Tuning in…
Tuning in…
Castaway
1 appearance
Celebrated photographer and the fifth Earl of Litchfield.
On the island
Eight records
I'm Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself a Letter
Fats Waller was a favorite of mine. I think my mother used to play some of his tunes, and so I chose to sit right down and write myself a letter.
As Time Goes ByFavourite
In some ways, been so overplayed in my mind, but it just somehow says something about... a period of filmmaking that I particularly like, and I also think the stars... in it were wonderful, particularly Bogart, and I never tire of of hearing the theme which is known as time goes by.
Cyril Smith and Phyllis Sellick
Well, it again goes back, I think, to listening to my mother playing the piano, because it's the piano setting of Sheep May Safely Graze by Bach.
During that time Bob Dylan was well established, and I think of all the... the songs that he wrote, one that I... used to enjoy especially then and I wrote it down in a diary which is why I chase it for here was just like a woman.
Well, since we're sitting on this island I would need cheering up, and sometimes a parody of a song is better even than the song itself, and banana boat song is appropriate because I have a little house on an island where bananas grow anyway, and... The Harry Belafonte one is the best known one, but the one that I think would cheer me up most is the one by Stan Friedberg.
Gary Brooker, Keith Reid and Matthew Fisher
Well, this is a record that again is a sixties memory. It's so mad that I enjoy it, but I also enjoy it particularly for the melody. And it's a whiter shade of pale by Prokol Hahn.
Well, Don McLean was a late sixties discoverer who... was best known for a track called American Pie, which his album was called. But the B side of it, as I remember I think it was the B side, was called Vincent and it was about Van Gogh and I loved the the whole of it.
The Choir of Westminster Abbey
Well, my last record is something that... we referred to earlier... because with all the luck I had in landing that very nice assignment at the wedding, I because of that missed out on being in the Abbey, in in the in the cathedral I mean, and I didn't hear the singing of I V Out of thee My Country, which at school we used to sing, and the second verse is my favourite.
In conversation
Presenter asks
0:26Why did you choose not to use your title [Earl of Lichfield] initially?
I chose... Not to use... The title initially because I thought it would have been something of a disadvantage, although most people won't believe that. I think in the sixties it might have been because... Nobody's about to give a job to somebody who would appear to be well healed when... There were others, perhaps more hungry than myself... wanting to work.
Presenter asks
1:31Did you grow up [on your estate in Staffordshire]?
Yes, in part. I was also brought up partly in Paris and partly in Tripoli. Um it was sort of wartime and post war and I whizzed about and... never really had a proper home as such. But... Saw quite a lot of the world in the process of growing up.
Presenter asks
2:23Did you hear a lot [of music] as a child?
Yes, my mother was a was a very accomplished pianist, and in fact that's what may have driven me out of doors to take photographs, because she would continually practise the same piece again and again and again, which is rather off putting... But nevertheless I... began to listen to music and... Really would hate to be without it.
The keepsakes
The book
Having never actually written a book without pictures, I think that would be a good time to do that ... so a blank book.
The luxury
if I were not to use it practically, which is it's I was thinking in terms of a telescope. ... I have often at night lain on my back, and just looked at the stars. ... perhaps a telescope or a pair of binoculars to look upwards would be a nice thing to do.
Presenter asks
5:14Apart from photography, what were you good at at school?
Avoiding things, really, I think. Essential. Yes. I'm quite good at boxing and... rather good at swimming, which caused my family great heartache because every previous generation for countless years had played in the Eaton and Harrow match at Lourdes and I preferred swimming which my grandfather had apoplexy about.
Presenter asks
9:45How did you set about [becoming a photographer]?
Well, in fact, I didn't really become a photographer. I became a photographer's assistant, which is... Well, certainly then was a very lowly occupation, but the only way to enter the profession in the way that I wanted to, which was the practical way.
Presenter asks
11:29What was the first session you were entrusted with to do on your own?
Well, funnily enough, I do. It was photographing some fake fur coats on some models, and I was rather stuck for... the money to pay for the models, and so I rang up four friends and asked them if they'd... Do the job for a little bit less than professional models would charge... the girls left to right, who were then, none of them I think, very professional, were Jacqueline Bissett, Charlotte Rampling, Marisa Burnson, and Princess Salima Arga Khan.
“I think in the sixties it might have been because... Nobody's about to give a job to somebody who would appear to be well healed when... There were others, perhaps more hungry than myself... wanting to work.”
“I had changed my lifestyle from driving a relatively comfortable car to riding a bicycle down to a dark room in Balham. And... so the temptation was to of course eat the products when we'd photographed them.”
“I would counsel any photographer starting that... He should always take on something that he might find a bit of a challenge rather than just the things he knows he could do.”
“The bad fairy at a wedding is in fact the photographer because he holds up the jollity and the and all that and he is the one person who, if he does a bad job, gets a terrible rocket, and if he does a good job, nobody says too much.”