For actress Helen George, Call the Midwife has been all about the formation of close bonds. ‘It is a really tight cast and crew who work well together,’ she explains. ‘I love the scenes when I’m with all the girls – Miranda, Bryony and Jessica – and the delivery scenes are fantastic because there is such a chemistry between us. Then when the nurses relax together, they all eat cake in the Nonnatus House kitchen and Trixie lights up a fag.’
This is perhaps the worst aspect of the job for non-smoker Helen. ‘They are herbal cigarettes and they smell awful. No fun at all when you’re going for the hundredth take.’
Q&A
What is your favourite outfit?
I think it all begins with the foundations. I couldn’t live without my circle-stitched brassiere and boned suspender belt.
Where do you go on holiday?
I have a wonderfully indulgent godmother who lives near Portofino; I try to visit her once a year.
Who is your dream date and where would you go?
I’d find it hard to resist David Niven – older men are so much more polished. And who could say no to supper and dancing at the Savoy?
What is your favourite record and film?
I have a Peggy Lee LP that we sometimes play in the parlour when the nuns have gone to bed. And I’ve seen Love is a Many Splendoured Thing five times – there’s something so compelling about a weepie.
What is your most treasured memory?
When I was eight, our cat Blossom had kittens in my doll’s cot. It was the first time I’d witnessed the miracle of birth – seeds were definitely sown that day.
Your favourite meal?
Anything eaten in an Italian restaurant, with a red-checked tablecloth and the company of friends.
What do you do in your spare time?
Mend my stockings and touch up my hair. And sometimes I sit at the back of the chapel during Compline and listen to the nuns as they sing their evening prayers. It touches me in a way I can’t describe.
What’s your secret vice?
I read the problem pages in magazines, and give really rude advice in my head.
And your most shining virtue?
I never show fear.
Where would you like to be in five years’ time?
Having fittings for a wedding dress.
‘WILL YOU AT LEAST LET ME TAKE YOU TO NORMAN HARTNELL, AND BUY YOU A WEDDING GOWN?’
LADY BROWNE
‘YOU CAN TAKE ME TO NORMAN HARTNELL, AND BUY ME A SKIRT SUIT. PREFERABLY CRIMPLENE.’
CHUMMY
Once, when I was on the set of Cranford, a very senior actress took exception to the term ‘costume drama’. ‘Why must people always speak of costume drama?’ she asked, in vexed but beautifully modulated tones, ‘I wear a costume in everything I’m in!’
She had a point. Costumes are literally woven into the very fabric of every film and television show, be they contemporary or set in the past. As much expertise and care goes into choosing the right jeans and jacket for a cop show as the tippets and gloves of a Gaskell adaptation. But when a drama is set in a different time all aspects of visual design are more immediately apparent and therefore, perhaps, there is more delight to be derived.
I first worked with Amy Roberts on the revival of Upstairs Downstairs, for which she received an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Costume Design. When Pippa suggested her for Call the Midwife, I knew at once that she’d be absolutely perfect. Amy already had several BAFTA wins for Costume under her belt, including one for the 2007 BBC production of Oliver Twist and the previous year’s Elizabeth I: The Virgin Queen.
One of the most interesting things about Call the Midwife is that although it is set long enough ago to qualify as a period drama, the 1950s are within living memory for many of the show’s core audience. This throws up challenges for every department, but people remember details of what they and their loved ones were wearing far more vividly than they can recall the finer points of the vehicles in the street or the news on the radio. I knew from the start that we couldn’t let the show become a fancy dress parade. And that, to my mind, was why we needed Amy, because she doesn’t just do costumes, she does clothes. Detailed, thoughtful, authentic garments that speak of lives lived, and work undertaken. ‘These were real people, doing real things, that really happened,’ she declares. From the outset, creating complete outfits for every single character from the smallest newborn to the oldest nun, Amy has been passionate in her desire to represent the tough, vibrant people of Poplar. Her determination to do justice to this world comes, in part, from her own family background. Her mother Jo, one of 13 children, grew up in the tough East End district of Custom House and left school when she was just 14 years old.
Unfortunately for Amy, her family was one of many at the time that didn’t own a camera, so there is no family archive for her to draw upon. However, over the years, she has accrued a wide-ranging personal library of reference material, which includes many photographs, newspapers and magazines from the fifties. Intriguingly, Amy also has a magpie’s eye for fashion spreads in the present-day glossies – these often provide clues as to how a character’s individual ‘look’ should be shaped, and give fresh insights into colour and texture. In her files, images torn from Vogue rub shoulders with black and white snaps snipped out of Picture Post.
Colour is vitally important to Amy. Thanks to the lack of colour images in contemporary journalism and newsreels, it’s tempting to think of the fifties as a rather drab decade. This was not necessarily the case, but clothing rationing had only ended in 1949, and less than ten years later many people were in the habit of making ‘serviceable’ choices in apparel, on the assumption that everything must last. There was still a lot of brown and grey about, and many young men and women were still in military uniform due to the demands of National Service. Amy has developed techniques for making sure the muted tones don’t dominate.
‘To make a crowd scene more arresting we will throw in an acid-yellow cardigan, or a plum-coloured headscarf to catch the eye. We are making a show and not a