Lionel Bart was an English writer and composer of pop music and musicals. He wrote Tommy Steele's "Rock with the Caveman" and was the sole creator of the musical Oliver! (1960). With Oliver! and his work alongside theatre director Joan Littlewood at Theatre Royal, Stratford East, he played an instrumental role in the 1960s birth of the British musical theatre scene after an era when American musicals had dominated the West End.
Manfred Mann were an English rock band, formed in London and active between 1962 and 1969. They were named after their keyboardist Manfred Mann, who later led the successful 1970s group Manfred Mann's Earth Band. The group had two different lead vocalists, Paul Jones from 1962 to 1966 and Mike d'Abo from 1966 to 1969. Other members of various group line-ups were Mike Hugg, Mike Vickers, Dave Richmond, Tom McGuinness, Jack Bruce and Klaus Voormann.
Roy Mitchell Kinnear was an English character actor and comedian. He was known for his acting roles in movies such as Henry Salt in the 1971 film Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory, Algernon in The Beatles' Help! (1965), Clapper in How I Won the War (1967), and Planchet in The Three Musketeers (1973). He reprised the role of Planchet in the 1974 and 1989 sequels, and died following an accident during filming of the latter.
Johnny Speight was an English television scriptwriter of many classic British sitcoms.
The Wednesday Play is an anthology series of British television plays which ran on BBC1 for six seasons from October 1964 to May 1970. The plays were usually original works written for television, although dramatic adaptations of fiction also featured. The series gained a reputation for presenting contemporary social dramas, and for bringing issues to the attention of a mass audience that would not otherwise have been discussed on screen.
Armchair Theatre is a British television drama anthology series of single plays that ran on the ITV network from 1956 to 1974. It was originally produced by ABC Weekend TV. Its successor Thames Television took over from mid-1968.
George Sewell was an English actor, best known for his television roles, but also active on stage and in films.
Nell Mary Dunn is an English playwright, screenwriter and author. She is known especially for a volume of short stories, Up the Junction, and a novel, Poor Cow.
Hylda Baker was an English comedian, actress and music hall performer. Born and brought up in Farnworth, Lancashire, she is perhaps best remembered for her role as Nellie Pledge in the Granada ITV sitcom Nearest and Dearest (1968–1973) and for her role in the 1960 film Saturday Night and Sunday Morning.
Meredith Lynn MacRae was an American actress, singer and talk show host. She is most remembered for her roles as Sally Morrison on My Three Sons (1963–1965) and as Billie Jo Bradley on Petticoat Junction (1966–1970).
"Up the Junction" was the third single released from Squeeze's second album, Cool for Cats. Sung by Glenn Tilbrook, it is one of the band's most popular and well-remembered songs, and reached number 2 on the UK Singles Chart, the same position as its predecessor, "Cool for Cats".
Christopher Jeremy Sandford was an English television screenwriter who came to prominence in 1966 with Cathy Come Home, his controversial entry in BBC1's The Wednesday Play anthology strand, which was directed by Ken Loach. Later, in 1971, he wrote another successful one-off, Edna, the Inebriate Woman, for The Wednesday Play's successor series Play for Today.
Peter Collinson was a British film director probably best remembered for directing The Italian Job (1969).
Carole Joan White was an English actress.
The Edgar Wallace Mysteries is a British second-feature film series mainly produced at Merton Park Studios for Anglo-Amalgamated. There were 48 films in the series, which were released between 1960 and 1965. The series was screened as The Edgar Wallace Mystery Theatre on television in the United States.
Up the Junction is a 1968 British "kitchen sink" drama film, directed by Peter Collinson and starring Dennis Waterman, Suzy Kendall, Adrienne Posta, Maureen Lipman and Liz Fraser. It is based on the 1963 book of the same name by Nell Dunn and was adapted by Roger Smith. The soundtrack was by Manfred Mann. The film followed Ken Loach's BBC TV adaptation of 1965, but returned to the original book. It generated less controversy and impact than the Loach version.
Alan Brown, known professionally as Alan Browning, was an English actor. Whilst working by day as a reporter for a local paper in Newcastle in the 1950s, he began acting as an amateur at the People's Theatre. He then moved to London to work for a news agency and was sent abroad to Cairo, where he met his first wife (Anne) who was serving in the Women's Royal Naval Service (Wrens).
A television play is a television programming genre which is a drama performance broadcast from a multi-camera television studio, usually live in the early days of television but later recorded to tape. This is in contrast to a television movie, which employs the single-camera setup of film production.
"Up the Junction" is an episode of the BBC anthology drama series The Wednesday Play directed by Ken Loach and produced by James MacTaggart. It was first broadcast on 3 November 1965 on BBC 1. The play was adapted by Nell Dunn and (uncredited) Ken Loach from Dunn's short story collection of the same name. It tells the stories of three young women living in North Battersea and Clapham and, to a lesser degree, their boyfriends.
Up the Junction is a 1963 short story collection by Nell Dunn.
