Category: not a book

book adjacent, film

Book Adjacent: Chitty Chitty Bang Bang

veritywilde

I feel like I’ve been on a bit of a run of long term favourite old movies recently, but I’m back with another one because Dick Van Dyke’s 100th birthday was yesterday (13 December) and given that I’ve already told you how much I love his other big kids movie role in Mary Poppins, this seemed fitting.

Chitty Chitty Bang Bang is the iconic story of a magical car owned by a not very successful inventor and which takes him and his family on adventures, including to rescue their grandfather from a foreign land where children are banned. It’s loosely based on the children’s book of the same name by Ian Fleming (of James Bond fame). By loosely I mean the whistling sweets, the flying and the floating of the car are from the book, but the whole Baron Bomburst plot is… not (the book has gunrunners on the French coast instead!). Chitty probably has just as much plot as Bedknobs, but it has a lot more musical numbers. Bedknobs is a kids movie with some songs, this is definitely a movie musical.

It should be stated up front that the Child Catcher is one of the scariest villains in all children’s movies and if you’ve got kids do remember that before you show it to them for the first time. Robert Helpmann is amazing playing him and it’s a creepy scary character and performance that can easily give kids nightmares. Dick Van Dyke is perfect for the chaos energy of Caractacus Potts – a scatty inventor and single dad who can be totally oblivious to anything but his work but who has made a contraption to cook food for his family. And he also gets to show of his dancing. I’ve put the Me Ol’ Bam-boo scene in here because it’s just so good – it’s basically the equivalent in this of the Chimney Sweep on the roof scene in Poppins, with massed dancing and tricks except that Van Dyke is two beats behind for a lot of it because the schtick is that he’s copying the others and learning it as he goes because he’s hiding from a man who’s just had a disastrous hair cut from one of his inventions.

The music is by the Sherman Brothers, who basically did the music for all my childhood favourite children’s movies because they also did Mary Poppins, Bedknobs and Broomsticks and of course The Parent Trap as well as most of The Jungle Book. And just to link it to my favourites even more, Irwin Kostal who conducted the music also did The Sound of Music (as well as Bedknobs and Mary P). Like Bedknobs and Broomsticks this was in my sister and my Saturday night rotation when we were kids, again recorded off the TV onto VCS and I’m pretty sure I still know all the words to the songs even now. I definitely borrowed the easy piano book from the town library more than once so that I could play the songs and sing along. Side note: I know that the word “quay” is pronounced “key” and when I’m singing along to Hushabye Mountain in the film I’m fine with the line “down by the quay” but any time I encountered it written down when I was playing the piano music it trips me up. Anyway.

And if you’ve watched the James Bond films there is a bit of cross over here too beyond just the fact that they’re both Fleming creations. Baron Bomburst is Gert Fröbe aka Goldfinger and the man that is scrapping the wreck of Chitty at the start of the movie is Desmond Llewellyn aka Q. And the screenplay is written by Roald Dahl (yes him) who also wrote the screenplay for You Only Live Twice. And it’s produced by Cubby Broccoli’s Eon movies and so of course because they’ve just been sold to Amazon there is talk of a remake, which is one thing we really do not need. This is already not a short film. It’s over two hours – nearly half an hour longer than Bedknobs and nearly ten minutes longer than Poppins – and I’ve never known a remake to be shorter than the original! But in any case, this is pretty perfect as is.

Have a great Sunday everyone.

film, not a book, streaming

Not a Book: Knives Out 3

veritywilde

I’m breaking my own rules today, and instead of a post about a book series, it’s a post about the latest movie in the Knives Out series, which is hitting Netflix in the UK today after a two week cinematic release – and we went the other weekend.

Wake Up Dead Man sees Benoit Blanc return to investigate the death of Monseigneur Jefferson Wicks, a charismatic but fire and brimstone type priest, who is killed in a seemingly impossible crime during the middle of taking mass. He is assisted by Reverend Jud Duplenticy, a young priest who has been set to Wick’s church as punishment for having punched another deacon. Jud is the obvious suspect – as he has had conflict with Wick, but despite the fact that Wick’s congregation is in a thrall to him, but all of them might also have reason to want him dead.

I’ve seen all of the Knives Out films at the cinema and I don’t remember the other two being as laugh out loud funny as this one is. As in there were multiple moments where the screening I went to was audibly laughing at the movie. There is also a literary connection to this, which I can’t explain without spoiling the plot, but which had my brain working in the background of watching it to try and figure out what clues I could take from it to the solution. Daniel Craig looks like he’s having a ball as Blanc – again – and that just adds to the fun of the thing too. The supporting cast is as starry as ever, I particularly enjoyed Andrew Scott’s turn as

It does have a slightly different tone than the previous films – but not so different that if you didn’t like the previous movies I don’t know that this will change your mind. I think Rian Johnson is also making more commentary on the state of the world at the moment as part of this as well. If the last movie was picking at the ultra-rich and their lives, this one is going at organised religion – and that may hit differently with audiences too because obviously there are more people involved in religion than there are ultra rich! I’ll definitely be watching it again on Netflix though to try and spot the things that I missed first time around too.

Have a great weekend.

theatre

Not A Book: Fallen Angels

veritywilde

Happy Sunday everyone, double theatre recommendations this week for you as we head towards Christmas and I get out and about in the run up before the festivities start.

Fallen Angels by Noel Coward is 100 years old this year and this is the first revival in twenty five years. Jane and Julia are best friends and one morning after their husbands leave for a golfing weekend, they hear from a former boyfriend that he’s in London and is planning on paying them a visit. The news throws them into a panic and then into a state of wild excitement and recklessness. The upshot is chaos – very, very funny chaos.

I don’t know how the idea of women having had pre-marital sex and getting drunk will hit to younger audiences who just accept it as a fact of life, but I can see why this caused a huge stir when it was first produced – with the personal intervention of the Lord Chancellor being needed to get it the licence it needed to be performed. This version stars Janie Dee, who I loved in Follies and Stephen Sondheim’s Old Friends but haven’t seen in a play since the Angela Lansbury revival of another Coward play Blithe Spirit more than a decade ago (gosh that’s scary). It was pretty early in previews when I saw it, but it was already in really good shape – although I suspect some of the physical comedy moments will have tightened up by now. I didn’t love it the way I did Private Lives, but that’s a very high bar (current count: four viewings of three different productions of it live and repeat viewings of one of those as well as TV version on streaming services) but if you like Coward, I think you’ll enjoy this. I saw it less than a week after I went to the Cecil Beaton exhibition and I think they’d make a pretty good double bill.

Fallen Angels is on at the Menier Chocolate Factory until 21 February 2026, although judging by how full it was the night I went (it looked sold out) you may want to buy your ticket sooner rather than later.

not a book, theatre

Not a Book: Titanique

veritywilde

Don’t panic everyone, it not a Sunday everyone, but we’re into December and I’ve seen so much stuff in recently that I want to talk about and as I try valiantly not to go too Christmas, too fast, and all the bookshops are Christmas central at this point with all the same book and gifts I thought I’d treat you to a bonus (non-Christmas) show today – although it would make a good festive outing if you wanted to, just saying.

So in case you can’t tell from the programme cover, Titanique is a jukebox musical parodying the film Titanic. It features the songs of Celine Dion and is told from Celine’s point of view after she interrupts a tour of a Titanic museum to claim that she is a survivor of the sinking. It’s another short show too – 100 or so minutes, no interval* and it really comes in, does it’s thing and ends on a high without outstaying its welcome.

I actually really struggled with how to describe this because it’s so off the wall but also at times it’s closer to a cabaret or comedy night than it is to a traditional musical. I would need to see it again to be sure, but it felt like there was a fair bit of improv coming from Astrid Harris as Celine. And you can see that dichotomy in the Olivier Awards categories it was in – it won Best Entertainement or Comedy Play (beating among others Ballet Shoes) but also Best Supporting Actor in a Musical for Layton Williams as the Iceberg (and various others). Lauren Drew, who was the original Celine was also nominated in Best Actress in a Musical.

I had a great time and would recommend it for people looking for a fun night out, but I think because of all the pop culture references it’s probably more one for adults, and maybe even millennials and up. I’ve never seen the film Titanic, but I’m old enough to remember it coming out and know what happens in it, so all the jokes about the film landed for me all the same. I can feel that this could end up being a show that groups go to on a night out – and there are definitely deals to be had on the tickets to make that happen. It’s in the Criterion which is at the smaller end of West End capacities (as well as being probably the most underground of them all) and also in one of the prime spots for passing footfall on Piccadilly Circus right next to Eros so it has that in its favour to keep it going for a while – The 39 Steps managed nearly a decade in there, and I think The Comedy about a Bank Robbery would have lasted longer than its four years if it hadn’t been for the pandemic. And I liked it enough that I’m not ruling out going back to see how the improv changes – or how a different cast handle it. But there are just so many shows I want to see that I haven’t already been to that I suspect it won’t happen in the near future!

Have a great Sunday.

*which made it three in a row in the West End for me – with Born With Teeth and Clarkston the other two.

Exhibitions, not a book

Not a Book: Cecil Beaton’s Fashionable World

veritywilde

Happy Sunday everyone, I had a really good time out at a gallery on Friday and given that the exhibition is only on until early January, I thought i ought to write about it sooner rather than later.

Cecil Beaton’s Fashionable World at the National Portrait Gallery is an examination of the photographer’s work in Fashion and Portrait photography. It takes you through from his early days and Bright Young Things of the 1920s to the My Fair Lady era in the 1960s. Along side the photographs there are also things like his first camera, which he used all the way through til after he first started at Vogue, and one of the dresses he designed for Julie Andrews to wear as Eliza Doolittle in the West End production of My Fair Lady in the late 19050s.

I didn’t get to see the last Cecil Beaton exhibition at the NPG – because it opened just a few days before Covid shut the world down in 2020 and never reopened. I have the exhibition poster from that on the wall of my house and the exhibition book as well, and that one focused on his work in the 1920s and 1930s with the Bright Young Things. This does have some of that, but is much broader in its scope. Yes the famous Stephen Tennant picture is here, but so also are the royal portraits and Hollywood royalty – like Marlon Brando, Katherine Hepburn and a young Yul Brynner with hair!

I really enjoyed myself – it’s in the same space that The Culture Shift exhibition was in earlier in the year which is big enough that you feel that there is plenty to see and that everything has space to breathe but not so big that you get overwhelmed by it all and start to lose focus.

Cecil Beaton’s Fashionable World is on at the National Portrait Gallery until January 11, and I would book your ticket in advance, especially if you’re planning on going at a weekend.

not a book, streaming

Not a Book: Victoria Beckham documentary

veritywilde

It’s Sunday again everyone and I’m back with a Netflix documentary series.

Last year we had Beckham, about David Beckham, this year we have Victoria Beckham, about his wife the artist formerly known as Posh Spice who is now a fashion designer. As it’s framing device this is focussing on the fashion business in the run up to a big show at Paris Fashion Week.

Now I’m not going to lie, this is no where near as good as the first one. We’ve covered the contours of Posh n Becks life together in the first doc and so there are times when there is not a lot of new to say. There is a lot about her fashion brand and if you were reading newspapers or online gossip pages when she started that up you will remember the suggestions that Roland Mouret was doing all the work, and she (and Roland) have Things To Say about that. And of course if you’ve been following the Family Drama, you will spot the notable absence of Brooklyn from the documentary, but it’s never discussed – and he wasn’t at Windsor Castle this week when David was knighted so it’s clearly all still going on.

If you’ve watched the first one, the second one is worth watching for contrast and completeness, but if you haven’t then watch the first one instead. No memes will be spawned by this new one…

book adjacent, Children's books, film, not a book

Book Adjacent: Bedknobs and Broomsticks

veritywilde

Angela Lansbury would have been 100 last month, so today I’m talking about one of my favourite childhood movies – Bedknobs and Broomsticks – which had magic and witches and is thus perfect for a post-Halloween autumn afternoon.

Bedknobs and Broomsticks is loosely based on two books by Mary Norton, who also wrote the Borrowers books. In this Disney version it’s 1940 and three orphans, Charles, Carrie and Paul, are evacuated to the village of Pepperinge Eye on the Dorset coast where they are billeted with the very reluctant Eglantine Price. They try to run away to London but change their mind when they discover Miss Price is a witch. When they try to blackmail her about this, she turns Paul into a rabbit and says that she’s learning magic to try and help fight the Nazis. When her correspondence course writes to say it’s closing down, they head to London on a flying bed to track down her teacher to try and get the final spell on the course. But it turns out the teacher is Emelius Brown, who is a street magician who has no idea his spell work when it’s Miss Price using them. And that’s only got you to the halfway point. The second half has a trip to a magical island and a Nazi invasion to thwart.

As well as Angela Lansbury as Miss Price, it has David Tomlinson (aka Mr Banks in Mary Poppins) as Emelius Brown, Reginald Owen (Admiral Boom from Poppins) and for Brits of a certain age Bruce Forsyth as a spiv. Like Mary Poppins it has a mix of live action and animation sequences and music by the Sherman Brothers. As is often the case the song that got the Oscar nomination (The Age of Not Believing) is not my favourite in the but Beautiful Briny, Substitutiary Locomotion, The Old Home Guard and the Portobello Road songs are singalong bangers.

Like so many Disney films, it was adapted into a musical a few years back and I saw it on tour in Northampton. That was ok rather than brilliant, it was great to hear the songs from the movie but I didn’t love the new additions and I can see why it never went into the West End. My sister and I recorded this off the TV (one Christmas I think) and watched it in rotation with about four other videos on Saturday nights while we were eating dinner in front of the TV (our weekend treat). Even now if I happened across it on TV on a weekend afternoon I’m pretty sure I would stop and watch it to the end.

Have a great Sunday.

film, not a book

Not a Book: The Sting

veritywilde

It’s Sunday and I’m back with a film recommendation today. Robert Redford died just over a month ago and this is both my favourite film of his and possibly my favourite heist film too.

The Sting is the story of two professional grifters who team up to try and con a mob boss. The plot is very complicated and I’m not even going to try and explain it more because I’m not sure I can. It’s got twist after twist after twist. Robert Redford is Johnny Hooker who is out for revenge on Lonnegan who has murdered one of his partners. Paul Newman is Henry Gondorff, an older conman who he recruits to help him. Lonnegan is Robert Shaw who you may also have seen in Jaws but also as the Spectre assassin in From Russia With Love. And it’s also the movie that caused a resurgence in Scott Joplin and ragtime music when it came out.

I don’t want to say too much about it all because I don’t want to ruin it. I knew very little about it the first time I watched it and i was on the edge of my seat for a large amount of it not knowing where it was going and how it was going to work out. It’s just so cleverly put together. And the good news is that you can watch the whole thing for free – legally – with ads on YouTube. It’s a perfect Sunday afternoon movie. Enjoy!

film, not a book

Not a Book: Rocky Horror documentary

veritywilde

Happy Sunday everyone, and I’ve got a new release film for you this week that I went to see yesterday and am posting about straight away beause screenings may be limited and (spoiler) I really liked it and want it to do well.

Strange Journey is a documentary telling the story of Rocky Horror documentary as it went from Upstairs at the Royal Court in London, to the Kings Road in Chelsea, to LA to the big screen and then its transformation into probably the ultimate cult movie. It’s directed by Linus O’Brien who is the son of Rocky creator and original Riff Raff Richard O’Brien and as well as being a history of Rocky, it’s also the story of Richard O’Brien’s own journey with his gender identity. It’s got all the talking heads you could want, as well as Richard O’Brien – singing some of the songs while playing them on guitar at 83! – it has Susan Sarandon, Barry Bostwick, Jim Sharman and most importantly Tim Curry. And there’s loads of behind the scenes footage too – it turns out someone had a cine camera behind the scenes of the Rocky movie shoot as well as at some of the early London theatre performances, so you get to see them all in their original incarnations as well as things like watching Curry performing Sweet Transvestite to the movie camera with all the trappings of the set. I’ve put the trailer in here because it gives you a good idea of what you’re in for:

It’s very much a history and appreciation – it’s got Trixie Mattel and Jack Black for talking heads as well as various film academics and shadow cast members talking about the historical significance of the film and the positive effect that it has had on their lives. I really enjoyed it – it brought a tear to my eye more than once and I once again remember that Tim Curry’s Frank N Furter is incredible.

I’m not sure how old I was when I first saw the movie, but I first went to the touring musical when I was in my final year at uni – and came straight out of the early evening show and bought a ticket to see the late show and watched it again from the front row, having spent more of my monthly budget than I intended and then went out to the stage door afterwards (not a very Verity thing to do) and got a picture with David Bedella (an even less Verity thing) which I still have, still think I look goofy in, but still sort of love all the same. So I think I’m the ideal audience member for this, and can’t really work out how it will land if you’re not a Rocky fan. But then it’s a cult of its own really, so hopefully some of the people who go to midnight screenings every week will turn out to see it.

Have a great Sunday everyone.

not a book, streaming

Not a Book: Matchroom

veritywilde

Happy Sunday everyone, I’m back with a streaming recommendation this week for something that may have gone under your radar, especially if you’re not in the UK.

Matchroom are a sporting event and sports promotion company that was founded by Barry Hearn in the early 1980s. Barry started out in snooker, managing Steve Davis and then moved into snooker promotion founding Matchroom and then taking the company into boxing and darts. Barry’s son Eddie is now in the business with him, and the premise of the series is that you’re getting a look behind the scenes at the company.

Of course it’s not that simple. The subtitle of the show is The Greatest Showmen and Barry and Eddie are very, very aware of the cameras and the storylines, as you might expect for men who work in the world of boxing and also who live in Brentwood, the home of that original British manufactured reality series The Only Way is Essex – and yes, we do get some cutaway shots of the exterior of Sugar Hut just to remind you of that. And don’t forget the Only Fools and Horses call backs just to remind you that they (well Barry) have come from nothing and made it big. Barry is talking about retirement, Eddie is desperate to take over, but there are other options inside the company for Barry than his son, who may be hungrier and scrappier than Eddie.

And it’s full of egos, rivalries and shouting matches. Get Eddie in front of a microphone – at a press conference or in a radio studio and he’ll start an argument with someone. At times he seems like a man who could argue with his own shadow without realising that he is doing it. People say that women are bitchy, but the levels of petty and grudge holding in this are off the scale. I like snooker, I can take or leave darts but boxing is one of the few sports that I don’t watch, so I watched the actual fighting sections through my fingers (or even looking away at some points). But even if you don’t like any of the sports involved, I think it’s pretty worth watching – for the pettiness, but also to spot the bits where something real pokes out from under the puff piece, and to watch Eddie and Barry trying to control their edits – and whether it works!

We watched all six episodes across two and a bit nights – and I would happily watch another series, although given how the fights featured in the series went for the Matchroom stable, Eddie may not be up for series two!

Have a great Sunday.