 1999, Jam and Jerusalem in 2006 and BBC comedy Beautiful People was made here in 2008. For several years, the longest-running sitcom on British TV was made at Shepperton. I refer of course to Last of the Summer Wine. The interiors were shot here on single camera and the final edited programme projected to a studio audience at Teddington to record their reaction. Interestingly, despite the longevity of the show (and its cast), in its final years it was shot using the latest HD camera technology. One assumes this was to make the most of the beautiful location sequences rather than revealing all the crags and crevices of the distinguished cast.
Whilst dealing with Shepperton, a brief mention should be made about Lion Television Services. This company was an offshoot of British Lion Films and was led by Peter Lloyd, who had previously been running the Granville Studio. It was formed in 1969 and was an independent company with an OB unit that was based at these studios, occasionally using one of the stages to make programmes. Regarding Lion TV, Mike Fitch has sent me the following... '...originally formed by an ex-ATV producer called Peter Lloyd. We had a garage and offices built on the left hand side just after coming through the main gate. We didn't fit out a studio there but we often used the scanner as a plug in to a studio with great success. We started off with a b&w scanner with Emi 2028 cameras, whilst we were building our colour scanner which was equipped with LDK 3 cameras. The first Head of Cameras was Roy Garner, ex ATV and then it was the late Dave Swann who tragically died in 1989 in a hotel fire in Bulgaria. The other cameramen at that time were John Howard, an Oz whereabouts not known, Barrie Dodd, who is Head of Cameras at Visions Mobiles, and Dave Barber (Rocket) who eventually formed his own OB company which is Telegenic. After a couple of years British Lion put us up for sale and we were bought by Trident Recordings, who renamed us Trilion.' Trilion are covered elsewhere on this page.
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Crystal Palace - John Logie Baird's independent studio centre.
1933 - 1939
Now you're probably like me and thought that John Logie Baird was something of an eccentric. A bit of a loner perhaps, working on a few tabletop experiments and creating a simple mechanical television system that was doomed to fail. It was only out of kindness that the BBC let him have a go in a studio at Alexandra Palace but frankly it was never going to work.
Wrong.
Before moving into the BBC's studio B at Alexandra Palace he had built a fully operational television studio centre of his own at Crystal Palace which was considerably larger and arguably more sophisticated than the 'official' BBC studio. The man was clearly a genius and as well as the mechanical television system you've probably heard of, he produced a 600-line colour television system decades ahead of its time and was working on a 1000-line 'stereoscopic' colour system before he died in 1946.
There are many excellent websites and books detailing Baird's life and achievements which I would recommend tracking down. The subject of this website is television studios so I shall attempt to summarise what he created at Crystal Palace. Actually - not quite yet because first I should mention his previous studio at 133 Long Acre.
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Baird's Long Acre Studio At 3.30pm on Monday 14th July 1930, the first ever television play was transmitted. It came from Baird's studio and workshop in Long Acre. Baird had previously experimented at Motograph House in St.Martin's Lane but had moved to the larger Long Acre premises in 1928. He formed a new company - Baird Television Limited. The play was The Man With the Flower in His Mouth by Luigi Pirandello. No, I have no idea why that play, but it was fairly short, relatively simple to stage and had a cast of only three. The play was transmitted live and had 29 shots. Only one camera was used and according to Richard G Elen... 'The area that could be illuminated by the flying spot and reproduced with 30 lines was so small that only one actor could appear on “stage” at a time, with a special “fade board” of chequered squares slid in front of the photocells when it was necessary for a new actor to appear. And if any movements were too sudden, the system was all too likely to lose sync.' The BBC broadcast the signal on the 'National Programme' so goodness knows what the pictures must have sounded like to the normal wireless listener. In fact, the pictures and sound were transmitted on separate frequencies - vision on 356 metres and sound on 261 metres, medium wave. The disadvantage of the long wavelengths was that only low-definition television signals could be carried, but the great advantage lay in their large range. Viewers saw the play as far away as Dublin and even Lisbon. These people were mostly enthusiasts who had purchased their Baird 'Televisors' in order to see the experimental broadcasts. The transmission was clearly done with the blessing of the BBC who looked upon it as an interesting experiment but nothing to be taken too seriously. The BBC Year Book of 1931 states... 'The experiment is still too recent for its implication to be grasped. It is possible that all the lessons learnt since the first play was broadcast will only need to be forgotten.' What on Earth did they mean by that??!! Despite their ambivalence over that first experiment, in mid-1932 the BBC began to carry out regular experimental television broadcasts from studio BB in the basement of Broadcasting House, using Baird's 30-line system. Later, in 1934, they moved to a newly converted studio up the road at 16, Portland Place.
Sadly, around the same time as the BBC broadcasts began, Baird Television Ltd (BTL) was in severe financial difficulties. Their saviour came from the unlikely direction of Gaumont-British, the film company. That company acquired BTL and provided the financial support to enable Baird's work to continue. In fact, the board of the company were not too keen on the direction Baird was taking - thinking he was concentrating too much on mechanical scanning. In the summer of 1933 Gaumont British brought about a shake-up in BTL's senior management. Baird's close friend and ally Sydney Moseley resigned from the board. Baird agreed to give up formal administrative power, although he stayed on the board with the nominal title of Managing Director, earning a large salary, He functioned mainly in a research and advisory capacity and also as something of a figurehead because of his high public profile. Gaumont British brought in a new Technical Director in the person of Captain AGD West who had worked previously with the BBC, the Gramophone Company, and EMI.. Baird Television Ltd had remained in Long Acre for about five years until 1932. In early 1933 Baird himself moved house to Sydenham, a mile or so from the Crystal Palace. He set up a small laboratory next to the house where he had space to continue his experiments. He moved on from the original 30-line system to a much more sophisticated 120-line system. He also worked on other developments such as a large-screen television system, which was demonstrated by Gaumont-British in their cinemas. As these experiments delivered workable systems it was clear that the time had come to move to larger premises and discover how the new equipment could be used to produce a workable television service. In short - to become Britain's first independent television company.
I am grateful to Derek Brady, who not only brought the existence of the first television play to my notice but also informed me about a re-creation of the play that was carried out in 1968 in the ILEA's studios in Highbury. These temporary studios were created within a disused school and were used for a couple of years whilst the ILEA's Battersea TV Centre was being constructed. The crew for the re-creation was made up of the ILEA TV staff, some teachers and some ex-Baird engineers who had been brought out of retirement. It must have been quite an occasion! The play was subsequently demonstrated at the Ideal Home Exhibition of 1968.
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The original Crystal Palace had been built in Hyde Park for the Great Exhibition of 1851. It was only intended to be temporary but when the exhibition ended there was a public clamour to keep the building and move it elsewhere. The top of a hill in Sydenham, south London seemed ideal so it was indeed dismantled, transported and rebuilt, opening in November 1854. It was, however, even grander than before. Its architect, Joseph Paxton, redesigned it and increased its height from three stories to five, also adding new wings at each end. The enormous building was set in spectacular gardens, the centrepiece of which was an ornamental pond with a fountain that spouted 200 feet high. To achieve this feat, two water towers were constructed, one at each end of the building.
These water towers were engineering marvels in their own right since they had to support an immense weight of water and allow it to flow at the rate necessary for the fountains to gush to the required height. They went to the best engineer of the day - Isambard Kingdom Brunel, no less - and he delivered the goods. One of the towers may be seen in the background of the image above. Now you may be wondering what has all this to do with Mr Baird's television service? All will become clear.
The towers were 275 feet high and were hence an ideal mounting for fixing transmission aerials. Since the building was on a hill the aerials would be 680 feet above sea level giving a line of sight 'view' of seven counties. Thus Baird decided that this would become the location for his new headquarters. One of the towers would provide a fixing point for his aerials and in the wing of the building below was a large space available to let. His company moved here in July 1933.
(It may not have escaped your notice that only three years later, the BBC would be using a very similar 'palace' - also on top of a hill - but this time a few miles north of central London and would build a 200 foot tower on top of it to enable their transmitter aerials to be almost the same height. Fancy that.)
The Post Office, known as the GPO in those days, was responsible for issuing licences to broadcast. They were happy to do so but thought they had better inform the BBC just in case they had a view. Rather surprisingly, Sir John Reith, the Director General, did approve but on the understanding that nothing that was broadcast would look like a public independent TV service. Baird's people must have worked very hard to give reassurance on this score because no objection was raised by the BBC. In fact, of course, a public independent TV service was exactly what they had in mind.
What was constructed was quite extraordinary.
Baird Television Ltd leased 40,000 sq feet under the south transept in which studios, offices and laboratories were constructed. Later, the south rotunda was also leased, increasing the size to 60,000 sq feet. A transmitter was installed within the south tower and aerials fitted at the top. No less than 380 people were now employed by the company.
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A picture postcard of the day. The south tower containing the transmitter is on the left. The studios were in the south transept, not far from the tower. The receiver factory was in the wing in the centre bottom of the picture. |
The BTL facility contained three studios, the largest of which was 60ft x 40ft. There was also a small 'spotlight' studio for continuity. This was a room in which the announcer sat in complete darkness. A spot of light scanned the person's face and this produced the image. This was a very ingenious system but as we can see from our 21st century perspective, not very practical. Still, it worked and produced a perfectly acceptable picture on the viewer's screen.
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Part of a drawing from the Illustrated London News. Behind the gentleman grimly tuning his receiver with pipe in gritted teeth can be seen a cutaway of the studio complex. A central control room looks down on the three studios. Top right is a photo of the water tower with the transmitter aerials protruding. |
Baird by now had moved on from his mechanical disc system which was impractical if high resolution pictures were to be created. His greatest achievement actually was in scanning techniques as described above and as used to turn an image on film into an electronic signal. Thus, his studios made use of the 'Intermediate Film System' a technique whereby a film camera loaded with 17.5mm stock was focused on a scene in wide-shot. The film was passed out of the camera and was processed in a bath of cyanide in less than a minute and whilst still wet was scanned by a flying spot device, thus producing an electronic signal that could be transmitted and received. Thus, the pictures produced were not exactly live but with only a one minute delay, as good as.
OK - there were clear limitations. The camera was huge and impossible to move, since it was physically connected to the developing and scanning system. Apart from anything, this meant that its use on outside broadcasts would be a challenge, to say the least. However, the novelty of ordinary people seeing moving pictures in their own living room gave this system a chance of success, however brief.
Of course, other companies were working on their own television systems in the USA, in Germany and in the UK. In Britain, EMI was developing technology that was purely electronic using relatively small and mobile cameras, which could be cut and mixed electronically. That system was aiming towards 405 lines as opposed to BTL's rather more modest 120 lines at that time. However, the EMI system was purely in the experimental stage and in 1933 Baird's was up and running with a studio centre almost ready to transmit a whole evening's viewing.
In 1934 EMI teamed up with the Marconi company who were experts in transmitters in order to develop that side of their system. Marconi also had access to television patents of the Radio Corporation of America (RCA) including those for Zworykin's electronic camera tube, the Iconoscope. The Marconi-EMI research team modified the Iconoscope to produce an improved camera tube which was christened the Emitron.
Baird's answer to this was to make a deal with another American with the glorious name of Philo T Farnsworth. Farnsworth was independent of RCA but also progressing in his experiments with electronic television. He agreed to make his electronic "image dissector" camera design available to BTL. This was not as sophisticated as the Iconoscope and required much more light to make it work. However, it did give Baird a foot in the electronic door, so to speak, and although not very practical in 1934, in future years he would develop this technology further.
Baird was quite open about how his system was developing and the work of the company was freely publicised. In contrast, the work being done by other companies was carried out in great secrecy. Actually, Baird was no fool and whenever photographs of his equipment were taken he would add or remove crucial parts to throw competitors off the scent. Thus, the photos that exist of his early cameras and equipment are often quite misleading.
The Baird system improved in 1934 and the resolution increased to 180 lines. John Reith was invited to a demonstration at the Gaumont-British offices where telecine and 'live' camera sources, transmitted from the BTL studios at Crystal Palace, were received using a cathode ray tube made by GEC. The company had moved on from the whirling discs and were offering CRT technology for receivers that would essentially not change until plasmas and LCDs came in around the turn of the century. What was particularly impressive was the flying spot system of scanning film. EMI were still using a mechanical system at the time. Sadly, Reith failed to turn up. His distaste for television is well-known so perhaps this was no surprise.
In a further development, Baird television sets began to be manufactured in a nearby part of the Crystal Palace building. The 'Baird' brand would continue to be seen on TVs for many years hence. Meanwhile, work continued in the studios in preparation to commence broadcasting a regular independent service.
Not surprisingly, John Reith and the BBC eventually began to wake up to the possibility that a private company was about to begin a regular television service and they were nothing to do with it. In fact, the BBC were still carrying on with their 30-line experiments in Broadcasting House. A meeting was held on 5th April 1934 between the BBC and the GPO to decide what the future arrangements would be concerning television. In the great tradition of the British establishment - a committee was set up, headed by a peer of the realm, Lord Selsdon, who would report back and advise the Postmaster General on matters concerning television.
Meanwhile, at Crystal Palace, they were almost ready to begin a regular service. A new very powerful VHF transmitter was installed in December 1934 that could cover the whole of London and well beyond - to a distance of about 30 miles.
Lord Selsdon's committee reported in January 1935. Knowing that Baird Television were about to begin but also aware of the pressure from Marconi-EMI, they proposed a television service that would transmit alternately, using the different systems. Perhaps to take the wind out of the Marconi-EMI sails, reporters were invited to visit Crystal Palace the day following the announcement. They were clearly astonished at the scale of the enterprise and indeed by the quality of the pictures. More than one reporter commented that it was pointless having the BBC build a new television studio centre when everything that was needed was already there. No doubt this was exactly the reaction that Baird was hoping for.
BTL proceeded to broadcast an 'experimental' service from then on. Between February and June 1935 over forty 180-line 'demonstration' transmissions were made from Crystal Palace. These generally ran for two hours, with several programmes involved. At the same time, the BBC continued with its 30-line service from Portland Place. This may have seemed a bizarre decision, but because the signals were of low definition the pictures could be sent on long waves which could be received all over the UK and even in parts of continental Europe. These transmissions ceased in September 1935, leaving Baird's Crystal Palace service the only working television system available.
BTL knew that once people saw the 405-line EMI system they would be in trouble so they worked hard to increase their system's resolution. A BTL research team headed by the company's Technical Director, ADG West, developed a 240-line 25 Hz system. This began to be used for transmissions from Crystal Palace in November 1935 and continued until the new BBC studios at Alexandra Palace began test broadcasts in August 1936. On November 2nd 1936 the BBC began the world's first regular 'high definition' television service from Alexander Palace. This used the Baird and EMI systems on alternate weeks. The BBC at that time termed 'high definition' as being anything over 240 lines. (Today's HD channels transmit 1080 lines.)
Thus, the studios at Crystal Palace were no longer needed. They had served their purpose as experimental studios, training the staff and crews on learning how to make programmes, how to link them with continuity announcements and how to overcome all the inevitable technical breakdowns that come with using cutting edge technology. However, the company was still busy. The real money in television was to be made from selling TV receivers. At the factory in Crystal Palace they produced dual-standard sets that could receive both systems.
Things were not going too well at Alexandra Palace, however. It was immediately clear to those making the programmes that the Baird Intermediate Camera System using only one static camera was nothing like as flexible as the EMI system where three cameras could track around the studio, moving in for close-ups and developing round a set or artist. The system was proving technically unreliable too. Bubbles in the cyanide developing bath were affecting both picture and sound. They did briefly experiment with the electronic camera developed by the American inventor, Philo Farnsworth, but as mentioned above it was found to be too insensitive.
Just as it looked as though things could not be going worse, on 30th November fire broke out at Crystal Palace and most of the building was destroyed. The studios and surrounding areas were completely ruined so many spares and much other equipment was lost. To cap it all, within a couple of weeks the BBC prematurely ended the trial of the two systems at AP. They decided to equip both studios with EMI cameras.
Fortunately, not quite all of the Crystal Palace building had been destroyed. Luckily, the television set factory was undamaged as was the plant manufacturing CRT tubes. The insurance money also enabled work to continue on the Gaumont-British system to transmit newsreels via TV to cinemas. Baird also worked on his colour TV system. A small studio was built on a lower floor of the water tower, which had also survived the fire, and experimental colour broadcasts were thus transmitted from Crystal Palace. This development was demonstrated in February 1938 at the Dominion Theatre where images were projected onto a large screen.
In September 1939 war was declared and BTL was wound up. However, a new company - Cinema Television was formed. Many of the former BTL technical staff, including Captain West, joined the new company. This later became CinTel and after being bought by the Rank Organisation became the leading company in flying-spot technology producing telecine machines for all the world's broadcasters. This system was directly descended from Baird's research. Rank Cintel also took over the cathode ray tube factory from BTL and during the war they manufactured over 100,000 CRTs for radar display screens.
After BTL had been wound up in late 1939, Baird himself continued his research independently, drawing on his savings. He produced a 600-line colour projection system and in 1944 an all-electronic colour receiver tube called the Telechrome. The earlier colour system was further refined to produce high definition stereoscopic images in colour. Quite extraordinary. In fact, of course, it would be 1966 before colour television eventually began in the UK, and stereoscopic television is something still for the future.
Or is it?? In 2007 and 2008 experimental 3-D television began to be shown at trade shows and the big Japanese manufacturers are said to be working on technology for the home. In 1944/45 Baird was taken on as a consultant to Hammersmith Studios (later to become Riverside Studios). They were interested in developing his system for showing events on giant TV screens in cinemas. How appropriate therefore that on 8th March 2008 those studios were the venue for a fascinating experiment, of which Baird would certainly have approved! It was the world's first live 3-D high definition screening of a sporting event via satellite - a rugby match as it happens. It is astonishing that it was over 60 years before the technologies that Baird was developing eventually came together.
In 1944 the British government set up a committee, under the chairmanship of Lord Hankey, to look into the prospects for television after the war. Testimony was received from many sources in the BBC and the television industry - and one private individual, John Logie Baird. He recommended that within a few years the British system should move to high definition (1000 lines), colour and eventually stereoscopic television. This of course has happened, though not quite in that order and over a far slower time frame than Baird anticipated.
Sadly, Baird died in 1946. The father of television? Certainly.
Information for the above section is taken from various sources but I am particularly indebted to two people. Firstly, Richard G Elen, who has written an article that can be found on www.transdiffusion.org/emc/baird/baird_itv.php. A visit to the site is highly recommended for a more in-depth analysis.
I have also been contacted by Baird's son, Malcolm, who has been kind enough to send me corrections and further information. Along with Antony Kamm he has co-authored a biography of his father - 'John Logie Baird: a life' - which is well worth reading. More information can be discovered on the website run by Malcolm - www.bairdtelevision.com.
1935 - present
These studios are probably the best known UK studios in the world. Although they quite rightly deserve this fame for the huge number of successful feature films made here they have in recent years been building up the television side of their business. At present, only two stages have been converted into fully equipped TV studios but it is probable that others will follow.
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This advertisement shows the studios as they were in 1961. There are five main stages, two smaller ones - F and G - and the long narrow one (top right, marked '21') now called stage H is referred to here as the 'tunnel stage.' Click on the image to see it in greater resolution. |
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Pinewood is arguably the most famous film studio in the UK - thanks to a long history of successful British and international movies. The studios' history dates from 1934 when Charles Boot, a businessman with film-making ambitions, bought Heatherden Hall. A year later he met J Arthur Rank and the rest is, as they say, history. Stages A - E were the first to be built and still form the hub of the site. In 1957 an additional two smaller stages (F and G) were brought into operation along with two new viewing theatres. Other stages have been added over the years including, of course, the huge 007 stage - which was originally built in 1976 for the film The Spy Who Loved Me. When completed it was 334ft x 136ft and was the largest stage in the world. It also had one of the biggest indoor tanks - at 297ft x 73ft and nearly nine feet deep. It was in fact a 'silent' stage as it was not soundproofed. Nevertheless, dialogue was often recorded in it - although filming sometimes had to wait for the occasional particularly noisy passing aircraft. This stage was completely destroyed by fire in June 1984 and reopened in January 1985, with a few alterations to its design, as the 'Albert R Broccoli 007 Stage', in honour of the producer of many early Bond movies. It is however known throughout the industry simply as the 'Bond Stage'. On Sunday 30th July 2006, during the derigging of sets for Casino Royale, fire broke out once again. The stage was almost completely destroyed but within a matter of weeks it had been dismantled and trucks laden with steel were arriving on site to begin the construction of its replacement. The new stage was completed in March 2007. It is said to have better sound insulation than before and the design is rather different with vertical walls rather than the sloping ones of its predecessor. The structural steel frame is now cleverly outside the walls thus increasing the useable floor area considerably. It has gone from about 45,000 sq ft to 59,000 sq ft and is the largest in Europe. This one stage actually occupies more space than all the studios at BBC Television Centre put together! Even that wasn't big enough for the film Prometheus in 2011. One end of the stage was removed and a temporary structure extended it many more feet onto the back lot. There is little point in trying to name the films that have been made at Pinewood. The list goes on and on. It includes some of the greatest and most successful movies made anywhere in the world. The studios' own website is an excellent source of historical material and there are several books that recount the ups and downs of these studios. However - our subject is television, so...
Pinewood was first and foremost a film studio. However, the increasing demand for television drama shot on film created a new market in the early 1960s. According to George Perry's book, 'Movies from the Mansion', in 1964 stage H was built specifically to house MCA productions, who were to make several filmed TV series. Owen and Burford's more recent book 'The Pinewood Story' says the same. The books state that as well as the 'new' stage a self-contained block was constructed with admin areas, dressing rooms, make-up and wardrobe. The first TV series was called Court Martial and consisted of 26 x 48-minute episodes. I must confess, I have a problem with this account. To be frank, H stage never looked as though it was built to make television productions in the 1960s. It is no longer with us but for many years was an ugly, concrete construction and was in fact much older than that. It can be seen on aerial photos of the site dating back to the 1950s and in the drawing shown above is referred to as the 'tunnel stage.' It was very narrow - making it rather difficult to arrange sets within it, I would have thought. It joined onto the Large Process Stage - another very narrow long building and was part of that complex. (Process photography involves models or sets which require back-projected scenery and/or special effects.) H stage must have had the strangest proportions of any in the country. It was 89 feet long but only 36ft 6ins wide. My conclusion, although I have yet to find final proof of this, is that the tunnel stage was refurbished and renamed H in 1964. Thus the stage was not actually built for MCA, rather it was adapted from its previous use. New admin and wardrobe/makeup facilities were created alongside it for MCA to use. However, this is not all they used. Bill Hill, one of their producers, has recalled that... 'The people at Pinewood built us our requirements as a self-contained unit. They gutted a whole block and reconstructed it, creating an admin block, completely self-contained and inter-communicating, plus dressing rooms, make-up, hairdressing and wardrobe departments. They modified three stages for our production. (My emphasis) This went on during July and August. The unit of 150 people started to arrive ready to shoot on 7 September.' (This quotation is gratefully taken from Owen and Burford's 'The Pinewood Story.') Thus, it seems that two more stages were involved, as well as H. Stages F and G were nearby and part of the same block of buildings so one assumes that these three formed the dedicated MCA complex.
In 1966, work began on two new stages - J & K. Previous stages on studio sites in the UK had mostly been built out of steel, clad in concrete - often painted cream. Frankly, these old stages are not very attractive as buildings. However, J and K were different in many ways. They were faced with red brick and with their admin and wardrobe/make-up facilities as part of the construction they form a nicely proportioned and visually attractive construction. The Pinewood management and architects visited studios all over the world to discover the latest techniques in design and construction and applied them to these stages. Television was very much in mind when they were designed. This requires fast re-lighting of sets so a grid with monopoles was included. Monopoles allow lights to be rigged with great accuracy and to be positioned much faster than in conventional film stages. (The way overhead lights are rigged in film stages is to mount them on elevated platforms or to hang them on scaffold poles, ladder beams or trusses that are suspended from the overhead beams via steel lines or chain hoists. This is a very slow and relatively inflexible method.) The other main difference between a TV studio and film stage is the floor. A stage has a floor covered in hard wooden blocks that can have nails hammered in, enabling scenery to be secured rigidly to the ground. Thus, any camera moves have to incorporate the use of tracks as the floor is too uneven to roll a dolly across it. This takes time to set up - time that does not exist in the making of television programmes. TV studios have a hard concrete floor, faced with lino or resin, enabling the wheels of camera peds or dollies to run smoothly over it. J and K were intended to be used for both film and television so this created a problem. The solution was to have a hard smooth floor that could have a wooden surface laid over it when required. In fact, after a year or two the wood stayed down until 2000, when the stages became dedicated TV studios and new resin floors were laid. More on this later. Another bit of forward planning in the design of these stages was to include space for TV control rooms. At the time of construction, all the TV drama made at Pinewood was on film but they considered the possibility that in future they might have to record on videotape using TV cameras. Thus, control rooms were incorporated between the stages, with windows at first floor level looking on to the studios. The rooms were not equipped and soon became used as dressing rooms and production offices. After a few years the windows were boarded up. The blocked-up window frames can still be seen today. The galleries were eventually equipped in 2000 and 2001 - although not quite as originally intended. Studio TV-one (as we must now call it) currently has its production gallery at ground floor level although TV-two's production gallery is on the first floor in the space it was originally designed to go all those years ago. The lighting galleries are both on the ground floor which suits me just fine!
Interestingly, at around the same time over at ABPC Elstree Studios they were building a new block of three stages incorporating similar ideas. Stages 7, 8 and 9 have monopole grids and (also not equipped) control room suites between 8 and 9. J and K (now known as TV-two and TV-one respectively) are quite large as TV studios go at 110 x 80 ft gross - 106 x 74 metric ft within firelanes. A couple of years after J and K, stages L and M were built - using the same design principles of a monopole grid and hard floor with wooden surface. These stages do not however have TV control room suites included. They are 105 x 90 feet wall to wall, so slightly shorter than J and K but usefully quite a bit wider. L and M are still mostly used as film stages, although they have often been used to make TV dramas on single camera film or video - for example, they were Gerry Anderson's base for a number of years when he made his series Space 1999 and Space Precinct. New Tricks is a more recent occupant. Stage M featured prominently in the first series of Ricky Gervais' comedy Extras. They have also been booked in the past for multi-camera productions using drive-in OB scanners as control rooms. For example, a series of the gameshow Strike it Lucky was recorded in 1994 in one of this pair. Apparently, Pinewood have considered converting L and M into TV studios in the past but at the time all the stages on the site were very busy with film work. In fact, according to press reports in 2007, EastEnders looked as though it was due to move to Pinewood within a year or two. These two stages were it seems earmarked to be converted into studios for that programme. However, the plans were abandoned and EastEnders stayed at BBC Elstree - at least until around 2015.
TV series and dramas shot on film at Pinewood have included Court Martial ('64), Man in a Suitcase ('66), The Avengers - 2 eps ('66), Strange Report ('68), From A Bird's Eye View ('69), UFO ('70), The Persuaders ('70-'72), Shirley's World ('71), The Zoo Gang ('73), Space 1999 ('73, '76), The New Avengers (''76, '77), The Professionals ('77), Press Gang ('89), Ivanhoe ('81), The Hunchback of Notre Dame ('81), Witness For the Prosecution ('82), The Last Days of Pompeii ('83), Master of the Game (''83), Squaring the Circle ('83), The Corsican Brothers ('84), Deceptions ('85), Still Crazy Like a Fox ('86), Pack of Lies ('87), Hazard of Hearts ('87), some sketches for French and Saunders ('87-'98), A Man For All Seasons ('88), War and Remembrance ('88), Press Gang ('89), Crucifer of Blood ('90), Fry and Laurie's Jeeves and Wooster ('91), The Camomile Lawn ('91), an episode of Inspector Morse ('91), Bye Bye Baby ('91), Tales From the Poop Deck ('91), Dennis Potter's Lipstick on Your Collar ('92), Lady Chatterley ('92), Head Over Heels ('92), Minder ('93), The Borrowers ('93), Moving Story ('93), Space Precinct ('94, '95), Chandler and Co. ('94, '95), Poirot ('94), The Spooks of Bottle Bay ('94), Class Act ('95), The Final Cut, ('95), Last of the Summer Wine ('95, '98, '05, '06), Ivanhoe ('96), The Preventers, ('96), Hostile Waters ('96), Born To Run ('96), Jonathan Creek ('96, '97, '99, '04), Crime Traveller ('97), Potamus Park ('96, '97), Invasion Earth ('97), The Vanishing Man ('97), CI5: The New Professionals ('98), Little White Lies ('98), Hornblower ('98, '00, '01, '02), Roger Roger ('98), Midsomer Murders ('98), Harbour Lights ('98) and the brilliant Longitude ('99). One unique example of a multicamera comedy series recorded at Pinewood in 1990 was entitled Heil Honey, I'm Home. This was a spoof, set in Nazi Germany but played in the style of a cheesey 1960s US sitcom. It caused huge controversy in parts of the press but hardly anyone saw it as it was made for BSB's Galaxy channel. Eight episodes were made but only one was transmitted before BSB went bust. Sky, who took them over, wanted nothing to do with it so the un-transmitted tapes are still sitting on a shelf somewhere. Dennis Potter's final two drama series, Karaoke and Cold Lazarus were filmed at Pinewood in 1995 - unique in that in order to fulfil the writer's dying wish they were jointly financed and transmitted on both BBC and Channel 4. Parts of the two British episodes of Friends -The One With Ross' Wedding were also filmed here in 1998 - the rest was made in front of an audience at Fountain Studios. More recent single-camera TV dramas and comedies shot here (often using L or M stages) have included Dinotopia ('00), The Lost World ('01), The Queen's Nose ('01), Trial and Retribution ('02), Wild West ('02), Spooks ('03-'11), Ray Winstone's Henry VIII ('03), Auf Wiedersehen Pet ('03, '04), My Dad's the Prime Minister ('04), two episodes of Dr Who ('06), some sketches for Dead Ringers ('03, '04, '05), some sketches for Little Britain ('03-'06), Grandma's House ('10), some sketches for That Mitchell and Webb Look ('06-'10), scenes for Come Fly With Me ('10) and New Tricks ('03-'12).
A number of gameshows and entertainment programmes have also used various stages as multicamera studios. These include Strike it Lucky ('94), You Bet ('95), Dog Eat Dog ('01), Shafted ('01), Braniac: Science Abuse ('04, '05 '06), X-Perimental ('04), The Whole 19 Yards ('09), The Magicians ('11) and Got To Dance ('11) which was transmitted live from the R stage. A fibre network has been installed all round the Pinewood site enabling any of the stages to transmit live TV and in 2011 the link to the BT Tower was upgraded to uncompressed HD. Although Pinewood has just had its ability to handle live TV upgraded, in fact the first live TV broadcast was from the K stage in 1992. This was for the children's Saturday morning show Parallel 9 which ran for several months in the summers of '92 - '94. The K stage became the surface of a distant planet whilst celebrity guests had to enter a tatty little caravan on the back lot, which of course was the 'portal' to Parallel 9. Weekends are usually quiet at Pinewood (apart from the occasional fire) so this show did not interfere with the normal running of the studios. Dragon's Den has also been shot here at Pinewood. The first two series in 2004/5 used a real location but since then the show has built a set on the F stage (100 x 76 ft wall to wall). It is interesting to note that the programme was still being made here in 2011 despite the fact that it is a Salford based show. In fact, they anounced that they would be using a studio at MediaCity from 2012.
In February 2000, Pinewood was purchased from Rank by a business consortium headed by Michael Grade and Ivan Dunleavy. In June of the same year, J stage began conversion into a dedicated TV studio, with a resin floor and its own fully equipped gallery suite with digital mixer and associated electronics. In 2001, K was similarly converted into a digital TV studio specifically for The Weakest Link, which had previously been using TV Centre and Three Mills film studios. Following some further refurbishment in 2005 the studios were renamed 'TV-one' and 'TV-two'. (K became one and J became two.) The studios specialise in series with standing sets but do occasionally accommodate single productions. For many years TV-one had The Weakest Link as a regular booking whilst TV-two has had sitcoms like My Family, According to Bex and All About Me filling its schedule. The first series of The Catherine Tate Show was also recorded in TV-two . Test the Nation came from TV-one on a few occasions when Fountain was busy and the Christmas special of The Green Green Grass was recorded in TV-two in October 2005. It was shot in high definition using an OB unit for facilities as the studio did not have its own HD gear. The second series of Extras was also filmed in TV-two in 2006. This series dealt with the making of a sitcom which was part recorded using the studio's facilities. Most of the series was shot on single camera Digibeta. Exterior shots showed BBC TV Centre but no, the studio was actually here at Pinewood. The Extras 2007 Christmas special was also made here in the summer of that year. In the spring of 2007 TV-one was the home of the second series of The IT Crowd, the production requesting that they have a studio with the production gallery on the ground floor. I had the pleasure of returning to the studios in November 2007 when I lit the Christmas special of To The Manor Born in TV-one. This was shot in HD using an OB scanner parked in front of the building. Other recent shows have included Lily Allen and Friends ('08) Would I Lie to You? ('10 and '11) and Lee Mack's All Star Cast ('11) 2008 saw an interesting development. The highly acclaimed theatre production of King Lear, with Ian McKellan in the title role, was recorded in TV-two for C4 and the American PBS channel. Let's hope that this indicates a return to recording successful theatre productions for television so that many more millions can see them - in the way the BBC did for many years but oddly abandoned in the early 1990s.
Investment and improvements have been carried out in these two studios from time to time. The control rooms, green rooms, dressing rooms etc are all very smart. The studios themselves have relatively new air conditioning systems. Some changes to the lighting grids may possibly happen in the future, although talk of fitting one of the studios with motorised bars or 'boats' - purchased by AFM some years ago from Central Nottingham - seems to have gone away. In the summer of 2009 TV-two was given a new resin floor, despite the existing one being less than ten years old. TV-one and TV-two never owned their own SD cameras and VTR machines but hired them in on a daily basis when required. This must have saved a great deal when setting them up and it also meant that less capital was tied up doing nothing when the studios were not actually recording. In this way, Pinewood have been able to charge less than some other studios when standing sets are used. Pinewood, perhaps surprisingly, have in recent years not carried out a full HD installation in these studios unlike other studios around the country. They have HD fibre cables installed in both studios and to and from the galleries and MCR but continue to hire in equipment when required. They have 8 Sony HDC-1000/1500 cameras which are shared with Teddington and hire in more when required. However, it is possible that a new gallery suite may be built soon in offices at the front of the building which will be able to service either studio.
In 2009 a BBC Children's series - ZingZillas - took up residence in TV-one for most of the year. This meant that the final series of Weakest Link before its move to Glasgow was moved into TV-two. The knock-on effect of this was that My Family had to move from its home of several years to Teddington. This unfortunately disrupted several regular Teddington bookings including Harry Hill's TV Burp and has undoubtedly affected subsequent bookings at Teddington. The wisdom of all this is not for me to comment on here but it has certainly caused much discussion amongst many people in the industry. The first part of 2010 was somewhat thin on the ground for TV bookings in these two Pinewood studios and from the summer they were rented out as film stages for the latest X-Men movie. I gather film bookings extended well into 2011, TV-one being used as a props workshop supporting the new Ridley Scott 'Alien' prequel Prometheus. It was also used as a wardrobe store for Snow White and the Huntsman for many months from 2011 into 2012. This doesn't on the face of it seem the best use of a TV studio but I guess the studio marketing people know best. TV-two saw the return of Would I Lie To You in March 2011. The previous series had been made in the same studio the year before. Lee Mack's All Star Cast was also made in TV-two in 2011.
In 2001 Pinewood purchased Shepperton Studios to form Pinewood-Shepperton. Michael Grade stayed as chairman and the Scott brothers also remained associated with the new company. The business with all its facilities and 36 stages became one of the world's premier film and television resources. During 2006 the company began operating under the name of the Pinewood Studios Group and now markets and operates the various stages and TV studios at Pinewood, Shepperton and Teddington as one operation. In May 2004 Pinewood-Shepperton declared an intention to redevelop both sites and increase their film and TV studio space significantly over the next ten years, demolishing some old stages and building several new ones. In April 2005 the company bought Teddington Studios when they went bust, thus saving them from closure but this unexpected acquisition was not expected to affect the company's plans for expansion at Pinewood or Shepperton. In May 2005 outline planning permission was granted at Pinewood enabling the redevelopment there to begin. In 2007 these plans were confirmed when full planning permission was granted and work immediately began on a new entrance and gatehouse and some new buildings nearby. The Queen opened the gatehouse on 2nd November. According to the Pinewood website at least three new film stages were planned - to be built to the north of stages A - D. These were to replace stage H, the small process stage, the lighting stores and some workshops (see the plan below). The plan from 2007 seen below indicates that the car park in front of the two TV studios was also to be developed. Rumour had it that a 15,000 sq ft TV studio was eventually intended to be built there. No sign of this so far and it is perhaps unlikely now that this will happen since very large film stages seem to be more popular for big entertainment shows. In fact, it seems probable that the development plans have been modified somewhat in the light of the changing demands of both the feature film and television parts of the business. Both now seem to need very large stages. The area opposite stages L and M has been cleared and one extremely large stage is being built here - Stage T. In January 2012 it was structurally complete and was being fitted out. It is a very impressive 30,000 sq ft (203ft x 148 ft and 50ft high). This is very large indeed - about half the size of the 007 stage but much larger than any of the main stages here and approximately the same floor area as the very old H stage at Shepperton which is due to be closed according to the published plans for that site. I gather that the T stage is intended for major TV entertainment shows as well as feature film production. It will have emergency exits and other facilities enabling a large studio audience to be handled if required. Stage T will be more than twice the size of any of the largest TV studios in the country so no doubt Pinewood will be looking to attract the big blockbuster Saturday night live shows. However, no technical facilities will be incorporated so an OB scanner will have to be used. The stage is due to be ready early in 2012.
At the beginning of September 2007 the Pinewood Studios Group surprisingly announced that they were considering purchasing BBC Studios. They spent nearly 1 million pounds on the bidding process but in the end the sale collapsed. It seems that Pinewood were not prepared to take on the pension liabilities of the BBC staff. Back in 2007 Ivan Dunleavy had announced that the company was planning to significantly increase the proportion of TV v film at Pinewood. According to the press, he stated... "We are looking to achieve a parity with film in terms of revenue. The UK TV market is large and diverse, we want to increase our share in it." Dunleavy apparently said that the company could increase the revenue share from TV, which currently stands at 30%, to 50% over the next three years." This interesting statement probably reflected the company's declared interest at the time in purchasing BBC Studios. It is likely that the purchase of the business would have been followed by the construction and/or conversion of several new TV studios at Pinewood. The staff and much of the equipment would have been moved to Pinewood over the following 3 or 4 years (along with with the BBC's regular programme bookings) enabling TV Centre to be demolished in 2013. Of course, the purchase of the business fell through, and the demolition of TV Centre is now unlikely (although it will definitely be sold.) It seems probable that TV Centre will retain some of its large studios when the BBC leaves. This will inevitably affect the expansion plans at Pinewood with them now unlikely to build new or convert any medium/large stages into dedicated TV studios. However, as mentioned above, they are building a very large new stage - much bigger than any TV studio in the country - which can also be used for TV shows. Another story will also have affected Pinewood's plans to increase revenue from television... In the summer of 2007 various rumours began to circulate widely, mostly from people associated with BBC Elstree, that EastEnders might be planning to leave Borehamwood and the BBC studios there sold off for redevelopment. These rumours grew and indeed were reported in two or three newspapers. According to press reports, Pinewood was the most likely site for the programme to move to. If so, Albert Square and its surrounding roads would have been reconstructed here and probably three stages taken over and converted into television studios. L and M were the most likely, given their original TV-based design, plus R, which is next door. Of course, a great deal of space would also have been required for prop and set storage and for offices and post-production suites. The story was repeated in the press in March 2008 but was officially denied by BBC spokespersons. They claimed that in the current economic climate it would not be possible to sell the Elstree site for the money they would be seeking. Thus EastEnders would be staying where it is for the time being. It seems that the BBC were hoping for £300m from the sale of that site (coincidentally the same as for TV Centre) which would almost entirely be given over to housing. However, the crash in property values diminished the value of the BBC's Elstree studio site considerably so a sale became unlikely for several years. Thus EastEnders remains at Elstree - until at least 2015.
In recent years changes in tax laws have seen the fortunes of Pinewood wax and wane as movie-making is so easily influenced by production costs. An uncertain period in 2005 was improved when the tax laws were made more encouraging in 2006. However, the availability of cheap labour and facilities in eastern Europe affected the number of films made here in the following few years. Nevertheless, Pinewood's reputation continues to attract film-makers and it still remains cheaper to make a movie here than in Hollywood. For most of the first decade of this century the television side of the business was thriving and the two TV studios were kept very busy. As the TV side of the business diminished towards the end of the decade the pendulum swung back towards the film side and the stages were busy all year round with features. In November 2011 the government announced that it was extending UK film tax relief until the end of December 2015, which is excellent news for Pinewood and of course all the other British film studios. 2010 saw a considerable reduction in Pinewood-Shepperton's income from television, compared to film. It fell from £11.3m in 2009 to £8.2m in 2010. This decline continued in the first half of 2011 - but was offset by a big increase in revenue generated from movie production. For much of this period the two TV studios were taken over by feature films and many of the studios at Teddington were relatively quiet. The Pinewood management partly blamed the BBC and ITV for using their in-house studios more than before in a press statement. However, about half of all the programmes shown on BBC and ITV are made by independent companies who are relatively free to make their shows where they like and Pinewood has a curious advantage over the other London TV studios in that it is technically a 'regional' studio since it is (just) outside the M25. It therefore enables programme makers to tick that particular box if they have to. In fact in recent years several entertainment shows have used film stages at Pinewood and Shepperton to record series such as Ant and Dec's Push The Button, The Whole 19 Yards and Got To Dance. This is the kind of work Pinewood is likely to be seeking to attract over the next few years. Although Pinewood-Shepperton was seen to be operating successfully (total revenue in 2010 increased by 8%) in April 2011 an unexpected bid was made to buy the company. This was from Peel Media, the company who own and run MediaCity in Salford. They already owned 29.7% of Pinewood and launched an £87.8m takeover bid. Two weeks later, Mohammed Al Fayed, former owner of Harrods, was also said to be considering an all-cash bid for the company. On 27th April it was announced that Peel had increased its offer to £96m and this new offer was accepted by the directors of the group. Michael Grade will stay on as chairman and Peel have said that they will allow Pinewood to continue to operate autonomously. Being owned by Peel has given Pinewood greater financial stability which already has enabled long term investment to begin. In the past the company has had to pass a large proportion of its profits to a number of shareholders, leaving relatively little for major investment. Peel seem to be looking at Pinewood in the long term enabling the construction of at least one new stage and probably some welcome investment in the two TV studios. Certainly, I can report that walking round the site now all the buildings are clean, freshly painted and old cables and other clutter have been removed giving a much smarter appearance all round. Most of the old dilapidated buildings and workshops have gone and everywhere gives the impression of a very successful and busy enterprise.
Project Pinewood... Yet more evidence of the determination to see the long term success of the studios came on 15th November 2007 when Pinewood-Shepperton announced a proposed expansion of the site - taking up the fields on the opposite side of the road between the studios and the M25 motorway. This extraordinarily ambitious scheme was quite unique and would have occupied a huge area on land already owned by the company. The plan as announced in 2007 was to build several permanent location sets to which film-makers would otherwise have to travel. Such travel can be hugely disruptive to a shooting schedule and of course very expensive. If a film or TV drama requires a scene or two in, say, downtown New York, it may be financially prohibitive or of course may mean that the whole film has to be shot in the US rather than on stages here at Pinewood. TV dramas and low budget films would benefit most as they would be able to set scenes all round the world whilst actually staying within ten minutes drive of the M25! The published plans were quite extraordinary in their ambition. Proposed locations included Venice, an American university campus, streets in Vienna and Chicago, a UK industrial canal, a London street market, New York warehouse district, 'Lake Como', West Coast America, Chinatown, and even a medieval castle and a Roman amphitheatre. Whew! The cost of constructing all this to the kind of detail that would be convincing on a huge cinema screen can only be imagined. Perhaps the most interesting part of the proposal was that these dwellings would be lived in by real people. About 2,000 homes were to be included which would be available to buy or rent, so if you fancied living in a flat overlooking a Venetian canal or possibly in a New York slum (??!!) you would be able to live out your dream. One small fly in the ointment was that this land is currently designated green belt. The other was, of course, the cost involved in constructing all these inhabitable but historically accurate dwellings. Not surprisingly, after almost a year of consultation (and acknowledgement of the world financial crisis) the proposed plans were considerably revised. As announced in September 2008 they then included large areas of open green space which would have been available for use by local residents and all the existing hedges and wooded areas would have been preserved. The castle, amphitheatre, Lake Como and Venetian canals had all disappeared from the plan. Shame. What was then proposed was a more realistic mix of pretty standard houses and streets. Well, perhaps not that standard as the roads were to resemble those of 'New York, Paris, Venice and other international streetscapes'. This was now a much more realistic proposal in every way and one can see how useful it might have been. (One wonders quite how much use the medieval castle would have had.) The site was to have a mix of 'filmable' streets and smaller private roads and cycleways for local inhabitants to use. Clearly, they would still need to drive the car to work every morning. The environmental aspect of the scheme was pushed to the forefront and was to include 'green' roofs and clever systems for preserving and reusing rainwater. There were to be power sockets concealed throughout the site meaning that generators would not be required for filming and fibre-optic leads would connect at various points to post production facilities over the road at Pinewood Studios so that when filming with the latest generation of digital movie cameras the images could be stored instantly on hard drives as raw data and immediately editing could begin. This is almost certainly how most films will be made within the next decade. One assumes that a clause in the deeds would have mentioned that at various times of the day or night the residents' privacy (and possibly sleep?) may be disturbed by various film crews. This might not have been everyone's cup of tea but I'm quite sure that they would have had no problem at all in finding takers for these unique places to live. The site was to include a primary school and community centre for residents and - most interestingly - a new training college for the British film and TV industry. In cooperation with the National Film and TV School at Beaconsfield, it would have trained 120 students per academic year, working in 20 different crafts associated with film and TV-making. Transport would not have been a problem either. A fast bus service was to carry residents to and from Slough railway station and local roads would have been improved.
A final planning application was made in July 2009. Unfortunately this was roundly refused in October by the local authority - largely because of the Green Belt issue. A local campaign to refuse permission was started up and strong views were expressed. A public enquiry into the development began on April 5th 2011 and lasted into May. Pinewood were hoping that the 960 permanent jobs that they were claiming would be created would help the application. Also that this expansion of facilities would help to maintain Pinewood's reputation as one of the top film studios in the world. David Cameron visited Pinewood in the middle of January 2012 and was shown around the site. He is said to have been impressed with the studios and some assumed that the application was likely to succeed. However, on 20th January secretary of state for communities and local government, Eric Pickles, announced that the application had been refused. His department stated that 'the loss of openness would not only be visually apparent but would all but destroy the concept of the site as part of open Green Belt land.' Unfortunately this decision came only a few months after the government announced that they were relaxing planning regulations in order to stimulate growth in the construction industry. This created a loud backlash of many individuals and organisations claiming that the Green Belt was now under threat. The government strongly denied that this was the case so had they allowed this application they would have played straight into the court of the protesters. Unfortunately the timing was not good for Pinewood. It is unlikely that Pinewood will appeal against this decision so the scheme is now dead - at least for the next few years.
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The photograph above shows Pinewood Studios in the 1950s. (Compare it with the cutaway drawing at the top of this section to discover what each building was used for.) At that time there were only five main sound stages: A - E. The old stately home, Heatherden Hall, can be seen foreground right and its grounds have been used for many a film location, including of course several of the 'Carry On' movies. The triangular pattern of paths on the large lawn on the foreground left indicates by coincidence the site and shape of the huge outdoor 'Paddock Tank', which was built in 1959/60. The open area to the top of the picture is now occupied by several more stages, supporting buildings and the back lot.
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Pinewood around 1970. Stages J and K are the brick faced buildings top centre. They would later become studios TV-one and TV-two. In the distance are the fields that are planned to become the site of 'Project Pinewood.'
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Pinewood in early 2006, viewed from the back lot end of the site. The huge building in the foreground is the 007 stage - since destroyed by fire and replaced with another. To its right are stages R and S - each 165 x 116ft and built in 1999. Nearby on the right of this picture are stages L and M, built with television in mind. The two TV studios currently in use are in the centre of this picture. Amongst the trees at the top of the site can just be made out the building that contains Europe's first underwater stage, which opened in 2005. The water is kept permanently filtered and warmed so it can be booked for use at very short notice. With thanks to the Pinewood website. |
The Scala Theatre - the television theatre that never was.
In 1964 the Beatles made their first film - A Hard Day's Night. Much of the film is centred on a television show being recorded in a 'television theatre'. We see many shots of the stage and auditorium as well as backstage. On each side of the auditorium is a control room with windows overlooking the stalls. On stage are four EMI 203 cameras and we can see the shots they are taking on the monitors in the production gallery.
In fact this was all created for the film and the scenes were shot over a week. Possibly the Scala might have made a good TV theatre but it was at the time an ordinary theatre, famous for its annual Christmas show of Peter Pan. It was sited in Charlotte Street, off Tottenham Court Road. Sadly, it was demolished in 1969.
One wonders why the filmmakers did not use an existing television theatre. At the time, London had the BBC TV Theatre, Granada's Chelsea Palace and the Granville was also available as an independent studio. However, for whatever reason they chose to create a fully working studio just for the film.
Hillside Studios
1965 - 2005
This centre was located in in Bushey, near Watford. For forty years it was unique amongst London's TV studios since although it was fitted out to full broadcast standards with two TV studios and two radio studios, it was not built to make programmes for any of the main network channels.
photo by Mike Emery
J Arthur Rank was well known as a very influential figure in the British movie industry, at one time owning several of London's film studios including Denham and Pinewood. His father had been a very successful miller and that company, which Arthur inherited, became the giant Rank Hovis McDougall. His company - The Rank Organisation - also went on to own 619 cinemas. As well as having a passion for film he was a hard-nosed businessman and his company took over several other businesses involved in the entertainment industry. Literally tens of thousands of people were working directly or indirectly for The Rank Organisation when it was at its height in the sixties and seventies.
What is perhaps not so well known is that he was a devout Christian and very active in the Methodist church. His original intention was that the films he produced should display good family values and be a counter to the 'bad' influence of Hollywood. Whether all his commercially made films actually achieved this aim is debatable and to counter such criticism, Rank also directly funded films with moral or Christian themes that could be shown in churches and Sunday Schools. Building on this he set up a trust in 1953 that later became the Rank Foundation. This organisation provided funding for the promotion of Christian belief. Rank realised that with the expansion of the influence of television it was essential that the Christian message should be promoted using this medium as professionally as possible.
During the '60s and '70s both the BBC and ITV broadcast religious programmes - usually late at night (eg The Epilogue) and for an hour or two on Sunday evenings. These programmes often included contributions from people working in various churches - not just the Methodist Church of course - and there was a perceived need to train these individuals so that on screen they would appear confident, professional and at ease.
Another requirement was to produce television programmes that could be shown to church members in their own premises on tape or 16mm film. These could be used as a basis for discussion or study.
To fulfill these needs, in 1959 the Rank Foundation set up CTVC - the Churches Television and Radio Centre - which established its base at Hillside Studios in 1965.
Following the death of Rank in 1972, Hillside expanded its activity to include general training in various aspects of television directing, interviewing and presenting. There were a number of radio courses too that were very popular with those looking for a career in the rapidly expanding world of local radio. The technical crews were a mix of staff, freelancers and a number of BBC and ITV staff who regularly topped up their salaries with a bit of moonlighting. Dave Mundy recalls that one of the reasons he enjoyed working here was that he was provided with free lunch, tea, coffee and sometimes even beer. Sounds like good Christian charity in practice to me.
As well as the training activities and making of material for churches, there was some programme making that was broadcast too. CTVC Productions was a production company that as early as the 1970s was making religious programmes here for the BBC and ITV. They also sold programmes to American TV companies - in 1976 Project the Right Image won the Silver Screen Award.
In 1972 the centre converted its studios to colour and re-equipped with Marconi Mk VIII cameras. Programmes were recorded on an Ampex 2" quad machine and some were later transferred onto 16mm film or onto video cassettes for distribution. In the 1980s the cameras were replaced with Hitachi Sk-970s and Z31s.
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A drama being shot in studio 1, probably during the 1970s. |
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to the right are the studio specs as advertised in the 1980s |
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One of the Mole booms at Hillside. Apparently, these worked in the opposite direction from the Fisher booms at TV Centre - so the operator might go to wind the boom in and it would actually fly out and knock a Ming vase off its stand. Well - maybe a slight exaggeration but the reverse direction kept many a moonlighting boom op on his toes. with thanks to Dave Mundy |
During the 1990s and into the next decade CTVC developed its programme making capability and sold religious programmes to the BBC, ITV, C4, Five and for transmission on US channels such as Discovery. These programmes included single factual documentaries and series as well as light entertainment music specials and studio discussion shows. Of course, not all of these were studio programmes but many were based here and used the facilities for post production. However, as the years went by it became clear that the studios themselves were less and less important to the core activity of the organization. Their website explains what happened...
'In August 2005 CTVC started on a new chapter in its history, moving from Hillside Studios near Watford, its home for 40 years, to new premises near London’s Tower Bridge. Fresh off the back of some of its most successful programme commissions in its history, as well as winning Britain’s premier award for religious broadcasting, “The Sandford St. Martin Award”, CTVC is right back in the centre of things. Quite simply, we’re leading the way as a Public Service Broadcasting independent production company in an exciting new age of opportunities for PSB – fulfilling the vision of J. Arthur Rank.'
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Hillside studio 1 with its Hitachi cameras - some time in the 1980s. |
Hillside has now been redeveloped into no less than 22 'exquisitely refurbished' apartments. I'm quoting the developer's website, obviously.
TVR/TVI - Windmill St and Whitfield St
mid '60s - 1989?
Television Recordings Ltd was a small company set up in the mid 1960s to provide videotape recording facilities. They were used by the BBC and ITV companies to record and edit programmes. This was at a time when videotape machines were very expensive indeed and the main TV companies could not afford to buy many for themselves. Occasionally they would find themselves short so they rented time on the machines owned by TVR. The programme was thus sent from the studio down the line to Windmill Street in Soho where it was recorded remotely.
However, as it was generally easier for the TV companies to use their own in house VTRs for production and editing work, the TVR videotape machines were often used to put the programmes to air. Chris Patten has written to me and tells me that he can remember on more than one evening walking down the corridor and watching three adjacent VTRs transmit the network programmes to air for BBC 1, BBC 2 and ITV. At that moment the whole of UK television was originating from a small facility in Windmill Street.
TVR's claim to fame was that it was the first non-broadcast company to have video and audio circuits to the Post Office Tower. To take advantage of this, they fitted out a small studio at Windmill Street (hence its inclusion here) which was used for interviews and talking heads. It was very small - about 12ft x 10ft with a very low ceiling - but was probably the first truly independent studio used by the BBC and ITV companies. A year or two later, in 1968, TVR opened a larger studio round the corner in Whitfield Street. This was a little over 1,000 sq ft - probably about 40ft x 25ft and was originally equipped with three Marconi MkIV cameras. The first studio then reverted to its use as a meeting room.
As one of the original outsourced programmes, LWT's Big Match opening season 1968-1969 came from TVR's Windmill and Whitfield Street facilities every Sunday Afternoon. TVR had a Marconi MkIV four camera scanner with VTR that covered the match on the Saturday afternoon, with the editing being done Saturday night at Windmill Street. On the Sunday morning Brian Moore would host the show and do interviews in the Whitfield Street studio with the programme going out on tape from Windmill Street.
Other uses for the Windmill Street studio was that it was used by ITN for their news bulletin for a period up to the launch of their flagship News at Ten programme. They used their own studio to build the News at Ten set and then did weeks of rehearsal from it, all the time putting out their regular late evening news service from TVR.
Soon after News at Ten started, one of the national newspapers - probably The Sun - decided to do a live 30 second ad in the mid news break. ITN did not want to do it so TVR made it in their Whitfield street studio feeding the signal to ITN to go to air nationally as the first commercial of the break.
Thanks to their unique link to the GPO (Telecom) Tower, The Windmill and later Whitfield Street studios of TVR were used for early two-way interviews by the BBC and regional ITV companies wanting to interview their own local MPs. There was a steady stream of British and foreign politicians arriving for interviews, including the Prime Ministers of various countries.
In September 1970 Television Recordings Ltd merged with Intertel VTR Services, who had been based at Wycombe Road (see elsewhere on this website) and became Television International Ltd or TVI.
The larger studio was later equipped with EMI 2001s and continued to be used by LWT for The Big Match during some of the 1970s. Airtime Productions was also a major client, making 'cheap and cheerful' commercials on video. Chris Patten recalls the technique used for these...
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'...Airtime productions did do cheap commercial to the extent that in one session I think we laid down in the studio the elements of 60 x 30 second ads. The method used was to load a one hour tape on the VTR and for the talent to just lay down the bed of the 30 second spot. The tape would continue to record and then the talent would just do the particular product part and different tags as one long list, but with sufficient spaces to allow for later editing. These elements for the commercials were then edited into the 60 different 30 second spots. I would have thought that while this type of commercial product is the norm these days, 40 years ago Airtime and TVR was certainly pioneering this style of work. Electronic editing of videotape had only been introduced by Ampex in about 1964, and electronic editing made this type of commercial production possible. In fact the first videotape editing I did was with a razor blade, although I never seriously got involved in editing as I spent most of my time in studios and OB's as a racks engineer.'
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Peter Piddock has written to inform me that Whitfield Street was still going strong up to 1986 and probably beyond. Its history is tied in with that of Sky and the great Mr Murdoch, no less. It seems that the original 'Satellite Television UK' channel (SATV) which began operation in 1982 first came from Molinare but then...
'...When Rupert Murdoch bought the company in 1983 and rebranded it as Sky Channel, the TX operation moved to TVI [in Jan 1984] and the Whitfield Street studio was put to use on music programming. This was mostly links, interviews and clips. If I remember correctly, the output was so frenetic that at one point 5 one hour shows a day were being produced, with the last one live – just to keep people on their toes! I guess it was also a clever way of avoiding overtime!'
Doesn't sound like Rupert Murdoch was involved at all does it?
I have yet to establish when TVI's Whitfield Street studio closed. Sky moved to its current HQ in Osterley in 1989 so it seems likely that the Whitfield Street studio continued in operation until then at least. Can you confirm this??? If so, did the TVI operation close then? Do drop me an email if you think you might know.
Dean Street (Intertel, Trilion)
Mid '60s - ?
Intertel are covered in some detail on the 'Old ITV studios page under 'Wycombe Road' as they owned the large studio in Stonebridge Park that was later taken over by LWT. However, they also owned a small studio in Dean St, Soho which was used amongst other things for LWT's The Big Match - probably for the '69-'70 season. I am told by Peter Dearing that the studio had originally been owned by Irvin Pannaman.
Intertel merged with TVR to form TVI in April 1971 and it is possible that they left this studio then - unless of course you know different! (TVR owned a studio in Whitfield St - see above.)
Paul Venner worked briefly in the studio during the Intertel days and recalls that it was in the basement along with the technical facilities and was the full width of the building. He reckons that it was about 20ft x 30ft. He recalls that it had 2 or 3 cameras and was used mostly for commercials and down the line interviews. He also remembers The Big Match being made here.
Andrew Hewkin tells me that in the mid 1980s the studio was owned by Trilion. He can't remember any details but says it was equipped for TV, had a cyclorama and smooth TV floor that was often repainted for different shows.
I'd love to have some more details about this studio. Can anyone remember anything??? Do get in touch, even if it's to confirm what is written here - and especially if you think anything is not right!
1968 - 2008; 2010 - ?
The studios on this site in Wandsworth were host to many successful ads, promos and TV shows for forty years. There are two studios - A is about 60 x 50 feet and B is about 50 x 40 ft. (These dimensions are wall to wall as, unusually, the studios did not have fixed fire lanes running round the sides.) They have monopole grids with crossovers similar to the studios at LWT - although of course much lower - and as such are very flexible.
When I lit a TV series a couple of years before their closure in 2008 I found them very nice studios to work in. The staff were friendly and helpful. The studios were equipped with a good selection of well-maintained lamps and their Ikegami cameras produced very nice pictures. A further advantage of the site was its excellent restaurant. John Tarby tells me that the man who built the studios - Keith Ewart - was very keen on good quality food and it seems that this tradition was continued right through the Capital years too. Possibly having so many cookery shows being made here also helped to maintain the high standards!
The studios' history is unique and they came about due to the drive and passion of a brilliant cinematographer - Keith Ewart.
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They may not look much but these dock doors saw everything from a white elephant to Frank Skinner pass through them. No, I'm not sure what I mean by that either. |
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In the sixties and seventies Keith Ewart was one of the talented and fashionable group of photographers who helped define the swinging sixties. He was also a cinematographer who was very much in demand making commercials. He directed many famous ads during the 1960s - with a young Ridley Scott often working as his art director.
Graham Le Page worked for Keith Ewart during the early sixties in his first studios at Glebe Place, Chelsea mostly making television commercials (TVCs). It's worth quoting Graham to get an idea of the kind of chap Keith was - and what his employees thought of him...
Graham also recalls a typical day at the 'office'..
During the early '70s Keith Ewart became drawn towards working with videotape at about the same time as Ridley Scott moved on to directing his own commercials. Ewart was a brilliant jazz musician and also held a private pilot's licence - flying twin-engined aircraft, although one assumes not whilst playing jazz. He did however use this skill to transport human organs around the country in his aircraft for charity. Like Graham above, some of those who knew him have described him to me as one of the nicest people they have met. His son, James has contacted me and I hope he won't mind me saying that he was surprised that I had described his father in such glowing terms. He believes that there are probably some people who did not quite share that view and remembers his father as being an 'incredibly talented man but not a very good manager of people!' However, in my experience we seldom see our own parents as others see them and possibly the truth lies somewhere between the two perceptions. Clearly a wealthy man, he decided to invest in constructing a small studio centre for his own use. Ewart Studios were completed in Wandsworth in 1968. Very unusually, although at the time he was very much a film man, he equipped the two studios with flat lino-covered floors, control galleries and monopole lighting grids. The grids were to enable rapid relighting from one production to another. The control galleries were very sensible forward thinking. At first, the two studios were simply used as photographic and film studios - working mostly in 35mm. Around 1969 studio A was equipped with black and white Marconi Mk. IV 4½ inch image-orthicon cameras fitted with Varotal 10:1 zoom lenses. These could record onto 2-inch videotape via a vision mixer in the normal way but the cameras had one interesting feature. They had optical splitters that also directed the image onto Mitchell 16mm film cameras attached to the TV cameras. As the vision mixer cut the programme a mark was made on the film so it could be edited later. This system was known as Gemini. Light levels had to be much brighter than normal as the image was being divided and of course the film stock in those days was relatively insensitive. At first, this caused problems as the power availability was limited but later a 1200A generator was installed. The Gemini system was used to make dozens of short films for the Central Office of Information. Those of us of a certain age will remember the little films that ran for two or three minutes just before closedown each night on the BBC. They demonstrated what happens if you throw water on a chip pan or warned you not to open the front door to strangers. Anyway - this is where many of them were made. Previously, these had been filmed at the Granville studio (details elsewhere on this website) and it is likely that the cameras came from that studio when it closed down in 1969. In the early 1970s, once colour was firmly established on BBC1 and ITV, Keith re equipped his studios with Bosch Fernseh cameras. He was convinced that videotape was the way to make ads but the industry was reluctant to follow his lead. Thus, the studios made commercials sometimes on tape and sometimes on 35mm. A typical campaign of the time shot on film in studio A was Macleans means whiteness, don't you forget it! which involved a white painted elephant. Other work during this period included the emerging phenomenon of pop promos. One of the most famous was David Bowie's Ashes to Ashes, made using video cameras and using some of the latest electronic effects, directed in 1980 by David Mallet. Another video that was well known in its day was the one for Paul McCartney and Stevie Wonder's 1982 No.1 hit Ebony and Ivory - probably directed by Keith (Keef) McMillan. I was informed by someone on the crew that although it looks as though both men are singing together, Stevie Wonder's contribution was made in the US whilst McCartney was filmed here at Ewarts, the two being cleverly combined in post-production. No less than the VT editor himself - David Hornsby - has contacted me to confirm this. He says it took about a week to 'glue' it all together.
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Above - the excellent grid in studio A. A lighting director's dream. The tracks were two feet apart and lights could be set alongside each other if need be. Crossover tracks enabled scopes to be moved round the studio very quickly and easily. |
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Studio A's production gallery, seen here early in 2008. This was shared with lighting and vision control. |
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Of course the studios really came into their own from 1982 when Channel 4 began. This channel was (and is) forbidden from making its own programmes. Everything shown on the channel had to come from ITV companies or independent production companies. Ewart Studios were ideal for the independents' use and almost immediately they became host to several cult entertainment series such as Vic Reeves' Big Night Out and Jonathan Ross' early shows such as The Last Resort. I am told that this latter series in particular probably saved the business as it was a regular long-running booking that paid relatively well. One might have thought that there would have been plenty of work to ensure the studios' success but in 1983 Limehouse Studios opened in Docklands. The smaller studio there was a very similar size to studio A here at Ewarts so both were in competition for some of the same work. Keith Ewart found this competition very hard to deal with and, I am told, allegedly believed that Limehouse were trying to put him out of business by undercutting him at a rate that he considered unviable. Nevertheless, thanks to his hard work and determination, Ewart Studios continued to flourish. However, Keith's family knew that the stress was beginning to tell. In the late 1980s the government changed the rules and said they would allow the ITV companies to sell some time in their studios to independent production companies. This was by definition going to be 'down time' when their own productions were not using studio space. Thus the studio owners would naturally be looking upon this income as a supplement, rather than a major source. From 1989 big, well-equipped studios would become available to the independents at relatively cheap rates. Ewart saw this as one step too far and could not face the added stress of having to run his business in the face of such competition. He decided to sell the studios. Tragically, five months later at the end of July 1989 he died of a brain tumour. Before the sale he had joked that the site would probably be worth more as a car park. (He was eventually to be proved almost right.) His daughter Victoria wrote to me in 2008 and told me... '...He could have profitted more from the sale himself, but he was determined to protect the livelihoods of his staff. He only sold when their jobs were guaranteed by the purchaser.' Referring to the eventual closure she wrote... 'Keith Ewart was a legend in his own lifetime. Demolition will never erase the impact he made on his world and on those who loved, admired and were inspired by him.'
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The attractive patio in the centre of the building. A very pleasant place to sit outside and take a coffee or eat one of the canteen's excellent meals. Apparently this is where Keith Ewart kept his parrots. No, really. |
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Studio A, looking towards the small audience rostra. As can be seen - the booms, which were seldom used in the last decade or so, were ingeniously stored on the wall. |
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So Ewart sold the studios to the Capital Radio group, who changed the name to Capital Studios. (Later, in 1997, Capital sold them off and they became an independent facility. However, they retained the name.) Back in 1989, despite the added competition from the ITV studios, Capital studios did manage to attract sufficient work to remain in business. In fact, from the early 1990s, competition increased even more when the BBC's studios too were marketed to independents. Nevertheless, Capital offered a unique mix of informality, friendliness and professionalism which many producers found attractive. Fantasy Football League with Frank Skinner and David Baddiel was made here, as were early Frank Skinner Shows before they moved to LWT. The studios then began to specialise in quiz shows and especially cookery. Fifteen to One was made here for many years in A, whilst Ready Steady Cook moved to Capital from its original home in the first Fountain Studio in New Malden and stayed for many years right up to 2008. The studio also produced two live shows each week - Saturday Cooks for ITV1, and on Sundays the BBC2 kids' show Smile was broadcast from here for several years during the early 2000s. Thanks to the very flexible grid it was possible to turn these shows round overnight. Meanwhile, studio B was host to UKtv Food's Great Food Live and Food Uncut every weekday between 2003 and 2008.
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Rats nest on the wall of studio B - courtesy of the sound department. I imagine it eventually became easier to sell off the studio than try to trace where each of these cables was plugged. |
However, despite their popularity, as Keith Ewart predicted, the land they occupied proved to be more valuable than the studios themselves and the site was sold off for redevelopment along with the closed-down brewery next door. Timing is everything and the credit crunch had not hit in 2007 when the deal was done. Another year and the value of the land would have plummeted, almost certainly ensuring the continued running of the business.
The studios closed on August 8th 2008. The last show in B was Wife Swap, the Aftermath and A closed with yet another cooking show - Step Up To The Plate. Meanwhile, Ready Steady Cook moved to TV Centre and Capital Studios became history.
Well, almost. As a last gasp, Capital was brought back into use between September and October 2008 to make another series of ITV's Daily Cooks Challenge. It was made in studio A using hired lights with an OB truck parked in studio B providing facilities. However, that came to an end in the middle of October and the management ceased to have access around the middle of December. The building was boarded up and extra security measures added.
Guess what? In March 2010 the studios had a new lease of life after all. Well, allegedly a three year lease or possibly 10 - it depends who you ask. I gather that an Iranian TV company called Manoto TV has taken over the building, using studio B for a daily magazine programme. ('Manoto' in Farsi means 'You and I'. Apparently. But then 'Dave' probably doesn't translate that well into Farsi.)
Initially an OB truck was parked in studio A to service B but the same engineers who a couple of years before went round snipping wires so that bits of kit could be sold off had to go back into the building and try to trace those old wires and get things up and running again. Studio B is now operating normally via its galleries. Studio A is occasionally used for entertainment shows for the Iranian TV channel. It still has no technical equipment or lights but the monopoles and dimmers are still there. An OB truck is used for facilities when required and lights are hired in.
I gather that they have made a Come Dine With Me type of show - although clearly not at all like that show in any way - and a singing talent show series in 2010 and again in 2011 called Googoosh Music Academy. Googoosh is a very successful female Iranian pop star. But then I'm sure you knew that.
In short, it seems that the scheme to develop the site including the old brewery ran into serious planning difficulties and obviously the financial crash didn't help either. So Capital lives on. Although, not quite as we knew it. Funny old world.
1970 - 1999
Battersea was an independent facility that was owned by the Inner London Education Authority (ILEA). It was originally an old school located in Thackery Road and occupied a surprisingly large site that has been described to me as being about the same size as Teddington Studios. The two studios themselves were relatively small but the building and its history are unique so deserve a mention here.
ILEA was the education authority for the 12 inner London boroughs in London from 1965 until its abolition in 1990. Educational needs are now handled by the boroughs themselves. However, in its early days it had a relatively large budget and one area it decided to move into was the provision of television programmes made specifically for its own schools. In this way the children from the schools themselves could get involved and programmes could be made that had a direct relevance to the target audience.
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The Inner London Educational Television Service actually began in Highbury in a converted school at Highbury corner. It was opened by Christopher Chataway in September 1968. The Highbury studio was used for a couple of years whilst the main base in Battersea was being prepared. (These are not to be confused with the Highbury Studios used by HDF Films and ATV, which were demolished in 1962.) This studio was also used to recreate Baird's first television play for the 1968 Ideal Home Exhibition. The original play - The Man with the Flower in His Mouth - had been broadcast from Baird's own studio at 133, Long Acre by the BBC in 1931. |
Battersea thus came into operation in 1970. The studios were commissioned by the Television Service's chief engineer Walter Kemp, who had been the first chief engineer of Television Wales and West and had commissioned their Cardiff and Bristol studios.
Production standards at Battersea were always high and the equipment was broadcast quality. Children can be a most demanding audience and soon get bored if they sense they are being patronised so every programme had to look as good as those being made by the BBC or ITV.
The studio centre comprised three buildings - a Studio block, a Production block and later a Publishing block.
On the ground floor of the studio block were the master control, Ampex VTR editing and transmission suites, studio maintenance workshop, a scene dock, scenery construction workshops and an industrial lift to take scenery to the two studios on the first and second floors.
The floor area of each studio was said to be about 1,100 square feet. The studios were constructed in the gutted shell of the old school building and each studio was initially equipped with three EMI 203 cameras, a Fisher boom and the usual floor monitors etc. Each studio had a sound control room with a 24 channel Neve desk and a production control room which also contained the lighting console.
In addition to studio A, the first floor also housed props storage and a make up room. On the second floor was studio B, a rehearsal room and a training studio. The third floor housed the Film Unit and the stills photographic unit and dark room. In later years one of the two production studios was re-equipped with Sony BVP3 cameras. The second studio then became a 4 wall studio, retaining its lighting grid and was often used as an ancillary to the other studio and for scene storage.
The second building contained the admin and production offices and a canteen. The film editing suites were sited there as well as the graphics/studio design suites. The OB unit offices were also in this building. The mobile unit was later equipped with two or three Link 110 colour cameras. The third building was used by the publishing unit which produced teaching materials for London schools. It can be seen that the ILEA's Television and publishing service was not a small operation.
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This marvellous photo was sent to me by Dickie Howett - to whom I am extremely grateful. This shows one of the ILEA studios in action soon after opening. The cameras are EMI 203s. The serious and somewhat self-conscious expressions on all concerned make it pretty clear that this was a posed picture rather than a 'grab' during a normal day's work. The fact that the crew seem to be lit brighter than the artist is also something of a giveaway. |
On the demise of the ILEA in 1989 the studios continued operating for about ten years after a staff buy-out as 'Battersea Studios'. Eventually, early in 1999, they were taken over by property developers and made into gated luxury apartments. I gather that Liz Mansell, Operations Manager of Battersea Studios, was shown over an expensive apartment by the sales person from the developers. On being shown one of the apartments with other clients, she apparently said "Oh this used to be the ladies toilets".
I'm grateful to Derek Brady, who has sent me much of the above information. If you have any photos or can add any corrections or details to the above, I'd appreciate it. It would also be nice to have the names of some of the programmes made here.
Incidentally, there is currently a facility that is marketed as 'Battersea Studios' that is nothing to do with the above. This is a development in Silverthorne Road, constructed in recent years, that contains 'studio' type office space. There are also two small TV studios within the building - TV1 and TV2 - that I understand have been used by Middle Eastern News and more recently NutsTV. Quite an interesting contrast. Neither studio is very large and they fall well outside the limit I have set for inclusion on this website. Oh - I just have. Forget I mentioned them.
Trilion Brewer Street
mid '70s - 1986
I'm told by Antony Koeller that this small studio was in the basement of the building with its main entrance in Lexington St and a goods lift to the studio in Poland St. VTRs, editing and telecine were on the first floor. The studio was about 1000 sq ft with a ceiling height of only 10 ft. There were two (possibly three) LDK-5 colour cameras and a b/w caption camera. The camera crew included Dave Swan, Barry Dodd and Dave Barber (Rocket). The work consisted of pop promos (often directed by Bruce Gowers), commercials and pack shots. They sometimes shot food for commercials - apparently using nitric acid for steam! The studio was also booked by HTV (ITV Wales and west country region) for interviews for its local news.
Trilion probably stayed here until they took over Limehouse in 1986. After that the premises were occupied by Goldcrest.
Trilion was the result of a merger between Lion Television and Trident. Lion were based at Shepperton studios - see that section for more information.
Trilion rapidly expanded their operation, purchasing several OB units. In 1983 they took over TVI and in 1986 they bought Limehouse Studios - which is covered elsewhere on this website.
I'm told that Trilion was a subsidiary of Centerdisc who also owned Trident Sound desks. Trident were also, it seems, the managers of Queen. This was confirmed to me by Dennis Weinreich, who was a recording engineer on some of the band's early recordings. Dennis informs me that...
'...the first Queen album was released on Trident Records before they were signed to EMI and got out of their deal with Trident. Trident was one of the most successful music studios in London which was (and still is in an altered guise) in St Anne's Court in Soho. It was owned by brothers Barry and Norman Sheffield who parlayed their success from Trident Studios into what became Trilion and the sound mixing desk company Trident whose factory was in Shepperton Town, nowhere near the film studios.'
Trident Studios were used by many major acts from the late '60s onwards. The impressive list includes The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, David Bowie, Elton John, Lou Reed, Marc Bolan, Free, Genesis, James Taylor and Carly Simon. The studios owned a 100 year old Bechstein concert grand that was known for its attractive and distinctive sound. This instrument was used on many rock and pop recordings over the years, including Elton John's Your Song and was also played by Rick Wakeman on Bowie's Life on Mars and Changes.
Paul McCartney inadvertently helped Queen to success. Apparently, he would block book the studio but then fail to turn up. Since Queen were managed by the company that owned the studio they were able to use this down time without having to pay a rental fee and the result was Bohemian Rhapsody. The famous Bechstein also features on that record, if memory serves.
Several high profile OBs and events were recorded by Trilion, including not surprisingly the video promo for Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody which was directed by Bruce Gowers.
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The promo for Bohemian Rhapsody ('75) was arguably a milestone in television history. Firstly, it was shown a great deal, since Queen were on the road when it was in the charts and could not actually appear on Top of the Pops or other shows. Even if they could have, it was the kind of song that frankly would not have come over well played live on TV. Secondly, it was unashamedly made on video without any pretence at being 'cheap film'. It made use of optical and video effects, which although they had been around for some time (the opening titles of Dr Who had used a monitor howl-round many years earlier) they somehow captured the public's attention. I have been given somewhat conflicting information regarding exactly where it was shot but thanks to being contacted by the director Bruce Gowers himself I am now confident that the following is the case: It was shot at Elstree where Queen were set up and rehearsing for their tour. Mike Fitch was one of the cameramen and he tells me that they used some prisms from Telefex, a company owned by ex BBC cameraman John Henshall. They shot it 'in about 5 hours, the bleed off effect was done by multiple howlround.' Mike recalls that the concert footage was from a recording at the Rainbow Theatre but this seems unlikely now since Bruce reckons it was all made at Elstree. Bruce says it was shot quicker than five hours. His memory is that recording began at 7.30pm as he was tied up on Aquarius at LWT. Apparently they finished in time to get to the pub for a drink! Antony Koeller was an engineer on the Elstree shoot and he remembers that they used an EMI 2005 that came from Heathrow Conference Centre. It was noisy and didn't match. What a surprise. Duncan Borrowman however recollects that some of it was made at Trilion in Brewer Street. Well, maybe but that now seems unlikely. He confirmed that the senior cameraman on Bohemian Rhapsody was Barrie Dodd and floor manager was Jim McCutcheon. Kevan Debonnaire used to work at Trilion and asked his colleague Barrie Dodd where it was made. He confirmed that it was shot at Elstree on one of the old stages now lost to Tesco. Whew. Mystery solved I think.
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Molinare
1978 - 2009
Towards the end of 1972 Stefan Sargent, his wife Tricia and a friend called Robert Parker were looking for a sound studio to record a radio programme that would be sold worldwide - 'The Bee Gees Story'. They were introduced to Michel Molinare, a retired fashion photographer who happened to own a lease on a large basement in Stratford Place, near Selfridges. Sargent paid for the rental and a small premium to use Molinare's name. Thus the first Molinare studio was created. It was immediately booked for a year by Capital Radio, who made ads and weekend radio shows in the studio. Other bookings followed and after a few years the business was looking to move to larger premises.
In February 1978 Molinare moved to its present HQ in Fouberts Place, Soho. The old warehouse/office building (dated 1873) was converted to include a studio on the ground floor with a scene dock door opening directly onto the street. This door must have been the warehouse's original goods access judging by its appearance.
By now the business had moved into filming and editing TV commercials so this studio was primarily intended for that use. Rather like Keith Ewart ten years earlier, Stefan Sargent believed that video had a role to play in making commercials as well as 35mm film. Such ads could be made much faster and cheaper and he saw a gap in the market in providing facilities for this.
Of course, the post production and editing side of the business continued to develop and Molly's has retained its reputation for excellence in this field to the present day. However, the main TV studio also found a market for small scale TV programmes made by independent companies for the main broadcast channels. When C4 launched in 1982 this provided another useful market for the facility.
1982 also saw another client arrive in the building. A company called Satellite Television UK (SATV) was founded by ex This Week researcher Brian Haynes. (Not to be confused with Brian Haynes, the retired Trinidad soccer midfielder. An easy mistake to make.) This channel broadcast to cable networks across Europe on the OTS-2 Orbital Test Satellite. The company’s offices were based in Molinare’s building and the transmission was handled from here, Studio 2 being used for live continuity. The business was, however, unsuccessful and was purchased in 1983 by Rupert Murdoch for £1. He renamed the channel 'Sky' (you may have heard of it) and the operation moved to TVI in Soho in January 1984.
The main studio was used occasionally to record pop promos. For example, Blondie's Hanging on the Telephone was recorded here back in the '80s. It was of course also used for a wide range of TV programmes over the years - I worked there myself in 2003 on a C4 chat show called Dirty Laundry. It was notably used for the first televised Mayoral debate in 2008.
Studio 1 was 45 x 33 ft (1,485 sq ft) and was the only drive-in television studio in London's West End. It had a saturation lighting rig and on the first floor was a large production gallery adjoined by the sound control room. Despite its small size, studio 1 could offer audience seating for 60 and there were the usual production offices and some set storage.
Studio 2 was 28 x 14 ft with a full lighting rig and gallery which was fully air-conditioned and sound proofed. It was used as both a conventional green/blue screen studio and fully integrated with Molinare’s ORAD Cyberset-NT 3-D VIRTUAL Studio system. In the early 80's studio 2 was used for continuity on a very early satellite TV channel called SATV. This channel was purchased by Rupert Murdoch for £1 and renamed Sky. You may have heard of it.
Sadly studio 1 was closed in May 2009 and converted into one of the largest colour grading theatres in central London. Studio 2 closed towards the end of 2009 and was also converted into a grading suite.
1983 - 1989
From the summer of 1983 to early in 1989 this studio centre in the heart of Docklands was in its day the place to be making programmes. Its story is one of enterprise, high expectations and a brief moment of success. Sadly, it was a victim of circumstances and its story is in some ways rather sad.
Much of the following information is gratefully taken from a 1984 copy of 'Television Lighting' - the journal of the Society of Television Lighting Directors. Some details and images were equally gratefully taken from an article by Martin Hawkins in the autumn 1989 edition of 'Zerb' - the magazine of the Guild of Television Cameramen. Martin also supplied most of the images below. John Brady was also kind enough to post me a CD with scanned-in copies of various Limehouse leaflets and publications. Further details were taken from an article in 'Building' magazine dated April 1984 and also from various documents issued by the company itself. Some of the more interesting details have been emailed to me by various individuals who were involved at the time.
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When Southern TV lost its franchise in 1981, three of the senior managers - Jeremy Wallington, Frank Letch and Al Burgess decided to plough £43,000 of their redundancy money into funding a feasibility study into whether there was a market for an independent studio in London. The result was inconclusive (so, money well spent then) but they decided to go for it anyway. Their approach was very much client-centred and they drew up a list of requirements that they believed would make their studios popular with programme makers. Three more people joined them to become directors of the company - John O'Keefe, previously production director of Thames' Euston studios, Michael Flint - formerly vice-president in charge of European production of Paramount Pictures and Mark Shivas - ex BBC producer. Limehouse Productions was formed - to make programmes for the BBC, ITV and C4 but the aim was also to build a studio centre to make their own programmes and offer the facilities to other independent production companies. The construction costs would be huge so the task of raising the necessary sum from various investors began. Much of this funding was raised by forming by a consortium of five companies - Associated Newspapers, DC Thomson & Co Ltd, Drayton Consolidated Trust plc, May Gurney Holdings Ltd and The Scottish Investment Trust plc. Along with the directors' own contributions a total of almost £10m was invested in the company. They looked for a site - initially in west London near most other studios but costs were prohibitive. Fortunately the Docklands Enterprise Zone had just been created and a suitable building was available for conversion. Shed 30, Canary Wharf had been a rum and banana warehouse, built in 1952, but its size and immense strength made it highly suitable for their needs. There were grants and loans available for building in this area and no rates would have to be paid until 1991. The government was very keen to see new businesses set up here so it seemed ideal. Famous architect Sir Terry Farrell was engaged and he came up with an ingenious and attractive plan. He had just completed the conversion of a Henley's garage into the new TV-am studios in Camden so he certainly understood what was required. The original technical report was carried out by Sir James Redmond (ex Chief Eng of the BBC). In fact, the studios occupied only half of the building. It was hoped that the right hand half would be occupied by other small companies working in the television industry so forming that most ghastly of expressions - a 'media centre'. In fact, probably the only company to take up residence was Spitting Image Productions. However, they occupied an upper floor in the eastern (studio) half of the building where they set up their puppet factory. The empty western half of the building was used for films and pop videos, including Derek Jarman's Caravaggio and Queen's I Want To Break Free. The ground floor was also used as the location for a play - God's Chosen Car Park - whilst the top floor became well known on Channel 4 as the home of Network 7. This was controlled from studio 2's gallery - but more on this show later...
According to a company document dated 18th January 1983, the lease taken out by Limehouse was for 200 years and I have been reliably informed cost £475,000 for the entire warehouse. This lease was signed in 1982 and work began. The directors of the company were fully involved in every aspect of the construction so that it not only ran to time but every detail was exactly as they wanted it. Actually - not quite to time. The construction work ran about five weeks behind schedule but allegedly that was mainly due to repainting the front of the building at the wishes of the architect. Terry Farrell went on to design the MI6 building in Vauxhall and the distinctive office block above Charing Cross railway station on the Thames. The family resemblance is clear. Incidentally, in 1961 one of Mr Farrell's first jobs was to design the ventilation ducts for the Blackwall Tunnel. Well, we all have to start somewhere. The staff were taken on during the final few months of construction and they too became involved in the fitting out of the studios. It was very much a team effort and all were hugely and justly proud of what they had achieved. There was a very small freelance market in those days so staff had to be attracted away from the security of their ITV or BBC jobs. Those that made the move proved to be highly motivated and contributed very much to the success of the company. Partly thanks to them, the technical fit-out was to time and on budget.
The studios were constructed to the highest possible standards. (An interesting contrast to those created by some in the past few years.) Antony Koeller has contacted me - he helped design and install the studios and Dave Chawner of Link was project manager. Each studio consisted of a sealed concrete box supported by giant springs in order to isolate it from extraneous noise. Technically, the company went to extraordinary lengths to ensure top quality. In order to make the right choice, every TV camera on the market was put in the same room and compared side by side. Vision engineers, LDs and cameramen all picked the Link 125. Even so, they asked Link to improve the design beyond the BBC spec, which they were happy to do. The lighting grid utilized motorised lighting bars rather than monopoles. This is the only somewhat surprising decision but it was made to offer the 'greatest flexibility to programme makers' and to speed up turn-rounds between shows. Some LDs would certainly quibble with the former argument but it is certainly true that fewer electricians are needed to prepare a saturation rig than a monopole rig thus saving operating costs. The lighting consultant was Jim Richards, who had previously been Head of Lighting with the BBC, so perhaps the choice of bars rather than monopoles is not that surprising. (I wonder if he ever lit a sitcom or drama in a monopole studio and found out how much easier it is than in a BBC studio!)
The Philips sound installation, as designed by Sandy Brown Associates, was unique for its day in that the main studio had 81 microphones slung in the grid along with 79 speakers. The sound could be fed through a delay simulating various acoustics including that of a concert hall if required. Musicians loved it. In May 1983 studio trials began. By July studio production was underway and the business immediately began attracting work. Surprisingly, it was not just programmes for the newly opened Channel 4, which had been the anticipated market. Some dramas were recorded here including Cyrano de Bergerac, which was transferred from TC1 at TV Centre, due to a strike. Other dramas included Winter Sunlight and God's Chosen Carpark. The National Theatre's production of The Mysteries was also a Limehouse production - shot over a week in the Cottesloe Theatre at the National. This production was highly regarded at the time by many people in the industry and beyond and proved the high production values that the Limehouse crews were capable of. Entertainment shows included Network 7 ('87-'88), Treasure Hunt ('83-'89), sketch show Who Dares Wins ('83-'88), Rock in the Dock, Food and Drink, The Emma Thompson Special and some inserts and a special for Spitting Image ('84-'89). Whose Line is it Anyway? began here in 1988. The main studio was also popular with rock musicians and in 1985 Carl Perkins recorded a celebrated televised concert here with George Harrison, Ringo Starr and Eric Clapton. A milestone in British television was reached when in August 1988 the Yogic Flying high jump world record was beaten, at 4ft 2ins, on an edition of Network 7. It was that kind of show. Actually, it was a groundbreaking show in many ways - aimed at a 'yoof' market and mixing current affairs and entertainment. It broke conventional television rules of the day wherever it could - using wobbly hand-held cameras and being lit with a giant softlight mounted on a fork-lift and other slightly more portable but equally unconventional fixtures. It was, in short, a typical Channel 4 show - many critics (and viewers) hated it but it gathered a small but devoted following and set trends that other shows copied. Martin Hawkins has quite rightly taken slight umbrage at my description of the hand-held shots as being 'wobbly'. He would rather describe them as 'canted.' Absolutely. The point though is that this show created its own style. In fact, cameramen would henceforth be asked to do a 'Network 7 - type shot.'
The Business Daily was a regular booking in studio 2. It was transmitted live six days a week for Channel 4 and on Sunday there was no rest for the wicked as The Business Programme was also made here. The facilities offered on site included a hospitality boat, 'John B', moored alongside which became very popular with artists and clients. The story goes that it had previously been a boat of ill repute moored to the west of London. After it became 'undockworthy' it was replaced by a small liner purchased from the Gdansk shipyards. Well I never.
It is probably worth mentioning that Limehouse did not have the market all to itself. Over in Wandsworth, Ewart Studios were also trying to attract companies making shows for Channel 4. Inevitably each attempted to outbid the other to win contracts. Someone close to Keith Ewart has told me that he found the undercutting very hard to deal with. Certainly, Ewarts was a much smaller enterprise and so one assumes had lower overheads than Limehouse. Keith Ewart is allegedly said to have believed that for a number of years Limehouse were undercutting him consistently at rates that he deemed unviable. However, Keith Wilkinson doesn't remember that as quite being the case. He was Deputy Chief Accountant, then Finance Director of Limehouse TV. He recalls that in the early days contracts may well have been underpriced but 'that was put right next time they were quoted.' Following a slightly shaky start the business began to settle down nicely. The studios were becoming known as being a great place to make programmes and more production companies were using them. In July 1986 the company was bought by Trilion plc. Trilion also bought an equipment hire company called Viewplan in November of the same year. Limehouse thus became part of a group that also owned a facilities house in Stockport, a distribution company and the Trident recording studio. Trilion had been operating an impressive fleet of OB vehicles but when they acquired Limehouse they sold off their large units and retained four smaller scanners and a location unit which were repainted with the Limehouse logo. Unfortunately, it seems that from this point the real trouble began. I am told that in spite of appearances both Trilion and Viewplan had not been generating cash and within a few months in 1987 the founders of Trilion and Viewplan had left the group. One sizeable block of shares changed hands and ended up in the hands of Brent Walker plc (yes - the same company that in 1989 bought and then sold off most of Elstree Film Studios to build a Tesco superstore). Brent Walker were regarded by the others as a hostile shareholder for a while, until peace broke out when a common enemy appeared in the surprising guise of the London Docklands Development Corporation. In Keith Wilkinson's words...
Astonishingly, despite all the encouragement given to the company when they first set up, it seems that the London Docklands Development Corporation issued a compulsory purchase order on Limehouse. To most people in the industry - let alone the staff - this was something of a surprise. I have incidentally been contacted by someone who was involved with the technical fit-out. He informed me that rather surprisingly, before the studios even opened, there was an understanding amongst the contractors that they would possibly have to leave within a few years. This apparently referred to a common belief at the time of the installation that the LDDC had the right to purchase the land back 'at any time.' This of course was technically true but none of the Limehouse management or staff actually expected them to do it - and certainly not the bank that had advanced the considerable loan enabling the studios to be constructed. Keith informs me that the compulsory purchase order was issued early in 1988, five years after they had begun to operate. He believes this was actually a bit of sabre rattling on the part of the LDDC. The Limehouse management were deeply unimpressed by this and thought that the LDDC were acting in a very shameful manner, especially considering the open and very public support they had previously given Limehouse. The LDDC wanted Limehouse to come to a deal with Olympia and York, the company that was developing Canary Wharf. Apparently, O&Y needed the studio site in order to build their new towers, even though the studios didn't actually occupy the land on which they would be built. Maybe somebody had decided that an old rum and banana warehouse wouldn't look quite right amongst all the shiny new skyscrapers. In any case, Keith tells me that Limehouse fought the order to move 'tooth and nail.' The lawyer in charge even felt it would make his career to see it off, but in fact they eventually reached an agreement with Olympia and York. In October 1988 it was announced to the staff that the studios would cease operation the following February. The deal that was done was financially very much in Limehouse's favour. Remember that the building itself had cost £475,000. The construction and technical fit-out had cost around £8m. The site was sold for £25m - so a significant profit was made. Where all that cash went is another story. How the deal was done is quite interesting. It seems that George Walker personally took on the negotiations and the £25m deal was reached in the Autumn of 1998. That is the public story. In reality though, at first he got nowhere - but I'm told that the studio manager learnt from an indiscreet builder that the Canary Wharf Tower could not be constructed without encroaching on Limehouse's property for scaffolding and access. Once he was armed with that information, Walker got the deal sorted out. You see it's not what you know... it's knowing what who you know knows.
Thus, only five and a half years after they opened, the studios closed. Studio 1's last production - Food and Drink - was recorded on 20th February 1989 and studio 2 packed up the following Friday. Both were stripped of all useful equipment - most of which was put into storage. By 16th March the site was empty.
The company still had their contract to provide facilities to the Business Daily programme so on they moved to the Trocadero in Picadilly (a site owned by Brent Walker) where a studio was temporarily set up, opening on 17th March.
On 9th June 1989 Limehouse bought Wembley Studios from Lee Lighting. (That company had been operating the site as Lee International Film Studios since 1978 but had left the site in 1986.) The old film studios were sold off by Limehouse for redevelopment as a retail park (note the Brent Walker touch here) and the huge Studio 5, which had been purpose-built by Rediffusion, was taken over. One source states that it took Limehouse only eight weeks to refurbish the studio but in fact the first programme was recorded some four months later on 6th October. (The Limehouse years at Wembley are covered on the |
