Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell

Speaker 20:00

Hello, I'm Kirsty Young, and this is a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. For rights reasons we've had to shorten the music. The programme was originally broadcast in nineteen eighty eight, and the presenter was Michael Parkinson.

Presenter0:29

In the highly colourful world of show business, there can be few more exotic stories than the life of our castaway. An orphan born 75 years ago in Dublin, she started a career as a dancer at the age of 12. As a teenager, she worked in the Germany of the late 20s and 30s before moving to France. It was here, more than 50 years ago, she formed a dance troupe which became synonymous with the high life of Paris, the Bluebell Girls. She's Miss Bluebell, Margaret Kelly.

Presenter0:57

Margaret, you're you're seventy five now. Are you still working?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell0:59

Uh no, I'm not working. I'm retired actually. But um I do uh get involved in many things outside um theatre.

Presenter1:08

What about the bluebell girls? I mean, you're still in control of them, aren't you?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell1:10

Uh well, I have captains that look after uh a group of them, but uh myself I'm not active any more, no.

Presenter1:16

But how big is the organization that you founded fifty years ago?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell1:20

You'll hardly believe what I say. I've had twelve thousand bluebell girls.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell1:25

In fifty years.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell1:26

Little more than fifty years now.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell1:28

So it's really been

Presenter1:30

Yeah.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell1:30

Great group

Presenter1:31

Now, you're going up to this desert island and you've got eight records to take with you. How have you chosen these records? I mean, are they just a favorite piece of music or do they have particular memories for you?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell1:40

They have particular memories for me, most of them.

Presenter1:43

So therefore, what what's your first choice of record?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell1:46

My first choice of record is no business like show business.

Presenter1:48

Why is that?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell1:49

Because that's how I feel. I think show business is absolutely sensational if one has the talent and one can achieve. Can you imagine the amount of people that we entertain or that my bluebell girls have entertained over those millions? Isn't that exciting when you think back?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell2:05

There's no business like, show business like, no business I know.

Speaker 32:11

Everything about it is appealing. Everything that traffic will allow. Nowhere could you get that happy feeling when you are stealing that extra mound.

Speaker 32:27

There's no people like show people. They smile when they are long.

Presenter2:34

There's No Business Like Show Business sung by Ethel Merman.

Presenter2:38

Margaret Kelly, uh I mentioned in my introduction that you're you're born an orphan. Uh have you any idea who your parents were at all?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell2:45

Absolutely no idea at all. I was born, as you say, in Dublin, and um I was given away for three months to an Irish family.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell2:55

It was understood that my parents had to go abroad and they couldn't take a child, so I was a young child with them. So therefore, when I was three weeks old, I was given away to this um Irish family. They paid um three months' rent and brought me uh clothes and everything to the family, and um we never ever heard about them again.

Presenter3:15

Have you ever tried to find out?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell3:16

No. For two reasons. Number one is that uh the family moved to Liverpool. Although I was born in Dublin, I was brought up in Liverpool. I'm really a Liverpoolian way. And um secondly, when I could have tried to find them, I had no money.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell3:33

And so therefore one would have had to go to Dublin and, um etcetera, etcetera, and one had to have money at that time, so therefore

Presenter3:39

But you've had no clues at all.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell3:41

Is there anything?

Presenter3:42

Has anybody ever told you, for instance, who was the m the woman who who came to the hospital to have you, what she looked like, or anything like that?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell3:49

Well, I was three weeks old. They say she was tall and good looking, and I had very nice clothes that they gave, but that's the only thing that I know. Then, when I went back to Dublin about a year ago, I went to the Pro Cathedral. I found out the address. I went to the address that they gave on the papers to see this family that were there. And I asked, I went to it was a bookshop. And I went in and said, Excuse me, it won't be you, but is this this bookshop been in your family? And he said, Oh, yes, my father was here. I said, By any chance, do you think your father knows anybody of the name of Kelly that used to live here? He said, Ma'am, everybody's called Kelly around here. So that was the finish of that.

Presenter4:30

A difficult task in Dublin. What about your adoptive parents though? I mean, quite obviously, it was a remarkable family that that adopted you.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell4:38

Oh, they were absolutely adorable. I wasn't adopted. Those days one didn't have to get adopted, right? But um they brought me up very, very nicely. There were three sisters. The two sisters got married and the other one, Mary Murphy, brought me up. She never married and I'm sure it was because of me and um she was absolutely fabul very strict.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell4:58

But fabulous.

Presenter4:59

And and how did the dancing start? Was that by chance or or by ambition?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell5:04

No, well let me go into this now. The first thing is that Bluebell came from a doctor.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell5:10

In Dublin when I was very, very young kid. I I was very, very difficult uh health-wise and Mary Murphy called in a doctor in Dublin.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell5:19

And he said, I believe I had no face, simply two big blue eyes. And the doctor said, If um she was my daughter, I'd call her Bluebell. And so Mary Murphy was an eccentric lady, and um so from then onwards I was always called Bluebell.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell5:36

Then well we moved to Liverpool, as I say. We moved to Liverpool when I was about eighteen months old or two years.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell5:42

And um we had to have doctors again, evidently. And when I was um five years old, the doctor told Mary Murphy that I had to go into some kind of exercises.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell5:53

So, um she I think was a frustrated ballerina herself and she got me into in Liverpool with Madame Cummings, uh Classical Ballet School, and I studied from when I was six years old in Classical Ballet in Liverpool.

Presenter6:06

Let's have another choice of Recco, please.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell6:09

The most beautiful girl in the world.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell6:11

Why?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell6:12

Because I've always had that my bluebells were the most beautiful chorus line in the world.

Presenter6:17

My words slip away from me, so hey Did you happen to see the most beautiful girl in the world?

Presenter6:32

Uh

Speaker 26:33

And if you did, must she cry?

Presenter6:43

If you happen to see

Presenter6:47

The Most Beautiful Girl in the World sung by Andy Williams.

Presenter6:51

Marit, d when do you make your uh professional debut on the stage? How old were you?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell6:56

Well, the first chance that I had was the bal as I tell you, the Ballet School in Liverpool. The lady, Madam Cummings, took six of her pupils to a pantomime in New Key, above all places. And so that was during the Christmas holiday from school, right? And so I we went there and I spent three weeks and of course I never dreamt at that time that one could go on the stage. I thought that it was so wonderful that you would have to pay to dance in front of public. And when I saw that it wasn't like that after this one three weeks in pantomime, then I decided that that would be it. And I remember when I was going out through this pantomime, I went home and told Mary Murphy I needed makeup. And I said, it's five and nine I have to get. She said, that's too much to put on your face. We can't afford that.

Presenter7:51

Well you made I think you were twelve, weren't you, when you actually b became so full-time professional.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell7:54

After that I went back to school and uh the next thing I was uh twelve and a half and I went into a group of um English girls that toured around Scotland.

Presenter8:05

What was it like touring around those days? I mean, what kind of acts were you with?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell8:08

Oh, it was absolutely fabulous. It was a real Scottish group of people. They were called the Five Hot Jogs. The Five Hot Jogs.

Presenter8:15

The five hot jobs.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell8:16

Yes, that's if everybody's hysterical when I tell them but it really is true. And we travelled around on all the um small places in in uh Scotland. Mary Murphy bought me a c a reefer coat.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell8:28

And she added some false astrakhan to make it long. And I remember the girls used to go around they were eight sixteen, s eighteen, nineteen, twenty used to go around when we arrived in the town every Sunday and have a look at the town, etcetera and I remember some of the local boys used to shout after me, Does your mother know you're out? And I thought I was looking really adult.

Presenter8:49

You were very young, of course, weren't you?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell8:51

Yes, oh, it was only, um, thirteen when I went there, yes.

Presenter8:54

So there could never have been any doubt, of course, from the very beginning that I mean you were you were into show business and that was to be your life, wasn't it?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell9:00

Up after I'd been to uh Torquay and the Pantomime, I knew that that was it, yes.

Presenter9:06

Another choice of record.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell9:07

Eliza Minnelli, I had great admiration for her mother.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell9:12

who I met several times. And she has just appeared in Paris on a charity for at the Leader in Paris at the moment. And um I think she's sensational.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell9:21

So I have great admiration for her talent.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell9:24

And I think that she's a a great girl.

Speaker 39:29

What good is sitting alone in your room, come hear the music play

Speaker 29:36

Yeah

Speaker 39:38

Life is a cavarer, old chum.

Speaker 39:43

Come to the Cabou!

Speaker 39:47

Down the knitting, the book and the broom, It's time for a holiday.

Speaker 39:56

Life is a cavarer, old chum.

Presenter10:00

Cabaret sung by Liza Minelli.

Presenter10:03

Laura Kelly, you left Glasgow and you went to to work in in Berlin, didn't you? As a dancer, why was that?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell10:08

R is

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell10:09

There was an English um uh gentleman, Alfred Jackson, who came from a theatrical family, and he came to audition for um girls to go to Germany, the scholar in Berlin.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell10:20

And um I went and accompanied one of the pupils from the school that I was with.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell10:24

And he saw me and he said, Why do are you auditioning now? Why don't you get dressed? And I said, No, I'm not auditioning. I'm going I was with my famous um Scottish group of people. And um he said, Well, as you're here, why don't you audition?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell10:38

And so I said, Well, I haven't got anything. So my friend said, Well, I'll lend you mine and I auditioned for him.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell10:44

And um he said, um I want to see your mother.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell10:47

So eventually I made an appointment with Mary Murphy and he um said, When I need a girl, I'm going to send you and he sent a cable and said he wanted me. She got a passport quickly in Liverpool for me, and I was on my way to Berlin.

Presenter11:01

No, this would be built in of the the late twenties and and thirties.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell11:04

Uh that was Berlin in uh 29.

Presenter11:06

29, yes. What was it like then?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell11:08

Do you know it's everybody asked me the same question and I can't tell you one thing and the reason for that is that we were liking a pension.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell11:17

chir young children in conference school. We all went to the theatre. We had no business to speak to anybody. We rehearsed all day. We did the performance and we went in a crocodile line home to the pension. So I didn't know Berlin at all.

Presenter11:31

Really nice.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell11:31

And I believe it was a very bright, gay city at that time, but I d can't say anything at all about that.

Presenter11:36

And you're chaperoned all the time. All the time. Continually.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell11:38

All the t continually, continually, yeah.

Presenter11:40

And what sort of what sort of an act was it you were doing? I mean, was it just a chorus line and a plan?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell11:44

No, it was um big theater. Although Jack Hilton played there, everybody played there of importance. And uh the Jackson girls did precision work, uh like the Tillers, but um much quicker. They ha that's where they made the reputation.

Presenter11:58

What I mean, were there many stage door Johnnies around at the time?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell12:02

They they couldn't even speak to us or see us. Madame Jackson and mister Jackson were always one at the head of the line and one at the back of the line.

Presenter12:09

Must have been very boring, wasn't it?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell12:11

Well, when you were a kid and you were excited to be performing, you didn't worry about the rest of it.

Presenter12:15

Yeah. Let some of the choice of record, please, Mario.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell12:18

I'd like Gigi now because um I've worked many times with Maurice Chevalier.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell12:24

And um I b he used to always sing there and uh so I think the D V D is a really adorable little song.

Presenter12:33

When did your sparkle turn to fire, And your warmth become desire? Or what miracle has made you the way you are?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell12:53

Yeah.

Presenter12:59

Gigi sung by Maurice Chevalier.

Presenter13:02

Margaret, how do you come to leave Berlin and go to Paris?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell13:07

As I told you, I was performing with this group of Jackson girls. They were all British. And they had a holiday of a month every year. Well, I really couldn't afford to come to come back to Liverpool because I was keeping Mary Murphy at that time also. So I asked Mr Jackson if I could go and replace in the this um volleybagere for the holiday period. He arranged that and I went to the volleybager.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell13:32

and um performed there as supposed to be for a month, right? And rejoined the group.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell13:38

But in the meantime, I asked mister Jeffson if I could stay at the fully video.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell13:43

And he said, Yes, all right. So I stayed at the Volleybacher instead of going back to Germany.

Presenter13:48

Did Mary Murphyn know about the Folly Bega? A bit naughty for her, I would have thought, wasn't it?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell13:52

Oh, yes. You know, she didn't know anything at all about it, but people did tell her. But when I sent her the album of The Folly Bougeuve when I was on it, she sat up all night and bought a kid's painting brush and paints and she painted bras and and pants on them.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell14:07

And so I went home to see her on the holiday, and I was looking at old pictures and I said, What's this? She said, Couldn't show it to everybody round here and so she painted them with the children's paint box.

Presenter14:19

Now how do you come to form your own dance to then have the bluebell girls start?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell14:22

Well, it started in the sense that then as I was telling you at the Folly Bishop, then the captain of the group of the Jackson girls decided to um get married. And mister Jackson asked me if I would take over as captain, so I said yes.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell14:37

Then Mr Jackson had problems with the Follybushare management. Um the bus the business wasn't very good, etcetera, etcetera, and so he gave his notice in and he left, and I left with him.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell14:49

and I went to Germany on holiday at his home with him, with one of the other girls.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell14:53

And event he was supposed to be going to reorganise his group of girls. And eventually I found that I was there for a month and nothing was happening. And he was paying me, but I didn't like getting paid for doing nothing. And so I said, Mr Jackson, I really should go back to England and try to uh get something to do, um get another job. So eventually I went back came back to Britain and um uh then um the Folly Bager management found out that I wasn't working and they asked me if I would like to form my own group for the new show at the Volleyberger.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell15:26

So um I said, Well, yes, I would. So I found eleven girls, dancers, plus myself twelve, and I started at the Follet Bouge with twelve girls, including myself.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell15:37

And then the producer said, Well, why don't we call them the Bluebell Girls? That's a nice name, and she's responsible And that's how the Bluebell Girls started. My first group at the Follywood Air under me, and I choreographed the the numbers for the girls was um the first of November, nineteen thirty two.

Presenter15:55

Very hot time ago.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell15:57

Yeah.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell15:58

Yet

Presenter15:59

No choice of record, please, Margaret.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell16:01

The next one that I would like is, um

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell16:05

Yeah.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell16:06

By the Beatles

Presenter16:06

But Beatles.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell16:08

Well, the Beatles and I must tell you something funny. One time I was speaking this is quite certain some time ago too one time from somebody said to me, Oh, you come from the same town as the Beatles I said, The Beatles come from the same town as me Quite right.

Speaker 216:26

Uh

Speaker 316:26

I said something wrong now I long for yesterday yesterday

Speaker 316:39

Love was such an easy game to play.

Speaker 316:44

I need a place to hide away, oh I believe.

Presenter16:52

Paul McCartney and Yesterday.

Presenter16:55

Margaret Kelly, when when you read your life story, there's almost a sort of sense of disbelief that that it wasn't invented by some Hollywood scriptwriter. I mean, we're now at the point where you formed this dance troop, came from no end of this. But the most remarkable part of your life was what followed after that. I mean, being in Nazi-occupied Paris with a husband who was a Jew, you hid from the occupying troops. It must have been very frightening times.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell17:18

Very frightening times. Oh, it was a terrible time and thank goodness that I have that character that I've got.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell17:24

that um I could fight the germ they never scared me, wasn't it funny?

Presenter17:28

And did they not?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell17:29

No. And when they had trouble or anything, I used to I've got a terrible look. I used to look them right in the eye when I was called up to the Gestapo, for example, and uh the guy was asking me all kinds of things. You see.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell17:41

My husband had been hidden all that time. Um

Presenter17:43

How old do you hide your husband?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell17:44

Two and a half years in an attic.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell17:47

With very little money he had no cards.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell17:51

No I mean no Russian cards. No, no Russian cards at all. So therefore for what I got from my s for my son and myself and the lady that stayed with me, I had to divide that out for to help him. Plus I used to go around and try to get some black market stuff.

Presenter17:52

No colours.

Speaker 217:53

No, you

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell18:05

But um it was really very um nerve wracking. But when you're in that situation, it's hard to believe when you're sitting down talking to you now. But when you're in that situation, it's much more fighting that you get that you keep going.

Presenter18:21

Course the consequence of him being discovered would be that both of you would have been, I suppose, taken away to a camp and

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell18:26

Oh no, thou I would have been killed

Presenter18:27

You would have been shocked

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell18:28

And him too, yes, yes. He'd been sent away to one of those camps and they it was announced on the radio every day.

Presenter18:29

Oh yeah.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell18:35

Anybody hiding Jewish people would be shot.

Presenter18:39

The real irony, of course again a remarkable twist in the story, is that having protected your husband, looked after him like that, he survived all that, that he died in a car crash in nineteen sixty three.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell18:49

Isn't that terrible?

Presenter18:50

He thinks Torny Irish.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell18:50

Surviving all that, yes. He went to Cairn with my eldest son, Patrick, and he phoned me at night time and said, We uh um I'll be back before you wake up, because I used to wake up at that time only at um at twelve noon as I got home at uh three o'clock and uh then the police came at um uh at six o'clock in the morning and um told me about the accident.

Presenter19:12

Another choice of record, please.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell19:13

The yellow said marine.

Presenter19:15

Another Beatles.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell19:15

Yeah.

Presenter19:16

Yeah.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell19:16

Yeah.

Presenter19:16

You like the Beatles?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell19:17

Yes.

Speaker 219:19

Boulders of his life.

Speaker 219:22

In the land of submarines

Speaker 319:26

So we sailed on to the sun.

Speaker 319:31

Until we found the sea of green

Presenter19:35

And we live beneath the waves

Presenter19:39

In our yellow submarine

Presenter19:44

We all live in the yellow submarine.

Presenter19:49

Yellow submarine sung by the Beatles

Presenter19:51

Margaret, you've had that extraordinary thing that not not many people, I suppose, go through in life. You've had that peculiar sensation of of seeing your own life story on the screen, because the BBC, of course, serialized your your life story. What was it like? Did you enjoy watching?

Presenter20:04

Yourself.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell20:05

Very emotional.

Presenter20:06

Was it?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell20:06

Well, first it was emotional looking for all the papers, etcetera, because that was really um a lot of work. But uh on top of that, when I looked at that and I said to myself sometimes,

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell20:16

I can't believe that I really went through all that, but I did, that's for sure.

Presenter20:21

Yes. Did in fact it provoke any reaction from long lost friends? Did you get much playback from people throughout the world?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell20:27

Oh, I've had lots of letters from for example, I'm so delighted, uh say from Britain, right? When um uh so many people wrote to me and said to me, It's absolutely wonderful, we've been watching your um programme, people I've never met and um from little kids I've had letters from say, Dear Miss Bluebell, I want to be a bluebell girl.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell20:49

When I grew up, what shall I do? And another thing that's very nice is I've had from parents um we would like to um uh tell you that we enjoyed your serie very much. We could let the family watch it. There was no vulgar language and no brutality in it, which was very pleasing to me.

Presenter21:06

Talking about about joining the Bluebell Girls, of course you wouldn't qualify today, would you?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell21:10

No, that's what they all say to me. You couldn't be a bluebell girl because I'm only five five.

Presenter21:11

You couldn't skip Luba.

Presenter21:14

And what would they have to be?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell21:15

The shortest is five, nine and a half and the tallest is six foot.

Presenter21:19

And what about the other changes that have happened to the to the girls? Of course, I mean, nudity's coming topless and it's been different since you joined or you started the troupe. Do I mean, obviously you'll prove of it, but I mean, is that something you would do yourself as a as a dancer?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell21:24

That's right, yes.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell21:32

Probably, had I been born in this period of time, I probably would have done it too, if I'd have had the figure.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell21:40

But um I was completely against it at the beginning. I'm talking about those many years ago. And I used to have just show girls that w went uh topless, right? And then a couple of my girls even came to me and said to me, Miss Bluebell, I would like to go to in the topless. And that's how I started it. And of course I must say to you that as you know very well, you go to the beaches and everything, they're all topless on it, so it's nothing extraordinary today.

Presenter22:04

And Margaret, what about the the the other thing that's changed over the years has been the sort of perception that other women have of the kind of uh showgirl that that you more or less invented, I suppose. A lot of women today, modern women, would say that it's exploitive of females. You must have had that criticism. How do you answer it?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell22:21

I think that's perfectly ridiculous.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell22:24

I know that all the people and those many girls I'm talking about and boys you know I have boys too that I call them the Kelly boys, right? They girls, they enjoy what they're doing, they get paid for what they're doing, otherwise they wouldn't stay, and they are delighted, they entertain so many people every year that it's a pleasure to be in that kind of business. Do you realize that the Bluebell girls have entertained millions of people?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell22:50

Over the years.

Presenter22:52

Another choice of record marks, please.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell22:53

Singing in the Rain by Jean Kelly.

Presenter22:56

Why?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell22:56

And I absolutely get on extremely well with him. He's very, very nice. He was at the lead quite recently with his wife and children. And I said, you've got to come backstage. My people would be very upset if you didn't come back state and say hello. And he said, of course. So after the show, I went to get him. And he said, you know, we could be related. I said, yes, but can you just imagine what we'd have to try to find that?

Presenter23:31

I'm singing in the rain

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell23:35

You're singing in the rain

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell23:39

Uh

Presenter23:39

Uh

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell23:39

Yeah.

Presenter23:39

Yeah.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell23:39

Glorious field.

Presenter23:41

And I'm happy again I'm laughing at clouds, so dark up a mouse.

Presenter23:53

The sons of mine

Presenter23:55

Gene Kelly and Singin' in the Rain.

Presenter23:58

Mark Kelly, you're you're seventy-five now, but you're you're a very young looking seventy-five. I mean, do you actually still

Presenter24:04

Work out, do you keep fit that way, or exercise, or what?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell24:07

I'm very flattered because everybody tells me the same t thing. Even when I met my girl, I said, Miss Bluebell, you haven't changed And I said, Well, no, I'd better not But I'm I'm always very active. I don't uh take uh half an hour of cur physical cultures or anything like that, but I'm always very active and I think that with having been trained since I was such a young kid that um I have remained super and I'm capable of

Speaker 224:28

Yeah.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell24:31

Kicking as high as my girls.

Presenter24:33

What is your life about now?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell24:35

Well, I still go to the Lido um and see um have uh make sure that everything's okay, right? I come over here quite often now. I've been uh working with uh m uh Agnes Sassoon with her uh programme that she has for uh charity performances and I really keep myself going. Then I'm leaving for Las Vegas. I've got my eldest son Patrick and my daughter Florence that live out there and then of course I've got um the two shows that I'm involved with.

Presenter24:59

It sounds a fairly active retirement to me, actually. You still live in Paris, don't you?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell25:01

To me, I'd say it's.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell25:03

Oh yes, my home's in PowerPoint.

Presenter25:04

This, have you ever thought about coming back to England, back to a

Presenter25:08

You are shaped.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell25:09

I have thought about it, and uh yes, I have thought about that. But um uh the only place that I could really and lit you see, I don't know London at all. I've never lived in London, and very little of England really. I know Scotland better.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell25:22

And, um, the the place that I would live would be in Liverpool because I have still the family of the Murphy family that are there. I have thought about it.

Presenter25:30

Final choice of record, please, Margaret.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell25:32

My final choice of record is Valentine.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell25:37

Signed by Maurice Chevalier.

Presenter25:38

Uh

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell25:38

Uh

Presenter25:38

Elle, aveld, tout tout potent, Valentine, neur, valentine, neu, Elle, aveil, dot toutit teton, que je tard, fait, ra tarton, tent tent, tentene, Elles, ave, a touti moton, Valentin, Valentine, autre c'est poti potent, c'est.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell26:06

Dom Tima Don.

Presenter26:07

Uh

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell26:07

Uh

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell26:08

Et frisée comes

Presenter26:13

Valentina sung by Maurice Schuvali.

Presenter26:15

Margaret Kelly, you're now on this desert island. Do you think you might enjoy it on the desert island? I mean, do you like solitude? Do you like being by yourself?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell26:22

I do. Yes, I enjoy it. And particularly as you're well aware, that first I've always been surrounded with lots of people. Number one, I had four children, myself, three boys and a girl. And then I was always with bluebells that were coming home, etcetera, etcetera. So now and again, it's a real change to be on your own a little bit.

Presenter26:42

And are you a practical person? I mean, can you look after yourself in this?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell26:45

Oh yes, very much so. Oh yes, yes.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell26:48

In fact, I'm look after the others too.

Presenter26:51

Now, you've got the eight records on the island. You have to imagine that seven are washed away by some tidal wave or other. You're left with one. Which would that be?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell26:59

No business like show business.

Presenter27:01

Because that sums up your life.

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell27:03

That's right.

Presenter27:03

That's right. And what about the book? Assuming you've got the works of Shakespeare and the Bible on the island with you, which book would you choose?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell27:10

Winston Churchill's History of the English Speaking People.

Presenter27:14

And what about the the luxury object inanimate? What would you take with you?

Margaret Kelly - Miss Bluebell27:18

Well, I brought something which I thought I've always had a sense of humour, you know, and I brought something that I thought would be quite amusing. It's not the Eiffel Tower and it's not Big Ben. It's the first dress that I had when I performed on stage and when I got big applause because I was real good at the Charleston and it's over here now. It's green with lots of diamonds on it and it's all those many years old and I thought that would be interesting.

Presenter27:46

Mark Kelly, Miss Blubel, thank you very much indeed.

Speaker 227:56

You've been listening to a podcast from the Desert Island Discs Archive. For more podcasts please visit bbc.co.uk slash radio forward.