Abstract
This chapter considers the representation of North-East history in film and television, beginning with four examples that are important works of British film and television culture: the historical period drama When the Boat Comes In (BBC, 1976–1981), the cycle of Catherine Cookson adaptations made between 1989 and 2000 for ITV, the acclaimed political drama Our Friends in the North (BBC, 1996) and the film Billy Elliot (2000). Later historical dramas are identified as challenging established tropes of representation, and a recent cycle of artistic documentaries about place, memory and identity is also given attention. The chapter concludes with an analysis of how North-East representations have themselves been historicised and canonised, in relation to the phenomenon of television ‘theme’ nights and archival curation.
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Notes
- 1.
Close the Coalhouse Door was repeated on BBC One in 1970. Quotation taken from the programme’s camera script, accessed via the Sid Chaplin archive at Newcastle University (SCP:GB 186 SC/5/2).
- 2.
Potter cited in Purser (2002: 24).
- 3.
‘Marra’ is a Northumbrian dialect term for close friends and work mates. See Jackson (2019: 2).
- 4.
For a summary of the debates around Days of Hope see Hill (2011: 150–154).
- 5.
The Beamish open-air museum near Stanley, County Durham, opened in 1972. It has different ‘zones’ relating to particular eras of North-East history, such as a nineteenth-century colliery village, a Georgian section and a 1940s farm. The ‘town area’ evoking an urban setting of 1913 is frequently used as a backdrop in Cookson dramas. Marsden Rock, another recurring location, is a rock formation in South Shields—its arch shape was a local landmark, but it collapsed into two separate sticks in 1996.
- 6.
Flannery cited in Phipps (2016: 95).
- 7.
The original stage play of Our Friends in the North featured a number of scenes set in Rhodesia, and the question about sanctions against Ian Smith’s government inspired the title, which referred to how it was described by BP staff in South Africa (Eaton 2005: 12).
- 8.
Melvyn Bragg speaking in the South Bank Show (ITV, 1978–2010; Sky 2012–) profile of Lee Hall (broadcast in 2019).
- 9.
See Feaver (2010), the inspiration for Lee’s play, for more detail on the Ashington Group.
- 10.
Hall speaking in the South Bank Show profile of Lee Hall.
- 11.
The production on screen in Billy Elliot is clearly Matthew Bourne’s version of Swan Lake, first staged in 1995, and famous for casting men in the traditionally female swan roles; the older Billy is played by the star of that production, Adam Cooper.
- 12.
Colls speaking in the South Bank Show profile of Lee Hall.
- 13.
Billy Elliot is by no means the first story of an Easington boy uprooted from a pit community. The Tyne Tees children’s series Andy Robson (1982), set in 1910, concerned a child orphaned by a mining accident who is sent to stay in remote Northumberland, where he befriends two locals (one wealthy, one not so much) and has various adventures.
- 14.
- 15.
The director William Oldroyd speaking on the DVD commentary for the film.
- 16.
Oldroyd cited in Rose (2017).
- 17.
Morrison cited in Popple (2018: 237).
- 18.
Programme information taken from Radio Times listings on the BBC Genome website.
- 19.
This short film was initially broadcast (2 June 2003) as part of the North East and Cumbria edition of the regional magazine programme Inside Out (BBC, 2002–). The art critic Brian Sewell had recently made comments suggesting that Tynesiders were not ‘sophisticated’ enough to appreciate the modern art exhibitions at the Gateshead Baltic gallery (BBC 2003).
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Leggott, J. (2021). Histories of the North East. In: The North East of England on Film and Television. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-69146-2_6
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