RIP, continued

Lord Montagu of Beaulieu (1926-2015), aged 88. As "The Daily Telegraph" wrote: Lord Montagu was the founder of the National Motor Museum, a pioneer of the stately home movement and, as a hereditary member of the House of Lords, an active parliamentarian whose views on heritage and transport commanded widespread respect. He was a pillar of the British establishment and its fascinating reading the fulsome obiuaries.

His name became more widely known, however, through his involvement in what became known as “The Montagu Case”. In 1953 Montagu, although engaged to be married, was arrested on a charge of sexually assaulting a boy scout at his beach-hut on the shores of the Solent. The charges were thrown out, but shortly after his acquittal the young peer was re-arrested, together with his cousin, the Dorset landowner Michael Pitt-Rivers, and the diplomatic correspondent of the Daily Mail, Peter Wildeblood for offences with two airmen at his beach hut - it turned out to be an eventful weekend as at the time Britain was cracking down on homosexual activity following some sensational spy scandals. There was also concern about the criminality of sexual acts between consenting adults. Unlike the discredited boy scouts in the earlier case the aircraftmen were adults and at no time complained that they had been forced to commit any acts without their willing agreement, though to avoid prison they testified against the defendants. As a direct result of the case a committee of enquiry was set up under the chairmanship of Sir John Wolfenden and, after a lengthy delay, the law on homosexuality was eventually reformed in 1967.

The enterprising Lord was also a whizz PR man, launching that great boys' comic THE EAGLE in 1950 and when he inherited the family estate he turned it into one of the country's leading tourist attractions, starting what became the British Car Museum, and jazz festivals etc.He also became chairman of English Heritage. He married twice had several children,and never mentioned the sensational court case until he published his autobiography in 2000, but he was a firm believer in bisexuality, and certainly overcame that sensational court case which is covered more fully in my review of the 2007 telefilm made about it, A VERY BRITISH SEX SCANDAL, which was mainly about journalist Peter Wildeblood, also sent to prison with Lord Montagu.  
See label below: Wildeblood.

Dean Jones (1931-2015), aged 84. As a certain friend of mine is wont to say " ...... was not a great actor nor a great star", but not everybody has to be. There is a niche for popular players in commercial entertainment and Dean filled that nicely with all those popular Walt Disney films in the '60s and '70s. 

Herbert Wise (1924-2015) aged 90. British television director who helmed some great classics: I CLAUDIUS, ELIZABETH R, BREAKING THE CODE and lots of classic television series like INSPECTOR MORSE, THE BILL, RUMPOLE, TALES OF THE UNEXPECTED etc.  Right: Sian Phillips as Livia ("Don't touch the figs") in I CLAUDIUS.

Jack Gold (1930-2015), aged 85. British director who also tackled INSPECTOR MORSE and films like THE MEDUSA TOUCH, ACES HIGH, ESCAPE FROM SOBIBOR, and classic television like THE NAKED CIVIL SERVANT, ME AND THE GIRLS, Nicol Williamson's MACBETH, THE BOFORS GUN, THE NATIONAL HEALTH and more. Left: John Hurt as THE NAKED CIVIL SERVANT.

Wildeblood & a very British sex scandal

A VERY BRITISH SEX SCANDAL, 2007. Life could be grim for homosexuals in '50s Britain and USA, where they were seen as security risks if in high office, blackmail was rife and if incriminating letters were found ... so they had to be very discreet. A holiday weekend at the estate of Lord Beaulieu in 1952 will have repercussions for four men, leading eventually to the Wolfenden Report and the 1967 changes in the law.

Putting this in context, being in my mid-teens around 1960 I came across the name of Peter Wildeblood and that sensational court case in 1954 where he and Lord Montagu of Beaulieu were tried for gross indecency in one of the British legal system's frequent attempts to clampdown on homosexuality, an almost unmentionable subject back then - trying to find out more about it was difficult. Other famous cases in the '50s  against gays were John Gielgud's arrest in '53 and Alan Turing's ....  while other notorious types like MP Tom Driberg and Lord Boothby were able to get away with it by their sheer chutzpah.

Then the Sixties began:  the 2 Oscar Wilde films appeared in 1960, Bogarde's VICTIM in 1961,  and the Profumo case would have us all engrossed, including teenage me, in 1963. A year later in 1964, I arrived aged 18 new in London, and already changes were in the air: signs like "No Blacks, No Irish" were being swept away; subtle gay contact ads were published in "Fiilms & Filming" magazine, Swinging London was about to happen, the Beatles made long hair and looking mod fashionable (not so gay looking anymore) and young gays went about their daily lives unbothered by the antiquated laws which were about to change, as they did in 1967 - when we were bopping to Tamla Motown in the new clubs like Le Deuce in Soho. I spent a weekend in Hastings with a friend, which  turned out to be the weekend Joe Orton was killed by his lover Kenneth Halliwell - it was in all the papers (I had seen his play LOOT a few months earlier).  Good to see that Wildeblood continued working as a campaigner until his death in 1999. His book "Against The Law" is still in print and available, I shall be reading it before too long ... he wrote some novels too.

Our enterprising Channel 4 ran a series on gay themes back in 2007 - to celebrate 40 years since that 1967 law decriminalising private gay behaviour. A VERY BRITISH SCANDAL was a fascinating docu-drama on the court case, mixing in reconstructions with talking heads of older gay men recalling their experiences at the time. I missed this programme at the time, but thanks to my good friend Colin, have now been able to catch up with it. Martin Hutson makes a fascinating Peter Wildeblood, and Orlando Wells (Susannah York's son) plays Lord Montagu, who always maintained his innocence. Karl Davies is also good here. Martin Hutson should surely be a lot better known, I see he has been busy in the theatre a lot, as actor and director.

Reading the two reviews on it over at IMDB, one of them is by my friend Martin Bradley, I think his comments sum it all up perfectly:

This docu-drama may err more on the side of docu than drama but it is nevertheless pertinent, beautifully made and ultimately very moving. Written and directed by Patrick Reams, it tells the story of the famous Lord Montagu trial in the early fifties when a peer of the realm and a well-known British journalist were arrested and tried for gross indecency. The high-profile nature of the trial in turn lead to the establishment of the Wolfenden Committee and ultimately to the decriminalization of homosexual acts between consenting adults in Britain.

Peter Wildeblood

Part history lesson, part polemic and part love story Reams' film shows just how terrible life could be for practicing homosexuals in the 1950's. It may all seem a lifetime away from today when gay role-models now seem to be ten-a-penny, (young gays may wonder what all the fuss is about), yet it is films like this that make us realize just who are heroes are and the debt we owe to men like Peter Wildeblood, the journalist in question who sealed his fate by admitting his homosexuality in court.

Alternating between a dramatization of events and a 'talking heads' approach in which elderly gay men who were either directly caught up in the events or simply remembered them talk directly to the camera, it is never less than engrossing. At times I found it deeply depressing but ultimately it is both uplifting and deeply moving and a credit to everyone involved.