Dates for Editor's Meets & Eats

Copied from an email Mary sent to Rod.

I think what I am interested in that the editors can help with is:

1. what it was like being at Ealing, the biggest user of film in the world. The experience of day-to-day stuff to the big super shows - Tinker, Tailor, or Ascent of man - on the camera side we were aware of these being big programmes - and of course, Dennis Potter stuff - cutting that must have been exciting. So any anecdotes about specific programmes welcome.

2. The edit block - Walt Denning told me a story of how the editors decided they did not want battle ship grey cutting rooms, so started painting them any old colour. The contact from Kays labs asked Walt why the requests for colour grading had escalated - and Walt discovered that the editors were being confused by the colour of the walls into compensating the colour balance o0f the film. Verification of that story would be welcome! And the experience of being an editor at Ealing - facilities, equipment, hours, working with directors - and the quality of the rushes! I maintain that we produced good rushes but I am sure editors will have a different slant - (I will of course leave any references to appalling rushes out on the grounds that camera dept are Gods, ha ha - no, I want to make the case that in general our Quality was good, so verification and opinions welcome).

3. What was the end like for edit dept? Did you have to write cvs and have silly bloody interviews to see if you could be made redundant? I had left by then (without being paid to go) - so I want to know how it felt. Did people get work"outside"? One element I am interested in is that having been at the BBC almost was an embarrassment outside - I certainly did not mention it when I went freelance (I probably looked like I had done time at HMP...)