Читать книгу The Complete A–Z of Everything Carry On - Richard Webber - Страница 8

Writing this book has been an exhausting, time-consuming, painstaking yet enjoyable task. The trouble is, when you set out to pen an A-Z of any series of television programmes or films, it’s difficult to know when to take your fingers off the keyboard, switch off at the mains and declare the manuscript complete. Inevitably there’s always more you could write, extra detail you could include, points that could be explored from a different angle; but before you know it, a manageable task – although, at times, it can appear completely unmanageable – quickly turns into an uncontrollable monster.

Compiling an A-Z is beset with headaches. As well as the aforementioned points, one always has that nagging thought in the back of one’s mind that such a book has to try and include references to every minute scrap of detail concerning the subject matter – in this case, the Carry Ons – but to be honest, it’s not feasible. Usually time constraints provide the final discipline, and if it’s not time you’re short of, it’s the overall word count allowed by the publisher which restricts you. So, as you can see, it’s not been easy deciding what qualifies for inclusion in this A-Z of Carry On.

One of the most challenging tasks has been tracking down some of the actors, actresses and crew members associated with the films, many of whom have long since left the profession or are now treading the boards of that great theatre in the sky. With agents, Equity or Spotlight holding no contact details, it’s been virtually impossible, in some cases, to unearth relevant information about some of the actors’ lives to enable me to pen a profile in the book. Occasionally I’ve resorted to telephone directories and cold-calling in the hope of tracing some of the profession’s more elusive people. I have, therefore, included as many profiles as possible, thereby helping fans know at least a little more about the people associated with the films. If I was working to an open-ended contract in terms of delivery date for the manuscript perhaps I could take the next ten years or so and, no doubt, locate more performers, but, alas, that’s not feasible.

Although I’ve included details of the various stage productions and television episodes over the years, I’ve decided to focus primarily on the films that had people guffawing – albeit to varying degrees – in cinemas around the British Isles upon their release. Although the small-screen offerings and highly successful stage shows were authorised projects and provided welcome entertainment for fans, it’s the films which I regard as the stars of the Carry On canon. In the main body of the text, I’ve concentrated on the first thirty films, from Sergeant to Emmannuelle, with Columbus and London featuring in the ‘Carry On Revisited’ chapter.

As mentioned earlier, I’ve tried to make this tome as comprehensive as I could, cramming in as much information as possible, but there are bound to be some details or areas that haven’t made their way into the book. Nonetheless, I hope you find what is included informative, entertaining and helpful in answering all those nagging questions you have about the Carry On films. As well as actor and crew profiles, there are character profiles too. Even those unseen characters mentioned in the scripts have been given their rightful place in this publication, together with details of who mentioned them, in what film and the context in which their names were used.

And then there are the ‘What Might Have Been’ scenes. The majority, if not all, Carry On fans won’t have seen the scenes included under this heading. Most were probably cut before the film hit the cinemas, while others could have been lost when the big-screen version was adapted either for the small screen or video format. Then there are situations when a minor character perhaps had a little more to say before the editor’s knife was sharpened, resulting in the said character’s utterance extending to little more than a couple of lines. Whatever the circumstances, these selections makes interesting reading, such as the anaesthetist’s scene involving John Horsley and Terence Longdon in Nurse.

Carry On reading – oh, and enjoy it too.