Maggie Cobbett

The unofficial Mayor of Emmerdale

Only one man deserves that title and I, as an ‘extra’ and ‘village regular’ on the show, couldn’t resist going along to the talk he gave in Ripon yesterday. Tim Fee began by telling his audience that he’d never done a day’s work in his life. Those of us who already knew about his long career in theatre and television must have looked sceptical, because he hastened to explain that everything he’d done had given him so much pleasure that he didn’t look at it as work. If only everyone could be as lucky as Tim!

Born to a musically gifted family in Blackburn, Lancashire – his parents were both talented pianists and his mother’s best friend was fellow Lancastrian Kathleen Ferrier – he was the youngest of five children. Refusing to learn to play a musical instrument as all his siblings had done, something he has regretted ever since, he was persuaded to take on the part of Hiawatha in a school production and this led to a lifelong love of verse speaking, drama and Shakespeare. However, it was right at the start of his time at Rose Bruford’s drama school in Kent that Tim realised that most actors spend a great deal of their time ‘resting’. Knowing that his parents were in no position to support him in this, he decided to concentrate his efforts back stage. Several years with the London Festival Ballet followed, including tours of the UK and abroad and an invitation to supper with Margot Fonteyn at her flat in Knightsbridge!

In 1973, whilst at the Bradford Alhambra, it was suggested to him by a stage hand that there was ‘more money in telly’ and he should apply for the position of floor manager at Yorkshire Television. He soon found himself in the drama department and on an upward climb through the ranks. Tim retired as line producer of Emmerdale (formerly Emmerdale Farm) in 2009. During his 22 years on the show, he saw it transformed from a sleepy rural production that the ITV executives in London loathed and wanted to scrap to one of the biggest soaps in television.

Tim’s proudest moment came in 2002 during the Queen’s Golden Jubilee tour. Having convinced the powers that be that a tour of the newly created village set in the grounds of Harewood House (owned by Her Majesty’s cousin, Lord Harewood) would be of more interest than anything the YTV studios in Leeds had to offer, he was placed in charge of the whole operation. Arranging such a visit is never simple and Tim had to tour the village with an equerry, organise an inspection by the Royal Protection Force and see the whole set thoroughly searched by police dog handlers. The Buckingham Palace press office, worried that enthusiasm for the Golden Jubilee might be flagging, asked him to come up with something that would ensure front page coverage. Ever resourceful, he decided to have the village post office ‘blown up’ by Emmerdale’s special effects guru Ian Rowling as soon as Her Majesty emerged from the Woolpack. (It is on record that she didn’t turn a hair when this happened a few feet away from where she was standing.)

The Emmerdale gardeners had been working hard and the set was looking at its best on the day, which coincided happily with a ‘village in bloom’ storyline.  Despite earlier worries about whether her Rolls Royce would make it safely over the humped back bridge leading into the village, all went well and the Queen met a wide variety of actors, crew members and television executives. The ‘explosion’ took place on schedule, the rain which had begun as Her Majesty arrived eased off and the sun came out.

Photographs and more details of this very special day can be seen at http://www.emmerdale.net/interv/queen/queen.html

When Tim Fee retired in 2009, he was given a very special accolade, his own gravestone in the village cemetery. Here it is below:

29 October, 2013 - There are 2 comments on this story

Oh dear! Summer is really over.

Driving to Leeds in the dark for an early morning call time was a shock to the system after all those sunny mornings, but I was studio based today, working as a customer in the Emmerdale café.

The first scene took a long time to complete and I was seated on my own throughout with a cup of cold coffee in front of me and an old magazine about health issues to pore over. Now I’m much better informed about a number of unpleasant medical conditions that I hope never to experience!

We were filming scenes to be used in different episodes and I next found myself in a different outfit, at a new table and having an animated conversation with another extra. This aspect of my work is trickier than it sounds, because we have to look convincing without making a sound. Microphones these days are so sensitive that even a whisper can ruin a take. (Any background noise needed for a scene is added later on during the editing process.) Even when miming, it’s sometimes difficult to think what to say and I often hope that there aren’t too many lip readers amongst the viewers. When really desperate, some of us have been known to resort to multiplication tables. You can probably imagine the sort of thing:

Extra 1: Seven nines are sixty-three.

Extra 2: You don’t say! Well, nine fives are forty-five, you know.

And so on and so forth!

26 September, 2013 - Make the first comment on this story

A Few Thoughts on Downton Abbey

I love Downton Abbey, but I do wish they’d film ‘local scenes’ up here in North Yorkshire where the story is set and not two hundred miles to the south in Berkshire and Oxfordshire. Amongst other things, the former Ripon workhouse, a place to which I often take visiting friends, is now one of our star attractions.

With its imposing gatehouse, it’s not at all like the building shown in last night’s episode. The unfortunate Charlie Grigg, former song and dance partner of Mr Carson, the butler, might well have been an inmate there at the same time as novelist Barbara Taylor Bradford’s grandmother and her children. (Their sad story was well documented recently in ITV’s Secrets From The Workhouse.)

23 September, 2013 - There are 2 comments on this story

Kind words from Deborah Moggach

I’m proud to have Deborah Moggach’s permission to pass on her kind words about one of the stories in my third collection. The author of the brilliant The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel and many other best selling novels has emailed me to say that she enjoyed Vainglory hugely and felt ‘so much at home in it’.  Like Debby’s earlier novel ‘Tulip Fever’, it was inspired by a 17th century Dutch masterpiece and is one of my favourites amongst all the many short stories that I’ve written.

The ‘genre paintings’ of contemporary domestic interiors by artists such as De Maes, De Hooch, Ter Borch and Vermeer are so detailed that ‘experts’ argue for hours about hidden messages, whilst fiction writers are free to let their imaginations run riot. Some of the happiest days of my youth were spent in Amsterdam and I thoroughly recommend a visit to the famous Rijksmuseum, now open once again after ten years of rebuilding, renovation and restoration.

Swings & Roundabouts is available from Amazon as a separate eBook or as part of an eBook or paperback omnibus edition of my three short story collections.

6 September, 2013 - Make the first comment on this story

Kicking up my heels with Mambo con Rumbo!

Whenever a month has a fifth Friday in it, Trisha and Deej of  Strictly Salsa http://www.strictlysalsa.co.uk/ run a social at their Wetherby venue. This time, they gave an opportunity to the new line up of a band many local salseros hold dear and around 120 of us turned up to support them. It was their first gig since the band re-formed, a practice really, and they were understandably nervous but gave a very creditable performance. We’re all looking forward to seeing them perform again on 13th September, just round the corner at the famous Wetherby Engine Shed.

Salsa steps are complicated enough without allowing alcohol into the frame, so the glasses on the table contained only J20 (orange and passion fruit). All the same, the mood was buoyant when our friend Andi came round with her camera.

That said, holding tightly onto Jack – and at least another dozen of our great leaders during the evening – was a pleasure, not a necessity. Viva la salsa!

30 August, 2013 - Make the first comment on this story

Everything comes to she who waits?

Well, not quite everything, but I was agreeably surprised today.

As those who’ve attended one of my workshops on ‘fillers’ and/or read my article in the December 2012 issue of Writing Magazine already know, I find these a useful way of supplementing my income during the dry spells that most writers experience.

One FAQ is how long to wait before assuming that a submission hasn’t hit the spot and offering it elsewhere. That’s a difficult one to answer, as witness the fact that the item above was sent off in February 2012 and appeared in the issue to hit the shops today. It’s lucky that I wasn’t desperate for the response to my query!

29 August, 2013 - Make the first comment on this story

Nothing wrong with nostalgia!

Most areas of the country have their own ‘nostalgic magazines’ and Down Your Way has featured many of my articles over the last few years.

Woodhouse Moor Revisited was inspired by memories of the part of the great northern city in which I grew up. My family moved house several times but we were never far away from the former common once known as ‘the lungs of Leeds’. It was, you might say, our local park. Childhood picnics and games of ‘catch’ gave way to roller skating round the already disused bandstand, the occasional game of tennis – I was never any good at that – and watching the boyfriend of the day playing football with his friends. Across Woodhouse Lane (formerly the Leeds-Otley Turnpike) from the landscaped section lay the ‘Cinder Moor’, empty and desolate for most of the year but coming to life when Billy Smart’s Circus paid its annual visit and again at Easter and particularly in September when the ‘Feast’ moved in for a few days. As I wrote in the article, ‘the smell of diesel fumes mingled with fried onions always served to heighten the excitement’ and ‘it was all about whizzing round to the latest hit records and flirting with the tough looking young men in charge of the Waltzers’. Well, I did attend a rather sedate single sex grammar school!

In those days, I never gave a thought to the long history of Woodhouse Moor, but a few hours spent in Leeds Local Studies Library gave me plenty of facts to choose from. Famous visitors included Thomas Fairfax, whose troops assembled there in 1643 to capture Leeds from the Royalists, Queen Victoria and Emmeline Pankhurst. The Chartists met there in 1837 to form Leeds Working Men’s Association and both World Wars saw large parts of the Moor turned over to military use and allotments. During WW2, air raid shelters were also added, but morale was kept up by regular concerts on the bandstand and dances in a large marquee on the tennis courts.

It was on a grey and drizzly Sunday in March that I set off with a friend and her dog to take photographs for my article. I was saddened at first to find that some features I remembered had either disappeared or been vandalised. The paths were in sad need of repair, some of the signs were covered in graffiti and paint had been daubed onto the statue of Robert Peel at one entrance. On the other hand, the flower beds and bowling green were still carefully tended, the children’s playground was much more colourful, better equipped and certainly safer than in my day and cheerful youngsters of all shades were showing off their moves in the skate park. The crocuses were in full bloom on the grass verges on both sides of Woodhouse Lane and the Moscow State Circus was preparing to move on from the Cinder Moor to its next venue.

Resolving to return in the summer, when the Moor will have been taken over by picnicking families and students ‘relaxing from their studies’, we equipped ourselves with takeaway coffees and baklava from a little café on Hyde Park corner and hurried back to the warmth of our car.

23 August, 2013 - Make the first comment on this story

Pour encourager les autres!

Many people have asked me what exactly goes on at ‘Swanwick’ and whether it’s necessary to sign up in advance for the various courses. Well, the answer to that is a resounding NO. The only exceptions to that are the very popular 1:1 specialist sessions offered by some tutors and their lists fill up FAST. You can think of the week’s programme as a smorgasbord and then it’s down to the individual to decide how much to take from it.

I’ve made no secret of the fact that I whizzed round like a blue tailed fly the first time I attended and was almost completely burnt out by the halfway point.  Nowadays I pace myself, secure in the knowledge that anything I miss out on one year will almost certainly come round again. What greater incentive could there be to return?

18 August, 2013 - Make the first comment on this story

Not Farewell But Au Revoir

Packing up to leave my room in Lakeside after an exhausting but exhilarating week amongst other writers is always a melancholy affair but, as I stood outside the main entrance of The Hayes Conference Centre to wave off those departing by coach, I comforted myself with the thought that the countdown to Swanwick 2014 (9th to 15th August) has already begun.

I hope that some readers of my blog will be joining me there. You won’t regret it!

Keep an eye on http://www.swanwickwritersschool.co.uk/ for regular updates and details of how you could win a free place through one of the annual writing competitions. Poetry, short story or writing for children – the choice will be yours!

16 August, 2013 - There are 4 comments on this story

A More Relaxed Day

Well, it had to come. In 2006, the first time I attended the Writers’ Summer School, I tried to fill every waking hour and was completely burnt out by the halfway point. Now, I attempt to pace myself and only attended the third part of Steve Hartley’s course during the day. With a host of examples, it focussed on the difficulty of getting many boys to enjoy fiction and the necessity to a) keep up the pace and b) banish anything remotely girly.

On days like this, the magnificent grounds of The Hayes come into their own. Talented photographer L.Fox Thomas took this shot of me with Cathy Grimmer, a fellow member of Ripon Writers’ Group.

The evening speaker was Curtis Jobling, prolific animator and writer with – amongst many other things – Bob theBuilder, Frankenstein’sCat, The Curious Cow and Wallace and Gromit in his long list of  credits.  If you’re not already familiar with The Curious Cow, do take a look at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k472n5Pg5mw  Curtis’s rapid fire delivery, not even pausing for breath while he drew cartoons on the flip chart behind him, and the video clips on the two big screens held the audience entranced. He has now laid down his crayons for the time being to concentrate on his fantasy novels about the Wereworld and he ‘read’ us an extract from Rise of the Wolf. (The book in his hand was clearly only there as an aide-mémoire, because he only glanced at it occasionally during a highly spirited performance.) A tribute to the man was the length of the queue afterwards – far longer than the one at the bar (!) – at his book signing, where he took the trouble to chat to everyone and add a cartoon to each signature.

14 August, 2013 - Make the first comment on this story