Richard Webber - The Complete A–Z of Everything Carry On

She died in 1977, aged eighty.

BARRY, MR & MRS

Unseen characters in Constable, the Barries live at 35 Nathaniel Road. While they’re away visiting their first grandchild in Canada, their neighbour, Miss Horton, reports an intruder entering their property, but it’s a false alarm because it’s only their daughter, Sally, returning early from a trip to Cornwall.

BARRY, SALLY

Played by Shirley Eaton

Befriended by PC Potter in Constable, Sally is an attractive blonde whom Potter encounters while investigating a possible break-in at 35 Nathaniel Road. Upset, Sally had been visiting her fiancé’s family in Cornwall when she rowed with her beloved Eric.

BARTLETT, RICHARD

Role: Gunner Drury in England

Richard Bartlett, who’s semi-retired from the industry, spent many years performing on stage, while appearing sporadically on television and in films during the 1970s.

On the small screen he was seen in Robin’s Nest and Minder , as well as playing Nigel in 1977’s Follow Me and General Vishishmou in The Tomorrow People. Other film credits include Loving Feeling and The Pink Panther Strikes Again.

BASIC JAPANESE

The book, written by R. Morrison, is read by Francis Courtenay during an idle moment in Regardless.

BATT, BERT

Assistant Director on Teacher and Matron

Born in Islington, London, in 1930, Bert Batt entered the film industry straight from elementary school. Taking the advice of his father, he wrote to Gainsborough Studios, two miles down the road from where he lived, and within weeks was hired as a gofer, earning twenty-five shillings a week.

In 1946 he became a third assistant but his career was interrupted two years later by National Service. Back in civvies in 1950, he joined Pinewood Studios and completed ten years’ service under contract before going freelance. His long career has encompassed over seventy films, including True As A Turtle, Rockets Galore!, Make Mine Mink, Zulu, The Dirty Dozen, The Spiral Staircase, The Man Who Would Be King, The Sea Wolves and, in 1998, Les Misérables.

Batt has also worked in television, including the 1990 Jeeves and Wooster comedy series.

BATTLEAXE

Played by Judith Furse

Seen in Cabby, this aggressive woman – who’s a widow – is picked up by Charlie Hawkins in his taxi. As Charlie piles her suitcases into the car, it looks like she’s taking everything but the kitchen sink.

BAWDEN, JAMES

Camera Operator on Doctor , Up The Khyber , Camping , Again Doctor , Up the Jungle , Loving , At Your Convenience and Matron

James Bawden, who was born in the Scottish town of Motherwell in 1920, began working as a camera operator in the early 1950s on films such as The Long Memory, Desperate Moment and The Million Pound Note.

Apart from a period working on the popular cult television series The Avengers , he’s worked primarily in films with other credits including The Square Peg, Doctor in Love, Crooks Anonymous, Quest for Love, The Eagle Has Landed, The Wild Geese and, in 1982, Witness for the Prosecution.

BAXTER, JOE

Played by Ian Lavender

Goes on holiday to the Riverside Caravan Site with his wife, Norma, and her huge pet dog, Ollie, which is the bane of his life. Seen in Behind.

BAXTER, NORMA

Played by Adrienne Posta

With her frizzy blonde hairdo, Norma is the wife of Joe Baxter. Seen in Behind holidaying at the Riverside Caravan Site with her spouse and their huge pet dog, Ollie, who seems more important to her than Joe.

MEMORIES

‘First and foremost for me was Peter Rogers and Gerry Thomas, two of the nicest men you could wish to meet. The shooting was tough, a rigid budget and a six-week shoot with no overtime. It was non-stop but a continual laugh and some of the days were hysterical.

‘The cast were great. Kenneth Williams never stopped talking, much of it deliciously outrageous. One day, on Matron , he slipped off a rostrum and fell to the floor. Gladys Goldsmith, the continuity girl, sat puce at her typewriter as he regaled her, loudly as ever, with the pain he was suffering from his sexual organs that had found contact with the rostrum on his descent and what the consequences might be. It was utter rubbish, of course.

‘There were so many funny moments that they all blur into each other and it’s difficult after all these years to remember them. One other I recall was on Teacher. Ken Connor had to walk down a corridor, enter the science class, take the stopper off a large glass jar, sniff it and make a face. It was a tracking shot with a low camera, awkward for the camera operator, Alan Hume. We put a stink bomb in the jar and on the first take Alan was shaking so much with anticipatory laughter in his hunched position that he fell off the dolly. I think all of us who saw that can still see Ken’s face as he sniffed the jar.

‘I worked on so many films that unless you keep a list, which I never did, some of them get forgotten, but the one thing you don’t forget is having worked on the Carry On s with the crazy cast.’

BERT BATT

BAYNTUN, AMELIA

Roles: Mrs Fussey in Camping , Corset Lady in Loving , Mrs Spragg in At Your Convenience , Mrs Jenkins in Matron and Mrs Tuttle in Abroad

A busy stage actress, Amelia Bayntun, born in 1919, also occasionally appeared on the screen. On television, her credits included Dixon of Dock Green, Adamant Lives!, On the Buses and her biggest role, two series as Ada Bissel in Thames Television’s Dear Mother … Love Albert.

She died in 1988, aged sixty-eight.

BBC NEWSCASTER

Played by Tim Brinton

During Emmannuelle he’s seen on the box reporting on the numerous affairs of Emmannuelle, the French Ambassador’s sex-mad wife.

BEACH PHOTOGRAPHER

Played by Alec Bregonzi

On Brighton Pier in At Your Convenience , the Beach Photographer is earning a living taking photos of happy tourists. (Note: the scene was cut.)

EXT. PHOTOGRAPHIC BOOTH. DAY

It has several of those stands with cut-outs to put the face through. Start with a C.S. of Vic, with his eye to a small camera, Myrtle standing bored beside him.

VIC: Hold it!

(And now we see his shot. The stand has a garish painting of a Caveman and a Cavewoman, the latter with large bare breasts. Bernie has his face above the Cavewoman and Popsy has hers above the Caveman.)

VIC: (OVER.)Lovely!

(A click. Bernie and Popsy come out from behind the cut-out, giggling. Bernie points over.)

BERNIE: Here, get a load of them.

(They look that way. This time the painting is of a man and woman in profile, holding hands with their face-slots placed close together. The woman has ridiculously large pert breasts sticking straight out and straining her bikini top. She also has a very pert bottom in a pair of tight red shorts. The man is ridiculously skinny and dressed in a bright blue striped blazer with a pair of shorts down to his knees. A man and a woman have their faces through the holes, and are smiling at the photographer.)

PHOTOGRAPHER: Thank you.

(The man and the woman come out from behind the screens and the joke is that they are dressed like and have exactly the same figures as the cartoon painting. Bernie, Vic and Popsy roar with laughter and even Myrtle has to smile.)