Heavy Weather (TV)
Encyclopedia
Heavy Weather was a dramatisation for television by Douglas Livingstone of the novel Heavy Weather
by P. G. Wodehouse
(1881–1975), set at Blandings Castle. It was made by the BBC
and WGBH Boston, first screened by the BBC on Christmas Eve
1995 and shown in the United States on PBS's Masterpiece Theatre
on 18 February 1996.
Though abridged for a 90-minute film, Heavy Weather followed closely the novel of 1933, the fourth in the Blandings series. Many of the familiar elements of the Blandings books were present: the wish of Lord Emsworth
's nephew, Ronnie Fish, to marry a chorus girl, Sue Brown; the concern of Emsworth's sisters, the imperious Lady Constance Keeble
and Ronnie's mother Lady Julia Fish, to ensure that the reminiscences of their other brother, the Hon. Galahad Threepwood
, were not published; Galahad's protectiveness towards Miss Brown, the daughter of his long lost love Dolly Henderson; the sustained efforts of the publisher Lord Tilbury
(a character probably based on Lord Northcliffe ) to gain possession of the reminiscences; Lord Emsworth's determination that his prize Berkshire pig, the Empress of Blandings
, should win the silver medal in the fat pigs class at the Shrewsbury
agricultural show; Lord Emsworth's employment of a private detective, P. Frobisher Pilbeam
, to protect the Empress and his rivalry with his neighbour, Sir Gregory Parsloe
, of Matchingham Hall, who had not only his own designs on the fat pigs class, but, as a prospective Parliamentary candidate, an interest in suppressing Galahad's reminiscences; and the employment as Lord Emsworth's secretary of Monty Bodkin
, who, as with most holders of that office, had an ulterior motive (in this instance, the need to hold down paid employment for a year in order to be considered suitable to marry one Gertrude Butterwick).
as Clarence, Lord Emsworth, Richard Briers
as Galahad Threepwood, Judy Parfitt
as Lady Constance, Sarah Badel
as Lady Julia, Roy Hudd
as Beach
the butler, Ronald Fraser
as Sir Gregory Parsloe and Richard Johnson
as Lord Tilbury, the recently ennobled George "Stinker" Pyke. Pilbeam was played by David Bamber
who became widely known around the same time as Mr. Collins in the BBC's adaptation of Jane Austen
's Pride and Prejudice
. Other members of the cast included Rebecca Lacey
as Sue Brown, Benjamin Soames as Ronnie Fish and Samuel West
as Monty Bodkin.
The screenplay was written by Douglas Livingstone. The director was Jack Gold
and the producers, Verity Lambert
and David Shanks.
There were many devotees of Wodehouse who assumed at the time that Heavy Weather was, in effect, a “pilot” for a series of Blandings adaptations. As such, this would have complemented the four series of Jeeves and Wooster
(Granada, 1990-3). However, not only did no series follow, but Heavy Weather has never been repeated on British television. It was released on VHS
and DVD
by Acorn Media
in 1999.
as Jeeves and, in 1937, A Damsel in Distress
(1919), virtually a Blandings novel, but with different characters, was turned by RKO into a musical film, scored by George Gershwin
, that starred Fred Astaire
and Joan Fontaine
.
An adaptation by C E Webber of a Wodehouse short story of 1935 was broadcast on BBC children's television in March 1956 as Lord Emsworth and the Little Friend. Then, in the 1960s, the BBC made a popular series called The World of Wooster (1965-7), featuring Dennis Price
as Jeeves and Ian Carmichael
as a rather middle-aged Bertie Wooster (Wodehouse himself much preferred Price’s performance ). This led to, among other spin-offs, a series of Blandings Castle (1967) with Sir Ralph Richardson
as Lord Emsworth, Meriel Forbes
as Lady Constance, Stanley Holloway
as Beach, Derek Nimmo
as Galahad Threepwood, and, as one Wodehouse scholar acutely observed, a Wessex Saddleback, rather than a Berkshire, as the Empress of Blandings.
Between 1984-92 there were several BBC radio adaptations of Blandings, in which Richard Vernon
, as Lord Emsworth, conveyed a mix of eccentricity and amiability (his delivery being quite similar to that in his occasional role in Yes Minister
and Yes, Prime Minister (BBC TV 1980-8) as the befuddled City
banker Sir Desmond Glazebrook). Ian Carmichael played Galahad in a number of these productions. In 1992 Random House Audiobooks released an abridged version of Heavy Weather, read by Martin Jarvis.
, Gloucestershire
, which was widely, though not universally, regarded as Wodehouse's model for Blandings. Wodehouse set Blandings in the more northerly county of Shropshire
, a location that stimulated some intriguing research by Richard Usborne
, a leading Wodehouse scholar, into train journeys (of which there were two in Heavy Weather) between London's Paddington station
and Market Blandings.
Sudeley was the home, during her marriage to Thomas Seymour
, of Queen Katherine Parr, sixth wife of King Henry VIII
. Katherine died in 1548 and is buried in the chapel at Sudeley. The castle has been owned since 1837 by the Dent Brocklehurst family. In 1972 it passed, on the death of his father, to Henry Dent Brocklehurst (born 1966), whose mother, later Lady Ashcombe, initially held Sudeley in trust and, by the mid 1990s, had done much to develop its potential for tourism and business.
The location of Heavy Weather at Sudeley assisted public awareness of the castle and its grounds. Sudeley's promotional literature emphasised the Wodehouse connection, noting, for example, that the double yew hedges in the Queen's Garden were the inspiration for the gardens of Blandings.
Heavy Weather (novel)
Heavy Weather is a novel by P. G. Wodehouse, first published in the United States on July 28, 1933 by Little, Brown and Company, Boston, and in the United Kingdom on August 10, 1933 by Herbert Jenkins, London...
by P. G. Wodehouse
P. G. Wodehouse
Sir Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, KBE was an English humorist, whose body of work includes novels, short stories, plays, poems, song lyrics, and numerous pieces of journalism. He enjoyed enormous popular success during a career that lasted more than seventy years and his many writings continue to be...
(1881–1975), set at Blandings Castle. It was made by the BBC
BBC
The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
and WGBH Boston, first screened by the BBC on Christmas Eve
Christmas Eve
Christmas Eve refers to the evening or entire day preceding Christmas Day, a widely celebrated festival commemorating the birth of Jesus of Nazareth that takes place on December 25...
1995 and shown in the United States on PBS's Masterpiece Theatre
Masterpiece Theatre
Masterpiece is a drama anthology television series produced by WGBH Boston. It premiered on Public Broadcasting Service on January 10, 1971, making it America's longest-running weekly prime time drama series. The series has presented numerous acclaimed British productions...
on 18 February 1996.
Though abridged for a 90-minute film, Heavy Weather followed closely the novel of 1933, the fourth in the Blandings series. Many of the familiar elements of the Blandings books were present: the wish of Lord Emsworth
Lord Emsworth
Clarence Threepwood, 9th Earl of Emsworth, or Lord Emsworth, is a recurring fictional character in the Blandings stories by British comic writer P. G. Wodehouse. He is the amiable and somewhat absent-minded head of the large Threepwood family...
's nephew, Ronnie Fish, to marry a chorus girl, Sue Brown; the concern of Emsworth's sisters, the imperious Lady Constance Keeble
Lady Constance Keeble
Lady Constance Keeble is a recurring fictional character in the Blandings stories by British comic writer P. G. Wodehouse, being Lord Emsworth's most formidable sister, a strikingly handsome woman, with a fair, broad brow, and perfectly even white teeth...
and Ronnie's mother Lady Julia Fish, to ensure that the reminiscences of their other brother, the Hon. Galahad Threepwood
Galahad Threepwood
The Honourable Galahad "Gally" Threepwood is a fictional character in the Blandings stories by P. G. Wodehouse. Lord Emsworth's younger brother, a lifelong bachelor, Gally was, according to Beach, the Blandings butler, "somewhat wild as a young man"...
, were not published; Galahad's protectiveness towards Miss Brown, the daughter of his long lost love Dolly Henderson; the sustained efforts of the publisher Lord Tilbury
George Alexander Pyke, Lord Tilbury
George Alexander Pyke, Lord Tilbury is a recurring fictional character in the stories of British comic writer P. G. Wodehouse. Pyke is a publishing magnate, the founder and owner of the Mammoth Publishing Company. Outside his business, he has a passion for pigs and is the owner of a prize pig...
(a character probably based on Lord Northcliffe ) to gain possession of the reminiscences; Lord Emsworth's determination that his prize Berkshire pig, the Empress of Blandings
Empress of Blandings
Empress of Blandings is a fictional pig, featured in many of the Blandings Castle novels and stories by P. G. Wodehouse. Owned by the doting Lord Emsworth, the Empress is an enormous black Berkshire sow, who wins many prizes in the "Fat Pigs" class at the local Shropshire Agricultural Show, and is...
, should win the silver medal in the fat pigs class at the Shrewsbury
Shrewsbury
Shrewsbury is the county town of Shropshire, in the West Midlands region of England. Lying on the River Severn, it is a civil parish home to some 70,000 inhabitants, and is the primary settlement and headquarters of Shropshire Council...
agricultural show; Lord Emsworth's employment of a private detective, P. Frobisher Pilbeam
Percy Frobisher Pilbeam
Percy Frobisher Pilbeam is a fictional character in the works of P. G. Wodehouse. A journalist turned detective, he is a rather weak and unpleasant man, generally disliked by all...
, to protect the Empress and his rivalry with his neighbour, Sir Gregory Parsloe
Gregory Parsloe-Parsloe
Sir Gregory Parsloe-Parsloe, 7th Baronet is a fictional character from the Blandings stories of P. G. Wodehouse. The seventh Baronet, who resides at Matchingham Hall, he is the son of the Very Reverend Dean Parsloe-Parsloe and is the rival and enemy of Lord Emsworth, master of Blandings...
, of Matchingham Hall, who had not only his own designs on the fat pigs class, but, as a prospective Parliamentary candidate, an interest in suppressing Galahad's reminiscences; and the employment as Lord Emsworth's secretary of Monty Bodkin
Monty Bodkin
Montague "Monty" Bodkin is a recurring fictional character in three novels of English comic writer P. G. Wodehouse, being a wealthy young member of the Drones Club, tall, slender and lissom, well-dressed, well-spoken, impeccably polite, and generally in some kind of romantic trouble.-Stories:Monty...
, who, as with most holders of that office, had an ulterior motive (in this instance, the need to hold down paid employment for a year in order to be considered suitable to marry one Gertrude Butterwick).
The cast
Heavy Weather had a distinguished cast: Peter O'ToolePeter O'Toole
Peter Seamus Lorcan O'Toole is an Irish actor of stage and screen. O'Toole achieved stardom in 1962 playing T. E. Lawrence in Lawrence of Arabia, and then went on to become a highly-honoured film and stage actor. He has been nominated for eight Academy Awards, and holds the record for most...
as Clarence, Lord Emsworth, Richard Briers
Richard Briers
Richard David Briers, CBE is an English actor whose career has encompassed theatre, television, film and radio.He first came to prominence as George Starling in Marriage Lines in the 1960s, but it was in the following decade when he played Tom Good in the BBC sitcom The Good Life that he became a...
as Galahad Threepwood, Judy Parfitt
Judy Parfitt
Judy Parfitt is a BAFTA-nominated English theatre, film and television actress who began her career on stage in 1954.-Life and work:...
as Lady Constance, Sarah Badel
Sarah Badel
Sarah Badel is a British stage and film actress. She is the daughter of actors Alan Badel and Yvonne Owen.-Theatrical career:...
as Lady Julia, Roy Hudd
Roy Hudd
Roy Hudd, OBE is an English comedian, actor, radio host and author, and an authority on the history of music hall entertainment.- Early life :...
as Beach
Sebastian Beach
Sebastian Beach is a fictional character in the Blandings stories by P. G. Wodehouse. He is the butler at Blandings Castle, seat of Lord Emsworth and his family, where he serves for over eighteen years.- Background and character :...
the butler, Ronald Fraser
Ronald Fraser
Ronald Fraser was an English character actor, who appeared in numerous British films of the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s whilst also appearing in many popular TV shows.-Background:...
as Sir Gregory Parsloe and Richard Johnson
Richard Johnson (actor)
Richard Johnson is an English actor, writer and producer, who starred in several British films of the 1960s and has also had a distinguished stage career. He most recently appeared in The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas.-Life and career:...
as Lord Tilbury, the recently ennobled George "Stinker" Pyke. Pilbeam was played by David Bamber
David Bamber
David James Bamber is an English actor, known for his television and theatre work. He is an Associate of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art.-Early years:...
who became widely known around the same time as Mr. Collins in the BBC's adaptation of Jane Austen
Jane Austen
Jane Austen was an English novelist whose works of romantic fiction, set among the landed gentry, earned her a place as one of the most widely read writers in English literature, her realism and biting social commentary cementing her historical importance among scholars and critics.Austen lived...
's Pride and Prejudice
Pride and Prejudice (1995 TV serial)
Pride and Prejudice is a six-episode 1995 British television drama, adapted by Andrew Davies from Jane Austen's 1813 novel Pride and Prejudice. Jennifer Ehle and Colin Firth starred as Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy. Produced by Sue Birtwistle and directed by Simon Langton, the serial was a BBC...
. Other members of the cast included Rebecca Lacey
Rebecca Lacey
Rebecca Lacey is a British actress, born in Watford, United Kingdom. She is the daughter of actor Ronald Lacey and actress Mela White. She is not the sister of actress Ingrid Lacey as is often reported....
as Sue Brown, Benjamin Soames as Ronnie Fish and Samuel West
Samuel West
Samuel Alexander Joseph West is an English actor and theatre director. He is perhaps best known for his role in Howards End and his work on stage. He also starred in the award-winning play ENRON...
as Monty Bodkin.
The screenplay was written by Douglas Livingstone. The director was Jack Gold
Jack Gold
Jack Gold is a British film and television director. He was part of the British Realist Tradition that followed Free Cinema.-Career:...
and the producers, Verity Lambert
Verity Lambert
Verity Ann Lambert, OBE was an English television and film producer. She is best known as the founding producer of the science-fiction series Doctor Who, a programme which has become a part of British popular culture, and for her association with Thames Television...
and David Shanks.
There were many devotees of Wodehouse who assumed at the time that Heavy Weather was, in effect, a “pilot” for a series of Blandings adaptations. As such, this would have complemented the four series of Jeeves and Wooster
Jeeves and Wooster
-External links:*—An episode guide to the series, including information about which episodes were adapted from which Wodehouse stories.*—Episode guides, screenshots and quotes from the four series....
(Granada, 1990-3). However, not only did no series follow, but Heavy Weather has never been repeated on British television. It was released on VHS
VHS
The Video Home System is a consumer-level analog recording videocassette standard developed by Victor Company of Japan ....
and DVD
DVD
A DVD is an optical disc storage media format, invented and developed by Philips, Sony, Toshiba, and Panasonic in 1995. DVDs offer higher storage capacity than Compact Discs while having the same dimensions....
by Acorn Media
Acorn Media UK
Acorn Media UK is a DVD publisher which distributes and sells home video products with a particular focus on British television.- Company history :The company was founded in 1997 when Lesley Fromant set up a branch of parent company Acorn Media in the UK....
in 1999.
Blandings on film and television
Two films were made in the 1930s with Arthur TreacherArthur Treacher
Arthur Veary Treacher was an English actor born in Brighton, East Sussex, England.Treacher was a veteran of World War I. After the war, he established a stage career and in 1928, he went to America as part of a musical-comedy revue called Great Temptations...
as Jeeves and, in 1937, A Damsel in Distress
A Damsel in Distress (novel)
A Damsel in Distress is a novel by P. G. Wodehouse, first published in the United States on 4 October 1919 by George H. Doran, New York, and in the United Kingdom by Herbert Jenkins, London, on 17 October 1919...
(1919), virtually a Blandings novel, but with different characters, was turned by RKO into a musical film, scored by George Gershwin
George Gershwin
George Gershwin was an American composer and pianist. Gershwin's compositions spanned both popular and classical genres, and his most popular melodies are widely known...
, that starred Fred Astaire
Fred Astaire
Fred Astaire was an American film and Broadway stage dancer, choreographer, singer and actor. His stage and subsequent film career spanned a total of 76 years, during which he made 31 musical films. He was named the fifth Greatest Male Star of All Time by the American Film Institute...
and Joan Fontaine
Joan Fontaine
Joan de Beauvoir de Havilland , known professionally as Joan Fontaine, is a British American actress. She and her elder sister Olivia de Havilland are two of the last surviving leading ladies from Hollywood of the 1930s....
.
An adaptation by C E Webber of a Wodehouse short story of 1935 was broadcast on BBC children's television in March 1956 as Lord Emsworth and the Little Friend. Then, in the 1960s, the BBC made a popular series called The World of Wooster (1965-7), featuring Dennis Price
Dennis Price
Dennis Price was an English actor, remembered for his suave screen roles, particularly Louis Mazzini in Kind Hearts and Coronets, and for his portrayal of the omniscient valet Jeeves in 1960s television adaptations of P. G...
as Jeeves and Ian Carmichael
Ian Carmichael
Ian Gillett Carmichael, OBE was an English film, stage, television and radio actor.-Early life:Carmichael was born in Hull, in the East Riding of Yorkshire. The son of an optician, he was educated at Scarborough College and Bromsgrove School, before training as an actor at RADA...
as a rather middle-aged Bertie Wooster (Wodehouse himself much preferred Price’s performance ). This led to, among other spin-offs, a series of Blandings Castle (1967) with Sir Ralph Richardson
Ralph Richardson
Sir Ralph David Richardson was an English actor, one of a group of theatrical knights of the mid-20th century who, though more closely associated with the stage, also appeared in several classic films....
as Lord Emsworth, Meriel Forbes
Meriel Forbes
Meriel Forbes was a British actress. She was married to the actor Ralph Richardson.-Selected filmography:* Girls Please! * The Belles of St. Clements * The Day Will Dawn * The Gentle Sex...
as Lady Constance, Stanley Holloway
Stanley Holloway
Stanley Augustus Holloway, OBE was an English stage and film actor, comedian, singer, poet and monologist. He was famous for his comic and character roles on stage and screen, especially that of Alfred P. Doolittle in My Fair Lady...
as Beach, Derek Nimmo
Derek Nimmo
Derek Robert Nimmo was an English character actor. He was particularly associated with upper-class "silly-ass" roles, and clerical roles.-Career:...
as Galahad Threepwood, and, as one Wodehouse scholar acutely observed, a Wessex Saddleback, rather than a Berkshire, as the Empress of Blandings.
Between 1984-92 there were several BBC radio adaptations of Blandings, in which Richard Vernon
Richard Vernon
Richard Vernon was a British actor. He appeared in many feature films and television programmes, often in aristocratic or supercilious roles...
, as Lord Emsworth, conveyed a mix of eccentricity and amiability (his delivery being quite similar to that in his occasional role in Yes Minister
Yes Minister
Yes Minister is a satirical British sitcom written by Antony Jay and Jonathan Lynn that was first transmitted by BBC Television between 1980–1982 and 1984, split over three seven-episode series. The sequel, Yes, Prime Minister, ran from 1986 to 1988. In total there were 38 episodes—of which all but...
and Yes, Prime Minister (BBC TV 1980-8) as the befuddled City
City of London
The City of London is a small area within Greater London, England. It is the historic core of London around which the modern conurbation grew and has held city status since time immemorial. The City’s boundaries have remained almost unchanged since the Middle Ages, and it is now only a tiny part of...
banker Sir Desmond Glazebrook). Ian Carmichael played Galahad in a number of these productions. In 1992 Random House Audiobooks released an abridged version of Heavy Weather, read by Martin Jarvis.
Sudeley Castle
Heavy Weather was filmed at Sudeley CastleSudeley Castle
Sudeley Castle is a castle located near Winchcombe, Gloucestershire, England. It dates from the 10th century, but the inhabited portion is chiefly Elizabethan. The castle has a notable garden, which is designed and maintained to a very high standard. The chapel, St. Mary's Sudeley, is the burial...
, Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire
Gloucestershire is a county in South West England. The county comprises part of the Cotswold Hills, part of the flat fertile valley of the River Severn, and the entire Forest of Dean....
, which was widely, though not universally, regarded as Wodehouse's model for Blandings. Wodehouse set Blandings in the more northerly county of Shropshire
Shropshire
Shropshire is a county in the West Midlands region of England. For Eurostat purposes, the county is a NUTS 3 region and is one of four counties or unitary districts that comprise the "Shropshire and Staffordshire" NUTS 2 region. It borders Wales to the west...
, a location that stimulated some intriguing research by Richard Usborne
Richard Usborne
Richard Alexander Usborne , or simply Dick Usborne, was a journalist and author. He is widely regarded as the leading scholar of the life and works of British comic writer P. G. Wodehouse ....
, a leading Wodehouse scholar, into train journeys (of which there were two in Heavy Weather) between London's Paddington station
Paddington station
Paddington railway station, also known as London Paddington, is a central London railway terminus and London Underground complex.The site is a historic one, having served as the London terminus of the Great Western Railway and its successors since 1838. Much of the current mainline station dates...
and Market Blandings.
Sudeley was the home, during her marriage to Thomas Seymour
Thomas Seymour, 1st Baron Seymour of Sudeley
Thomas Seymour, 1st Baron Seymour of Sudeley, KG was an English politician.Thomas spent his childhood in Wulfhall, outside Savernake Forest, in Wiltshire. Historian David Starkey describes Thomas thus: 'tall, well-built and with a dashing beard and auburn hair, he was irresistible to women'...
, of Queen Katherine Parr, sixth wife of King Henry VIII
Henry VIII of England
Henry VIII was King of England from 21 April 1509 until his death. He was Lord, and later King, of Ireland, as well as continuing the nominal claim by the English monarchs to the Kingdom of France...
. Katherine died in 1548 and is buried in the chapel at Sudeley. The castle has been owned since 1837 by the Dent Brocklehurst family. In 1972 it passed, on the death of his father, to Henry Dent Brocklehurst (born 1966), whose mother, later Lady Ashcombe, initially held Sudeley in trust and, by the mid 1990s, had done much to develop its potential for tourism and business.
The location of Heavy Weather at Sudeley assisted public awareness of the castle and its grounds. Sudeley's promotional literature emphasised the Wodehouse connection, noting, for example, that the double yew hedges in the Queen's Garden were the inspiration for the gardens of Blandings.