Rawlinson End

"English as tuppence, changing yet changeless as canal water, nestling in green nowhere, armoured and effete, bold flag-bearer, lotus-fed Miss Havishambling opsimath and eremite, feudal still, reactionary Rawlinson End.

"The story so far..."

Rawlinson End characters

• Sir Henry Rawlinson
• Lady Florrie Rawlinson (née Maynard)
• Ralph (`Raif') Rawlinson, son
• Candice Rawlinson, daughter
• Hubert, Henry's younger brother
• Humbert, Henry's dead older brother, now a ghost
• Lord Tarquin Portly of Staines (née Maynard), Florrie's brother
• Lady Phillipa of Staines (née Maynard), his wife
• Old Scrotum the Wrinkled Retainer, the butler
• Mrs. E, the housekeeper
• Seth One-Tooth, landlord of the Fool and Bladder
• Reg Smeeton, Newsagent and walking encyclopedia
• Mr. Cumberpatch, the former gardener

Some extracts

• An elfin tissue curdled [Florrie's] mind with muted chimera. Through dancing-dark, neon-bright, saraband eels, gauzes of filmy Fellini, glimpses further than the rocket fathoms, rythmic, fading and in unending procession.

• It was chill but a beautiful morning. During the night soft snow mattressed the vast acreage of Rawlinson. Yet, defiant, hoyden heralds thrust emerald from the woodlands and window boxes of nearby Concreton.

  A pale Sun poked impudent marmalade fingers through the grizzled lattice glass and sent the shadows scurrying, like convent girls menaced by a tramp.

  Gorgeous beyond imagining were brassy hoars of winter-depression-fierce daffodils blaring yellow-white reveille and croci, gingering the lawns in tesselate Performing-Right-Society.

• "Filth hounds of Hades!"
  Sir Henry Rawlinson surfaced from the blackness, hot and fidgety, fuss, bother and itch, conscious mind coming up too fast for the bends, through pack-ice thrubbing seas, boom-sounders, blow-holes, harsh-croak Blind Pews tip-tap-tocking for escape from his pressing skull.

  With a gaseous grunt he rolled away from the needle-cruel light acupuncuring his pickle-onion eyes, and with key-bending will slit-peered at the cold trench Florrie had left on her side of the bed. Tongue like yesterday's fried cod: "Mind over batter? Tongue sandwiches? Bleah! Eat what? But it's been in somebody else's mouth!" Black spot! The Blind Pews were now thrashing with their canes. "God's turban and tutu! Do I need a dare of the hog?"

  He reached for the bellrope, yanked savagely to summon the housekeeper, and discovered himself, nighty round his waist, turned tortoise on the rug. Paralysis lasted... scarce a blink but with impotent rage he bellied his unwilling hulk to the wardrobe. Cold comfort, as his palsied hand found the shotgun. Good stock. "Roll over!" One action: commando stuff. "Cock over!" Safety off, both barrels through the ceiling. Stunned shock and then Henry's eruptive bellow "Mrs. E!". The plaster had not setted before the housekeeper stood lurcher-backed at-your-servile-sir in the room.
  "Yes?" she said.
  "I don't know what I want but I want it now".
  "Fried or fried?"
  "Now"
  "Fried?"
  "Fired!"
  "With or without, dear?"
  "Within. Get out."
  "Fried, without... Mmm... Off, dear."

• Some of Sir Henry's wisdom:
  • "If I had all the money I'd spent on drink, I'd spend it on drink".
  • "That was inedible muck and there wasn't enough of it".
  • "After-life, after-shave: I don't hold with any of it."

Rawlinson End multimedia

• Album tracks (1967-1982)

• Mid-70s BBC Radio 1 John Peel Show items: Radio Flashes.
• Rawlinson End by John Hobbs; concentrates on the BBC Radio shows.

• Stage show

  Contributed by Alan Jolley:

  VS performed Sir Henry live on stage at the London University theatre around the time the record was released. Stevie Winwood, Rodney Slater and Roger Spear (on percussion! and rubber chicken) were in the ensemble.

• Sir Henry at Rawlinson End 1978 album
  Transcription of the album by David Evers

• Sir Henry at Rawlinson End And Other Spots book by Vivian Stanshall.
  First published 1980 by Eel Pie Publishing
  ISBN 0 906008 21 2 (orig. price was £3.95) pp.101 (pbk)

  Matthew Woollard writes:

  Essentially the book of the film (and radio and record) with text, generally the same as some of the radio broadcasts and illustrations from the film.

• Sir Henry at Rawlinson End 1980 film

• Sir Henry At Ndidi's Kraal 1983 album

• Rawlinson Dogends stage show, Bloomsbury Theatre, 1991 - see Mark Millmore's biography

• Ruddles TV ad 1994

• Planned: Sir Henry II album

• Planned: Sir Henry animated series

Sir Henry At Rawlinson End Film Credits

Cast

Trevor Howard: Sir Henry Rawlinson

Vivian Stanshall: Hubert Rawlinson

Henry Magee: Rev. Slodden

Harry Fowler: Buller Bullethead

JG Devlin: Scrotum (footnote)

Denise Coffey: Mrs. E.

Sheila Reid: Lady Florrie Rawlinson

Suzanne Danielle: Candice Rawlinson

Daniel Gerroll: Ralph Rawlinson

Ben Aris: Lord Tarquin of Staines

Liz Smith: Lady Phillipa of Staines

Jeremy Child: Peregrin Maynard

Vernon Dudley Bohay-Nowell: Nigel Nice

Talfryn Thomas: Teddy Tidy

Simon Jones: Joachim

Gary Waldhorn: Max

Written by Vivian Stanshall and Steve Roberts.

Music composed by Vivian Stanshall.

Charisma Films, 1980, black & white.

Locations: Knebworth House and Gloucestershire.

Produced by Tony Stratton-Smith.

Directed by Steve Roberts

The film broke box office records during its London run but in the U.S., despite critical acclaim, was poorly promoted and only played in New York and Los Angeles.

However, for a different view, here's what the (anonymous) film reviewer of the Radio Times said of the film in the 22nd March 1997 edition. I think it says more about the reviewer than the film.

A mercifully brief, and smirkingly unfunny, British oddity, with Trevor Howard as an eccentric, boozy aristocrat at odds with an army of characters seemingly left over from other comedies. The Goon Show it isn't, though it would like to be. And the fault lies firmly at the door of former Bonzo Dog (Doo Dah) Band member, the late Vivian Stanshall, who wrote the film and contributed the music to it.

Internet Movie Database

Footnotes

Old Scrotum the Wrinkled Retainer

Steve Roberts

J.G. Devlin