News article: Western Daily Press, 17 August 1972
Thursday, 17 August 1972 06:00 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
arthur_of_the_britonsThis article appeared on page 3, about halfway down on the right, on Thursday 17 August 1972.
Stunt is a hair-raiser
Stuntman, Peter Brayham lost an £80 long blonde Saxon wig in the River Chew, in Woollard, near Pensford, yesterday.
He was fighting with Bath actor Jack Watson in a scene from HTV’s £500,000 Arthur series, which is being filmed on location throughout the West.
There are very few scenes in which Jack Watson, as Llud, is seen fighting in or near water, and in none of those is he fighting a Saxon.
In “The Penitent Invader”, which was filmed during early August, he fights some Picts by the side of the River Chew, but their wigs are curly black ones.
In “Go Warily”, he fights the giant Brosk (played by Dave Prowse), who is not a Saxon, and who, in any case, is wearing a helmet, not a wig. The episode is thought to have been filmed in September, and so post-dates this article.
In “Rolf the Penitent”, Brian Blessed, playing Mark of Cornwall, throws a Saxon wearing a long blond wig into the River Chew, but this particular episode is thought to have been filmed in early October.
Given the date of the article, it seems most likely that the loss of a blond wig – if it happened at all - occurred during the filming of "In Common Cause", during which a stuntman, doubling for Michael Gothard, jumps into Woodborough Mill Dam, while wearing such a wig. However, the dam is not very big, so if his wig had fallen off, it should have easily been retrieved.
A cynical person might suspect that this article was a complete work of fiction, devised as a way of keeping the project in the news, or perhaps simply to fill a couple of column inches on a slow news day during the silly season!
Stunt is a hair-raiser
Stuntman, Peter Brayham lost an £80 long blonde Saxon wig in the River Chew, in Woollard, near Pensford, yesterday.
He was fighting with Bath actor Jack Watson in a scene from HTV’s £500,000 Arthur series, which is being filmed on location throughout the West.
There are very few scenes in which Jack Watson, as Llud, is seen fighting in or near water, and in none of those is he fighting a Saxon.
In “The Penitent Invader”, which was filmed during early August, he fights some Picts by the side of the River Chew, but their wigs are curly black ones.
In “Go Warily”, he fights the giant Brosk (played by Dave Prowse), who is not a Saxon, and who, in any case, is wearing a helmet, not a wig. The episode is thought to have been filmed in September, and so post-dates this article.
In “Rolf the Penitent”, Brian Blessed, playing Mark of Cornwall, throws a Saxon wearing a long blond wig into the River Chew, but this particular episode is thought to have been filmed in early October.
Given the date of the article, it seems most likely that the loss of a blond wig – if it happened at all - occurred during the filming of "In Common Cause", during which a stuntman, doubling for Michael Gothard, jumps into Woodborough Mill Dam, while wearing such a wig. However, the dam is not very big, so if his wig had fallen off, it should have easily been retrieved.
A cynical person might suspect that this article was a complete work of fiction, devised as a way of keeping the project in the news, or perhaps simply to fill a couple of column inches on a slow news day during the silly season!