Amid the continued feel good factor from Yorkshire’s triumphant hosting of the Tour de France’s Grand Depart, now there emerges interest in turning the story of the county’s successful bid into a film.
Apparently Welcome to Yorkshire has held talks about the project.
Gary Verity, chief executive of the tourism agency, said this week that British scriptwriters are hoping to turn the story behind the county’s Tour bid into a feature film.
According to the Yorkshire Post the film would be a British comedy in the same vein as Golden Globe-nominated Calendar Girls, and Screen Yorkshire, Creative England and the British Film Institute are believed to have been involved in early talks.
Before you dismiss this idea, bear in mind that Calendar Girls was a global success and Yorkshire is an increasingly popular destination for those filming for the big and small screens.
Indeed, currently Hollywood A lister Catherine Zeta-Jones is at Flamborough head with British acting stalwarts like Tom Courtenay, Michael Gambon and Bill Nighy, filming a big screen version of much-loved TV comedy show Dad’s Army.
When you think of some of the successful films set in Yorkshire, such as Brassed Off, The Full Monty and Calendar Girls, they do all tend to have one thing in common: a group of bumbling amateurs achieve success against the odds.
I’m not sure Yorkshire’s bid deserves that treatment. It was a slick, well thought out coup that delivered more than it promised.
But dramatising it won’t really be the big challenge. Never mind the hundreds of pages of script that needs writing, I think the hardest job the film-makers will face is casting the actor who will play Gary Verity.
I know Gary claims to have been mistaken for Downton Abbey star Hugh Bonneville in the past, but now he’s lost weight, he might not fancy being played by the Earl of Grantham.
It reminds me of the old Bilko episode where the conniving US army sergeant played by Phil Silvers travelled to Hollywood to be the military adviser on a film about a battle in the Pacific in which he’d fought. (I think the film was provisionally entitled ‘Love in a Foxhole’)
After rejecting a series of square-jawed leading men who were set to play him, Bilko approved a bald, bespectacled actor as the best looking of the lot.
I’m not sure The Big V would consider George Clooney handsome enough to play him.
Here’s an idea: Perhaps they could do a Carry On style film, but bring it into the present day by having the main character leading the team bidding to bring the Grand Depart to Yorkshire as a closet UKIP supporter.
Every time he has to deal with the French he breaks into a series of Jack Douglas-style involuntary spasms – and that’s before he’s had to kiss them on both cheeks.
I’m not sure whether Welcome to Yorkshire’s doughty PR chief Dee Marshall should play the Joan Simms or Barbara Windsor role – I’ve seen both sides – and Gary’s loyal right hand man, marketing and sales director Peter Dodd, appears a cross between Jim Dale’s Dr Nookey and Kenneth Williams’ Dr Tinkle.
Should this epic ever be made and any of the above ideas be incorporated into it, then I will certainly demand a big screen role.
Sadly, rather than playing a dashing journalist who seduces a series of French beauties, I fear I may be cast as a Kenneth Connor-style character.
He played the perennially frustrated Stanley Blunt whose biggest thrill in Carry On Abroad was when his wife June Whitfield rummaged in his pockets to find the tickets for their coach trip to the Mediterranean beauty spot of Els Bels.
