1975 ‘A Nous les Petites Anglaises’ and the Ramsgate teds

Part 1

The film ‘A Nous les Petites Anglaises’ (difficult to translate the commonest translation seems to be ‘Let’s get us those little English Girls’ although, apparently, the only – and limited – English release in 1977 translated the title as ‘English Girls – Wow!’) was a 5.7 million box office hit in France following its release in January 1976. This was the third grossing film in France of that year; its success and that of its soundtrack – Mort Schuman’s work – has for many French people remained forever associated with that year making it, in some ways, a Gallic equivalent to the US ‘American Graffiti’ (1973). It was a quasi-autobiographical film, based on the memories of writer-director Michel Lang’s own experience during a sojourn in Ramsgate. The bumph on the video release neatly sums up the story (paraphrased):

Jean-Pierre and Alain after having failed disastrously at their school-leaving exam are deprived of their usual mediterranean Saint Tropez holiday and are sent to England to learn the language of Shakespeare. / The rain and the fog … what a charming prospect! / The two friends resign themselves to their fate and contemplate the reputation of English women of being walkovers. / But their ambitious plans for romance aren’t always that easy, especially considering that the young Englishmen are ready to defend themselves against the invaders …

Modelled on Lang’s own sojourn in England, the story is set in summer of 1959 (!) but little effort seems to have been spent to recreate the zeitgeist of the late 1950s, instead what we get is a good representation of Ramsgate as it was in 1975 when the film was shot. A French commentator on Amazon.fr, *Micfer noted the situations in which the French summer students found themselves is realistically portrayed: “I was at Ramsgate the year in which the film situated the story and I was 17 years old … I can testify that our adolescent ‘problems’ of the time are perfectly reproduced. Even if those adolescents seem quite tame compared to today it was really what we lived.”¹“J’étais à Ramsgate l’année même où le film situe l’action et j’avais 17 ans… Je peux donc témoigner que l’atmosphère, les situations, les ‘problèmes’ des ados que nous étions à l’époque sont parfaitement reproduits. Même si ces ados nous paraissent bien sages par rapport au monde d’aujourd’hui, c’était vraiment ce que nous vivions.”

Jean-Pierre and Alain, supposed to be studying at a summer school, join a group of likeminded rich French teens in the same predicament all trying to make their stay at Ramsgate as fun as possible (in one scene they are all seen taking down a dictation from an older ‘leader’ for a letter to tell their parents how serious they are studying). A large part of the fun is trying to score with the English girls (and trying to avoid the attention of the daughter of host family (a young Rynagh O’Grady, better known today as Mary, one-half of the mutually-hating couple holding Craggy Island Stores in ‘Father Ted’). For having seen the film it’s fairly pleasant, but a little bit unexciting and loose in parts but, in contrast, it is actually excellent in its portrayal of the teds of the time.

For locations filmed, see:

< www.reelstreets.com/index.php/component/films_online/?task=view&id=6&film_ref=a_nous_les_petites_anglaises >

For bus geeks:

< www.screen.busesonscreen.net/screen1/index.php?p=screenfm.fma.anous >

And nostalgic French viewers of the film can see screengrabs from the rest of the film (which, weirdly from our point of view, shows none of the teds …):

< https://fr-fr.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.148125441900463.31368.148116308568043 >

Part 2

The young Englishmen who have some reservations to Frenchmen nabbing their girls are none other than the teds; early 70s teds, not the 50s variety despite the supposed setting of 1959. Apparently there was a thriving ted scene in Ramsgate by the mid 1970s; *bugsyxx commenting on the Isle of Thanet Gazette, 25.Jan.2014, writes: “I remember in the 70’s Thanet was alive with teddy boys and teddy girls. The girls skirts were beautiful with all their petty coats and high ponytails. They certainly bought a lot of colour to the town.”²www.thanetgazette.co.uk/Anniversary-exhibition-appeal-Mods-Rockers/story-20494181-detail/story.html

The two featured teds are Dave (David Morris) and Mike (Eric Deacon). Dave, possessed of a menacing leer is well cast for the part and Mike, his slightly less daunting companion, is not at all bad in his portrayal. Mike was none other than Eric Deacon (then 23, it was his third film role) and has subsequently regularly graced our tv screens and has written for television as well as directed. He is now head of acting at the London Academy of Media Film and Television. The other ted, Dave, is more difficult to identify. Before ‘A Nous les Petites Anglaises’, he seems to have played bit parts in the roles of Gerry in a 1962 episode of the BBC tv show ‘Dixon of Dock Green’; as the Young Carey Phillips in the 1964 British film ‘Of Human Bondage’ (the second remake which, in light of what I am about to write, I must emphasise is a ‘wholesome’ film); and as Martin Lang a 1973 episode of the BBC tv show ‘Softly, Softly – Task Force’. He is elsewhere identified on some internet sources as the David Morris, born David Reingold, who was an American from White Plains in the suburbs of New York born in 1952. This David ‘Morris’ played in 146 films until his death in Florida in 1999 of a drugs overdose. With so much screen presence you may be wondering where else you may have seen him … ahem, if so you may now be blushing, since he only seems to have appeared in American pornographic films mostly credited as ‘Unknown’, once as ‘Delivery Boy’ and once as ‘Big Pole’! The David Morris acting in ‘A Nous les Petites Anglaises’ seems to have too impeccable a Cockney accent to have been brought up in America, so I have my doubts that they are the same person. But, I really don’t know …

The rest of the teds are genuine! Local teds from the Ramsgate area had been spotted by the French film-makers and were invited to contribute to the dance-hall scene in the Royal Pavilion in which a local 6-piece rock’n’roll band performs singer + 2 guitarists + sax + pianist + drummer (not Canterbury’s Flight 56, soon to be fronted by Little Tina). Although less than 4 minutes long, the dance-hall scene, which apparently takes part at the Pavilion, is excellent as the film’s two French lads come across the strange rockin’ scene for which they were not prepared (their look of surprise is priceless!). The two local girls with which they have arranged to have a date seem also to be friendly with Dave and Mike and the scene ends with Dave slapping ‘his’ girl which leads to the intervention of another ted and ends in a general brawl. Actor Stéphane Hillel, who played Jean-Pierre, the more brazen of the two French friends, in a 15-minute ‘making of’ ‘A nous les souvenirs’ which accompanies the dvd release of the film, remembered (my exclamation marks between brackets):

“there was a moment, I think in the film, where there was a general brawl in a nightclub as we were dating the English girls or something like that, and we shot this in deepest (!) England near Ramsgate … and the director had brought in real skinheads (!) and we were shooting in this nightclub with real blokes, gangs, they really had the look, so we had been told to be careful during the shooting … there were huge blokes who were there to manage all of that, to stop them from drinking too much etc. We were protected by blokes just as sinister-looking as the others, but in any case, they were supposed to be protecting us, at least the shoot, so that stuff wouldn’t be nicked and a little to protect us from getting into difficulties etc, then, all of a sudden, there’s a moment in which there is fighting, a brawl scene – and we must escape Rémi Laurent (Alain) and me – and blows were raining and the shoulder-held camera was filming, then all of a sudden ‘cut! cut! stop! stop!’ and you could hear everywhere ‘cut!’; but no-one stopped, they continued to fight heedless of the instructions, so it took ten minutes for everyone to calm down.” (“il y a un moment, je crois me souvenir dans le film, il y a une bagarre générale dans une boîte parce qu’on doit draguer des filles anglaises ou un truc comme ça, bon, et on a tourné ça dans l’Angleterre profonde près de Ramsgate … et ils avait pris des vrais skinheads (!) et on tournait dans cette boîte avec des vrais, des mecs, des bandes, c’était vraiment le look, hein, donc on nous avait dit attention le tournage … alors il y avait des mecs balèzes qui étaient là pour canaliser tout ça pour les empêcher de boire trop et cetera, nous on était protégé par des mecs aussi patibulaires [= sinister] que les autres, mais enfin bon, c’était censé de nous protéger … enfin protéger le tournage, pour pas qu’on pique pas les trucs et cetera et un peu nous protéger dans les coins [= difficulties] et cetera, et tout d’un coup donc et cetera … il y a un moment ou ça se bat, il y a un scène de bagarre – et on doit s’échapper, je crois, Rémi [Laurent] et moi – et ça castagnait, ça tournait et le caméra à l’épaule et c’était parti et cetera, puis d’un coup ‘coupez! coupez! stop! stop! et on entendez partout coupez! et ça ne coupait rien du tout et ça continuait de se battre allègrement et il a fallut que ça s’intervienne, ça a pris dix minutes pour calmer tout le monde quand même.”)

French people can be wholly unaware of teddy boys and a fuddy-duddy film critic of the Catholic The Tablet [05.Feb.1977 page 14] called Miss Maryvonne Butcher (1910–91) – definitely a French first name – also misidentified the teds in a review of this film: “The [French] boys run into Mods (!) at an amusement arcade—the time is 1959” < http://archive.thetablet.co.uk/article/5th-february-1977/13/cinema >. Yet another indication of how ordinary French people don’t get the ‘discrete ubiquity’ of the teddy boy phenomenon in 1970s Britain is illustrated by a particular French film critic who thinks their portrayal in the film is exaggerated:

… the director is wise enough not to insist too much in remaining realistic in a microcosm which is never wholly caricatured, apart from a few teddy boys a little too stereotyped in their use of ‘local colour’ (… il sait ne pas trop appuyer pour rester réaliste dans sa description d’un microcosme jamais totalement caricaturé, hormis quelques Teddy boys un peu trop stéréotypés dans leur emploi de « couleur locale »). < http://jtlancer.skyrock.com/3086176007-Do-you-remember-those-happy-days.html >.

*Impétueux in 2009 writes “des voyous (qui se partageaient en mods et en rockers ; là ce sont des mods)” < www.impetueux.com/?p=3957 >

Another French reviewer, Michel Delain in L’Express of January 1976 noted correctly – in French terms – that the teds were ‘a successful pastiche of 1958 rockers’ (although the year is supposed to be 1959 and our teds – we know – are, of course, 1970s originals not 1950s originals).

Nothing could be further from the truth, hats off to the Ramsgate teds in that film! Not only were they realistically portraying ted behaviour well – and remember the bloke who slapped the girl was a scripted actor – but they are a fantastic example of how colourful and interestingly 70s teds dressed (I include the girls too) and how fun and varied was their dancing.

Note: The Pavilion did have live shows at the time but in 1976 the building was converted into a casino.

Part  3

Sometime later in the film Jean-Pierre, the more audacious of the two French friends, having been ditched by a French girl Claudie, finds himself alone playing the one-armed bandit in the Pleasurama arcade. From behind, as he is occupied with his game, come Dave and Mike and they stand either side of him. Jean-Pierre finally realises he is being eyeballed, he truns his head and Dave returns a creepy smile:

Towards the end of the film at a night-time beach party which the French students are holding, around the corner of the cliff come Mike and Dave singing Mort Shuman’s composition ‘bye-bye, cry-baby’. Suddenly a rocker girl appears accompanying them: it’s Mireille who has ditched her glasses and frumpy look and put on a pair of jeans and a leather jacket. So Jean-Pierre’s quick-fix matchmaking solution actually leads to a happy ending. The two teds appear content and are no longer the menace they appeared to be.

Found sound-track version by Mort Shuman isn’t as good as Mike and Dave’s version.

< www.youtube.com/watch?v=YNg-KiQHHpA >

Part 4 The Clothes and the Dancing

Short excerpt of the dancing shown in the film’s trailer (timeline 00:18–00:29) which you can find on YT < www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-YRZ3lBVXE >.

A few seconds of dance-hall scene (where the smaller ted gets ready) only found in trailer

[memories of filming: http://thanetonline.blogspot.ie/2009/10/nous-les-petites-anglaises-lets-get.html].

CONTACT Eric Deacon through: email: study@londonacademy.co.uk [NOT SENT YET]

OR SEND QUESTIONS THRU < http://ericdeacon.com/contact > SENT 1st REQUEST ON 5TH FEB

Part 5 The Film’s Music

Mort Shuman (1936–91) is well-known as the co-composer with Doc Pomus of many rock’n’roll hits. No point repeating his illustrious career in rock’n’roll. Suffice to say for our purposes that by the early 1960s he was living in England but, inspired by the music of Franco-Belgian balladeer Jacques Brel, went to live in Paris in 1966 and so was around for the greater pleasure of music lovers of that country (later, in 1982, he returned to London). Since Lang’s film was supposed to be set in the 1950s, Shuman was contacted to provide the soundtrack to the film. He came up with an album which contained some 50s hits but a number of original compositions, not all being rock’n’roll. The soundtrack album released by Philips, then, is a mixed bag, although most is some kind of rock’n’roll (8 songs out of 14), some actually being good in my opinion. I’ve not bought the album yet so I may be missing details but all the songs are given as if they were sung by Mort himself which cannot be the case, most emphatically numbers 4 and 11 which have a woman singing. The songs ‘Ramsgate rock’ and ‘my life’ seem for all the world to be sung by the band performing in the dance-hall scene (and they begin a fantastic rocking instrumental as the teds begin to brawl which is not included in the album). The film itself is punctuated by a number of other rock’n’roll originals such as ‘when’ and ‘the great pretender’. The Académie des Césars (a césar being French equivalent of the Hollywood oscars) included Shuman’s album in the nominations for 1977’s best film soundtracks.

Here’s my review of the album’s content where, in proper ted style, I won’t mince my words in calling what I don’t like shit:

1. ‘sorrow’ – rubbish French-style ballad which unsurprisingly became a hit single following the film (version here sung by Shuman)
2. ‘battle of New Orleans’ – corny folky version of the song
3. RNR ‘why?’ – really nice rnr ballad
4. RNR ‘twilight time’ – fine version of rnr ballad
5. RNR ‘bye bye, cry-baby’ – jaunty Everly Brothers’ style rock’n’roll ballad (pop-sugary version, much better version sung by teds Mike and Dave in film in their cockney accent)
6. ‘gone are the days’ – poncy pop ballad
7. RNR ‘you and me’ – fine swingy rnr number
8. ‘Botany Bay’ – nice Beach Boys-type number (‘sha-la-la-la’) but not rnr by ur standards (sung by Shuman)
9. ‘theme Hollywood’ – forgettable jazzy American background music
10. RNR ‘theme rock’ – slightly corny rnr instrumental with sax lead
11. RNR ‘lolly pop’ – ok version of rnr classic ‘lollipop’ with slight corny start
12. RNR ‘my life’ – rnr ballad, arrangement reminiscent of 1970s Jerry Lee Lewis
13. RNR ‘Ramsgate rock’ – great rnr belter (performed by the rnr band in film)
14. ‘sorrow’ (orchestral version) – same rubbish song made even worse by an orchestral arrangement

The musical question which most tantalises me is who were the band playing rock’n’roll in the dance-hall scene? They seem to be what I suppose to have been a typical showband of the time who played lots of rock’n’roll, dressed up especially for this occasion perhaps and singing two of Mort Shuman’s compositions ‘Ramsgate rock’ and ‘my life’ apart from their own rocking instrumental. They are a 6-piece band (singer + 2 guitarists + sax + pianist + drummer). For a while I wondered whether they were the local rock’n’roll group Flight 56 from nearby Canterbury, soon to be fronted by Little Tina, but that’s not the case). Perhaps Dinky Dawes if ever he gets to read this will know who they were.

POSTED February 2015.