Mike Dick's blog

Today is the 50th anniversary of the UK cinema release of the great British director John Schlesinger's movie "Midnight Cowboy". It starred Dustin Hoffman as "Ratso" Rizzo and Jon Voight as Joe Buck. The film won three Academy Awards - Best Picture, Best Adapted Screenplay and Best Director.

 The British Entertainment History Project has an 147 minute interview with John Schlesinger  recorded on the 30 th March 1994. It covers his early career at the BBC in the 1950s. He talks eloquently about directing such classics as "A Kind of Loving" "Billy Liar" "Far From The Madding Crowd" and "Marathon Man". You can find the interview at

 https://historyproject.org.uk/interview/john-schlesinger

 In this excerpt he talks to interviewer  Norman Swallow about the making of "Midnight Cowboy"  

The British Entertainment History Project is deeply saddened to hear of the death of the great Italian film director   Franco Zeffirelli. Our collection of interviews includes one recorded in 1987 with Ossie Morris who worked with him as  Director of Photography on the movie "The Taming of the Shrew" starring Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor. In this transcript  of  the interview  Ossie talks about working with Zeffirelli on the movie. You can listen to the complete six hours and forty three minute interview at:  https://historyproject.org.uk/interview/oswald-ossie-morris . The section about working with Zeffirelli is on Side 8.

Interviewer.

 Let’s talk about Zeffirelli.

Ossie Morris

Interviews digitised January / February 2019

Audio 

Ossie Morris  # 9    9 sides of tape

Oswald ('Ossie') Morris (1915-2014 ), cinematographer, OBE, BSC, was born on 22 November in Middlesex. One of the most significant cameramen of the post-war era, Ossie began his career working as a projectionist during his school holidays. In 1932, he left school to become an apprentice in the film industry, with his first job as a clapperboy on After Dark(1932) at Associated Sound Film Industries, Wembley. During WWII, Morris served as a bomber pilot for the Royal Air Force, and returned to the film industry when the war ended. After some experience as an operator at Pinewood in 1946, he was given his first film to light in 1950.

The latest batch of History Project interviews uploaded to our website this month include:

Interview number 532  Peter Graham Scott  Peter was an film producer, film director and screenwriter. One of the producers and directors who shaped British television drama in its formative years, He was a key figure in television drama in the seventies and eighties and was responsible for top rating series including The Avengers, Mogul, The Troubleshooters, and, most successfully, The Onedin Line, which ran for 9 years. He was much admired by fellow directors as well as actors and was renowned for his film editing skills, which he had honed in the forties while working for J Arthur Rank on films such as Brighton Rock.

In August 2016  the following interviews have been digitised and uploaded to the website. Peggy Gick ( Interview number 403) ; Tony Garnett ( Interview number 560) ; Kitty Wood ( Morrison) ( Interview number 6) ; Peter Morley ( Interview  number 166) ; Rodney Giesler ( Interview number 312) 

In August 2016  the following interviews have been digitised and uploaded to the website. Peggy Gick ( Interview number 403) ; Tony Garnett ( Interview number 560) ; Kitty Wood ( Morrison) ( Interview number 6) ; Peter Morley ( Interview  number 166) ; Rodney Giesler ( Interview number 312) 

There are many reasons why knowing our history is important, and this is particularly so for trade unionists and trade unions.

In this era of YouTube, the iPhone, 3 D movies, Facebook, ultra high definition television , the BECTU History Project links us to a time when we worked in a different way. It tells the stories of the workers in our industry over the last 100 years – it tells about the challenges they had to overcome, the skills they developed, the enduring human relationships they forged as Britain developed into one of the world’s major centres of the film and television industry.