It has been cold and quiet over the weekend when sport took a back seat to EastEnders and good progress in getting my personal records and the work in project work activity. The Hurt Locker won the best film at the BAFTA’s, I film I have not seen and a political choice. Jonathan Ross introduced the event and was awful telling poor jokes which amused no one, making off the cuff remarks which either offended, embarrassed or were silly. The person who signed him up should be have several sleepless nights and never be given such power again.
In the twenty five years since 1985 there have been nearly 4000 episodes of EastEnders there have been 206 cliff hangers shared by 1100 actors of which 1000 have departed. I have two major criticisms of the show. Its failure to represent multiracial and multi language London.
It did briefly reflect a working class street market and local public house community of residents around an East London Square of the 1970’s, admitted to be around Bow Station which extends from the Whitechapel Road on the way to Stratford and West Ham, having travelled and visited the area in the latter 1990’s and early millennium. I also have knowledge of the late 1950’s areas extending from the city of London from Bishopsgate and Aldgate encompassing the Petticoat and Brick Lane markets which was my patch and where my office was located as an Olivetti salesman for a few months in 1959 and was also the area of a walk before Christmas.
However the area has become predominantly non white and new European with English the second language. There are white families with generations of cultural tradition stepped in the area, although in fairness EastEnders never attempted to portray the authentic language which had to be sanitised for the suburban respectable working and middle class middle class readers of the Mirror, Mail and Express who watched the programme alongside Coronation Street which also perpetuates similar myths of contemporary working class Manchester.
The truth is that in Britain the traditional London working class of EastEnders and Coronation Street has largely disappeared, replaced by immigrants from the middle and eastern Europe and the growth of Indian and Pakistan communities, and those from the West Indies and Africa, and inter-racial couplings. On one hand we have seen the end of working class occupational dependence on ship building, coal mining and steel making, and the exporting of manufacturing to the Far East especially China and back to India. Commercial agriculture and construction has been increasingly dependent on foreign labour as has the caring services together with the staff of hotels, restaurants and places of entertainment. We are only beginning to feel and understand the impact on all our cities because of the dramatic increase in young people migrating for higher education from other parts of the world, notably China, as well as from other parts of the UK, especially the impact of their interaction. There has developed a peculiarly British form of underclass comprising people who have been to prison, or who would of become institutionalised because of various forms of mental disabilities together with a large proportion of young people dependents on social welfare benefits who also participate in the alternative economy provided by drugs, the sex industry, gambling, counterfeit goods and knock offs. They swear a lot, drink and smoke themselves into early graves, and breed too young, thus creating or perpetuating a cycle of behaviour which democratic governments can only contain.
EastEnders has unsuccessfully struggled to give the impression of retaining its traditional and no longer existent culture by bringing in and then rapidly taking out, a succession of families and individuals because of the problem that in general those with foreign sounding names tend to work hard and maintain respectable family lives, in fact, whereas the whites who inhabit the Square remain unscrupulous, amoral if not immoral, liars and cheats with no political awareness or interest, no religion or spiritual beingness, and remain uneducated and cultural morons. The also go in for extraordinarily expensive flamboyant weddings and funerals.
I backed this up by examining the lists of characters for foreign sounding names accepting that those of West Indian background usually have British, and predominantly English surnames. At present there are three Masoods, two Abbassi’s (occasional) and one Ahmed. One Shah is to be replaced over the year by one Masood and the three Inzamam who were added to show off an Asian wedding.
In the past there was Adonis Papadopolous 2009 (1). In 2008 an Iqbal and a Choria (2); In 2007 two Convalenco’s, a Patel, a Bianco and Chong (5) In 2006 the five Pappas and one Chaudury (6) 2005 the four Ferreia’s and a Larousi (5); 2004 an Abrahim (1). 2003 one Ferreria and Malik (2) 2002 the two Di Marco brothers(2) 2001 one Di Marco (1) 2000 4 Di Marco’s a Francesca, and a Badawi(6); 1991 one Di Marco, Di Clemente, Lopez and Massi (4); 1998 five Kapoors, two Di Marco’s and a Chan(8); 1998 a Kalwaski, a Collantoni and a Zappieri (3);1996 a Sharma(1); 1995 (0) 1994 two Tavernier, (2); 1993 three Taviernier, a Kominski, and a Chung(5); 1992 one Tavernier and one Kominski(2) 1991(0) 1990 the four Karim’s and the 5 Ahmed’s (9) 1989 the five Osman’s (5); 1988 three Osmans and a Czajkowski and a Gabir(5); 1987 a Singh, Farrukh and Naima Jeffrey (3); 1986 Dario Chimisso (1); 1985 two Osman and Saeed Jeffery(2) I making some 80 non British sounding names, land less than 10 percent.
The number should be at least 50% with matching storylines and central and ongoing performance in the story lines.
Unsurprisingly the has always been a strong involvement of the police with DI Bob Ashley and WPC Lyn Baxter; and then with WPC Alison Howard, PC Keith Manly, Supt Alan Milward, Chief Supt Dave Penton, Sergeant Jimmy Buckwell, WPC Julie Morgan, PC Judith Simkin, DC Ross Fox, DS Steve Peters, Sgt Bob Green, DS Maggie Wilson, DS Paul Kemmit, DC Wayne Atkins PC Dennis Cogan, PC Jim Sellars, Dc Mitch Cowen, DC Jamine Field, DC Wayne Hughes and a recurring character DCI Jill Marsden who departs this season.
The changing medical profession has also been reflected with the move for the local one man practice of Dr Harold Legg who reappeared in cameo appearances after his retirement in 1999. Since then there has been Doctors Cousins, McCulloch, Trueman Harisons(2) Khans, and Drs Monks, Rodford, Fonesca, Samuels and Singh. The medical profession has been conspicuously absent over the past few years.
My second major criticism is that show became too preoccupied with ratings and finding shocking tales to satisfied the readers of the Sun, the People and News of the World rather than remaining a Masterclass in social problems of the day. When Wendy Richards was recruited to the programme after a successful career as a dolly bird in Carry On films and Are You Being Served, she was advised that the intention was cover such issues as teenage pregnancy, drugs, racial conflict, prostitution, rape, mental illness, homosexuality, alcoholism, and muggings. Obviously as a soap opera, or continuous drama, as the BCC prefer to designate the programme, it had to attract and then retain an audience and having covered these issues together with physical, mental and emotional disabilities, and one presumes that audience research provided the evidence for creating the likes of a murder, major crisis or attempting killing ruining every Christmas dinner for decades, for farcical feuding, and flamboyant and grotesque expensive weddings and funerals designed to attract the interest of Hullo magazine and WAGS tales.
EastEnders is was also primarily been about extended families living in close proximity, but with the device of relatives appearing in seasons and then disappearing as quickly and I in the first retrospective I want to look at the original principal family of the Beale’s, Lou and her children, Pauline, who married Arthur Fowler, and their children Michele, Mark and late baby Martin, and her brother Pete and his wife Kath and their son Ian, someone who will have a whole writing to himself, having performed in over 3000 episodes and it the only actor to have appeared in the first show and continuously since.
The programme has also been notable for resurrecting popular characters with varying success, particularly for Leslie Grantham who played Dennis Watts back from the dead after his gangland shooting into a river, He was then murdered by a bevy of women in a who really did it series not dissimilar to the that in relation to Archie Mitchell this Christmas. Other notable returnees have been the daughter of Dennis and Ange- Sharon, Janine Butcher, Bianca and Ricky Butcher, Carol Bianca’s mother also returning recently, Peggy Mitchell (who going for good this season), Nick Cotton, Robbie Jackson, Mark Fowler, Frank Butcher, and returning sometime soon the popular Shane Ritchie and Jessica Wallace as Alfie and Kat Moon, presumably as licensee’s of the Old Vic.
There has also been the growing up of children with Ian Beale the outstanding example and his children coming to the fore at present to represent contemporary youth culture. Dirty Den’s daughters Sharon and Vicki have been other notables along with Mark and Martin Fowler, and the children of Carole Jackson.
Some characters were created to fit established actors coming into the series with Wendy Richards and the Barbara Windsor, Mike Reid, Shane Ritchie. Larry Lamb whose father was a RV presenter and his son is also A TV personality. Two established actors from the school series Grange Hill were brought in, first Tully as Michelle Fowler and then Todd Carty who had an even bigger following as Mark Fowler, after the actor had walked off and then committed suicide. Ian Lavender and Ray Brooks were brought in as potential husbands for Pauline Fowler after the death of Arthur, Martin Kemp of Spandau Ballet and Jill Halfpenny from Byker Grove had major roles, and a host of others appeared in smaller roles including Cherie Lunghi, Rula Lenska, John Junkin, Michael Elphick, Michael Jayston, Susan George, Diana Coupland, Nadia Sawahla, Anthony Newley, Paul Nicholls and Amanda Holden
Another aspect to be covered been the departure of major characters who set off voluntarily and sometimes involuntarily to establish themselves alternative careers in television with perhaps the most successful for continuing involvement, Ross Kemp who played Grant Mitchell and is rarely off one channel or another. Nick Berry who played David Wickes went on to star in Heartbeat and Harbour Lights, Martine McClutcheon reached the pop charts and Daniella Westbrooke with four periods as Sam Mitchell, is a front runner in the current Ice Dancing competition as well as popular TV presenter. Tamzine Outhwaite has had her own series and Michelle Collins was a star Two Thousand Acres of Sky
Wendy Richards was born in Middlesbrough and her parents came to London to run a pub close to Shepherd’s market one of the pubs most fashionable Square and now a London’s finest restaurants and boutiques, as far away from Albert Square as it is possible to conceive. However the Shepherd Tavern today has a reputation for poor food and indifferent staff with no atmosphere according the published reviews, and therefore sounds more like the Queen Vic.
Pauline Fowler grew up dominated by her mother Lou Beale with the script creators writing about her as"A lively 70 year old. Archetypal East-end mother-earth figure. Fat, funny, sometimes loud, often openly sentimental. An obsessive view of family...she can be a stubborn cruel "old bag" when she wants to be, sometimes keeping "atmospheres" going for months. It was always Lou's house that was used for the big family celebrations. Especially Christmas. Twenty or more people crammed into a tiny house. Five sisters wedged into a minuscule kitchen; drinking gin and orange; wearing funny hats; all wearing aprons; laughing raucously and trying to cook a huge dinner at the same time. Lou's house was also the meeting place for the family Sunday teas. Ham, or tinned salmon salad. Bread and butter. Jelly and tinned cream. And, tea...the changing face of the area (especially the immigrants) is a constant source of fear to her, but then she doesn't go out much. She prefers to be at home, or on a trip down memory lane: day trips to Southend - the Kursal, Rossi's ice-cream and a plate of cockles; one wonderful week's holiday in a caravan in Clacton; fruit picking in Essex; Christmas; weddings; street parties.” This strikes some chords with my own childhood especially the sisters cooking meals on one stove in one kitchen (six sisters, one severely disabled, one husband, seven children, four already adults one a new baby.
Lou was played by Anna Wing who was 71 at the time and remains alive at the age of 96, She decided to leave the show after its first three years because of doubts about its moral integrity. She remains a Member of the Society of Friends and supporter of CND. The character had a splendid death and burial and in 2006 she attended the funeral of Went Richards, who died from cancer. She also presented the lifetime achievement award to her to June Brown who continues to play Dot Cotton, and in some respects took over the role planned of Anna by the producers who had said she had the role for life literally.
Dominating her daughter Pauline and indulging her son Pete, led the character Pauline becoming disillusioned with life and turning into a dour character soured by what happened to her husband, their marriage and her three children, although she centred as the middle aged woman having a late baby, knocked down at Christmas by a car driven by Ricky Butcher, developing fibroids and a consequential hysterectomy and trying homeopathy. For most of the time she has deal with the problems created by other family members but the after the death of Arthur she begins a series of relationships with five minor ones and two major. The first was Ian Lavender who was well known through his role in Dad’s Army as Private Pike. However marriage was out of the question when it transpired that the character had become gay with estranged children, The second choice was Ray Brooks who ahd a long and well known TV and film career from Coronation Street, to Dr Who and Two thousand Acres of Sky. Pauline did not find the on screen relationship a happy one and is said to be the reason why she asked to leave, rather than because of her growing personal health problems.
A key factor in understanding the character is the relationship with she ahd with her first husband, the longest lasting marriages on EastEnders to date. She loved Arthur despite his limitations and deterioration after losing his factory job after 15 years he had been on the dole for a year when the programme commenced. He went to prison twice, the first occasion given a 28 day sentence for stealing Christmas Club money, after which he had an emotional breakdown which brought national attention in the problem as well and created substantial sympathy. When Arthur again found himself in prison, this time framed and wrongly sent to prison there was a national outcry off and well as on screen. Arthur asked to leave the show having become depressed by his role, but admitted to being shocked when he was killed and buried on screen and which meant he could not return. Public sympathy for the character had been sustained during the time when relationship between him and Pauline had become boring and eh commenced an affair with a woman who was more attractive , socially superior and fun.
What I find interesting is that I met more men like Arthur in prison that I did the Mitchells or the younger version of Nick Cotton, although they were also there in numbers. Arthur was played by Bill Teacher who had a modest career before and since his on screen death.
The Fowlers had three children. Mark was intended to leave school and become an out of work racist which the actor had difficulties accepting this, so was written out which created major alterations to some 50 scripts already completed. The original actor then committed suicide so when the character returned to the Square having disappeared he became the major series personality originally intended clad in leathers and riding a motorcycle.
The most famous aspect of his role was to become HIV positive which his previous TV Grange Hill fan club enable him to bring and keep audience sympathy although the show also highlighted people’s natural prejudice, fear and hate.
Sympathy with Mark became even stronger when his first wife, Jill, who was also HIV separately, developed AIDS and died the day after their wedding. he remained a much loved figure with the public. This became more so when he married his first wife who had developed AIDS and died the day after their wedding. Sympathy for Mark meant that his early life as juvenile delinquent was forgotten, sent to borstal for drug offences, burglary and assaulting a policeman. The daughter of friends of Fowlers, the Carpenters was caught smoking Cannabis she had she had stolen from Mark and his Welsh friend after he had returned home form working in Southend and living with an older Swedish woman and her children, and then doing farmwork in Wales and Gloucestershire and having a spell in Newcastle. He was one for the ladies from the start. He ahd a relationship with Diane Butcher and Rachel Kominski before Jill, his Newcastle girlfriend, came to live in Walford with him.
Marks second marriage was to Ruth who he met while visiting a friend at a hospice where she was also visiting someone. Their relationship seemed ideal but broke up after the child they fostered was returned to its parents, and Ruth then had an extra marital relationship and left the series with her child and its father.
The penultimate but one major story centred on Mark concerned Nick Cotton who had got Mark into drugs in his youth. Mark found that Nick had sold dodgy ecstasy to his baby brother Martin and their feud led to Nick having a fall and becoming wheelchair disabled. Nick enlisted the help of his son to gain revenge who then stole Mark’s motorbike to run him over only to be killed because his father had drained its brake fluid
The penultimate story was Mark’s third relationship with Liza who was on the rebound from a relationship with Phil Mitchell. Phil seduced Liza back when he found out her daughter, Liza was his He survived being shot by Liza and she escaped to Portugal with her daughter where he subsequently attempted to regain the care of his child.
After 13 years of showing that it was possible to live with HIV infection mark developed AIDS and died off screen having said his goodbyes. Todd Carty then became a notorious Policeman in the Bill!
The Fowler’s daughter Michelle was bright, a teenage feminist in the making who was vulnerable and susceptible to dodgy men. She was played by Susan Tully who like Carty had established herself in Grange Hill. Because the first Mark left the series her character was then developed. She became a pregnant teenager with four possible candidate including the already infamous landlord of the Queen Vic, Dennis Watts both on and of screen when it was disclosed that Leslie Grantham had been sentenced to life imprisonment for unintentionally murdering a taxi driver while serving in the British army in Germany, and three other characters, one of the Carpenters, one of the Osmans and Andy O’Brien. This was first whodunit where bookmakers quoted odd. It was Den of course who thereafter became known as Dirty Den.
The next development was her relationship with the nice Lofty and the speculation developed would she leave him at the altar. Which she did but then had a change of heart and they married, but they broke up after she had aborted his child, unbeknown to him. He left to become a handyman in a children’s home. Their relationship always appeared doomed. Lofty was played by Tom Watts who although continued to appear in TV and film Dramas, developed a second career with his first love football becomes a well known TV and Radio presenter, and sports writer. He also achieved national publicity through his relationships with Anita Dobson who played the wife of Dirty Den.
It was likely that the relationship between Dennis and Michele would have developed as his marriage to Angie turned from love to hate, except for the arrival of the Firm and gang land EastEnders into the soap. Denis was shot and fell in the canal, although his body was never found and disappeared for 13 years, returning long after Michele had left the series.
Dennis and Angie, who was unable to have children adopted a daughter Sharon played by Letitia Dean who was Michelle’s best friend and of the same age. It was only years later after Sharon returned to the Square as landlady of the Queen Vic that she was able to talk to Sharon about the affair with her father. Michelle then became involved with the Mitchell brothers after Sharon married Grant. Michelle turned to Phil for help when she became pursued by a fellow student with whom she had a one night stand, having enrolled at the local university. The young man disappeared. Previously Michelle had got a job selling time shares and moved in with a college lecturer Rachel Kominsky, with whom Mark had a brief relationship,, who had persuaded Michelle to study for a degree at the college where she worked. Rachel Mark, lost her job and ran a market stall during which time she ahd a one night stand with the Market supervisor, Mark had taken over the fruit and veg stall which had been run by his mother’s twin brother Pete Beale The market was a as important if not more important feature of life in Square until its continuation became a problem given that in reality the East end markets had become dominated by new immigrant groups. Michelle left living with Rachel after rumours circulated the square about the nature of their relationship.
At one point her daughter, Vicki was kidnapped and she was also involved in a shooting incident. She also had a brief affair with Sharon’s husband Grant Mitchell, Phil’s brother. She left the series after ten years, gave up acting and went into theatrical management directing several episodes of the soap subsequently. Her character continues to be referred to her off screen life in north America with excuses given as to why she did not appear at the funerals of her brother, father and mother.
Martin Fowler was played by Jon Peyton Price as a baby through to his 11th year, and coinciding with the death of his father he was replaced by James Alexandrou who then grew up as secondary school child passing his twenty first birthday party before deciding to leave in order to attend drama school to refresh his acting ability and appears in stage productions including with the British Shakespeare Company. He hopes to return one day to EastEnders. In his EastEnders life to date Martin managed to combine aspects of the lives his older and brother. Reacting to his father’s death and previous life, he becomes involved with a gang of older criminals and engages in thefts, burglaries and vandalism. He attempts to pressure the daughter of the Di Marco’s into sex and when she rejects him, he loses his virginity with the old Sonia Jackson who become pregnant. The child is placed for adoption when Martin admits is does not want to be father. Martin then comes under the influence of Nick Cotton who has return to the Square and this results in Mark’s feuding with the criminal thug, that Nick, and not his younger brother who he does his best to try and encourage him away from the life he appears set on.
This fails and Martin is sent to prison fro six following a hit and run car accident, after which he resort to robbery and blackmail and drug dealing growing Cannabis on his father allotment shed. He is protected from further imprisonment when Ian Lavender takes the blame. Martin become involved with Sonja Jackson again, the sister of Bianca and part of the Carole Jackson’s family by several fathers and they marry quietly and moved in with his mother. The combination of Pauline’s interference and hostility towards Sonja affects the couple’s relationship but their relationships survived including when an Old Vic Barmaid becomes infatuated and obsessed with Martin, pretends they have slept together and attempts to kill him when the truth is revealed. He barmaid is committed to a mental health establishment. However the relationship of the couple becomes strained and reaches breaking point when Sonja discovers that Martin and his mother have established contact with her daughter.
Sonja leaves and establishes a lesbian relationship which Martin uses when the legal guardian of their daughter dies and he gains custody. Then a situation develops which is one of several melodramas for which EastEnders has become more well known and remembered that some of the quieter episodes when the storyline and acting has been suburb, such as the Dot Cotton half hour soliloquy or Monday nights follow up to the death of Bradley. Death by falling from buildings has become a regular feature of EastEnders.
Martins relationship with Sonja and their child continued to be on and off with Sonja kidnapping her daughter at one point after the two are divorced. Martin kidnaps Ben in retaliation, Phil Mitchell’s son in order to get Phil to reveal where Sonja and his daughter are hiding. After they get together again and announce their engagement to marry, Pauline pretends to have a brain tumour and dies from a brain haemorrhage tumour at Christmas. However this is shown to have been caused by a previous blow to the head For a time the chief suspect is Sonja and she is arrested and released. It is eventually discovered that the culprit was her second husband who dies by falling from a window where he has been preventing Dot Cotton from going out and revealing the truth.
After the death of Pauline Martin discovers that his mother has willed their home to him on the understanding he does not marry Sonja. Sonja decides to go off thinking this will be better for him and their daughter Rebecca. Martin find her and the three go to live in the United States. Sonja without Martin or daughter attended the recent second wedding of sister Bianca to Ricky Butcher. She discusses the state of her marriage with her mother and decides to return to the USA. This keeps open the possibility the one or both characters or both, with their daughter will return in the future.
Vicki Fowler, Den’s daughter with Sharon remained on screen from her birth in 1986 until she accompanied her mother to the USA in 1995. She reappeared in 2003 as a rebellious teenager with an American accent. 500 applicants were auditioned, participating in 30 workshops which reduced the number to 4. It was only went told she was being offered the part, was she told it was for EastEnders, to coincide with the return of her father Den, having dragged himself out of the canal and gone to live in Spain for over a decade.
In the story Vickie has a relationship with Spencer Moon, the younger brother of shortly to return to the series Alfie. Vickie becomes pregnant by Spencer after a one night stand and Sharon, her half sister, offer Vickie £10000 if she can bring up the child as her own. Vickie accepts the offer but then has an abortion. Vickie also discovers that Den has another child Dennis Rickman who she persuades to come and live in the Square which by this time has attempted to become more up market or down market with a night club and a separate wine bar. When Sharon, adopted and Dennis Rickman commence an adult relationship, Vickie is one alongside Dirty Den who is horrified and she has a relationship with one of the Ferreira’s and she then has a relationship with a man over twice her age, a 45 year old lecturer. When she talks of moving in with him, her step mother sets out to trap him as a love rat by seduction, leaving him stripped naked in the Old Vic toilets so she can expose him to Vickie!
Arising from the sub plot relationship between Sharon and Dennis, their father persuades Zoë Slater to pretend she is pregnant by Dennis as a means of breaking up the relationship with Sharon. Sharon tries to persuade Dennis to come with her to the USA and after his death, does so alone. In yet another Christmas melodrama Vicki hears her father saying how much he cares for Sharon rather than herself and she decides to also return tot eh USA and to her mother.
Audience reaction to Vickie probably explains her short stay in the series as a young woman. Views hated the fake American accent which was dropped during the second year and some that she an abortion. The part was played by Scarlett Johnson who had appeared in a six month stage production of Under Milk Wood for the National theatre, return to the stage after EastEnders. The child of Michelle and Grant Mitchell, called Mark is yet to appear, but sure as Christmas, he will. Another likely Fowler to appear is Rebecca Miller, Martin’s child. I have not explained how it was possible for Martin to become her legal guardian after she was adopted by the Miller’s. They died in a car crash and her legal guardian then became her adopted grandmother. After she ahd a fall and died Martin was able to establish his a parenthood with the help of his mother.
There is also the possibility of other branches of the Beale’s Fowlers coming reappearing having previous briefly reappeared before.
In addition to the line created by Pauline’ and her twin brother Pete and his wife Kathy Hills and their son Ian, the subject of the Beale‘s part two, Lou and her husband had Ronnie married to Gail with no known children, Dora and Harry, not known to have married, and Maggie who married Sean Flaherty who had four children , Tommy and John, unmarried to date, Eamon who married Brenda and their children are Eamon, Collete and Kyle, and Connor who married Geraldine whose child is Mary,
Mary Flaherty first appeared in 1997 when the Fowlers went to Ireland to find her long lost sister, Mary came back to Walford to escape her alcoholic and violent grandfather and relationship with an older man. Although she got on with Mark Fowler she and Pauline found they could not live in the same house so she moved out and quickly became a problem after coming between Joe Wicks and Sarah Hills. She also had affairs with Mathew Rose and Robbie Jackson. She returned to Ireland with her father in 1999 who was then running off with Ruth, Mark’s wife who he had got pregnant. Who said life is not circular and everyone is connected to everyone by no more than six connections. It is difficult to believe that the only Beale’s in the future will be those from Pete and Kath.
In the twenty five years since 1985 there have been nearly 4000 episodes of EastEnders there have been 206 cliff hangers shared by 1100 actors of which 1000 have departed. I have two major criticisms of the show. Its failure to represent multiracial and multi language London.
It did briefly reflect a working class street market and local public house community of residents around an East London Square of the 1970’s, admitted to be around Bow Station which extends from the Whitechapel Road on the way to Stratford and West Ham, having travelled and visited the area in the latter 1990’s and early millennium. I also have knowledge of the late 1950’s areas extending from the city of London from Bishopsgate and Aldgate encompassing the Petticoat and Brick Lane markets which was my patch and where my office was located as an Olivetti salesman for a few months in 1959 and was also the area of a walk before Christmas.
However the area has become predominantly non white and new European with English the second language. There are white families with generations of cultural tradition stepped in the area, although in fairness EastEnders never attempted to portray the authentic language which had to be sanitised for the suburban respectable working and middle class middle class readers of the Mirror, Mail and Express who watched the programme alongside Coronation Street which also perpetuates similar myths of contemporary working class Manchester.
The truth is that in Britain the traditional London working class of EastEnders and Coronation Street has largely disappeared, replaced by immigrants from the middle and eastern Europe and the growth of Indian and Pakistan communities, and those from the West Indies and Africa, and inter-racial couplings. On one hand we have seen the end of working class occupational dependence on ship building, coal mining and steel making, and the exporting of manufacturing to the Far East especially China and back to India. Commercial agriculture and construction has been increasingly dependent on foreign labour as has the caring services together with the staff of hotels, restaurants and places of entertainment. We are only beginning to feel and understand the impact on all our cities because of the dramatic increase in young people migrating for higher education from other parts of the world, notably China, as well as from other parts of the UK, especially the impact of their interaction. There has developed a peculiarly British form of underclass comprising people who have been to prison, or who would of become institutionalised because of various forms of mental disabilities together with a large proportion of young people dependents on social welfare benefits who also participate in the alternative economy provided by drugs, the sex industry, gambling, counterfeit goods and knock offs. They swear a lot, drink and smoke themselves into early graves, and breed too young, thus creating or perpetuating a cycle of behaviour which democratic governments can only contain.
EastEnders has unsuccessfully struggled to give the impression of retaining its traditional and no longer existent culture by bringing in and then rapidly taking out, a succession of families and individuals because of the problem that in general those with foreign sounding names tend to work hard and maintain respectable family lives, in fact, whereas the whites who inhabit the Square remain unscrupulous, amoral if not immoral, liars and cheats with no political awareness or interest, no religion or spiritual beingness, and remain uneducated and cultural morons. The also go in for extraordinarily expensive flamboyant weddings and funerals.
I backed this up by examining the lists of characters for foreign sounding names accepting that those of West Indian background usually have British, and predominantly English surnames. At present there are three Masoods, two Abbassi’s (occasional) and one Ahmed. One Shah is to be replaced over the year by one Masood and the three Inzamam who were added to show off an Asian wedding.
In the past there was Adonis Papadopolous 2009 (1). In 2008 an Iqbal and a Choria (2); In 2007 two Convalenco’s, a Patel, a Bianco and Chong (5) In 2006 the five Pappas and one Chaudury (6) 2005 the four Ferreia’s and a Larousi (5); 2004 an Abrahim (1). 2003 one Ferreria and Malik (2) 2002 the two Di Marco brothers(2) 2001 one Di Marco (1) 2000 4 Di Marco’s a Francesca, and a Badawi(6); 1991 one Di Marco, Di Clemente, Lopez and Massi (4); 1998 five Kapoors, two Di Marco’s and a Chan(8); 1998 a Kalwaski, a Collantoni and a Zappieri (3);1996 a Sharma(1); 1995 (0) 1994 two Tavernier, (2); 1993 three Taviernier, a Kominski, and a Chung(5); 1992 one Tavernier and one Kominski(2) 1991(0) 1990 the four Karim’s and the 5 Ahmed’s (9) 1989 the five Osman’s (5); 1988 three Osmans and a Czajkowski and a Gabir(5); 1987 a Singh, Farrukh and Naima Jeffrey (3); 1986 Dario Chimisso (1); 1985 two Osman and Saeed Jeffery(2) I making some 80 non British sounding names, land less than 10 percent.
The number should be at least 50% with matching storylines and central and ongoing performance in the story lines.
Unsurprisingly the has always been a strong involvement of the police with DI Bob Ashley and WPC Lyn Baxter; and then with WPC Alison Howard, PC Keith Manly, Supt Alan Milward, Chief Supt Dave Penton, Sergeant Jimmy Buckwell, WPC Julie Morgan, PC Judith Simkin, DC Ross Fox, DS Steve Peters, Sgt Bob Green, DS Maggie Wilson, DS Paul Kemmit, DC Wayne Atkins PC Dennis Cogan, PC Jim Sellars, Dc Mitch Cowen, DC Jamine Field, DC Wayne Hughes and a recurring character DCI Jill Marsden who departs this season.
The changing medical profession has also been reflected with the move for the local one man practice of Dr Harold Legg who reappeared in cameo appearances after his retirement in 1999. Since then there has been Doctors Cousins, McCulloch, Trueman Harisons(2) Khans, and Drs Monks, Rodford, Fonesca, Samuels and Singh. The medical profession has been conspicuously absent over the past few years.
My second major criticism is that show became too preoccupied with ratings and finding shocking tales to satisfied the readers of the Sun, the People and News of the World rather than remaining a Masterclass in social problems of the day. When Wendy Richards was recruited to the programme after a successful career as a dolly bird in Carry On films and Are You Being Served, she was advised that the intention was cover such issues as teenage pregnancy, drugs, racial conflict, prostitution, rape, mental illness, homosexuality, alcoholism, and muggings. Obviously as a soap opera, or continuous drama, as the BCC prefer to designate the programme, it had to attract and then retain an audience and having covered these issues together with physical, mental and emotional disabilities, and one presumes that audience research provided the evidence for creating the likes of a murder, major crisis or attempting killing ruining every Christmas dinner for decades, for farcical feuding, and flamboyant and grotesque expensive weddings and funerals designed to attract the interest of Hullo magazine and WAGS tales.
EastEnders is was also primarily been about extended families living in close proximity, but with the device of relatives appearing in seasons and then disappearing as quickly and I in the first retrospective I want to look at the original principal family of the Beale’s, Lou and her children, Pauline, who married Arthur Fowler, and their children Michele, Mark and late baby Martin, and her brother Pete and his wife Kath and their son Ian, someone who will have a whole writing to himself, having performed in over 3000 episodes and it the only actor to have appeared in the first show and continuously since.
The programme has also been notable for resurrecting popular characters with varying success, particularly for Leslie Grantham who played Dennis Watts back from the dead after his gangland shooting into a river, He was then murdered by a bevy of women in a who really did it series not dissimilar to the that in relation to Archie Mitchell this Christmas. Other notable returnees have been the daughter of Dennis and Ange- Sharon, Janine Butcher, Bianca and Ricky Butcher, Carol Bianca’s mother also returning recently, Peggy Mitchell (who going for good this season), Nick Cotton, Robbie Jackson, Mark Fowler, Frank Butcher, and returning sometime soon the popular Shane Ritchie and Jessica Wallace as Alfie and Kat Moon, presumably as licensee’s of the Old Vic.
There has also been the growing up of children with Ian Beale the outstanding example and his children coming to the fore at present to represent contemporary youth culture. Dirty Den’s daughters Sharon and Vicki have been other notables along with Mark and Martin Fowler, and the children of Carole Jackson.
Some characters were created to fit established actors coming into the series with Wendy Richards and the Barbara Windsor, Mike Reid, Shane Ritchie. Larry Lamb whose father was a RV presenter and his son is also A TV personality. Two established actors from the school series Grange Hill were brought in, first Tully as Michelle Fowler and then Todd Carty who had an even bigger following as Mark Fowler, after the actor had walked off and then committed suicide. Ian Lavender and Ray Brooks were brought in as potential husbands for Pauline Fowler after the death of Arthur, Martin Kemp of Spandau Ballet and Jill Halfpenny from Byker Grove had major roles, and a host of others appeared in smaller roles including Cherie Lunghi, Rula Lenska, John Junkin, Michael Elphick, Michael Jayston, Susan George, Diana Coupland, Nadia Sawahla, Anthony Newley, Paul Nicholls and Amanda Holden
Another aspect to be covered been the departure of major characters who set off voluntarily and sometimes involuntarily to establish themselves alternative careers in television with perhaps the most successful for continuing involvement, Ross Kemp who played Grant Mitchell and is rarely off one channel or another. Nick Berry who played David Wickes went on to star in Heartbeat and Harbour Lights, Martine McClutcheon reached the pop charts and Daniella Westbrooke with four periods as Sam Mitchell, is a front runner in the current Ice Dancing competition as well as popular TV presenter. Tamzine Outhwaite has had her own series and Michelle Collins was a star Two Thousand Acres of Sky
Wendy Richards was born in Middlesbrough and her parents came to London to run a pub close to Shepherd’s market one of the pubs most fashionable Square and now a London’s finest restaurants and boutiques, as far away from Albert Square as it is possible to conceive. However the Shepherd Tavern today has a reputation for poor food and indifferent staff with no atmosphere according the published reviews, and therefore sounds more like the Queen Vic.
Pauline Fowler grew up dominated by her mother Lou Beale with the script creators writing about her as"A lively 70 year old. Archetypal East-end mother-earth figure. Fat, funny, sometimes loud, often openly sentimental. An obsessive view of family...she can be a stubborn cruel "old bag" when she wants to be, sometimes keeping "atmospheres" going for months. It was always Lou's house that was used for the big family celebrations. Especially Christmas. Twenty or more people crammed into a tiny house. Five sisters wedged into a minuscule kitchen; drinking gin and orange; wearing funny hats; all wearing aprons; laughing raucously and trying to cook a huge dinner at the same time. Lou's house was also the meeting place for the family Sunday teas. Ham, or tinned salmon salad. Bread and butter. Jelly and tinned cream. And, tea...the changing face of the area (especially the immigrants) is a constant source of fear to her, but then she doesn't go out much. She prefers to be at home, or on a trip down memory lane: day trips to Southend - the Kursal, Rossi's ice-cream and a plate of cockles; one wonderful week's holiday in a caravan in Clacton; fruit picking in Essex; Christmas; weddings; street parties.” This strikes some chords with my own childhood especially the sisters cooking meals on one stove in one kitchen (six sisters, one severely disabled, one husband, seven children, four already adults one a new baby.
Lou was played by Anna Wing who was 71 at the time and remains alive at the age of 96, She decided to leave the show after its first three years because of doubts about its moral integrity. She remains a Member of the Society of Friends and supporter of CND. The character had a splendid death and burial and in 2006 she attended the funeral of Went Richards, who died from cancer. She also presented the lifetime achievement award to her to June Brown who continues to play Dot Cotton, and in some respects took over the role planned of Anna by the producers who had said she had the role for life literally.
Dominating her daughter Pauline and indulging her son Pete, led the character Pauline becoming disillusioned with life and turning into a dour character soured by what happened to her husband, their marriage and her three children, although she centred as the middle aged woman having a late baby, knocked down at Christmas by a car driven by Ricky Butcher, developing fibroids and a consequential hysterectomy and trying homeopathy. For most of the time she has deal with the problems created by other family members but the after the death of Arthur she begins a series of relationships with five minor ones and two major. The first was Ian Lavender who was well known through his role in Dad’s Army as Private Pike. However marriage was out of the question when it transpired that the character had become gay with estranged children, The second choice was Ray Brooks who ahd a long and well known TV and film career from Coronation Street, to Dr Who and Two thousand Acres of Sky. Pauline did not find the on screen relationship a happy one and is said to be the reason why she asked to leave, rather than because of her growing personal health problems.
A key factor in understanding the character is the relationship with she ahd with her first husband, the longest lasting marriages on EastEnders to date. She loved Arthur despite his limitations and deterioration after losing his factory job after 15 years he had been on the dole for a year when the programme commenced. He went to prison twice, the first occasion given a 28 day sentence for stealing Christmas Club money, after which he had an emotional breakdown which brought national attention in the problem as well and created substantial sympathy. When Arthur again found himself in prison, this time framed and wrongly sent to prison there was a national outcry off and well as on screen. Arthur asked to leave the show having become depressed by his role, but admitted to being shocked when he was killed and buried on screen and which meant he could not return. Public sympathy for the character had been sustained during the time when relationship between him and Pauline had become boring and eh commenced an affair with a woman who was more attractive , socially superior and fun.
What I find interesting is that I met more men like Arthur in prison that I did the Mitchells or the younger version of Nick Cotton, although they were also there in numbers. Arthur was played by Bill Teacher who had a modest career before and since his on screen death.
The Fowlers had three children. Mark was intended to leave school and become an out of work racist which the actor had difficulties accepting this, so was written out which created major alterations to some 50 scripts already completed. The original actor then committed suicide so when the character returned to the Square having disappeared he became the major series personality originally intended clad in leathers and riding a motorcycle.
The most famous aspect of his role was to become HIV positive which his previous TV Grange Hill fan club enable him to bring and keep audience sympathy although the show also highlighted people’s natural prejudice, fear and hate.
Sympathy with Mark became even stronger when his first wife, Jill, who was also HIV separately, developed AIDS and died the day after their wedding. he remained a much loved figure with the public. This became more so when he married his first wife who had developed AIDS and died the day after their wedding. Sympathy for Mark meant that his early life as juvenile delinquent was forgotten, sent to borstal for drug offences, burglary and assaulting a policeman. The daughter of friends of Fowlers, the Carpenters was caught smoking Cannabis she had she had stolen from Mark and his Welsh friend after he had returned home form working in Southend and living with an older Swedish woman and her children, and then doing farmwork in Wales and Gloucestershire and having a spell in Newcastle. He was one for the ladies from the start. He ahd a relationship with Diane Butcher and Rachel Kominski before Jill, his Newcastle girlfriend, came to live in Walford with him.
Marks second marriage was to Ruth who he met while visiting a friend at a hospice where she was also visiting someone. Their relationship seemed ideal but broke up after the child they fostered was returned to its parents, and Ruth then had an extra marital relationship and left the series with her child and its father.
The penultimate but one major story centred on Mark concerned Nick Cotton who had got Mark into drugs in his youth. Mark found that Nick had sold dodgy ecstasy to his baby brother Martin and their feud led to Nick having a fall and becoming wheelchair disabled. Nick enlisted the help of his son to gain revenge who then stole Mark’s motorbike to run him over only to be killed because his father had drained its brake fluid
The penultimate story was Mark’s third relationship with Liza who was on the rebound from a relationship with Phil Mitchell. Phil seduced Liza back when he found out her daughter, Liza was his He survived being shot by Liza and she escaped to Portugal with her daughter where he subsequently attempted to regain the care of his child.
After 13 years of showing that it was possible to live with HIV infection mark developed AIDS and died off screen having said his goodbyes. Todd Carty then became a notorious Policeman in the Bill!
The Fowler’s daughter Michelle was bright, a teenage feminist in the making who was vulnerable and susceptible to dodgy men. She was played by Susan Tully who like Carty had established herself in Grange Hill. Because the first Mark left the series her character was then developed. She became a pregnant teenager with four possible candidate including the already infamous landlord of the Queen Vic, Dennis Watts both on and of screen when it was disclosed that Leslie Grantham had been sentenced to life imprisonment for unintentionally murdering a taxi driver while serving in the British army in Germany, and three other characters, one of the Carpenters, one of the Osmans and Andy O’Brien. This was first whodunit where bookmakers quoted odd. It was Den of course who thereafter became known as Dirty Den.
The next development was her relationship with the nice Lofty and the speculation developed would she leave him at the altar. Which she did but then had a change of heart and they married, but they broke up after she had aborted his child, unbeknown to him. He left to become a handyman in a children’s home. Their relationship always appeared doomed. Lofty was played by Tom Watts who although continued to appear in TV and film Dramas, developed a second career with his first love football becomes a well known TV and Radio presenter, and sports writer. He also achieved national publicity through his relationships with Anita Dobson who played the wife of Dirty Den.
It was likely that the relationship between Dennis and Michele would have developed as his marriage to Angie turned from love to hate, except for the arrival of the Firm and gang land EastEnders into the soap. Denis was shot and fell in the canal, although his body was never found and disappeared for 13 years, returning long after Michele had left the series.
Dennis and Angie, who was unable to have children adopted a daughter Sharon played by Letitia Dean who was Michelle’s best friend and of the same age. It was only years later after Sharon returned to the Square as landlady of the Queen Vic that she was able to talk to Sharon about the affair with her father. Michelle then became involved with the Mitchell brothers after Sharon married Grant. Michelle turned to Phil for help when she became pursued by a fellow student with whom she had a one night stand, having enrolled at the local university. The young man disappeared. Previously Michelle had got a job selling time shares and moved in with a college lecturer Rachel Kominsky, with whom Mark had a brief relationship,, who had persuaded Michelle to study for a degree at the college where she worked. Rachel Mark, lost her job and ran a market stall during which time she ahd a one night stand with the Market supervisor, Mark had taken over the fruit and veg stall which had been run by his mother’s twin brother Pete Beale The market was a as important if not more important feature of life in Square until its continuation became a problem given that in reality the East end markets had become dominated by new immigrant groups. Michelle left living with Rachel after rumours circulated the square about the nature of their relationship.
At one point her daughter, Vicki was kidnapped and she was also involved in a shooting incident. She also had a brief affair with Sharon’s husband Grant Mitchell, Phil’s brother. She left the series after ten years, gave up acting and went into theatrical management directing several episodes of the soap subsequently. Her character continues to be referred to her off screen life in north America with excuses given as to why she did not appear at the funerals of her brother, father and mother.
Martin Fowler was played by Jon Peyton Price as a baby through to his 11th year, and coinciding with the death of his father he was replaced by James Alexandrou who then grew up as secondary school child passing his twenty first birthday party before deciding to leave in order to attend drama school to refresh his acting ability and appears in stage productions including with the British Shakespeare Company. He hopes to return one day to EastEnders. In his EastEnders life to date Martin managed to combine aspects of the lives his older and brother. Reacting to his father’s death and previous life, he becomes involved with a gang of older criminals and engages in thefts, burglaries and vandalism. He attempts to pressure the daughter of the Di Marco’s into sex and when she rejects him, he loses his virginity with the old Sonia Jackson who become pregnant. The child is placed for adoption when Martin admits is does not want to be father. Martin then comes under the influence of Nick Cotton who has return to the Square and this results in Mark’s feuding with the criminal thug, that Nick, and not his younger brother who he does his best to try and encourage him away from the life he appears set on.
This fails and Martin is sent to prison fro six following a hit and run car accident, after which he resort to robbery and blackmail and drug dealing growing Cannabis on his father allotment shed. He is protected from further imprisonment when Ian Lavender takes the blame. Martin become involved with Sonja Jackson again, the sister of Bianca and part of the Carole Jackson’s family by several fathers and they marry quietly and moved in with his mother. The combination of Pauline’s interference and hostility towards Sonja affects the couple’s relationship but their relationships survived including when an Old Vic Barmaid becomes infatuated and obsessed with Martin, pretends they have slept together and attempts to kill him when the truth is revealed. He barmaid is committed to a mental health establishment. However the relationship of the couple becomes strained and reaches breaking point when Sonja discovers that Martin and his mother have established contact with her daughter.
Sonja leaves and establishes a lesbian relationship which Martin uses when the legal guardian of their daughter dies and he gains custody. Then a situation develops which is one of several melodramas for which EastEnders has become more well known and remembered that some of the quieter episodes when the storyline and acting has been suburb, such as the Dot Cotton half hour soliloquy or Monday nights follow up to the death of Bradley. Death by falling from buildings has become a regular feature of EastEnders.
Martins relationship with Sonja and their child continued to be on and off with Sonja kidnapping her daughter at one point after the two are divorced. Martin kidnaps Ben in retaliation, Phil Mitchell’s son in order to get Phil to reveal where Sonja and his daughter are hiding. After they get together again and announce their engagement to marry, Pauline pretends to have a brain tumour and dies from a brain haemorrhage tumour at Christmas. However this is shown to have been caused by a previous blow to the head For a time the chief suspect is Sonja and she is arrested and released. It is eventually discovered that the culprit was her second husband who dies by falling from a window where he has been preventing Dot Cotton from going out and revealing the truth.
After the death of Pauline Martin discovers that his mother has willed their home to him on the understanding he does not marry Sonja. Sonja decides to go off thinking this will be better for him and their daughter Rebecca. Martin find her and the three go to live in the United States. Sonja without Martin or daughter attended the recent second wedding of sister Bianca to Ricky Butcher. She discusses the state of her marriage with her mother and decides to return to the USA. This keeps open the possibility the one or both characters or both, with their daughter will return in the future.
Vicki Fowler, Den’s daughter with Sharon remained on screen from her birth in 1986 until she accompanied her mother to the USA in 1995. She reappeared in 2003 as a rebellious teenager with an American accent. 500 applicants were auditioned, participating in 30 workshops which reduced the number to 4. It was only went told she was being offered the part, was she told it was for EastEnders, to coincide with the return of her father Den, having dragged himself out of the canal and gone to live in Spain for over a decade.
In the story Vickie has a relationship with Spencer Moon, the younger brother of shortly to return to the series Alfie. Vickie becomes pregnant by Spencer after a one night stand and Sharon, her half sister, offer Vickie £10000 if she can bring up the child as her own. Vickie accepts the offer but then has an abortion. Vickie also discovers that Den has another child Dennis Rickman who she persuades to come and live in the Square which by this time has attempted to become more up market or down market with a night club and a separate wine bar. When Sharon, adopted and Dennis Rickman commence an adult relationship, Vickie is one alongside Dirty Den who is horrified and she has a relationship with one of the Ferreira’s and she then has a relationship with a man over twice her age, a 45 year old lecturer. When she talks of moving in with him, her step mother sets out to trap him as a love rat by seduction, leaving him stripped naked in the Old Vic toilets so she can expose him to Vickie!
Arising from the sub plot relationship between Sharon and Dennis, their father persuades Zoë Slater to pretend she is pregnant by Dennis as a means of breaking up the relationship with Sharon. Sharon tries to persuade Dennis to come with her to the USA and after his death, does so alone. In yet another Christmas melodrama Vicki hears her father saying how much he cares for Sharon rather than herself and she decides to also return tot eh USA and to her mother.
Audience reaction to Vickie probably explains her short stay in the series as a young woman. Views hated the fake American accent which was dropped during the second year and some that she an abortion. The part was played by Scarlett Johnson who had appeared in a six month stage production of Under Milk Wood for the National theatre, return to the stage after EastEnders. The child of Michelle and Grant Mitchell, called Mark is yet to appear, but sure as Christmas, he will. Another likely Fowler to appear is Rebecca Miller, Martin’s child. I have not explained how it was possible for Martin to become her legal guardian after she was adopted by the Miller’s. They died in a car crash and her legal guardian then became her adopted grandmother. After she ahd a fall and died Martin was able to establish his a parenthood with the help of his mother.
There is also the possibility of other branches of the Beale’s Fowlers coming reappearing having previous briefly reappeared before.
In addition to the line created by Pauline’ and her twin brother Pete and his wife Kathy Hills and their son Ian, the subject of the Beale‘s part two, Lou and her husband had Ronnie married to Gail with no known children, Dora and Harry, not known to have married, and Maggie who married Sean Flaherty who had four children , Tommy and John, unmarried to date, Eamon who married Brenda and their children are Eamon, Collete and Kyle, and Connor who married Geraldine whose child is Mary,
Mary Flaherty first appeared in 1997 when the Fowlers went to Ireland to find her long lost sister, Mary came back to Walford to escape her alcoholic and violent grandfather and relationship with an older man. Although she got on with Mark Fowler she and Pauline found they could not live in the same house so she moved out and quickly became a problem after coming between Joe Wicks and Sarah Hills. She also had affairs with Mathew Rose and Robbie Jackson. She returned to Ireland with her father in 1999 who was then running off with Ruth, Mark’s wife who he had got pregnant. Who said life is not circular and everyone is connected to everyone by no more than six connections. It is difficult to believe that the only Beale’s in the future will be those from Pete and Kath.
