BUT WHAT A SWEET LITTLE ROOM • REVIEW

BUT WHAT A SWEET LITTLE ROOM • DECLASSIFIED

• Pre-Titles Teaser... Arthur de Crecy drives his sweetheart Anne Fenwick down to his house in the country. Once there he shows her into a sweet little room. She goes to look at the view from the windowed back door and find it is locked. She turns the key, but it still seems jammed. Suddenly she realises the door she entered the room through is also locked. There is the hiss of gas jets and Anne realises her predicament. She tries desperately to escape and sees de Crecy outside, digging a grave. Before long, she is overcome with the fumes and collapses.

• Production Brief... But What A Sweet Little Room was Danger Man creator Ralph Smart's second and final script for Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased). He also contributed the opening episode, My Late Lamented Friend and Partner and had been instrumental in selling Dennis Spooner's idea for the series to a less-than-convinced Lew Grade at ITC. Following his work on this episode, Smart returned to to live in his native Australia.

• This episode featured an experimental but ultimately unsuccessful attempt at combining moving background footage shot on location with moving footage shot in studio. The sequence in question depicted the killing of Julia Fenwick by Rawlings in a Morris Minor 1000. At the Petersham Place location in Brompton, South West London, a second unit filmed the car and doubles of Julia and Rawlings, using perpective shots from within the car as it bore down on the girl. In the studio, the camera was dollied in on actress Anne de Vigier, who screams and falls out of shot, in front of a blue screen background. When optically combined, the sequence fails to convince, with the foreground and background sliding around unnaturally. Despite it's failure - the process was only used once more, on the next episode to be filmed, For the Girl Who Has Everything, before being abandoned - it was a brave experiment and proof that the film makers were open to innovative techniques. At the time that Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) was being filmed, director Stanley Kubrick was pioneering the use of motion control in his film spectacular, 2001: A Space Odyssey; this technology was expensive and not available to television film crews. It is quite possible that the camera teams were aware of the process and were trying to replicate the effect with limited resources.

• The sequence involving the football match utilised stock footage and was not shot especially for Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased). The footage was actually sourced from two matches, both staged at Wembley Stadium, North West London. These were the 1963 FA Cup Final between Leicester City and Manchester United, and the 1966 World Cup Final between England and West Germany. The tell-tale signs are the shots involving players in white with dark shorts (West Germany) alternating with players in white with white, blue-lined shorts (Leicester City's away kit). The kits of Manchester United and England were visually consistent across the two matches, and so the editors most likely have thought the sleight of hand would not be noticed by viewers. Incidentally, the Occupation Road location where Rawlings parks the black van to take advantage of the crowd noise from the match is actually situated next to another football stadium, Vicarage Road, the home of Watford Football Club.

• The 'sweet little room' of the title was a studio set, specially constructed for this episode. It utilised re-dressed elements of Happy Lee's apartment set from My Late Lamented Friend and Partner and was designed with the consideration in mind that it would need to be partly destroyed to realise the gas explosion described in the last scene of the camera script.

• The surname of the ill-fated Julia and Anne Fenwick appears to have caused some confusion during production, as some cast members, including Mike Pratt, seemed not to know how to pronounce it! The correct pronunciation is "Fennick", but several actors opted for "Fen-wick" instead. This is apparent from their lip movements. Faced with a situation in which some actors were saying the name correctly while others were not, a decision was made to ensure that pronunciation was consistent so as not to confuse the viewer. Therefore, many scenes in which the name was spoken were redubbed in post-production, complete with very obvious changes in acoustics as the correct pronunciation is dubbed over. It also appears that the film editor Alma Godfrey and director Roy Ward Baker made a conscious choice to try to keep the actors in question off-screen when possible at the point of the dubbing. This would have been an attempt to hide the replacement as much as possible, though in the final result it still jars somewhat.

• When Jeff confronts De Crecy in his apartment towards the end of the episode, Pratt continues mispronouncing the name ('Fen-wick'), but Michael Goodliffe's response is intriguing. He too uses 'Fen-wick' when feigning his ignorance and pretending not to know her (and his line, as with Pratt's, has been re-dubbed). Then, when Jeff reveals that he basically knows everything about the scam and De Crecy realises that he is wasting his time by lying, Goodliffe then reverts to the correct ('Fennick') pronunciation and so this line was not re-dubbed. This suggests that Goodliffe might have made a subtle decision to use Randall's mispronunciation ('Fen-wick') as a sly means of feigning ignorance, before then revealing that he does know the woman (and also the correct pronunciation of her name). This offers a further possibility that this Fennick/Fen-wick detail was part of the original script, and was jettisoned as potentially confusing, but this is perhaps unlikely. Either way, Goodliffe (perhaps unwittingly) contributed to the confusion over the woman's name, and so a decision must have been made to use dubbing to ensure uniform pronunciation.

• Filming of this episode took place in June to July 1968.

• Post production work was completed in late October 1968.

• On Location... An impressive set of filming locations for this episode: the striking Edge Grove School; Water End in Hertfordshire; the War Memorial at North Mymms; a road running beside Watford Football Club's Vicarage Road stadium and central London locales in Brompton, Hampstead, Kensington, Lambeth and Paddington. 'Ewhurst Manor', the location of Arthur de Crecy's house, which contains the 'sweet little room' of the title, was tracked down by Alan Hayes of Randall and Hopkirk (Declassified) in March 2012 after years of searching by fans of the series. Also uncovered was Ewhurst Manor's rather fruity sideline! See The Hunt for De Crecy's for the juicy titbits and a detailed look at the house and estate. More details on all the locations featured in this episode in Locations: But What A Sweet Little Room.

• Haunting Melodies... The music that we see Elliot conducting in his apartment was a specially composed piece by Edwin Astley, and not, as suggested, a true classical piece.

• Seeing Things... But What a Sweet Little Room received its first UK broadcast on Friday 31st October 1969, when it was transmitted in monochrome by the Westward and Channel ITV regions.

• It was first shown in colour on ITV on Friday 28th November 1969 at 7.30pm when it aired on the ATV and Yorkshire regions.

• Trivia... One notable pointer that this is an early episode is that Jeannie Hopkirk isn't yet working as receptionist in Jeff's office. When we see her at the offices in But What A Sweet Little Room, she is merely "dropping by".

• Marty is very possessive about Jean and seems to expect her to remain faithful to him in her widowhood, for the rest of her life. Today, this seems quite an outdated concept, but in the immediate post-war years in Britain, it was something that was very much expected of a bereaved young wife.

• As in the opening episode, My Late Lamented Friend and Partner, and for some of the subsequent episode, For the Girl Who Has Everything, Kenneth Cope's wig is on back to front with its parting on the left-hand side. The soles of his shoes, which were seen to be black in the first episode, were whitened for this episode.

• When Marty appears to Jeff from inside the cupboard and tries to prevent Jean becoming involved in Jeff's investigation, this reveals to us for the first time in the series the near-side of the office set.

• When Marty takes over Madame Hanska's seance, he materialises wearing a Roman toga complete with a red sash and a large blue brooch. This is the only time in the series where we see Marty (as a ghost) out of his traditional white suit.

• Only You, Jeff? Marty manifests himself to the phoney spiritualist, Madame Hanska (Doris Hare). Marty is surprised to find that she is actually a good subject, despite the fact that Madame Hanska has always considered herself to be nothing other than a fake. Marty later comments to Jeff that, "Actually, her aura was rather good. I had no trouble materialising." It would seem that she has a latent ability for genuine clairvoyance.

• Ghosts and Ghoulies... Just Marty Hopkirk, our friendly neighbourhood spectre in this one.

• The Vehicles... Appearing in this episode were the following wonders of transport...

	1968 Vauxhall Victor FD 2000 Registration RXD 996F Driven by Jeff Randall	Also appeared in: Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) - used extensively throughout the series Department S - 'The Last Train to Redbridge', 'The Man from X'
	1966 Peugeot 404 Registration LAE 887E Driven by Arthur de Crecy
	1964 Triumph Herald 1200 Convertible Registration CKY 230B Driven by Julia Fenwick	Also appeared in: Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased) - 'A Sentimental Journey' (as a background vehicle on the studio backlot)
	1957 Morris Minor 1000 Registration 846 BRC Driven by Rawlings
	Morris LD Van Registration 6549 MT Driven by Rawlings	Also appeared in: The Champions - 'The Gilded Cage' Bedazzled (1967 film)
	1965 Ford Cortina Deluxe MkI Registration KPB 726C Driven by Elliot

• Seen It All Before? The set used for the interior of Julia Fenwick's well-to-do residence was from stock and had been used previously in many other ITC series and would be redressed on several occasions for episodes of Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased).

• The room in which Madame Hanska hosted her seances was a redressed version of set used as Sorenson's study in My Late Lamented Friend and Partner.

• Cock-ups... At 13 minutes and 36 seconds, in the set piece sequence depicting Rawlings mowing down Julia Fenwick in a Morris Minor at the Petersham Place SW7 location, he starts out at the eastern end of the street in front of a blue door and blue garage door and sets off after Julia, who is shown walking in a westerly direction. Suddenly, despite it being implied in the edit that neither Julia or the car has turned around, she and the Morris are bearing down on the same, eastern end of the road with the blue door and blue garage door...

Images © ITV Studios, 1968

• At 13 minutes and 52 seconds, having hit Julia, the car crashes into an untidy array of boxes, sacking and rubbish bins on the right in front of the blue door. In the previous shot from the driver's perspective as the car bears down on the unfortunate Julia, these items are nowhere to be seen.

Images © ITV Studios, 1968

• In the same sequence, the drunken salesman is seen in the Morris' passenger seat in the studio blue-screen shots, but is absent in the on-location shots where the car clearly has just one person inside. Were that not enough, the Morris Minor 1000 that Rawlings is driving can be seen parked up at the roadside to the right in the background of the back projection shot!

Image © ITV Studios, 1968

• At 37 minutes and 55 seconds, we see footage of a football match. This is stock footage from the 1963 FA Cup Final between Leicester City and Manchester United. However, the last shot used was taken from the 1966 World Cup Final between England and West Germany - the difference being that while the Manchester United and England kits were visually very similar (red shirts, white shorts, red socks), the colour of the Leicester City and West Germany shorts varied (Leicester: white with a vertical blue stripe, West Germany: black).

Images © ITV Studios, 1968

• Actor Cyril Renison, who portrayed Andrews in this episode, is mistakenly credited as 'Cyril Renision' in the end credit sequence. Naughty Chambers+Partners!

• And Finally... The filming location for Arthur de Crecy's country cottage proved exceptionally difficult to track down and we now know why: it was demolished in the early 1970s. 'Ewhurst Manor', 37 Furzehill Road in Borehamwood was used by several ITC productions as a filming location, but it had a seamier side. It was a favoured location for the photographing of young ladies in various states of undress and the filming of 'glamour' films by a variety of photographers and film makers, the most famous of these being George Harrison Marks. The owner of the house, Mrs Doris Clifford was reputedly a great champion of Marks' endeavours and he would shoot many 8mm films at the 18th century manor house including Nightmare at Elm Manor (1963), Photo Session (1963) and Visit from Venus (1964). Mrs Clifford encouraged film makers to use her property and she requested a 'nominal charge' for filming and photographic sessions. For further details, please see Features: The Hunt for De Crecy's.

Plotline: Scoton Productions / ITC • UK Transmissions by Simon Coward and Alan Hayes
Review by Alan Hayes • Declassified by Alan Hayes
with thanks to Geoff Dodd, Alys Hayes, James Owen Heath,
Andrew Pixley and Claire Saunders

All timings given on this page relate to the Blu-ray editions of this episode