Hollywood bosses told me I wasn’t sexy and had the ‘wrong body’, says Harry Potter star Helena Bonham Carter
IN a different TV era, Noele Gordon was “the Queen of the Midlands” as the star of soap Crossroads.
Millions tuned in to watch her play motel matriarch Meg Mortimer in the Birmingham-based show, turning “Nolly” — as she was affectionately nicknamed — into a national sensation.
While captivating viewers of the soap, famed for its wobbly sets, she scooped a host of best actress gongs.
And the drama wasn’t just on screen for Noele, with her private life just as eventful and colourful, but sadly touched by tragedy.
In a world where we have the choice of dozens of channels as well as multiple streaming services, it is hard to imagine how big a star Nolly was in the Seventies and Eighties.
And now new ITVX drama Nolly hopes to introduce this former telly superstar to a whole new generation.
The three-parter from It’s A Sin and Doctor Who writer Russell T Davies, and starring Helena Bonham Carter in the title role, covers Noele’s career from 1964, when she was hired to launch the new soap, Crossroads.
It then continues up to 1981, when she was axed before dying of cancer four years later, aged 65.
Though much of her story is tragic, the drama is also filled with joy, and not just because it pays a nostalgic trip back to the ITV show known for its shaky sets and sometimes even shakier acting.
It reminds us that Nolly, during the 3,521 episodes of Crossroads she starred in, helped create a hugely-loved TV institution.
Soap matriarch
And she won the coveted TV Times best actress award every year for six years, which no doubt enraged rivals at Coronation Street.
Her character, motel boss Meg, became one of the greatest soap matriarchs alongside Coronation Street’s Elsie Tanner, and in the same bracket as the later EastEnders legend Dot Cotton.
Helena, 56, said: “It’s very difficult to explain to people like my kids, who think I was brought up with dinosaurs, that there were only three channels so the impact of the soap was huge.
“And the impact of Nolly, she was in everyone’s living room – with 15million viewers. Because there wasn’t much else.
“Now it’s a bit of a shame because none of us are watching anything at the same time, we’ve missed the community of watching now.”
Nolly became rich and famous on the back of having millions tune in to see her, but she worked her way up from the bottom.
There were only three channels so the impact of the soap was huge. Nolly was in everyone’s living room with 15 million viewers, three times a week. Because there wasn’t much else.
Helena Bonham Carter
Jean Noele Gordon was born in the East End of London on Christmas Day 1919, hence her middle name, and the one which she eventually used as her stage title.
She went into performing from an early age.
In 1928, aged just eight, she was in the world’s first colour transmission carried out by John Logie Baird, the inventor of television.
Another landmark in her career came when she started working for new Birmingham-based ITV station ATV, first as the country’s first female producer, then landed her own chat show, Tea With Noele Gordon.
She even became the first woman to interview a Prime Minister, the then leader Harold Macmillan.
But her career really took off when she signed up to Crossroads, carving out a niche for herself that earned her the title of “Queen of the Midlands” and made her a star in her.
She entered the pantheon of Britain’s best known ntertainers by the Seventies, often appearing alongside her close pal, presenter Larry Grayson, portrayed in the new ITVX show by Mark Gatiss.
Crucially, Nolly was largely credited with making a huge hit out of the soap, which was generally seen as something of a poor man’s Corrie.
In doing so, the programme, and its leading lady, were credited with popularising daytime TV — because before it came along nobody thought anything that aired before 7pm was significant.
Among the cast and crew she was also a mother figure, often feared but also loved for her incredibly kind gestures.
But the bosses didn’t like her bombastic manner when it came to rewriting scripts and scenes.
Eventually, in 1981, she was brutally axed from the ITV show, not because her performances had waned but because it was felt she had got too far above her station.
Helena says she felt an affinity with the character of Noele as she was a strong woman who had forged a successful career in a male-dominated industry.
The Crown and Harry Potter actress said: “She was a proper leader and she looked after almost everyone who was on Crossroads.
“She was very upfront and deeply authentic. And she wore her experience and she had been, I felt, sacked in her prime.
“She couldn’t have been better at what she was doing.
“I suspect that she was sacked because people were threatened by her. They might have been annoyed too, but she was clever, probably more clever than other people on the show and they resented her power.
“But she was right most of the time.”
Nolly also touches on the tragedy of the central character’s love life.
She received multiple proposals, and was engaged for a while, but for 20 years she had “left her life empty” waiting for it to be filled by the married man she was besotted by — Val Parnell.
The showbiz impresario was known as “Mr Television” due to the large number of stars he created, ranging from Norman Wisdom to Julie Andrews.
He told Nolly he was ending their relationship because he couldn’t divorce his wife due to being raised a Catholic.
Then he ran off with his secretary who was half his age, before dying of a heart attack in 1972.
But it was Nolly who, ultimately, was seen as a peculiar character — because she never married or had children.
Helena said: “In episode three, Nolly gives a wonderful speech where she talks about women being defined by men.
“Particularly then if you’re a woman and you’re not married and don’t have children, you’re viewed as strange or odd.
“And there’s a silent army of women with no name and there’s a lot to be said these days in that.”
But in the TV drama Nolly is seen finally finding a man who understands an cares about her in Tony Adams, who played the caddish motel manager, Adam Chance.
There was no romance between the two actors, not least because he was 21 years younger than her.
But Nolly and Tony, played by Augustus Prew in the ITVX drama, had an incredibly close relationship which brought her huge joy and support in her final years.
Hilarious highs
The drama includes the hilarious moment when Nolly was filming her final scenes on Crossroads — waving goodbye as she set sail on the liner QE2 — when Tony sailed a boat alongside the vessel to give her a proper send off from her best friend.
There are other hilarious highs, like the sight of Nolly getting arrested in Thailand after she was sacked from Crossroads.
She had been caught having a night on the town in a Bangkok strip club and was duly arrested, before being released.
As well as being a sad story, it is also the tale of someone who bounced back as, in 1985, Crossroads bosses asked her to return to the soap, but she was already too ill.
Helena said: “You’ll like this drama if you’re a woman and you’re approaching mid-life, or even if you’re a man, or anybody who’s been sacked or been bullied or been badly treated.
“But you don’t have to be a fan of Crossroads to find this hilarious. it’s a brilliantly told story — come on the ride.”
- Nolly is released on ITVX on February 2.
More motel faves
THE writing really was on the wobbling wall for Crossroads when Victoria Wood parodied the soap.
From 1985 to 1987, the late comic lampooned the soap in spoof Acorn Antiques, which also starred Julie Walters and Celia Imrie.
Then, in 1988, ITV axed Crossroads.
Aside from the bizarre plots and sometimes laughable acting, the cast of characters at the motel gave Victoria plenty of material to work with.
Most memorable was Benny Hawkins, the kind but poorly educated handyman played by Paul Henry from 1975 and 1988.
He became one of the most famous, and widely impersonated, soap characters in history.
Wartime bomb
Another favourite character was Diane Lawton, played by Susan Hanson.
She arrived at the motel to take part in a beauty contest in the Sixties then got a job as a waitress and kitchen hand.
Years later, Diane suffered a nervous breakdown after witnessing a wartime bomb explode in the motel kitchen.
Yet the character with the best name, if nothing else, was Shughie McFee, the motel’s Scottish chef played by Angus Lennie.
He once went behind a fridge to get some ingredients and, in a classic Crossroads continuity cock-up, wasn’t seen again for weeks.