The following is a transcript of a commentary Peter recorded as an introduction to the Department S episode, ‘A Small War of Nerves’, for the Umbrella Entertainment release of the series.Some of you may’ve already heard this, but for those of you who haven’t, I hope you’ll enjoy it.
“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen.
The main attraction of this episode is, of course, Sir Anthony Hopkins.
I thought the story had a good idea, and I discussed it with the director, Leslie Norman. He’s made many successful films at the famous Ealing Studios, such as the recently shown ‘Dunkirk’. he was the father of Barry Norman, who presented that wonderful television series, Film ’90, ’91, ’92, ’99; it lasted 20 years. Now taken over by that very funny and delightful, Jonathan Ross.
What Barry Norman didn’t know was that his dad directed me in my very first screen test, around nineteen-hundred and thirty-seven, or thereabout. It was for the male lead in a film that was to star Jean Simmons. The scene was in her bedroom, and I was this Latin-American kidnapper who’d come in to seduce her. I don’t know if you’ve ever seen or heard yourself on screen – it’s the most horrible experience in the world!
I took my girlfriend at the time with me to see the rushes of this scene for moral support and boy did I need it! What I saw on the screen bore no relation whatsoever to what I thought I was doing to the camera in the studio. The auditorium darkened. On the screen, we got the Clapper Boy hitting his board, and it said: ‘test for Jean Simmons’ as, erm, Lady whoever, and Peter Wyngarde for Antonio.
My hand had now gripped my girlfriend’s hand in a vice. But there was worse to come! It was the noise that came out of that enormous mouth. The line was: “Hello. My name is Antonio”. What came out sounded like: “Hhheeeellllooooo. Mmmyyyyyy nnnnaaaaammmmmmeeee iiissss Aaaaannnnntttttooooonnnnnnnnniiiiooooo!”
I heard a gasp from my girlfriend, which I thought was in reaction to what was on the screen, but it wasn’t. My nails that I’d dug so far into her hand had drawn blood!
When I reminded Leslie Norman of this test, he said he didn’t remember it being that bad: “At least no worse than someone called Anthony Hopkins!”
When I read ‘a Small war of Nerves’, I said we must go for the best. Halliday has to carry the whole of the first and second part of the film, and the last confrontation scene requires an actor – by that I mean a gifted actor, who can find nuances and tempo to make the scene work. But above all, he must have sensitivity so the audience can sympathise with his motive. Without the right actor there was no film! If he had charisma as well, we’d got it made! Everybody agreed when I suggested Tony Hopkins.
And he’s superb in this as he is in everything he does. He brings a wonderful sincerity, a quirky nervousness, and an enormous power, as always. He makes us believe completely in the character he plays. English actors love to rehearse because of our theatre traditions, I suppose – our training. So at the beginning of the series, I tried to get the cast together just to do this, so as not to waste time with the technicians who were about doing their personal and professional jobs; sort of preliminary search of the best way to get the truth of the script. Or, in some cases, to get more of the truth into it, which the confines of television had robbed. And possibly, actors are the most hardworking profession. It was never difficult to ask them to rehearse – even out of their contractual time… except for Anthony Hopkins!
When he arrived at the studios, I went to his dressing room – first to welcome him, and then to discuss the script and to ask him if there was anything he’d like to lose, or gain – or whatever. It’s called “throwing it around”, and it becomes second nature – spontaneous.
I knocked on his dressing room door. Nothing. I tried again. There was no answer. Again, I tried it. Still no answer. I thought maybe he’s gone to the canteen or something. Then Fredrick Jaeger, who plays the villain – a wonderfully funny man, who kept us all in fits on the set, had the dressing room next door; I was just about to knock on his door to welcome him, when he came out and said: “It’s no good – he won’t answer. We’ve all tried!” We both looked puzzled, and to this day I don’t know why Tony Hopkins didn’t respond to our knock.
So, the big scene at the end of the film was never rehearsed; it is completely spontaneous., and I think all the better for it. Tony taught me that, for films, the whole point is getting ‘The Moment’ – the French call it ‘mystere’d moment’. I call it good acting!
However, we did find, or notice at least, a small empty half-bottle of Scotch a little way down the corridor. I’m sure Tony won’t mind me mentioning this, because he himself has said that, at the time, he was inclined to have a sniff or two.
He’s superb in this, as he is in everything he’s done. he brings a wonderful simplicity; a quirky nervousness, and an enormous power, as always. It makes u believe completely in the character he plays.
Unlike a feature film, we don’t have time to use the details of the finer brushstrokes, because of the very nature of the time set of commercial television. Our guides are the breaks, and points have to be made within them. It’s like a clever puzzle, which has a teaser at the beginning; a fast action pace in the middle, and a swift denoument at the end. To get some red-blooded acting in is a wonderful bonus. And that’s what Tony and the rest of the cast bring to ‘A Small War of Nerves’. “
The Dybbuk(also known as ‘Between Two Worlds’) is a celebrated play of the same name by S. Ansky (pseudonym for Shloyme Zanvl Rappoport), which was written during the years between 1912-1917. The idea for the play came to Ansky as he led a Jewish folklore expedition through small towns of Eastern Europe, which was cut short by the outbreak of World War I. The Dybbuk reflects Ansky’s deep perception of the shtetl’s religious and cultural mores, as well as his insightful appreciation of its hidden spiritual resources. Plans to produce the play in Russian by Stanislavsky’s Moscow Art Theater in 1920 were aborted by the Bolshevik Revolution. Ansky, who died in 1920 never lived to see his play produced. The play however, was destined to become one of the most widely-produced in the history of Jewish theater. Its rich ethnographic tapestry, mystical themes, star-crossed lovers and haunting melodies were designed to bridge the historical abyss.
The Story
The Dybbuk tells the tragic, but ultimately triumphant story of a young man and his sweetheart, who are bound together by love, but who are separated by ignorance and the strictures of convention. However, as in the case of Romeo and Juliet, the device of the young lovers provides an opportunity to explore and reveal other, more profound issues; issues of power, of culture and tradition and, most importantly, of modernity.
The setting is the small village of Brinnitz in Poland in around 1850, where poor hasidic scholar, Channon (Peter Wyngarde), who is deeply in love with Leah (Yvonne Mitchell) – the beautiful stepdaughter of the rich and powerful merchant, Sender (Harold Kasket). For Channon, Leah is no ordinary woman, but the immortal beloved; the human vessel of God’s divinity, and in aspiring to her love, his soul aspires to divine fulfilment.
When Channon is away from the village pursuing his studies, Leah’s stepfather promises her in marriage to Menashe (Donald Morley). When Channon returns, he is devastated. In an attempt to reverse Sender’s decision, Channon turns to his friend and fellow scholar, Chennoch (John van Eyssen) who is known to dabble in the dangerous power of the Kabbalah in an attempt to help him win her back. He chooses a horrific death and the damning his own soul to possess Leah and the entire community of Brinnitz as a Dybbuk to force her release.
When Leah rebels against her stepfather and invites her now deceased lover to her wedding, she rejects Menashe in front of his family and all the other wedding guests, leaving Rabbi Samson (Marne Maitland) powerless to officiate. A message is sent to Azrael (Mark Dignam), a Rabbi from the nearby city of Mirapol who is wise in the arts of the Kabbalah who pronounces the ‘great malediction’ to exorcise Channon’s spirit from Leah. But she is intent on resisting, choosing death over marriage and patriarchy, promising her lover Channon that they will ascend to heaven and live together in eternity.
A Bit Of Trivia
Playing Channon was one of Peter’s favourite roles.
The ‘great malediction’ – or ‘Cherem’ in Hebrew – which is used by Rabbi Azrael to exorcise Channon’s spirit from Leah is the most powerful religious curse in religion. Jewish authorities were at all times reluctant to perform it because of its dreadful implications; its utterance condemns the sinner to everlasting hell. As far as anyone can be certain it was only ever pronounced once in the 20th Century; by Rabbinical Court in Eastern Europe during World War II against Adolf Hitler.
The producer of the play, Rudolph Cartier, also worked with Peter on ‘Will Shakespear’ in 1953.
‘The Dybbuk’ is sometimes called ‘the Jewish Romeo and Juliet’, however, scholars have often argued that Ansky’s play is a more multidimensional work, with a deeper philosophical meaning than Shakespeare’s famous drama.
The choreographer on the play was Tutte Lemkow, who also worked with Peter on L’Aiglon (TV), 1953; Will Shakespeare (TV), 1953; Siege of Sidney Street (Film); Jason King – To Russia With… Panache! (TV), 1972
Hard-nosed former police detective, George Bulman, has left the force under a cloud and set himself up as a private detective in London with his assistant, Lucy McGinty.
Created by writer and producer, Murray Smith, the series ran on British television (ITV) June 1985 until August 1987.
The Story
Bulman (Don Henderson) is hired by Kate (Sheila Hancock) to obtain proof that former gangland boss, Lol Gallio (Peter Wyngarde) is back in London after being forcibly exiled for over 20 years. Having formally managed one of Gallio’s numerous brothels and strip joints in London, she wishes to convince the Home Office that he’s back in town and out for revenge.
Peter as Lol Gallio
The grumpy detective attempts to snap a photograph of the crook on his arrival at Heathrow Airport, but is thwarted by a couple of Gallio’s heavies and he’s able to slip away without capture.
Bulman finds Kate at her cafe, which is really just a front for a seedy ‘Peep Show’ she’s running. She tells the detective that she plans to get out of the sex industry and has bought herself a small garden centre in Norwood, Northwest London, and fears that Gallio’s reappearance will end her dream of a new life.
The detective’s assistant, Lucy McGinty (Siobhan Redmond), is dispatched to search the archive of the local newspaper for any information about Gallio that might be on file there. She learns from a reporter there that the ‘paper has already received calls concerning the whereabouts of Gallio, which Lucy finds concerning given that on she, Bulman and Kate knew that he would be returning to the UK.
Bulman learns that Gallio has entered the country under a false name and is now posing as an Amazonian Trade Delegate, and so he heads to Amazonian High Commission where he hopes to catch up with the criminal. However, when he reached the Commission he’s informed that no one by the name of Lol Gallio is there, despite the fact that Bulman has already caught a glimpse of his quarry. To add to the conundrum, the detective is warned off from perusing Gallio by one of his former colleagues (John Benfield).
For her own protection, Bulman advises Kate to temporarily leave her home, so she moves in with one of the strippers that works for her. In the meantime, Bulman realises that his office phone has been bugged, which answers the question as to how the news of Gallio’s arrival in the country had got out.
In spite of her moving out of her own home, Gallio learns where Kate is and forces his way into the taxi she’s hired to take her to her garden centre. There, the Gallio attempts to force her into signing over all her assets to him, but when she refuses, he instructs his gang of henchmen to set about destroying all the buildings and stock at the Centre.
Having got what he came for, Gallio places the documentation he’d forced Kate to sign into a briefcase and heads Straight for the airport. When he gets there, however, he finds a crowd waiting for him that include Bulman and Lucy, plus several members of the press. In the scuffle, Gallio misplaces his briefcase which just happens to fall into Bulman’s hands. Harassed and jostled by the press pack, Gallio finally loses his cool and punches a female reporter in the face, knocking her to the ground. He’s immediately arrested and marched away by the police, much to Bulman and Lucy’s delight.
Publicity photograph of Peter for the episode
A Bit Of Trivia
Peter told The TV Times at the time of broadcast that he decided to base the character of Lol Gallio on George Raft’s portrayal of American gangsters in 1940s and ’50s melodramas.
The action takes place in Stratford-Upon-Avon and London in the 17th Century
Scene 1: The cottage in Stratford, 1584
Scene 2: The Palace of Whitehall – 10 years later
Scene 3: Backstage at the Globe Theatre – the first performance of ‘Romeo and Juliet’
Scene 4: Shakespeare’s lodgings in London, the same year
Scene 5: An inn at Deptford – the same night
Scene 6 The Palace of Whitehall – the next afternoon
Rudolph Cartier’s production of Miss Clement Dane’s ‘invention’ was a spirited and dramatic explanation of a problem which has troubled critics and commentators for centuries. How did Will, a seemingly raw and ordinary lad from Stratford, become William Shakespeare, the greatest dramatist of all time; what were the forces that shaped him?
The story begins, funnily enough, in Stratford with Will, though only 20, already married to an ill-tempered Anne Hathaway. Fame, in the shape of Henslowe, a strolling minstrel, beckons the young man to London and encouraged, too, by the coursing demand of his genius, the cries of his characters as yet unborn.
Will (Peter Wyngarde) chooses to seek his fortune and finds it. He also discovers the exacting price of fame. We are to see some of the stormy seas which beset him, and also some of the experiences which contained the very stuff of tragedy.
Here is Kit Marlowe, Murray, the Dark Lady of the Sonnets, and, overshadowing all of them, the splendid figure of Queen Elizabeth I. She is the heroine of this play – concerned for her drama as she was for her navy, and ringing greatness from herself and from Will.
Many of Will’s yet-to-be characters made an appearance in the play, including Ophelia, Desdemona, Hamlet, Rosalind, Shylock, Falstaff and MacDuff – the latter played by the future film and stage director, John Schlessinger.
Ms. Dane certainly presents Shakespeare as a wordy, windy and morbidly introspective man; certainlythe long speeches, most of them in blank verse, may well have bored many viewers.
Her Elizabeth I was evidently influenced by subsequent twentieth-century representations, and her portrayal of Shakespeare’s relationship with Christopher Marlowe (and others, seldom read or performed today) were equally shaped by myths current in 1921, which was when the play was written.
Istanbul: Simon Templar (Roger Moore) is in the Turkish capital to meet his old friend, Geoffrey Bane (Hedger Wallace) – deputy curator of the Silbatakin Museum; home to the 3,000-year-old Gadic Collection.
While he waits for Bane in one of Museum’s galleries, Templar notices a young woman by the name of Ayesha (Nicole Shelby), who appears to be comparing the items from the Gadic Collection to a set of photographs she has with her. He also observes that she’s being watched by a somewhat unkempt man of seemingly local origin, whose attempt to grab and manhandle her to the ground is thwarted by Templar’s timely intervention.
As she hastily makes her exit from the museum gallery, Ayesha drops several of the photographs which Templar retrieves and hands to Bane on his arrival. The images are taken to the Curator, Ahmed Bayer (Andre Van Gysegham), who recalls that the last time the Gadic Collection was outside the Museum had been 30 years ago, which couldn’t possibly have been when the photographs were taken. It transpires, however, that the artifacts had been taken off display just 3 months earlier for cleaning. The work had been carried out, not by the Museum itself, but by an outside specialist by the name of Abdul Kemal. Templar and Bane decide to pay this contractor a visit, but when they reach his workshop in the city they find it abandoned.
Peter as Turen
While they’re still on the premises, none other that Ayesha arrives followed in short order by the unkempt man that Templar had tackled just an hour earlier at the Museum who, once again, is thwarted in his attempt to abduct the young woman. Bane recognises Ayesha as Kemal’s niece. Templar insists that she take the two of them to meet her uncle.
Kamal is shown the photographs that Ayesha had dropped at the museum and admits to having taken them for the purpose of making replicas of the items from the famous Gadic Collection. He had latterly sold the forgeries to a wealthy foreign art collector. Watching Templar and Bane leave Kamel’s home is Sukan (Michael Ripper), who his himself interested in The Gadic Collection.
Later that evening at his hotel in the city, Templar receives a call from Geoffrey Banewho asks the Englishman to meet him at the Museum. However, when he arrives there he finds Bane dead in his office having discovered that the Collection in the Museum is fake. Within minutes, the police arrive.
Templar attempts to explain to Inspector Yolu (Martin Benson), the senior officer on the scene, what had happened so far – insisting that Ayesha and her uncle will confirm his story, but when they arrive at Kamel’s home they find no one there and that the house appears as if no one has lived there for some years.
After being released by the police on license, Templar returns to Kamal’s home where he runs into an elderly couple who live in the same building. While both of them had seen him, Ayesha and Bane the previous day, they had had told the police they had never seen the Englishman before and that they knew nothing of Kamal. Templar learns that Kamal had paid them to lie to the police.
Peter with Roger Moore as Simon Templar and Michael Ripper as Sukan.
In the meantime Sukan, who believes that Templar is in possession of the real Gadic Collection, offers to acquire the artifacts for millionaire art collector and criminal, Turen (Peter Wyngarde). Sukan agrees to arrange a meeting. But when Templar refuses to tell Turen the whereabouts of the Collection, he’s put into a dungeon with spiked walls are set to close in an kill its occupant unless he confesses. Horrified by her husband’s behaviour Diya (Georgia Brown) – Turen’s wife – conspires to drug him and manages to release Templar just in the nick of time.
With the help of Ayesha, Templar retrieves the genuine Gadic Collection from where Kamal had hidden them and returns them to the Museum. With Inspector Yolu present, the Englishman reveals that Kabal had not acted alone. Indeed, the instigator of the plot is none other than curator, Ahmed Bayer!
With the real Collection back on display in the Museum, the fakes are handed over to Templar by the police to dispose of a his discretion. With the full approval of Turen’s now estranged wife, Templar contacts the crook who agrees to buy the ‘Collection’ for $100,000, believing it to be the genuine article, with Diya and Templar splitting the proceeds.
A Bit Of Trivia
Freddie Francis, the director of this episode, also directed Peter in ‘The Innocents’.
Peter hated ‘The Gadic Collection’ and never watched it.
In the 2015 Channel 4 documentary, ‘It Was Alight In The Sixties’, Peter was hauled over the coals for ‘Blacking-Up’ to play Turen. The condescending producer of the programme didn’t appear to realise that white actors playing ethic characters was the done thing back in the 1960s, and that Peter wasn’t unique in doing this.
He was no Leonardo da Vinci, but that didn’t stop Peter from drawing on anything and eveything he could find, including on postcards and the backs of envelopes. Here are just some of the sketches and cartoons I saved over the years…
The first edition of the Radio Times in 1950 advised “People with weak nerves” to find something “soothing” to do such as play dominos or draughts when the BBC broadcast Stephen Harrison’s production of Rope, as it might be too much for them. may be too much for them.
Patrick Hamilton’s Rope concerns upper class Oxford student Wyndham Brandon (David Markham) who, under the malign influence of German philosopher, Fredrich Nietzsche and his philosophy of the Ubermensch – the superior man, persuades his weak-minded friend, Charles Granillo (Peter Wyngarde), to help him in the murder a fellow undergraduate, Ronald Raglan, simply for the fun of it.
The pair then place the body in a wooden chest, and to add spice to their crime, invite some carefully chosen acquaintances – including the Raglan’s father, Kenneth (Floyd Allen) – to a dinner party, using the chest as the table from which the food is served.
The theme of the play was suggested by a classic American murder case, in which two young men killed a friend solely for the pleasure of killing him. No motive, surely, could be more appalling.
Brandon’s first topic of conversation at the party is, of course, murder and, inevitably, the death penalty. Since the play is the perfect whodunit in reverse, as it has the distinction of revealing the murderers from the outset; the thrill of it is to see whether his two undergraduates will get away with it… or end up on the end of a rope.
The man who, in the end, defeats the murderers is poet, Rupert Cadell (Alan Wheatley), who finds the first world war has not made him quite the amoral cynic he thought he’d become. He spots the one mistake that Brandon and Granillo have made. With what appears to be his singular insight into Brandon’s perverted character, Cadell points out that even a seemingly motiveless murder is bound to be found to be solved.
Above: Peter as Granillo and Alan Wheatley as Rupert.
Brandon: “I have committed murder. I have committed passionless motiveless faultless and clueless murder. Bloodless and noiseless murder.”
Granillo. “Yes.”
Brandon: “An Immaculate murder. I have killed. I have killed for the sake of killing. I am alive. Truly and wonderfully alive.”
“Because, dear Brandon, that sort of murder would not be a motiveless murder at all. It would ever quietly emotive. Vanity! It will be a murder of vanity. And because of that, the criminal would be quite unable to keep from talking about it or showing it off in some fantastic way or another”.
Hamilton creates tension not with an Agatha Christie-style guessing game, but with the fear of imminent exposure. As with many plays of the era, Rope values neatly constructed plot over character development. It delighted momentarily, but had little further resonance.
Patrick Hamilton always denied that the famous case involving Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb case in the United States in 1924 in which two teenagers from prominent Chicago families committed an apparently motiveless murder of a 14-year-old boy, was the inspiration for Rope. The similarities between his play, and the Leopold and Loeb crime, make his claim lack credibility.
At the time, this was the 2nd television production of the play.
Since the early 70s when the supremo style and panache of superscribe, Jason king, rule supreme and was hardly ever off our TV screens, appreciation on the box by the man behind one of television’s all-time favourite characters, Peter Wyngarde,have been all too brief and few and far between. One such appearance was the guest star on The Two Ronnie’s Christmas Special on BBC television in 1984. For all self-respecting members of the Hellfire club, this is definitely one performance not to be missed.
The sketch, set in mediaeval times, is a spoof of the classic ‘Robin Hood’ and ‘Ivanhoe’ series of the 1950’s and played for laughs from start to finish. Messrs (Ronnie) Corbett and (Ronnie) Barker play two bungling peasants on their travels through an English forest as a minstrel merrily sings along – strumming away on his lute.
Peter is perfectly cast as the local lord, Sir Guy (Peter Wyngarde), who appears astride his trusty mount; galloping through the trees with his henchmen in tow. Resplendent in blue and
gold robes – his horse decked out to match – his tousled locks flowing in the wind and his fine aristocratic features, he portrays a masterful and mischievous look. His majestic air is completed by a bird of prey perched on his arm! Here we have a man of style and authority, perhaps a distant mediaeval ancestor of the inimitable and illustrious Mr. King!
Sir Guy seeks out the two peasants, Snivelling (Ronnie Corbett) and Grudge (Ronnie Barker) who, apparently, dabble in the medicine of the day and who he hopes might assist his beloved daughter who, we learn, has sunk into a deep despair over a lost love.
His henchmen search high and low for the pair, but when the hunt proves fruitless, Sir Guy calls for his Sergeant at Arms. Alas, the poor soldier is unable to get a word in, as his Master cusses and shouts over him. Despite his inability to respond to a single demand his superior makes, the hapless subordinate is given the following warning: “I’ve had enough of you! One more word from you and I’ll have you beheaded!”
The tongue-tied sergeant at managed to begin a sentence, but the impatient Sir Guy once again cuts him dead before he’s able to finish – bellowing, “Answer me!” Again the browbeaten sergeant splutters and stammers over his reply, which is of course all too much for his Lordship: “That’s it!” he yells. “Off with his head!”
It’s at this very point that the two miserable peasants appear from the undergrowth, led by the soldiers. Sir Guy appears to rest more easily in his saddle as he has the two men brought to him. Snivelling immediately pays due homage: “Honoured to be in your presence, m’Lord,” he sniffles, then throws himself to the grand and kisses the horse on one of its hoofs. Sir Guy looks down from aloft at this… person and slightly puzzled and demands, “What are you doing?”
“I’m kissing your ‘orse, m’Lord.”
“Are you Snivelling?” inquires his Lordship, to which the ragamuffin replies, “No – Snivelling!”
Silent until now, Grudge now decides to chime in: “We ain’t done nuffin’ wrong, m’Lord… but we’d like 27 other offenses to be taken into account.”
But all Sir Guy is interested in is their ability to help his daughter, and so he enquires: “Did you two miserable creatures sell a patent medicine to a Freeman of the City?”
Grudge, fearing the worst, quickly replies, “No! No! We didn’t!… Well, we might have done.” He turns to his friend to get his reaction to what had just been said.
“It cured his constipation,” Sir Guy continues, quite oblivious to Grudge. “Do you think you could help my daughter? She’s fallen into a morbid flux”.
“Oh, I stepped into one of those myself,” Grudge sniggers.
Clearly not taking in anything the two down and outs are saying, Sir Guy simply continues with his concerns about his daughter: “She is much distempered!”
Concerned, Snivelling interjects: “Oh, we don’t do decorating!”
This latest interruption doesn’t go down at all well with Sir Guy, who demands: “You will give her your Ethiopian Elixir. The alternative is the rack!”
Missing the order entirely, Snivelling responds with concern: “Oh, she doesn’t deserve that, m’Lord!”
Angered by the obvious stupidity of the pair, Sir Guy makes it clear that The Rack awaits them if they fail to cure his beloved daughter: “For YOU! Followed by hanging, drawing and quartering!”
He instructs his soldiers to take the “learned gentlemen” to his daughter’s apartments but has a warning for them before he gallops off: “You have until the cock crows!” Snivelling and Grudge are left to ponder their fate.
“What do we do?” inquires Snivelling of his friend. “Well, for a start we strangle the cock!” comes the reply.
The action now transfers to Sir Guy’s castle. The two peasants are seated next to the young maiden’s bedside as she lies in slumber. While they are trying in desperation to hatch plan to escape, they fall asleep and fail to hear the wandering minstrel enter the room and attempt to comfort the tender young maiden, serenading her with this ditty:
The maid lies here – unloved, unwed,
but our heroes cannot save her.
So I’ll creep into the fair maid’s bed
And do us all a favour.
This is possibly the cure she’s really been in need of. “Oh minstrel,” she enquires sweetly, “is that your loot?”
“No,” he replies, “I keep my money in my back pocket”.
In the meantime, Snivelling and Grudge have managed to find a secret passage from the castle and make their escape. Seconds later, in comes the girl’s anxious father who is shocked to find that the two peasants have fled. He immediately dispatches his soldiers to follow the escapees. Pausing for a moment, he listens to the content murmurings coming from behind his daughter’s bed curtains. Speechless, he takes another quick look and emerges with a rather puzzled look on his face.
At first light, the two peasants are being chased through the forest by Sir Guy and his henchmen – completely unaware that the fearsome Lord believes that its they that are responsible for his daughter’s newfound happiness.
With no sign of their quarry, Sir Guy halts his men in a clearing. “Cures! Curses!” he exclaims, producing a bag of coins. “I’ve brought them this 10 pieces of gold. I’ve never seen my daughter so happy. Someone must have given her the right medicine!“ Sighing, he tosses the purse over his shoulder and then gallops off to carry on with this business round the estate.
In the meantime, Snivelling and Grudge have concealed themselves in the very cunning disguise of a horse, and are making a getaway through the forest.
The name of Peter Quint strikes fear into some who hear it. The name is that of some kind of monster… Or it is just that of a course and perhaps highly sexualised man of lowly station who is just a corrupter of virtue and innocence…
When I hear the name of Peter Quint I think of my grandfather as I was reading about Peter Quint in the original source material The Turn of the Screw (1899-1900) written by Henry James (1843-1916) the night my grandfather died…. I never finished that novella and was spooked by what was essentially a ghost story. Peter Quint for boys is the male adult of who leaves an impression on them either good or bad as a part of their childhood. I wondered if my grandfather had pulled the pin deliberately and staged his death that night to leave maximum impression…
Henry James
I was and still am a gullible sort open to the questionable lies of others and I wondered if it was his ghost that came to visit me in my Hindley Street flat as a red dust storm engulfed the city of Adelaide between the time he died and his funeral. Fortunately, or unfortunately, despite all the positive influences my grandfather had on me, this was a disturbing end to our relationship. It sent me over the precipice.
There is the character of Quint played by Robert Shaw in Steven Spielberg’s Jaws (1975) who is of the ilk of the Peter Quint character in The Turn of the Screw… The original novel is set in Victorian England and was printed in weekly portions before being published in book form. Most people these days say it deals with sexual
repression, while others say it’s all about ghosts and it could be too – but, really, it’s about the corruption of the young and even the madness of not giving into corruption – for some.
There is the character of Quint played by Robert Shaw in Steven Spielberg’s Jaws (1975) who is of the ilk of the Peter Quint character in The Turn of the Screw… The original novel is set in Victorian England and was printed in weekly portions before being published in book form. Most people these days say it deals with sexual repression, while others say it’s all about ghosts and it could be too – but, really, it’s about the corruption of the young and even the madness of not giving into corruption – for some.
There are some interesting versions of the novel which have been transformed onscreen. The best being director Jack Clayton’s (1921-95 heart attack) The Innocents (1961) starring Deborah Kerr (1921-2007 Parkinson’s disease) as the repressed governess to two young children named Miles and Flora on a large countryside estate owned by their uncle. It was there the previous governess had died under mysterious circumstances along with another manservant on the grounds Peter Quint. Kerr becomes obsessed with these two dead servants, so much so that she begins seeing them around the house and gardens.
Director Jack Clayton
This dead pair seem to have left and impression on the children in terms of bad language and also ape their sexual behaviour to a certain degree.
The story, as told in The Innocents, has a great performance by Kerr as the governess who may really be seeing ghosts, or are they just hallucinations conjured by her own Victorian repressed sexuality. She knows these two had a sex life and even the children may have one among themselves as in one version of the story they dress up and apply lipstick and fondle each other.
Filmed in Cinemascope The Innocents opens with the praying hands of Kerr’s governess, possibly in a madhouse as she weeps. She is trying to save the souls of the children with prayer. The film also ends with the clasped hands as a kind of bookend. Sometime director Freddie Francis (1917-2007 after stroke) photographed the movie and a whole article could be written about his use of the widescreen and the black and white film stock.
“I want to save the children not destroy them,” Kerr tells herself about her worries that the souls of the children are possibly lost.
The truth being that once the innocence of a child has been erased to a certain degree, there is no going back, except if the child is perhaps only aping the behaviour of the corrupt adult – say of the name of Peter Quint… there is still a kind of innocence in that case if the child does not fully understand what is happening… As Kerr becomes involved with the household and knows of its past, she possibly, as a Christian, grows hysterical when the extent of Quint’s reputation starts to manifest itself as he hardly led people down the path of righteousness including children… As a result, it has her groaning sexually in her sleep while the children watch. Her latent sexuality is near awoken but she will not allow it.
Photographer Freddie Francis
Kerr’s sexual innocence is one that has remained intact or ‘pure’ since childhood we assume and also through adolescence. She thinks the same should be for Miles and Flora, but the children have already seen things. We suspect Quint and his woman even made love in front of the fireplace, but it is all ghostly and unproveable. They are impressions in the minds of the children.
Flora knows foul language and Miles kisses Kerr full on the lips like a lover despite being barely eight or ten years old. This is shown in close-up in the movie just to underline the point. The photography as I mentioned is fantastic with dark corridors in the house enclosing the characters from either side almost like death or an otherworldly realm.
“Thank heaven for children,” says the head maid played by Megs Jenkins (1917-98). This actress would appear again as the maid in another version entitled The Turn of the Screw (1974) which starred Lynn Redgrave as the governess. Shot on video tape, this is a solid adaptation by American director Dan Curtis.
Peter Wyngarde as the evil Peter Quint
And also from the maid: “He really had the devil’s own eyes” she says of no one in particular except Quint himself and she swallows her words when Kerr almost gasps. He is a character who we only see briefly in this movie but Peter Wyngarde (1928-2018 unspecified) makes a great impression in the role. It is an evil countenance.
“Would the Lord just leave me here to walk around? Doesn’t that happen to some people?,” asks Flora of Kerr after saying her prayers and doubting their efficacy. Flora innocently believes in ghosts at this point in the movie.
And so, we have the set up as we will wonder if the house is haunted by the spectre of Peter Quint, or is it only the minds of those in his former living realm that are disturbed by his spirit as it was in life and the troubles it has left behind in those who know him and those infected by his legend through word of mouth.
Meanwhile the boy Miles may have the power “to contaminate, to corrupt” says Kerr to the maid and herself with a spooked look on her face… It is said that the author of the novel Henry James had his own Peter Quint in the form of his father who chose for his son not to be educated in the classics but had him opened up to many influences, both scientific and philosophical, which one biographer described as “haphazard and promiscuous”. It should also be added that James admired the morally ambiguous and totally human work of the French writer Honore de Balzac (1700-1850).
The excellent script for The Innocents is based on the 1950 play by William Archibald (1917-70 hepatitis) with the help of legend Truman Capote (1924-84 liver disease and drug overdose) while there are extra scenes by John Mortimer (1923-2009 stroke) of Rumpole of the Bailey fame.
Archibald’s original play said the ghosts in James’ novel were real but one could imagine Capote injecting the repressed sexuality scenario into the new screenplay. It was director Clayton who decided to go with the psychological aspect of the script right through to the ending and he asked Kerr to try and balance her performance between reality and unreality, something she found to be difficult and intense. Archibald was upset about the doubts cast about the ghosts and argued with Clayton… The director won out and a classic was forged with the children watching Kerr moan in her sleep and Miles later strangling Kerr in fun and games like some sado-masochistic lover getting carried away.
The book in play form
It is then Kerr ‘sees’ Quint and the beginning of her spiritual disturbance has begun and quickly turns to the hysteria in one scene of being like a caged bird to the sound of canaries or cheeping birds trapped in an airless place. We even get the idea that Miles has learnt cruel behaviour such as breaking the wings and necks of doves from Quint. The spectre of Quint is disturbing in many ways even if he wanders and appears nary at all: “You didn’t know Quint… such power he had over people” says the maid as she tells Kerr about how Miles followed the man around like a dog.
Just a word on the screenplay once more and it is said that Capote was brought in to do rewrites and it turned out that 90 percent of the screenplay was his… Thus, the American Southern Gothic feeling to it all while Mortimer was brought in to polish the dialogue and give it a Victorian feel which he succeeded in doing.
Part of the blurring of reality and the ghosts Kerr sees in the children themselves as well as a part of her disturbed personality is suggested when she says: “They’re playing some monstrous game” with the words monstrous and game brought together to show corruption and innocence as well as reality and unreality and perhaps also the evil supernatural and the rules of the psychological: “Unless they’re deceiving us, unless they’re both deceiving us… the innocents!”
Kerr says the title of the movie with irony and yet there is no conviction to this irony as if she herself can’t even imagine how the kids could deceive her. It’s as if Kerr has forgotten what it’s like to be a child, or else she was raised in a convent and has a childish adult perspective of an uninitiated adolescent.
The strange thing about the effect of Peter Quint, once his spirit or legend takes hold of Kerr, is that it’s effect on Miles is twofold just as the spirit of Quint’s governess girlfriend Miss Jessell affects Flora…. So massively when Kerr tells her the ghost is present.
Not only does Quint and Miss Jessell’s contact with the children before their deaths remain intact in the minds of Miles and Flora but Kerr’s stirring of the memories of these dead personalities from Resting in Peace again into the monsters they once were, makes them seem they ‘once are’ once more. So, the children are The Innocents as Kerr overestimates how corrupt they really are.
“They lure, they know, they share this hell,” says Kerr about “casting out these devil’s forever” as she sees the ghosts as a manifestation of the children and still can’t see how it is herself which is responsible for these so-called manifestations in the first place. It is like she has a neurosis as she projects it upon the children themselves.
Let me just mention that Kerr was around forty when she made this movie and the role in the original novel had the governess aged only around twenty. It’s an amazing performance.
Further, the sound design for the movie is pure genius at moments especially when matched with Clayton and Francis’ work… Let’s not go into that as you must study the movie yourself.
The ending of the movie has Kerr reducing Flora into a screaming hysterical mess while a bit later Miles dies of heart failure after imagining he sees or can sense the presence of Peter Quint after Kerr prompts him that he is watching from the darkness. Such is the essence of ghost stories. Quint in Miles mind may have returned from the grave as the boy succumbs with no REAL presence. Or was there? The power of suggestion can kill. So, the legend of Peter Quint has imprinted himself in his lifetime on the boy and in the boy’s death as well. Such is the experience of some children who suffer or learn at the hands of adults. Kerr as a teacher hoped her Christian learning would also rub off on the children while Quint’s lessons in life are on the other far end of the scale. It is sometimes not the fault of the children that they learn such behaviour in certain communities or in a society… the Quint affect continues… even Kerr’s Christian ‘cruelty’ in the end against Miles and Flora is comparable to Quint, or even worse, once she is too is affected by this man. Triggered late in life after a lifetime of prayer, something she returns to at the very end as she doesn’t take responsibility of the reality of the ending but instead directs it with her belief in Christ and the New Testament. It possibly saves her but not the children as she wished and she prays with an almost detached delusion.
Kerr has seen two worlds collide in terms of her own Christianity and those who live without it… Unfortunately, ghosts, whether they are in the mind on a part of the supernatural can destroy lives and that goes for the man that was Peter Quint who was obviously not a Christian at all.
There was a prequel to The Turn of the Screw directed by Michael Winner (1935-2013) entitled The Nightcomers (1971). It starred Marlon Brando (1924-2004 respiratory failure) as Peter Quint and it showed some of his boorish behaviour as well as his intelligence laziness and lust. The most interesting part of this movie is perhaps the ending where the children murder Miss Jessell and Peter Quint, which is probably the ultimate set up for the original novel The Turn of the Screw. The children are older in The Nightcomers and so the sexual themes could be explored further.
As you know, Winner isn’t known for being a great director and the script is by Michael Hastings (1938-2011). I found the movie forgettable otherwise.
The trailer proclaimed: “Marlon Brando as Peter Quint who took two children and taught them everything” while it also mentioned Brando’s “Inventive film acting.”
Another remake of the original stars one of my favourite underused actresses from the 1990s… Her name is Jodhi May (1975-) and she stars in the 1999 version of the movie which keeps the original title. May, some will remember, was the younger sister in The Last of the Mohicans (1993). She does a good job here. Whereas the uncle, who gives the governess the job at the beginning of The Innocents, was played by Michael Redgrave (1908-85 Parkinson’s disease), here it is played by Colin Firth (1960-). It’s a good movie and the ending, rather than having Miles die of heart failure, instead has May seem to smother him to death at her breast. Certainly, another way to express repressed sexuality.
Then there’s director Rusty Lemorande’s version made in 1992 which doesn’t quite have the polish or the previous films and it has languished in obscurity thanks to its reputation. It is however a different take on the tale. This one has Patsy Kensit (1968-) as the governess and the movie this time is set during the 1960s with Julian Sands (1958-) as the uncle and French actress Stephane Audran (1932-2018) as the maid or housekeeper. There is even a performance which bookends the movie by Marianne Faithfull (1946-) who tells the tale from a diary and who may be Flora now one of the inmates of a ‘home’. It’s a version which, like the Dan Curtis version starring Lynn Redgrave, is agreeable without being particularly special.
And I will visit another version from a couple of decades back which was a Spanish-American production which starred Sadie Frost (1965-) as the governess, Harvey Keitel (1939-) as the uncle and Lauren Bacall (1924-2014 stroke) as the governess. It is called Presence of Mind (1999). Set in Catholic Spain at the turn of the 20th Century, it has the courage to use an adolescent child in the form of NIlo Zimmerman (Nilo Mur) (1986-) and more or less have a scene of sensuality of the child changing his clothes in front of Frost and baring his backside. The film is not a great one otherwise but here’s some dialogue to wrap up the article.
“The dead are dead Miss… There’s nothing else they can do to harm the living anymore,” says Lauren Bacall in an ironic twist for later on. And meanwhile Miles later in the classroom looks up the word ‘ghost’ in the dictionary… “Because sometimes things have more than one meaning. Ghost. One, the spirit or soul. Two, or haunting memory. And three, the supposed spirit of a dead person, appearing to the living as a shadowy apparition…. If ghosts don’t exist. Then why are they in the lexicon.”
Is there no choice for the boy but to become this man?
Well, I guess they are not banned and Kerr reads about the Holy Ghost in her Bible… Why is it that many of us are fascinated by ghost stories? Why do we like being scared by them? Or why do we become scared in the first place? There must remain some doubt as to their existence for us to let them into our mind and scare us… for some, deeply.
And so, I am back to the spirit of my grandfather as the dusty winds blew through the window of my second-floor apartment with the curtains blowing and I imagined this man who had shown me Treasure Island through to Tennessee Williams from Jaws (Quint! Quint! Quint!) through to Jacques Tati had returned to admonish me for being a failure… It was at that midnight hour when I could not sleep that my mind began to disintegrate to a point where I would be almost classically mad…
He had once warned me with a laugh of Dame Judith Anderson’s character in Rebecca (1940) as she madly and almost queerly believed that there could be such a thing as a ghost in the first place. I see now in that dusty midnight hour that I need not have been scared and I need not believe he had returned to torture me: “He was dead” and like in Old Marley in Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol: “as a doornail”!
And like Kerr, I pray over this keyboard with a sense I don’t really believe this at all and yet I try to believe in the good in people… and try to forget the Peter Quints’ of the world who may haunt me either living or dead for the rest of my mortal existence.
With grateful and sincere thanks to J.P. Quirk for allowing us to reproduce this work.
PETER WYNGARDE: The Official Website 