The Festival of Fantastic Films is a delightfully old-school festival, held the last 20 years in Manchester, England. With the involvement of novelist, and sometime Video Watchdog columnist Ramsey Campbell, what the affair lacks in slick marketing, it more than makes up for in the opportunity to chat in the bar with key figures like Peter Sasdy (Countess Dracula), John Carson (Captian Kronos: Vampire Hunter), and Ian McCulloch (Zombie/Zombie Flesh Eaters) after their films have shown.
Missing Friday's viewing of Burke and Hare with Derren Nesbitt (which was a shame, as I was dying to ask him what was so awful about a film that caused Vernon Sewell to quit directing, and lusty vampire Yutte Stensgaard to move to the US and get religion), the first film I viewed on Saturday morning was Hammer's Scars of Dracula (1970), followed by a Q&A with star Jenny Hanley moderated by Wayne Kinsey who wrote the outstanding books Hammer Films: The Bray Studio Years (2002), Hammer Films: The Elstree Studios Years (2007), and the lavish Hammer Films: A Life in Pictures (2008), and therefore knows his stuff.
Wayne first asked Ms Hanley about her father Jimmy Hanley (1918–1970), who appeared in many films, including his last, the Hammer camp-fest The Lost Continent (1968). Jenny reminisced about the many actors in her life, including her godfather, Jack Warner (TV's "Dixon of Dock Green"), and her godmothers Hazel Court (The Masque of the Red Death), and Flora Robson (The Beast in the Cellar), before talking about the dysfunctional special effects in Lost Continent, and the fact that Jimmy Hanley had to strangle himself with a claw when the giant lobster refused to cooperate.
Her mother, actress Dinah Sheridan (The Sound Barrier), was from Russian stock and Jenny's grandparents became royal photographers after they moved to England. Talking about her childhood, she mentioned her brother, now Sir Jeremy Hanley KCMG, (my MP when I lived in Richmond, Surrey in the early 90s), who was 6ft 4ins at the age of 14, and received all the attention growing up. Jenny was not an attractive child, and her mother who was then married to John Davis, head of the Rank Organisation, overheard someone saying "What a plain child", and as a result, paid for her to have modeling lessons. This clearly paid off, as Jenny was voted "Sexiest Woman in the World" by the Daily Mail newspaper, in 1970. The readers then voted and placed her #2 behind Raquel Welch.
Prior to that achievement, she appeared in the Bond film On Her Majesty's Secret Service and talked about how much she liked George Lazenby, and the difficult position he was in after the press gave him such a hard time (way more severe than the rebukes Daniel Craig received before Casino Royale). Everyone was against Lazenby, including the stunt men and skiers (Diana Rigg's animosity was not mentioned, but is well documented). She also talked about the amazing set used for her scenes as one of Blofeld's Angels of Death, which now houses the Piz Gloria revolving restaurant on the Shilthorn, near Mürren, Switzerland, and the fact that the production invested money in its construction, in order to style it the way they needed.
Jenny mentioned Telly Savalas who played Blofeld and the fact that he had a strong belief in ghosts, spirits and karma, and would never turn off an LP when he left a room, as it would be rude to the spirits. She translated the French lyric of Edith Piaf's "Rien de Rien" for him, and described him as a gentle soul, but a dreadful womanizer, who bedded fellow Angel Dani Sheridan, and later had a baby with her. Another Angel, Joanna Lumley taught her and the other girls (including Catherina von Schell, Anoushka Hempel, and Julie Ege) to crochet, to pass the time between scenes.
Under contract to Harry Saltzman, Jenny was offered a part in The Battle of Britain, but refused it, as the role at that time involved nudity (which she steadfastly refused to do), as a result, she was loaned to Hammer for The Scars of Dracula, where she was directed by Roy Ward Baker (experienced, lovely and intuitive), and appeared opposite Dennis Waterman (The Sweeney), who took a dislike to her, as she was too tall, and too posh. Ward Baker got them together one night and arranged for them all to get drunk and play darts – Jenny won, and she noticed for the first time at that day's viewing that Waterman has his fist clenched behind her head when they're kissing.
She discussed at length her challenges working with the notorious bat puppet, one of which led to a rebuke from Christopher Lee. The bat operators were a gay couple, one handling the head, the other dealing with the wings, and as they were wrangling the thing for the final attack on Hanley's character, they suddenly kissed, causing her to burst into fits of laughter. She turned to see Christopher Lee in full Dracula regalia, intoning the words "You do realize, Count Vlad was real." before sweeping from the set. As she stated, Christopher Lee took it all very seriously. She managed a kind of retort when, tired of Lee's constant opera singing in the next dressing room, she asked him for bit of Gilbert and Sullivan instead – he gladly complied.
Later, he and his wife took Jenny to a country fête at an English stately home, badly guided by a parking attendant, Lee scraped the side of his enormous Rolls Royce against a stone wall, maintaining a typically British stoic expression as he did hundreds of pounds-worth of damage to the car. Having completed his responsibilities at the fête, he turned to Jenny and boomed "Now, how the fuck do I get my car out."
Ms Hanley also talked about her other co-stars, Patrick Troughton ("Dr Who", The Omen), who was a terrible giggler and improvised the whistling during the scene where he has to dismember Anoushka Hempel's dead body; Michael Gwynn (Village of the Damned, Jason and the Argonauts), a very quiet, intelligent man; Michael Ripper (who appeared in more Hammer films than any other actor), who was a friend of her fathers and would regale her with stories of their adventures; and Anouska Hempel ("Noosh"), who had to be dubbed due to her broad Australian accent and angered make-up maestro Roy Ashton, by turning up on set, fresh from a holiday in Barbados, with a deep tan to play Dracula's vampire bride. With regard to dubbing, it's always been stated that Jenny was dubbed for Scars, but she thinks that, having watched the film again at this showing, it was her own voice (I have to admit that she sounded dubbed to me).
Other nuggets of information regarded her costume, which was hugely cantilevered to create an impressive décolletage, from her less than ample bosom and - at her request - was made from three layers of fabric, with a pair of tights sewn in, to ensure that it wasn't transparent. She still wears the cross that played a pivotal role in a couple of scenes, as she used her own, being allergic to base metals; she also still possesses the ring that Dennis Waterman's character uses to propose. Fond mention was also made of stunt man Eddie Powell, who stood in as Dracula in the lifting scenes, as Lee had a bad back and how he was covered in fire gel for the dangerous final scene in which Dracula is conveniently struck by lightening and bursts into flames.
Tam Lin (aka The Devil's Widow 1970)
Her thoughts on this, Roddy McDowall's only film as director (tagline "She drained them of their manhood… and then — of their lives"), were a little more sparse as she hasn't seen it in years. She did recall that McDowall was a sweetheart, and that Ava Gardner had an incredible ability to pull off what she called a "natural facelift", and appear years younger on set than she did off it.
Jenny worked for eight weeks on Billy Wilder's flawed, but immensely likable Holmes pastiche, playing in a flashback as Holmes' first love, they filmed idyllic scenes in Oxford where the young Holmes was at university and madly in love with Jenny's character, and completed the tragic finale wherein Holmes, on a bet from his fellow students, visits a prostitute, who is revealed to be our heroine, complete with corseted 16 inch waist. Jenny was lauded in the US as "Billy Wilder's new juve lead", only to have her part cut (like several others in the original three hour and 20 minute version). She recalled that Wilder loved Oxford, dressing in pink, as he thought, to blend in with the locals; and that her mother was shooting The Railway Children in the next studio.
Unfortunately, Jenny's fond career reminiscences do not extend to working with Pete Walker, who she swore she would never work with again after her experiences on this, one of the earlier films in his horror career after graduating from softcore sex romps. The film is set in an abandoned theater on the end of an English pier, and she explained how vulnerable she felt stuck out in the middle of the sea, especially when, in violation of her "no nudity" clause, he attempted to pressure her into taking her clothes off by claiming she was keeping "all these people waiting". She took to wearing a second set of underwear for one disrobing scene, which infuriated Walker and caused him to shoot the scene a second time with a hugely well-endowed full-frontal body double complete with brown pubic hair. Actor's union Equity threatened to sue for defamation of character on the grounds that Hanley is a natural blonde, and Walker was forced to cut the lower half, but was allowed to keep the boobs, as long as the girl was given a credit.
“Magpie” (1974–80)
Following a few more films and many more TV appearance, Jenny Hanley slipped into a regular role on the children's TV series “Magpie”, explaining that the series was entirely improvised: the presenters were given subject headings and expected to be knowledgeable. The show was unique in that it had no ad break (so as not to commercialize our fragile little minds), and was the first to take donations direct, without using a charity as middle man, for its regular drives to help under-privileged British children. Her proudest moment from the series is a solo parachute jump, and she also shared that she recently reunited with fellow presenters Douglas Rae and Mick Robertson, who are now both successful producers – Rae is currently producing Christopher Smith's Triangle follow-up The Black Death, and Robertson creates independent content for the BBC.
This was a highly enjoyable one hour-plus, Jenny Hanley came across as a very likable person, very approachable and notably stayed for the rest of the weekend, meeting with old friends and fans.
The worst possible picture I could take of Jenny Hanley at the 20th Festival of Fantastic Films 2009 (© Gareth Walters).
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