Soho Bites Podcast

The Big Jessie series.

This is the first of a three part mini-series focusing on the 1930s' biggest UK film star, Jessie Matthews.

None of Jessie's films were set in Soho, but the fact that she was born on Berwick Street where her dad was a market trader, that she lived in William & Mary Yard on Brewer Street and that she learned to dance in an upstairs room at The Blue Posts means that, as far as we're concerned, any film starring Jessie Matthews is a Soho film.

Across the next three episodes we will talk about three different Jessie films and learn about her life through talking to several special guests. In this first episode, we talk to Rob Baker, Jade Evans and Dr Lawrence Napper about Jessie's early life and her rise to stardom and Lawrence hangs around to talk about Jessie's 1933 breakthrough film, The Good Companions.

Also starring a very young John Gielgud, Edmund Gwenn and Mary Glynne, The Good Companions was directed by Victor Saville, produced by Michael Balcon and was based on a best selling 1929 novel of the same name by JB Priestley. And yes, I know that Michael Balcon link goes to a Wetherspoons named after him. Here's a more serious link.

Watch this 1981 BBC documentary about Jessie Matthews.

Jessie appeared on This is Your Life in 1961.

Jessie's biographer, Michael Thornton wrote this appalling, salacious, muckraking and probably untrue article for the appalling, salacious, muckraking Daily Mail which I have pasted it into this Google Doc to deprive the Mail of your clicks.

Rob Baker is on Twitter and you can buy his books HERE.

Article about Jessie by Rob on his Flashback website.

Follow Jade on Twitter and/or Instagram to learn about her research in fact you can find all her links HERE.

Buy Jessie's autobiography or read it for free online.

Of course, Lawrence is on Twitter too and here's his At the Pictures blog.

In this episode, the passage from Jessie's autobiography was read by Jane Slavin whose official title is, apparently, "Queen of Loveliness".

During the pandemic, we made an episode of Mural Morsels about Jessie Matthews.

Thank you for listening.

Follow us on Blue Sky (our Xwitter account is no more)

We're now on YouTube

Email us at [email protected]

We'd love it if you left us a lovely REVIEW.

And if you'd like to help support the show we'd be very grateful.

Check out our spin-off series Mural Morsels

In fact, see all relevant links HERE

Not a normal episode.

We're not actually talking about a Soho film in this episode. It's a long story... We do, however, talk to a genuine film star from the golden era.

As an eight year old boy, Bobby Henrey was rocketed into the public eye when he starred in Carol Reed & Graham Greene's 1948 thriller, "The Fallen Idol". He joins us on Soho Bites (on his 84th birthday!) to tell us about that experience.

Bobby is now known as Robert and there is a double reason for having him on the show. His mother, Madeleine Henrey, was a French author, based in London, who wrote several memoirs - social histories - about Soho and the west end. These included "A Village in Piccadilly" from 1942 and "Spring in a Soho Street" from 1962. Her books were often published under her married name, "Mrs Robert Henrey" which seems quite an odd decision to make, but Robert explains the reasoning behind this and talks about how this literary career began.

Robert spent his early childhood living in Mayfair, specifically in Shepherd Market during the blitz. This period is documented in Mrs Robert Henrey's memoir, A Village in Piccadilly.

In the final part of the show we preview our upcoming three part special seasn about Soho's very own fallen idol, the 1930s mega star, Jessie Matthews.

An article about Robert.

You can buy Robert's book, Through Grown Up Eyes, at Foyles.

Some of the people who have helped me research this episode include Professor Debra Kelly of Westminster University, Celia Cotton of the Brentford High St Project, who put me in touch with Anne Wallace who is a distant relative of the Henreys and Roger Greaves, whose book, Reading Madeleine, is currently in production.

Madeleine Henrey's Wikipedia entry and her obituary.

Images of Shepherd Market from then & now.

Our favourite tired old queen reviews The Fallen Idol.

During the pandemic, we made an episode of Mural Morsels about Jessie Matthews.

Custom artwork for this episode was created by Andy Oliver.

Thank you for listening.

Follow us on Blue Sky (our Xwitter account is no more)

We're now on YouTube

Email us at [email protected]

We'd love it if you left us a lovely REVIEW.

And if you'd like to help support the show we'd be very grateful.

Check out our spin-off series Mural Morsels

In fact, see all relevant links HERE

At last! It's the long awaited exotic birds episode.

The Green Cockatoo (1937) is a noir-ish thriller set in gangland Soho. The Green Cockatoo of the title is not actually a beautiful tropical bird but a drab Soho nightclub. When Dave Connor gets on the wrong side of some gangsters, his brother, Jim and an innocent bystander, Eileen get caught up in the trouble.

Directed by William Cameron Menzies, it stars John Mills, supported by Rene Ray (The Countess of Midleton! Yes really!) & Robert Newton. The film has a superb supporting cast and was based on a story by Graham Greene.

Nigel Smith pays his first visit to Soho Bites to talk about the film.

Follow Nigel on Twitter & check out his many projects HERE.

Watch Nigel's Nerd Nites talk about Alfred Hitchcock HERE.

At Soho Bites we regularly scour the internet looking for those lovely old lobby cards that cinemas would display in their... er... lobbies. We found some for The Green Cockatoo.

In the first half of the show, the exotic bird we're talking about is an actual bird, not a night club - the Green Ringed Parakeet. London is home to tens of thousands of these green feathery friends and their population is growing.

Nick Hunt became, for a few months, a "Gonzo Ornitholigist" investigating these birds and he joins us to tell us about his discoveries and explain what Gonzo Ornithology is. In collaboration with photographer, Tim Mitchell, he wrote a fantastic little book on the subject: "Parakeeting in London: An Adventure in Gonzo Ornithology". Buy your copy HERE.

Follow Nick on Twitter and read about his other work on his website.

Read all about Ring Necked Parakeets.

You can watch The Green Cockatoo, in full, on YouTube.

Interesting article about The Green Cockatoo.

The originator of Soho Bites, Dr Jingan Young, has a new book out all about.... guess what? Films set in Soho! Get your copy at Foyles.

Thank you for listening.

Follow us on Blue Sky (our Xwitter account is no more)

We're now on YouTube

Email us at [email protected]

We'd love it if you left us a lovely REVIEW.

And if you'd like to help support the show we'd be very grateful.

Check out our spin-off series Mural Morsels

In fact, see all relevant links HERE

It's Jazz, man. Also, it's Shakespeare.

All Night Long (1962) is a re-telling of Shakespeare's Othello in which Othello is Rex, the famous leader of a jazz band, Desdemona is a singer called Delia and Iago is the band's drummer, Johnny.

The film was directed by Basil Dearden and stars Patrick Mcgoohan and Richard Attenborough plus several major jazz stars of the day, including Tubby Hayes, Charles Mingus, Johnny Dankworth and Dave Brubeck.

Film & theatre composer, Gary Yershon, returns to Soho Bites to talk about the film.

Watch a trailer for All Night Long

And look at these (badly colourised) lobby cards

Our other guest is a two time finalist in the BBC Young Jazz Musician of the Year competition, Saxophonist, Tom Smith. Tom has an intriguing connection to the late Ronnie Scott and we recorded both interviews at Ronnie's famous club.

On the same day we recorded the interviews, Tom as performing at Ronnie Scott's that night with the band, Resolution 88.

Here's some more of the Tom's music on Soundcloud and you can find more details about him on his website and of course, follow him on Twitter.

During lockdown, Tom and his big band did that remote recording thing.

Watch one of Tom's performances on BBC Young Jazz Musician of the Year.

We were first introduced to Tom through the late, legendary Barry Fantoni in an interview he did with our sister podcast, Mural Morsels, about Ronnie Scott.

Gary isn't on social media but he does have a website and you can find all of his previous visits to our three podcasts on the links below.

Soho Bites episode 22: A Touch of Class

Mural Morsels episode 9: George Melly

Kino Quickies episode 5: Say it With flowers

Kino quickies episode 12: Scrooge

And recently Gary did a series of on-stage Q&As with Mike Leigh at the Garden Cinema which you can find HERE.

Follow Ronnie Scott's on Twitter and see what shows are coming up on their website.

A few years after the release of All Night Long, John Dankworth (who appears in the film and his wife, Cleo Laine (who doesn't) must have caught the jazz Shakespeare bug because they released this album.

If you want to keep up to date the efforts to bring the Kino Cinema back from the dead, follow Kino Quickies.

The originator of Soho Bites, Dr Jingan Young, has a new book out all about.... guess what? Films set in Soho! Get your copy at Foyles.

Thank you for listening.

Follow us on Blue Sky (our Xwitter account is no more)

We're now on YouTube

Email us at [email protected]

We'd love it if you left us a lovely REVIEW.

And if you'd like to help support the show we'd be very grateful.

Check out our spin-off series Mural Morsels

In fact, see all relevant links HERE

Thirty nine episodes in and we finally do a gay themed episode of the show. About time too!

Nighthawks (1978) was directed by Ron Peck and was based on a script developed by him and Paul Hallam. It stars Ken Robertson as Jim, a geography teacher at a London comprehensive school who spends his nights looking for love in gay bars, clubs and discos (discos were still a thing then).

To talk about Nighthawks we're joined by Prof Glyn Davis of St Andrews University. Turns out he's not as Welsh as you expect him to be!

Watch Nighthawks on the BFI Player or buy the DVD which has a ton of bonus features.

Ron Peck named the film after Edward Hopper's 1942 painting. Both, he said were about, "essentially lonely people, trying to come together, maybe succeeding for a while"

Our other guest, author, Will Hampson, has been living with HIV for three years. His book, The Lost Boys of Soho, is an account the months following his diagnosis.

Follow The Lost Boys of Soho on Instagram

The director of Nighthawks, Ron Peck, died in November 2022. Here an obituary.

Some of the filming locations in Nighthawks.

Some 1978 press clippings about Nighthawks.

Interesting experimental by Ron Peck & Paul Hallam - "Soho"

Soho has it's very own sexual health clinic for LGBT people - 56 Dean Street.

The Terence Higgins Trust is one of the oldest HIV charities.

If you want to keep up to date the efforts to bring the Kino Cinema back from the dead, follow Kino Quickies.

The originator of Soho Bites, Dr Jingan Young, has a new book out all about.... guess what? Films set in Soho! Get your copy at Foyles.

Thank you for listening.

Follow us on Blue Sky (our Xwitter account is no more)

We're now on YouTube

Email us at [email protected]

We'd love it if you left us a lovely REVIEW.

And if you'd like to help support the show we'd be very grateful.

Check out our spin-off series Mural Morsels

In fact, see all relevant links HERE

Murder mystery? Rom-com? And, as an afterthought.... wartime boosterism?

East of Piccadilly (1941) was known as "The Strangler" in the US and was directed by Harold Huth. It stars Judy Campbell & Sebastian Shaw and was written by the then quite young J Lee Thompson. It tells the story of a murder investigation and is (extremely) loosely based on a real life case, that of the "The Soho Strangler".

1940s UK film expert, Mel Byron, comes all the way in from Talking Picture TV Podcast HQ to talk about the film. It's her third visit to the podcast - she wasn't that keen on Street of Shadows and her second visit was for Soho Conspiracy which is possibly the worst film ever made. Apologies to Mel. Will she like this one more?

The 1930s Soho Strangler case upon which the film is supposedly based, is largely forgotten now but not by our other guest, Michael J Buchanan Dunne. Mike is the creator of the Murder Mile podcast and at the time of publication has just released the third episode of a TEN PART series about the Soho Strangler.

At the time if writing this, East of Piccadilly is simply NOT AVAILABLE to stream (legally) anywhere online. It does sometime crop up on certain streaming services - if you fill in THIS FORM you will be notified when it appears (can't guarantee it will be free though!)

However, if you are based in London or are ever a visitor to our beautiful city, you can watch East of Piccadilly in the BFI Library. Grab yourself a terminal and ask one of the nice librarians for help. The reference number is N-626109.

Did the director of East of Piccadilly, Harold Huth cast himself in a small uncredited role as a Spiv in Joe's cafe? You decide.

The Spanish version of the film poster is ace!

A 1938 article in the Chicago Tribune about the Soho Strangler case.

Mel Byron is on Twitter and has a website.

You can also follow Talking Pictures and the podcast on Twitter.

Murder Mile Mike is on the Twitters too as his girlfriend. Catch up on the Murder Mile podcast HERE.

If you want to keep up to date the efforts to bring the Kino Cinema back from the dead, follow Kino Quickies.

The originator of Soho Bites, Dr Jingan Young, has a new book out all about.... guess what? Films set in Soho! Get your copy at Foyles.

Thank you for listening.

Follow us on Blue Sky (our Xwitter account is no more)

We're now on YouTube

Email us at [email protected]

We'd love it if you left us a lovely REVIEW.

And if you'd like to help support the show we'd be very grateful.

Check out our spin-off series Mural Morsels

In fact, see all relevant links HERE

Attention jiving scum! This is one is straight from the fridge dad.

It doesn't get more Soho than Beat Girl (1960) - coffee shops, beatniks, strip clubs, The 2 i's.... it's got the lot.

Gillian Hills leads the cast of Beat Girl, which also stars Adam Faith, Christopher Lee, Shirley Ann Field and, in a very small role, a young Oliver Reed.

We met novelist, Des Burkinshaw in the bar of the Soho Theatre to talk about Beat Girl which is the closest we could find to a bohemian coffee bar.

Des is a huge fan of John Barry, who wrote the music for Beat Girl and he recently concluded a two year stint as the presenter of the Museum of Soho Show on Soho Radio.

Beat Girl is available to stream on the website of our favourite TV channel, TPTV Encore.

TPTV Encore is this 2016 BFI interview with the star of Beat Girl, Gillian Hills, about the making of the film. It's well worth a watch.

Back in the day, Des actually met one of the stars of Beat Girl and grabbed this selfie.

Gillian Hills released a four part podcast about her life in December 2021.

Follow Gillian on Facebook.

Our other guest for this episode is Paris based journalist Hanna Steinkopf-Frank. Paris is some distance from Soho - the connection is that Gillian Hills became a Yé-yé singer and Hannah came on to talk about this genre.

What's Yé-yé? Find out in this article by Hannah.

Follow Hannah on Twitter and check out her website.

You can also follow Des on Twitter.

There' s a LOT of music in this episode. Here's a track list:

Eiko Shuri - Yé-Yé

France Gall - Poupée de cire, poupée de son

Françoise Hardy - Comment te dire adieu

J Girls - Kiiro no sekai

Brigitte Bardot - Moi Je Joue

France Gall - Les Sucettes

Gillian Hills - Tut Tut Tut Tut

Gillian Hills - Zou Bisou Bisou

Françoise Hardy - Tous les garçons et les filles

Sylvie Vartan - La Plus Belle Pour Aller Danser

Nancy Holloway - T'en va pas comme ça

France Gall - Laisse tomber les filles

John Barry Seven - Beat Girl Theme

In one scene in Beat Girl, the youths all go off to a gig / party in Chislehurst Caves. Did you know about Chislehurst Caves? I didn't!

The voice of the person recommending we do Beat Girl on Soho Bites was provided by Murder Mile Mike.

If you want to keep up to date the efforts to bring the Kino Cinema back from the dead, follow Kino Quickies.

The originator of Soho Bites, Dr Jingan Young, has a new book out all about.... guess what? Films set in Soho! Get your copy at Foyles.

Thank you for listening.

Follow us on Blue Sky (our Xwitter account is no more)

We're now on YouTube

Email us at [email protected]

We'd love it if you left us a lovely REVIEW.

And if you'd like to help support the show we'd be very grateful.

Check out our spin-off series Mural Morsels

In fact, see all relevant links HERE

This is not really an episode I'm afraid - time just ran away from me.

However, I've recorded this mini-episode because there is some very important business to finish up which is to announce two things....

• The winners of last month's Dora Bryan competition
• Kino Quickies season 2

Two lucky lucky listeners were destined to win a copy of the new 4K DVD release of The Sandwich Man - all they had to do was answer a fiendishly tricky question.

Did you enter? Did you win? Listen to the episode to find out.

And the second half of this episode is the preview trailer of Kino Quickies season 2 - our season of live films screenings at the Kino Cinema in Bermondsey Square, London.

We'd love to see as many Soho Bites listeners as possible at the screenings. Tickets available here: https://www.ticketsource.co.uk/kinoquickies

Thank you for listening.

Follow us on Blue Sky (our Xwitter account is no more)

We're now on YouTube

Email us at [email protected]

We'd love it if you left us a lovely REVIEW.

And if you'd like to help support the show we'd be very grateful.

Check out our spin-off series Mural Morsels

In fact, see all relevant links HERE

Everything changes but....

The changing faces of London neighbourhoods is our loose theme for this episode.

In the first half, the novelist, Christopher Fowler makes his second appearance on the podcast, talking about his latest book and about his memories of Soho - a neighbourhood which changes constantly but somehow always remains the same.

***UPDATE*** Christopher very sadly died a few weeks after we recorded this conversation. You can read an obituary HERE.

Read about Chris's most well known characters in The History of Bryant & May.

This episode features a snatch of original music composed by Des Burkinshaw. It was written as the theme tune for proposed TV adaptation of the Bryant & May series. Listen to it on this page of Chris's website.

Follow Des on Twitter.

Our featured film is The Optimists of Nine Elms (1973) in which Peter Sellers, playing a faded former music hall star, befriends - or is befriended by - two local kids. It's a beautiful portrayal of an unlikely friendship and of an area that has massively changed in the intervening 50 years. Our film chat guest, Robert JE Simpson, rather likes it.

Follow Robert on Twitter and check out his podcast Cinepunked. He is also engaged in some detailed research into Exclusive Films.

Definitely definitely definitely try to watch the Optimists of Nine Elms. It's available to stream on the BFI Player.

This clip will give you a flavour of it

Here's a set of lovely old lobby cards of the film.

Have a look at some of the locations from the film, then & now, on the every brilliant Reelstreets website.

*** COMPETITION *** COMPETITION *** COMPETITION *** COMPETITION **

In episode 33 we discussed The Sandwich Man with the aforementioned Christopher Fowler. That episode has just been included as a bonus feature on a new 4K release of the film. To win a DVD, answer the question: Who was Dora Bryan frequently mistaken for by members of the public? Winners will be announced in the next episode.

If you would like to support the show with a small financial contribution towards our running costs you can do that here. For every £1 donated, a kitten lives.

If you are a business and would like to sponsor us, please get in touch and let's talk the talk.

Please leave us a review or a star rating HERE.

Between March & May 2022, we ran a series of screenings of 1930s quota quickie films at the Kino Cinema in Bermondsey. Each screening was followed by a Q&A with our resident quickie expert, Dr Lawrence Napper of Kings College London and a specially invited expert guest. We will be returning to the Kino in the autumn for season 2 but, in the meantime, you can hear season one of the Kino Quickies podcast at KinoQuickies.com. You can also follow us on Facebook.

The originator of Soho Bites, Dr Jingan Young, has a new book coming out all about.... guess what? Films set in Soho! Get your copy at Foyles.

Thank you for listening.

Follow us on Blue Sky (our Xwitter account is no more)

We're now on YouTube

Email us at [email protected]

We'd love it if you left us a lovely REVIEW.

And if you'd like to help support the show we'd be very grateful.

Check out our spin-off series Mural Morsels

In fact, see all relevant links HERE

Two Films, One Guest.

Normally we have two guests on each episode of Soho Bites, but when your guest is as good as David McGillivray, who needs a second?

Long before Matthew Sweet gave him the moniker, "The Truffaut of Smut", David reviewed Zeta One (AKA The Love Factor - no idea why) for The Monthly Film Bulletin. He didn't have a lot of good things to say about it then - has his opinion changed over the last 51 years? He makes a return visit to Soho Bites to tell us.

Produced by Tony Tenser, the film had a troubled shooting period and was shelved for two years upon completion. Although the main attraction was, presumably, the acres of naked flesh on display throughout the film, top billing nominally goes to James Robertson Justice as the chief baddy and his oily sidekick, Swyne, played by Charles Hawtrey.

Any mention of Charles Hawtrey invites another reading of his Wikipedia entry which is always fun.

But maybe watch the trailer first so you have some idea of what you're letting yourself in for.

And here is an album of stills from the film.

There are some outrageous Crimes Against Location in Zeta One - eg pretending Warwick Avenue is next to Greek Street and Berwick Street market leads to Camden. If you're a London geography geek just waiting be outraged, look at the film's locations on Reelstreets.

In the first half of the programme , David talks about a film that promises to be a teeny-weeny bit better than Zeta One, although we won't get to find out until next year. The Wrong People is currently in pre-production and is David's own adaptation of Robin Maugham's 1967 novel of the same name.

Set in Tangier in the early 60s, it's the uncomfortable story of Arnold, a closeted gay teacher who falls under the corrupting influence of Ewing Baird, a wealthy ex-pat with particular peccadillos.

You could also follow him on Twitter.

Here's an interesting short film about Dean's Bar in Tangier, the real life version of one of the book's fictional locations.

And you can download the book in PDF format HERE.

The author of The Wrong People, Robin Maugham, was an interesting character.

If you would like to support the show with a small financial contribution towards our running costs you can do that here. For every £1 donated, a kitten lives.

If you are a business and would like to sponsor us, please get in touch and let's talk the talk.

Please leave us a review or a star rating HERE.

Between March & May 2022, we ran a series of screenings of 1930s quota quickie films at the Kino Cinema in Bermondsey. Each screening was followed by a Q&A with our resident quickie expert, Dr Lawrence Napper of Kings College London and a specially invited expert guest. We will be returning to the Kino in the autumn for season 2 but, in the meantime, you can hear season one of the Kino Quickies podcast at KinoQuickies.com. You can also follow us on Facebook.

The originator of Soho Bites, Dr Jingan Young, has a new book coming out all about.... guess what? Films set in Soho! Get your copy at Foyles.

Thank you for listening.

Follow us on Blue Sky (our Xwitter account is no more)

We're now on YouTube

Email us at [email protected]

We'd love it if you left us a lovely REVIEW.

And if you'd like to help support the show we'd be very grateful.

Check out our spin-off series Mural Morsels

In fact, see all relevant links HERE