Film and TV have not always been kind to sport. After all, actors are not athletes nor vice versa and while Chariots of Fire won 4 Oscars these were for the story and Vangelis' music rather than Nigel Havers' running style. Cricket has made occasional screen appearances. I seem to remember somebody being murdered in the score box on Midsomer Murders and of course FS Trueman made a memorable appearance in an episode of Dad's Army. (The Test 1970). One of my favourite TV moments centred on cricket comes in an episode of Ever Decreasing Circles from 1984 when Martin Brice's next door neighbour, the gentleman amateur and Cambridge Blue, Paul, played by Peter Egan with the late Richard Briers as Martin, strikes the ball to all parts to win the match. Egan had never played cricket but clever camera work almost makes you think you might be watching Ted Dexter. Almost.
On the big screen I recall 'The Final Test' from 1954 starring Jack Warner as Sam Palmer, an ageing cricketer rather than an ageing policeman, playing his last test match. Len Hutton, Denis Compton, Alec Bedser, Godfrey Evans, Jim Laker, Cyril Washbrook and John Arlott all playing themselves make up a decent supporting cast and the substance of a decent cricket team. My clearest memory of this film, not seen for years, is when Richard Wattis (credited as cricket fan in stand), is asked by an enthusiastic American if the game is going to be exciting. Wattis replies in the sardonic style of which he was the master, 'I hope not'.
Somewhere between the sitcom and the cinema screen is the TV movie and here my favourite is a film by the late husband of Maureen Lipman, Jack Rosenthal, with the perhaps puzzling title, P'tang, Yang Kipperbang. This early Channel Four film gets an airing now and again and is a delightful comedy starring Alison Steadman. The story centres on young Alan Duckworth, and his largely unrequited love for his classmate Ann. Quack Quack Duckworth (get it?) is a keen cricketer and a sub plot in the story centres on an affair between his English teacher (Steadman) and the school grounds man. In his fantasies, other than those he has about Ann, Duckworth, surely the name is no coincidence for Rosenthal was a Lancastrian, sees himself as an England cricketer playing against Miller and Lindwall in the 1948 series with commentary by, you've guessed, John Arlott. Wonderful!
My most recent experience of cricket on screen came just before Christmas at my local film society at Ripon. The film, Le Grande Seduction, a French Canadian production was billed as a comedy which indeed it was. The action is set on a remote island off the Quebec coast. In order to be chosen as a site for a new factory the islanders need to recruit a doctor and the film describes their attempts to seduce a young doctor from Montreal to take up full-time residency. In advance they learn that he is a cricket enthusiast and try to dupe him into believing they are like minded, which they categorically are not, and their attempts to do so are very funny. Alas the scriptwriter seems to have learned his cricket from baseball for bowlers are pitchers and when, on a tv screen in a bar, we see footage of Ramprakash batting against N'tini, his sumptuous cover drive pierces 'the right field'. The natives can't wait to turn back to the ice hockey. Still the whole thing went down well with the Ripon audience and if you don't mind subtitles I can recommend the film not just for its cricket content.
Season's Greeting to our readers, today is 37 seconds longer than yesterday, all at the end of the day, so the evenings are drawing out and if you accept April 1st as the start of the 2015 season then the there are just over 13 weeks to go. If that is not enough to get you excited then why not dazzle friends and family with movie trivia by letting them know that Richard Wattis was born in Wednesbury and his uncle was MP for Walsall from 1924 to 29. Be honest you didn't expect to learn that when you started reading what purports to be a cricket blog.
Spot the tea room. Answer next time.
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