When the lights go out for the last time at Didsbury studios, there’ll be a lot of us who will go all sentimental like dear old Bernie Winters and hum a chorus of “Bye Bye Didsbury”!

And why shouldn’t we be sentimental about the studio which saw the birth of Armchair Theatre, of Boy Meets Girl, of Big Night Out, Just Jimmy, Opportunity Knocks and so many other ABC shows?

My first contact with Didsbury was for Happily Ever After starring Dora Bryan in 1961. Actually, it wasn’t; my very first contact with Didsbury was in 1956 (or was it ’57?) when ABC and Granada got together for a social evening! If that’s a digression, it’s one which still surely invokes a few memories with the “founder” members — of whom there remain so many at Didsbury.

Back to Happily Ever After. Opposite Dora Bryan as her doctor husband was Peter Murray. In those days comedy shows were played the more logical, but certainly less effective, way round. That is, the audience was in the circle and the performers were a mile away on the floor! A lot of the action was ‘blind’ to the audience and reaction was consequently weak. Later, in an effort to improve atmosphere, seats for an extra audience were added on the floor and finally the studio was turned round to the present shape.

Pre-1961 I can only speak of Didsbury-based shows as a (then local) viewer. I remember Joan Edwards dusting away each Saturday morning to the strains of Poor People of Paris, Cherry Pink and Que Sera Sera – all 1956 vintage pre-rock stuff when pops still came from Tin Pan Alley.

Then, of course, there was Home Town Saturday Night, Top Numbers and Billie Whitelaw’s Time Out for Peggy. In 1959 rock arrived at Parrswood Road in Boy Meets Girl [sic: Girls — Ed] and Wham! Marty Wilde, Billy Fury, The Vernons Girls, Joe Brown and so many now forgotten rock stars of the fifties must certainly keep happy and affectionate memories of those days and those ever-helpful people at the Capitol.

I can speak personally in this — and I know that Roy, Peter, Milo, Pat and Ronnie will echo my own feelings. There was nothing quite like the Didsbury welcome; nothing quite like Frank’s greeting at the steps to make you feel wanted and important! The crew have handled just about every big artiste and every type of big show from Drama to Spectaculars yet one always sensed and appreciated their excitement with each new series.

Melody and evergreen tunes for a while replaced rock ‘n’ roll in Buckaroo. Looking back on it (impartially — I wasn’t producing!) what a super set it was, and what a happy show. And the music tapes still sound good today, don’t they fellers? And, of course, Jimmy Clitheroe. For three years Just Jimmy has been one of the big rating-pullers in our own regions and is now at last being seen in London. The appearance of the show in the Tam Top 20 is a feather in Jimmy’s schoolboy cap – and another for Didsbury.

Mike and Bernie Winters arrived with Big Night Out in 1963 and this was one of the first shows to feature regularly the ABC Television Showband – a group of Manchester-based musicians got together by Bob Sharples. The combination of Mike and Bernie with Lionel Blair paved the way for Blackpool Night Out in 1964. Although not strictly Didsbury in origin, the Blackpool shows were very much the responsibility of Didsbury studio and technical personnel.

I know that David Nixon has attempted and succeeded with tricks at Didsbury which he would hesitate to perform elsewhere.

Without giving away those professional magicians’ secrets (in fact, I couldn’t — I usually wonder how they’re done myself!) I cannot help recalling that complicated system of runners between the studio and the bar of the Parrswood opposite. Not, I hasten to add, for liquor, but in some mysterious way connected with David’s “subject” isolated in the bar. David must have lost count of the programmes he has appeared in at Didsbury – Comedy Bandbox, Candid Camera, the David Nixon Show and very many guest spots.

And if Mike and Bernie, David Nixon and all of us in Light Entertainment will miss Didsbury, so too will Hughie Green. Opportunity Knocks now approaches the end of its fifth series and Hughie’s frequent praise of the crew is some measure of his respect for this soon-to-be-darkened studio.

And where else could Ken Dodd watch a playback in the small hours of the morning – he would certainly want to add his discomknockerating thanks!

I am grateful to Joan Davy, who has edited our House Magazine for all these years, for the opportunity to thank everyone at Didsbury from all of us in Light Entertainment. Each of us must have his own collection of Didsbury memories and those which stick with me include seeing Emperor Jones as a live Armchair Theatre; Bernie Winters being “blown up” each week in Big Night Out; Hughie Green introducing Tony Holland (can’t hear “Wheels” without thinking of the Muscle Man, can you?); Peter’s editing sessions — “It fills a ninety minute tape – how the hell can I get it down to thirty-seven-thirty?”; Ronnie Baxter’s warm-ups (how could they not be a good audience when he’s so nice to them); Pat Johns, the flying ace of Blackpool; and Milo and Roy and their audition marathons – how many times must they have heard Granada?

But the fact is that they’re all happy memories. And, in return for them may I wish all the Diddlesbury boys and girls, as Hughie would say, who are shortly crossing the Pennines, the very best of luck in your new jobs and in your new homes. If it’s any consolation, Drury Lane will have nothing on the old Capitol for ghosts!

The post Farewell Didsbury appeared first on THIS IS ABC WEEKEND from Transdiffusion.

THE eyebrows shot up. “Me? Square?” Producer Jack Good spluttered indignantly at the idea. Then he added: “Well, perhaps physically. But that’s as far as it goes.”

Jack, the man who looks more like the Oxford undergraduate he once was than the TV producer he is now, was talking about ABC’s Boy Meets Girls.

He beamed and said: “You might say the show’s gone square though. Comparatively, that is.”

Comparatively, because this 28-year-old veteran of two teenage rock ‘n’ roll TV successes has a reputation for blasting the viewers almost out of their seats.

But that’s finished. The bounce of Jack’s last series, Oh Boy!, has been toned down. So much so, that some are saying that Jack is going square.

Jack explained: “It’s not true, of course. Rock ‘n’ roll is not as overwhelming as it was. But there is nothing sudden about the change.

“Popular music is tending to become more melodic and less frantic. The arrangements are sweeter and the whole atmosphere is different – like the new show.

“Oh Boy! taught me that there is no substitute for personality in entertainment. The high spots always came when an artist got something of himself across.

The attack can become just as boring as the slow, dragging pace. We shall us an occasional ‘wild’ number, but the accent is on friendliness and the programme is aimed at a wider audience.

“We are out to capture the elder brothers and sisters of the teenagers. And the mums and dads, too.

“I have never been a rock ‘n’ roll producer. I have been a producer of excitement. It’s not the music that counts, it the thrill.”

Giving viewers the thrills and excitement are some of the old favourites from Oh Boy! Among them is petite South African organist Cherry Wainer and her cousin, drummer Don Storer; sax star Red Price; the Vernons Girls from Liverpool; and Marty Wilde, the show’s compere.

Twenty-four-year-old Cherry is not worried about the soft-pedal technique “It’s quite a change of course,” she said “but I like all kinds of music and I’m enjoying every minute of it.”

Said cousin Don: “This quieter atmos phere gives us a better chance to get a number over.”

Don and Cherry – they were last in South Africa almost two years ago – both love England. “Apart from the weather,” said 30-year-old Don. “I know you are all blowing your tops about this summer you’ve just had, but really it was no better than are many winters in Durban.” Producer Good is bringing into the programme guest artists and new stars from America and the Continent.

On a recent two-and-a-half month tour of Europe he found Little Tony and His Brothers. They will be making their second in the show appearance tomorrow (September 26).

Little Tony is 18. He sings in English but he does not yet speak it fluently.

His guitar-playing brothers, Enrico, 16, and Alberto, 21, are also up against the language difficulty. But when I met them, all three were talking excitedly to British rock ‘n’ roller Terry Dene. He speaks no Italian, but he discovered that the language of rock ‘n’ roll is international.

Little Tony took to rock ‘n’ rolling a year ago and already has many discs to his credit. He has won top prizes in rock ‘n’ roll festivals, too.

When he became interested in it he took English rock ‘n’ roll records to an elderly English language teacher to learn them parrot-fashion. It has paid off handsomely.

Many people think he is Italian. But though he lives in Rome he comes from the tiny, mountain-top Republic of San Marino.

And he proudly produces his Roman identity card, which describes him as a “foreigner,” to prove it.

The friendly, family atmosphere of the show is being exploited in a glamorous way – with the 16 Vernons Girls.

The group – all are aged between 17 and 25 – has two understudies. They attend rehearsals and learn the routines so that if a girl falls ill or leaves to get married there is always a replacement available.

“The Vernons are the first group who have not been presented as girls who look alike and dress alike,” said Jack Good.

“They are a nice bunch of kids; there is nothing of the stainless-steel glitter of the ordinary show girl about them. They are happy and friendly.

“After Oh Boy! we decided that if the public knew more about them they would go for them in a big way.”

Jack has in mind chiefly viewing mothers and their sons. He would like the mothers to regard the girls as their daughters and the sons to regard them as their sisters.

Dance director Leslie Cooper said: “The girls are being featured more in the new show than they were in Oh Boy! and we think it will serve to increase their popularity.”

The girls get plenty of fan mail. And 23-year-old Margaret Stredder, who wears spectacles, gets more than any of them.

Silver-blonde Margaret has seven pairs of glasses (one for each day of the week) and a regular boy-friend.

But the boy the girls “dig” the most is 19-year-old Marty Wilde, star of the show. He has a taste for fast cars as well as fast music.

Marty, owner of a sports car, told me: “I don’t get much time for motoring these days. I’m far too busy.”

The new role of compere? Marty thinks it’s terrific. “I’m very excited about it. It’s the biggest break for me so far and I hope this new show is going to be a great success.”

Marty is not worried that the general tone-down will lose him some of his fans. “I think I shall gain 10 new fans for every one I may lose. This treatment of the programme is just what teenagers want.”

Twenty-year-old Terry Dene, who shares Marty’s interest in speed (he has a motor-cycle), agreed.

“I have been doing more ballads than rock ‘n’ roll numbers and I have found that they have gone down better,” said Terry. “I don’t think people want to be knocked out of their seats any more.

“I wouldn’t say that rock is dying, but there is a swing towards the quieter numbers.”

Quiet, sweet, friendly. That’s Boy Meets Girls. It’s not the mixture as before, but it’s the formula that should give Jack Good his hat-trick of TV hits.

The post Boy Meets Girls appeared first on THIS IS ABC WEEKEND from Transdiffusion.

Or else they frankly disbelieved it — like the assistant who was fitting him for a hired morning suit. When the customer’s name had to be written in a limited space on the hire form, Voytek slowly spelt out the improbable collection of letters until there was no more room on the form. The assistant looked up, pained: “Really, sir, this is no time for joking.”

After that he became just Voytek, which is the nearest phonetic spelling of his first name.

Born in 1925, Voytek spent his teens in Warsaw. He had always drawn well and been interested in art, but under German rule he had to go to an agricultural school.

He studied architecture secretly at the “underground university.”

Small groups of students met their tutors in private houses. Says Voytek: “It was dangerous, but everyone accepted it as a calculated risk — like crossing a busy street.”

As a member of a Resistance sabotage group, Voytek drew sketches and plans of places to be destroyed when the time came to rise against the Germans. It came in the autumn of 1944 In the confused street fighting, Voytek was wounded. When he recovered he hitch-hiked south to join the Polish forces in Italy. There he took part in camp theatricals.

He recalled: “We used to make scenery out of paper, but it stretched when wet, so I used to rub dry colour powder on with my hands.”

And so to Britain and post-war resettlement. After a year spent studying art and learning English, Voytek was interviewed for the Old Vic School of Design.

“I did not appreciate I was joining one of Britain’s principal theatrical institutions,” he told me.

“The Old Vic was still bomb-damaged and I saw the director in a back room. I was quite off-hand about it. I even asked to know the result of the interview the next day, although it usually took about a fortnight.

“If I had been less ignorant I would have been overawed. But they accepted me.”

Since then, by way of repertory theatre, the Arts Theatre and, for the past two years, on TV, Voytek has been earning a reputation for distinctive and sometimes brilliant stage designs.

For ABC he is the designer of Boy Meets Girls, Counter-Attack and many “Armchair Theatre” productions.

He is happiest when he can interpret a script in an impressionist style. Then, he thinks, a designer comes into his own in creating a mood which is right for the play without being realistic. A good example is a set he designed for J. M. Barrie’s Mary Rose at Nottingham Playhouse – a misshapen door and alcove to represent the distorted lives of the characters and set the mood.

Says Voytek: “I believe the Theatre is the essence of reality rather than a mediocre copy of our environment. ‘Props’ do not have to be realistic provided you get the right style for the play.

“I have used a few woven rustic screens and pieces of wood with chicken wire stapled over the top to represent trees. If you catch the right atmosphere with a design, the imagination of both actors and audience is stimulated.”

Voytek uses his hands expressively as he speaks. He has come a long way since winging his way through an entrance examination for Dundee Art School in 1946 – a first step towards the Old Vic.

To design a television play Voytek prepares “almost a comic strip” of the various shots and scenes throughout the production. From these lightning sketches emerge the more detailed “props.”

In the “Armchair Theatre” production of Boy With a Meat Axe, the script simply set the scene in “a street.” Voytek made it a street with lots of brickwork and heavy shoring timbers propping up a high wall.

“The timbers became an integral part of the fight scene, breaking up the action and providing a series of dramatic shots, visually exciting,” he told me.

“In television we usually work in a naturalistic style that is closer to film than the stage. It seems to be thought that while people will accept abstract design in the theatre, on television they will only accept it in advertising.”

Sometimes, with a few brush strokes, a designer can create a character visually. Voytek’s quick sketch of a jealous husband for the comedy Italian Straw Hat, produced at Nottingham, shows how a designer may not only create the clothing but suggest the complete character.

It was at Nottingham in 1955 that Voytek met his wife, actress Renate Brent. They were married the following year and now live near ABC’s Teddington studios with their children, two-and-a-half-year-old Stefan, and Julie, aged nine months.

Voytek used to “run away from the theatre” ever so often and do something else. He once went to Wales and painted pictures for a few months. Another time he became a decorator in a Mayfair hotel – and painted walls.

He is less Bohemian now. He no longer “runs away.” Instead, with a wife who has an interest in his work, the distinction of a single name may become his signature instead of a necessity.

• Wojciech Roman Pawel Jerzy Szendzikowski, MC (1925-2014) continued to work in theatre and television into the 1990s. His marriage to Renee produced a further child, Joe, but ended in divorce in 1971. His second marriage, to Fionnuala Kenny, also ended in divorce. They had one child, Taya. At the time of his death he had six grandchildren.

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