The Studio Tours project, tell us a little bit about that. Was that Plowright’s idea? Very much so, yes, yes. It was a good idea in an inadequate location basically. Really? Yes because we put a lot of work into it in advance, even to the point I would go to America on National Association…
Read MoreAndrew Quinn on his highlights of working at Granada
What are the highlights looking back over these times? What are your highlights of your time at Granada? Well, I don’t know. If I look back on it and I sort of couldn’t have had a better progression in life. I mean I suppose the norm for many people is that you hit your peak…
Read MoreNick Steer – Biography
Soundman Nick Steer joined Granada Television in 1979. He spent a year working on local programmes and was then assigned to work on World In Action. He went on to work ith Tony Wilson on So It Goes and then spent many years working on dramas such as A Tale of Two Cities, Cold Feet…
Read MoreDaphne Hughes describes how she joined Granada
I joined in August 1980. At the time, I had been working for BBC Radio Merseyside, where I had been very happy for five years. But Chris Kerr, who at the time, was involved with Merseyside Arts, used to come into Radio Merseyside and do short items and reviews on arts in the Merseyside area.…
Read MoreDaphne Hughes’s memories of Granada’s Exchange Flags programme
There would be people sitting in the actual area of Exchange Flags behind the town hall, sitting there having their lunch and we would come out say, “Do you want to be in the audience?” I have a glass of wine and a sandwich. I’m just rounding up these people. Sometimes though, we would ring…
Read MoreDaphne Hughes on her move to the Albert Dock
1986, it was the start of Granada in the Albert Dock. We all moved down to the Albert Dock, which, as you know, were the premises there. The Dock Traffic Office, and that whole Albert Dock development, was part of Heseltine’s initiative for Merseyside following the riots. Then, because of the whole structure of Granada…
Read MoreDaphne Hughes on her technical knowledge
You must have built up a great technical knowledge? Yes. Well, I mean I’m not a technical person as really, but I knew where people were. Again, just to go back to Tonight with Trevor, because we were in Manchester, but even when I went down and worked in London and the ITN office, I…
Read MoreDaphne Hughes on presenters she remembered
The people like Roger Blythe and Tony Wilson and Bob Greaves. I had always admired Tony and Bob for their ability to make… if there was a gap and the producer would say, “Could you talk for two minutes?” and these two could do it. They could do two minutes. I thought, “That’s amazing.” They…
Read MoreDaphne Hughes on the lure of the Crooked Billet pub
A lot of life went on in The Crooked Billet. One reason being that it was a shortcut to the car park, but inevitably, you didn’t always make the car park. You just stayed in The Crooked Billet, but for one or two or three and your car stayed in the car park. There was…
Read MoreDaphne Hughes describes working on This Morning in London
I’m on This Morning (in Liverpool), then in about ‘96 they made this announcement that This Morning was going to move to London. They just made this announcement saying this had been decided, that This Morning would move to London. I was happy to go, although they targeted certain people they called “key staff”, one…
Read MoreDaphne Hughes on the technical challenges of This Morning
The thing I found difficult, they did use to have a bit at the beginning of the show which they called news reactive. So they would comment… not so much Hillsborough, because that was… they devoted a lot of time to that. But they were devoted… bit at the beginning, a news reactive story, and…
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Glenda Wood describes the skills needed by a make-up artist and the difference that colour television made to the role
There were always about 10 or 11 of us, and we used to bring a freelance in if we needed more. Did you ever go into the make-up room? We had these kitchen cupboard things down the middle, and we had to have more make-up space in there, so they put… you know those people…
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Glenda Wood on her encounter with Margaret Thatcher
Did you ever make up politicians, like Mrs Thatcher? Oh, God! Yes. Do you know, we never, ever got tips. Which is the nature of the game, isn’t it? But I went to Blackpool, and it was the year after the Brighton bombing – you wouldn’t believe the security to get in there! I was…
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Glenda Wood recalls the day-to-day work on a drama
So I presume there was a team of make-up artists. There was the person who was the principal, and then you would have all your assistants, and you’d worked it out, how many assistants you’d need. Generally it was only two, but when you had a big crowd of extras. I used to work it…
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Glenda Wood remembers the good times at Granada
What was Granada like to work for? From the word go they were smashing, absolutely smashing. I remember my boss was Michael… big tall fella, very handsome. Mike Scott. When I first started he was there. But yes, everybody was really nice. And I really do think that everybody enjoyed it so much – that’s…
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Glenda Wood’s memories of working on Coronation Street
What about some of the Coronation Street people? Pat Phoenix? Oh! Yes. I did her a few times. It’s funny, because the make-up she had was left over from the 50s. I don’t mean the pots that we had, but the way she had it was left over from the 50s. Is that what she…
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Glenda Wood talks about her work on ‘Stars in Your Eyes’ for which she won a BAFTA
So what programmes do you particularly remember? Well, I loved Stars in Their Eyes, it was a make-up artist’s dream to do that. I did that for the whole lot, I forget how much that… I got a BAFTA for that. Why did you enjoy that so much? Because it was perfect. If you were…
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Glenda Wood’s impressions of Sidney Bernstein and Denis Forman
Did you ever have any contact with Denis Forman or the Bernsteins? Yes. yes. I remember one night… we used to do What the Papers Say live at about 11pm, and I was sitting in the make-up room, waiting for whoever was doing What the Papers Say, and Bernstein came in. And he used to…
Read MoreNick Steer talks about his time on World In Action.
So after that first year on local programmes, I then got assigned to World in Action with Alan Bale, who was the recordist and George Turner, who was the cameraman. A few of the other cameraman came in for various things, but it was mostly George. And I had about a year just doing that…
Read MoreNick Steer describes working on drama
Towards the later part of the 70s I started doing drama, mostly with Phil Smith but some with John Muxworthy, who taught me boom swinging, basically. And the sort of drama techniques. So you were an assistant on the dramas that you refer to… My first dramas, I was a boom swinger. Yes, boom operator.…
Read MoreNick Steer talks about the music programme, So It Goes
I’m a bit a little hazy in terms of the timescale, but I think it was probably… there was two series, and I think in the first series I was assisting Phil Smith and we recorded a band called Asleep at the Wheel at the Library theatre, who were sort of western swing. Directed by…
Read MoreNick Steer’s memories of the Manchester City documentary
Well, as I said, I had originally come in and my interest was documentary. But the kind of opportunities for that weren’t as great, I found. As I became more experienced in doing drama, I did really enjoy that. It was more challenging, because there’s documentary and documentary, really. A lot of what was classed…
Read MoreNick Steer on the challenges of filming a drama in two languages.
More drama, a 1988 A Tale of Two Cities, which is another big one. We were in Bordeaux shooting for, oh weeks, must have been nine, 10 weeks or something. Which was another great experience. That was an interesting one, because it was a co-production with a French company and the cost was half, well…
Read MoreNick Steer talks about working practices
When you look at the list of programmes, the perception was that when things started to change… I think when we were doing Tale Of Two Cities… Granada, whether there was money problems or whatever, I don’t know, Granada decided… I think it was Thatcherism as well. There had been the TV-am dispute, and all…
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Sita Williams on joining Granada
Well, the reason I got into television was I grew up in Sri Lanka where there was no television. But I heard about someone, through a friend whose son had joined a television company and I thought, “Oh, that sounds good. I want to do that.” So anyway, I planned my career in a very…
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Sita Williams talks about working in the drama department
I thought, “Well, I’ve come to Granada to do drama,” and David Plowright was the managing director. So I got an appointment with him and I said, “Actually David, I only came here in order to do drama.” The arrogance of a young person. “And this is my background, I worked in drama at the…
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Sita Williams remembers David Plowright – and getting her P45!
David Plowright was also the head of drama. He was managing director and head of drama. I remember going in one day to complain that my budget wasn’t enough and he said to me, and it was so wonderful. That was Granada at its best. He said, “I’ll give you what you want. Just go.…
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Sita Williams talks about the drama series The Street.
Well, that was Jimmy’s (Jimmy McGovern) idea where we had a street in Salford it turned out and each episode you went behind the door and it centred on the story coming out of that door, that family. And so they were self-contained but you also saw other characters in the street and then we…
Read MorePete Terry talks about how he came to join Granada
I was freelancing in Birmingham, ATV – which no longer exists, of course – in the centre of Birmingham. I got a contract there straight from college. I was in the design department, and I had, I think, a nine-month contract to work on their winter campaign of 1979. So this was 1978. A number…
Read MorePete Terry remembers his early days in Graphics
In those early days, you come in as an assistant graphic designer, or even a junior assistant graphic designer. You always go, or we used to, onto the local news. That would have been Granada Reports. The ITV company has retained that name. That’s to my knowledge, the only real link with the past now.…
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