Jane Freeman and Jonathan Linsley advertising John Smiths

It isn't a true reflection of who you are in real life.


But certain actresses/actors do bring their real life personas to part they play Brian Blessed is a classic example he is the same loud and boisterous person in real life as he was in any number of parts he has played. I am sure people can think of many other examples Olivia Coleman for a start .
 
But you have to "act" a character. It isn't a true reflection of who you are in real life.

I don't understand.

My point is Jonathan Linsley is a very capable actor, and I don't think his weight loss would have altered his performance as Crusher.

I don't think his weight loss altered his appearance enough to not be included in the show, particularly as weight loss can easily be written into a show (in fact there is some comedy value there to be gained).
 
I always assumed that Milburn's nickname Crusher was a direct reference to his size and the weight loss effectively killed of the analogy and therefore the character.

That's pretty much Alan Bell's explanation in his book for why they didn't bring the character forward. If you watch, they were even making him look bigger then he was in some scenes, where he towers over Compo because they had him standing on something. I don't think Bell could see the character as thinner and smaller and as Crusher wasn't a major character on the show, I guess he felt there wasn't a need to bend over backward to make it work.

That all said, I do keep wondering about the decision to have his girlfriend appear in a Christmas special a few years later as if he was still around. Like maybe it was supposed to originally feature a short appearance by Jonathan and it just didn't come together.
 
The part of Fran, Crusher's girlfriend, seemed hastily written - nothing to do with the plot, and added absolutely nothing to the story.

Wasn't the actress a Blue Peter presenter?

Anyone know if Blue Peter were doing a feature on the show, and the part was specially written for this?
 
Yes it was Yvette Fielding making a guest appearance.They we’re doing a Blue Peter report in the show. Mark Curry another BP presenter has also made an appearance.
 
The part of Fran, Crusher's girlfriend, seemed hastily written - nothing to do with the plot, and added absolutely nothing to the story.

Wasn't the actress a Blue Peter presenter?

Anyone know if Blue Peter were doing a feature on the show, and the part was specially written for this?

Yeah, I know about the Blue Peter angle but its also interesting because they made her unusually accurate for the role. Specifically, her hair. There was a Crusher episode where Compo refers to his "colored bird" girlfriend and then explains that her hair is different colors. They actually did that for the special. For a show that typically didn't pay attention to older references, its a surprisingly well considered detail.
 
Does anyone know of a video of the Blue Peter report on Yvette's role in the show, or at least the date of it? It would be interesting to see thier take on it.
 
I don’t know of any footage online from it but here’s the radio times listing, from 19th December 1988


Blue Peter
Mon 19th Dec 1988, 17:05 on BBC One London
with Mark Curry, Caron Keating and Yvette Fielding
Last of the Summer Wine! Go behind the scenes as Compo, Clegg and Seymour put together their Christmas programme. But who's that punk lurking in Nora Batty's cafe? It couldn't be Yvette, could it?
(Subtitles)
Contributors
Presenter:Mark Curry
Presenter:Caron Keating
Presenter:Yvette Fielding
Producer:Nick Heathcote
Producer:Andrew Whitman
Producer:Oliver Macfarlane
Editor:Lewis Bronze
 
I had a look in YouTube etc last night to see if there was anything but I couldn’t find it.There’s a couple of episodes from two weeks before but not this one. Hopefully someone can find it.
 
I had a look in YouTube etc last night to see if there was anything but I couldn’t find it.There’s a couple of episodes from two weeks before but not this one. Hopefully someone can find it.

I had a look on Youtube and also Dailymotion and Google, but with not much more luck than you ferret.
 
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