Pinewood
Studios tour 2004
 This
is a review of a very excellent day spent on the Pinewood Studios
tour on the 21st November 2004 which was a very special day because
the studios are usually not open to public. We would like to thank
Gareth Owen Roger's PA, Andy Boyle of www.bondstars.com
who organised this very interesting and entertaining day. If you
just want to read about the Pinewood open day go to the next
page.
Firstly a brief
history of Pinewood Studios to set the scene. Pinewood studios are
Europe’s or indeed one of the world's leading Studios to come
into existence and have survived strong until this day. The first
recorded owner of Heatherden Hall (later to be called Pinewood Studios)
was Dr Drury Levin towards the end of the 19th-century, The second
tenant was a famous cricketer KS Ranjitsinhji. After him the house
remained empty for some time before being bought by a Canadian former
multimillionaire and MP for Chiswick, Lt Col Grant Morden. He spent
thousands of pounds on the house completely renovating the property
and gardens it became a sumptuous Buckinghamshire country house
but at the time of his death he had been declared bankrupt leaving
only £10.00 in his will. The hall had been a popular retreat
for politicians and diplomats and indeed was valued at £300,000.
After Morden’s death Heatherden Hall was sold at auction for
what must have been a bargain £35.000. The estate agents in
the brochure said it would be suitable for hotel or institution
or clinic usage. It was sold to Sir Charles Boot of Boots the chemists
fame who was drawn into the world of film with a view to establishing
and building a British studio to rival those of Hollywood . Boot’s
idea was simple to build a studio to rival the best in California.
J Arthur Rank - become one of the greatest
British film makers in history and one of the most unlikely!
Rank also a millionaire flour miller and a devout Methodist. |
One Sunday
he decided to screen a religious film and it proved to be a great
success and Rank decided he would make one of his own. In 1933 Rank
formed a Religious Society and his first film was called Mastership.
Rank made more
films and was joined by Lady Yule a millionaire’s widow who
like Rank was religious. She had been left an estimated £9M
upon her husbands death. Her only hobby was horses so her interest
in films was merely to combat boredom and later when she became
a share holder in Pinewood Studios she had little interest whether
the films made a profit or not!
Rank made no
secret of his annoyance at the inefficiency of small studios at
the time and reasoned that be it a flour mill or a studio one factor
is much like another with similar principles. So Rank desired better
facilities. Unsurprisingly Rank and Lady Yule soon joined forces
with Boots to become major shareholders in Pinewood Studios Ltd.
The named Pinewood was chosen according to Sir Charles Boot because
of the number of trees which grow there and also because it seemed
to suggest something of the American film centre in its second syllable.
The first bricks of the new studio were laid in December 1935 and
by September 1936 the first film was in shooting. The cost of building
a studio was over £1 million.
In 1937, Rank bought Lady Yule's share in the studio and became
Chairman of Pinewood. A year later, Pinewood was 'twinned' with
Denham Studios, also now under Rank's control. The rest is history
We would like to thank Gareth Owen
Roger's PA (left with Sir Roger Moore) who organised
this very interesting and entertaining day
|
|
 The
Pinewood Story: The Authorised History of the World’s
Most Famous Film Studio
b y Gareth Owen and Brian Burford, with
a foreword by HRH The Princess Anne, an introduction by
Norman Wisdom, a preface by Roger Moore and an afterword
by Richard Attenborough.
USA
link http://www.amazon.com
USA
link http://www.amazon.co.uk |
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