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ARTS IN ACTION: Luck be a Lady - noteworthy rôle début to crown Opera Carolina's November 2019 production of Giuseppe Verdi's Macbeth
Lady of the hour: soprano Othalie Graham, Lady Macbeth in Opera Carolina's November 2019 production of Giuseppe Verdi's Macbeth
[Photograph © by the artist]
Io vorrei in Lady una voce aspa, soffocata, cupa...la voce di Lady vorrei che avesse del diabolico. | I want for the Lady a harsh, throttled, somber voice...I want Lady's voice to embody the diabolical.
It was with these words, written in a letter to librettist Salvadore Cammarano on 23 November 1848, that Giuseppe Verdi described the qualities that he wanted the voice of the eponymous thane's consort in his ambitious operatic treatment of William Shakespeare's Macbeth to embody. Rarely in the history of opera can a composer be found to have complained of a singer's voice being too beautiful and angelic to sing a rôle effectively, but this was the foundation of Verdi's dissatisfaction with Eugenia Tadolini, the soprano who earned Gaetano Donizetti's admiration with her creations and, in the cases of first Giovanna Seymour and later the title rôle in Anna Bolena, recreations of leading ladies in his operas and was engaged by Teatro San Carlo to sing Lady Macbeth in the Neapolitan première of Verdi's Macbeth.
When Macbeth was introduced to the public at Florence's Teatro della Pergola on 14 March 1847, Lady Macbeth was sung by Florentine soprano Marianna Barbieri-Nini, a renowned exponent of dramatic bel canto who had already created the part of Lucrezia Contarini in I due Foscari for Verdi in 1844 and would later be the first Gulnara in Il corsaro. Eighteen years after the opera's Italian première, Verdi substantially revised Macbeth for a Paris production. His second incarnation of Lady Macbeth was first sung by Amélie Rey-Balla, a soprano whose career is sparsely documented aside from accounts of her acclaimed portrayal of Sélika in Meyerbeer's L'Africaine. Prodigiously documented are the formidable demands of Lady Macbeth's music, before and after the composer's revisions: rivaling the ferocity of the vocal writing for Abigaille in Nabucco, Verdi's musical portrait of Lady Macbeth is one of opera's most intimidating sings.
Indicative of the work's many difficulties is the fact that, though Il trovatore, Rigoletto, and La traviata were performed in the company's inaugural 1883 – 1884 Season, Macbeth was not staged by New York's Metropolitan Opera until the 1958 – 1959 Season, when a production by Carl Ebert served as the vehicle for the house début of soprano Leonie Rysanek. Already celebrated for her portrayals of Wagner and Strauss heroines (and, at the time of her MET début, already heard in New York as Lady Macbeth, courtesy of a 1958 Carnegie Hall concert performance by The Little Orchestra Society), Rysanek shouldered the unenviable task of singing the rôle originally intended for Maria Callas, whose supremacy as Lady Macbeth was established by five performances at Milan's Teatro alla Scala in December 1952—her only performances of the part. In subsequent seasons, Macbeth has been performed slightly more than one hundred times at the MET, whereas La traviata has amassed more than a thousand MET performances since 1883.
Veritable armies of singers have performed rôles like Bizet's Carmen and Mimì in Puccini's La bohème at the MET, but the company's roster of Ladies Macbeth is considerably shorter, its relatively meager ranks including Americans Irene Dalis (the first mezzo-soprano to essay the rôle under the MET's auspices), Elinor Ross, and Olivia Stapp [regrettably, the exhilarating Lady Macbeth of another American soprano, Marisa Galvany, never graced the MET stage]; the Swede Birgit Nilsson; the Ukrainian Maria Guleghina; and Russia's Anna Netrebko, who is scheduled to reprise the rôle in the MET's 2019 – 2020 Season. Also significant is the fact that the MET's sole Italian Lady Macbeth to date is the inimitable Renata Scotto.
Following a much-anticipated début in the rôle with Toledo Opera in October 2019, Ontario-born soprano Othalie Graham returns to Charlotte for three further performances as Lady Macbeth with Opera Carolina. Previously heard in Charlotte as Verdi's Aida and Puccini's Turandot [reviewed here], Graham is an uncommon singer with a voice that is at once attractive, powerful, and flexible. Her depiction of Turandot, potentially one of opera's most unidimensional characters, in Opera Carolina's 2015 production confirmed that she is also a shrewdly intelligent actress who instinctively discerns the touchstones of a characterization in the rôle's music. She is a performer whose sincerity forms the nucleus of her approach to any rôle. In an instance of felicitous casting, Graham will be partnered in Opera Carolina's new production of Macbeth by another distinguished singing actor and bona fide Verdian, baritone Mark Rucker. It should not be unusual in 2019 for the leading couple in a Verdi opera to be portrayed by artists of color, but opera companies' rosters still do not reliably mirror the increasing diversity of opera's audiences.
La luce langue: mezzo-soprano Grace Bumbry as Lady Macbeth in Los Angeles Music Center Opera's 1987 production of Giuseppe Verdi's Macbeth
[Photograph © by Los Angeles Music Center Opera; image from the Detroit Public Library collection]
Racial bias in the casting of rôles in Verdi's operas has been prevalent since the works' first performances, especially in the name parts in Aida and Otello. Russell Thomas's 2017 début in the rôle in concert performances with the Atlanta Symphony welcomed an exceptionally rare Otello of color, but, regardless of the suitability of their individual voices for the character's music, Black sopranos from Leonora Lafayette and Gloria Davy to Jessye Norman and Wilhelmenia Wiggins Fernandez have been encouraged to sing Aida. It is narrow-minded to suggest that casting singers of color as Aida has often been based primarily upon race, but scrutiny of performance annals discloses a worrying—and continuing—pattern. Alzira has been performed too infrequently to engender casting trends, but how often have singers whose appearances reflected the character's Andean heritage been engaged to sing Alvaro in La forza del destino? Unlike most of her sisters in the Verdi canon, however, Lady Macbeth, unquestionably a Caucasian character, has benefited extensively from the dramatic prowess of singers of color.
Defying prejudice with a triumphant depiction of Lady Macbeth opposite Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau's Macbeth at the 1964 Salzburger Festspiele, St. Louis-born mezzo-soprano Grace Bumbry became the first artist of color to don the Lady's crown for the Metropolitan Opera when she sang the rôle in a concert performance by MET forces in Newport, Rhode Island, on 17 August 1967. Ultimately, six of Bumbry's seven MET Ladies were sung in tour performances: only her final MET performance of the rôle, on 4 June 1973, was sung at Lincoln Center. Praised in The Saturday Review for 'the manner in which she conceives the character's [in the context of Irving Kolodin's review, Eboli in Verdi's Don Carlo] place in the drama,' Bumbry exhibited dramatic sensibilities with much in common with Othalie Graham's artistry.
Also assuming Lady Macbeth's mantle at the MET in 1973 was one of America's most gifted Verdians, native New Yorker Martina Arroyo. The vitriolic psychology of the power-hungry Lady could hardly be more different from the good-humored soprano's natural temperament, but her mastery of the music imparted the necessary duplicity. In nearly three decades with the MET, Arroyo built a repertoire that encompassed parts as diverse as Donna Anna in Mozart's Don Giovanni, virtually all of the Verdi heroines then before the public, rôles in Wagner's Lohengrin and Der Ring des Nibelungen, and Puccini's Cio-Cio San, bringing to her interpretations welcome emotional directness. Possessing a voice capable both of delivering florid music credibly and of voicing dramatic rôles like Turandot with the requisite aural impact, Graham perpetuates Arroyo's legacy.
Remarkably, the Lady Macbeth of Shirley Verrett (1931 - 2010), justifiably cited by many aficionados as one of the preeminent operatic portrayals of the Twentieth Century and documented on disc and film, was heard only once at the MET (15 February 1988). Like Bumbry, Verrett was a mezzo-soprano who possessed vocal range and dramatic versatility that enabled her to diversify her repertoire by singing soprano rôles. Though her MET tenure as Lady Macbeth was unfortunately limited to a single performance, her depiction still casts a long, intimidating shadow. A critic's description of Verrett's Leonora in a MET traversal of Donizetti's La favorita as 'stupendous in vocalism and amazingly believable in action' also accurately recounts the essence of her Lady Macbeth.
Fatal mia donna: mezzo-soprano Shirley Verrett as Lady Macbeth (left) and baritone Ryan Edwards as Macbeth (right) in Boston Opera Company's 1976 production of Giuseppe Verdi's Macbeth
[Photograph © by Boston Opera Company]
In the context of her depiction of Lady Macbeth garnering appreciation in her homeland, soprano Margaret Tynes, who was educated in and has many ties to North Carolina, was even less fortunate than Verrett. Tynes's MET tenure consists of only three performances, all of them of the title rôle in Leoš Janáček's Jenůfa in 1974, in which her Laca and Kostelnička were Jon Vickers and Astrid Varnay, who was also an accomplished Lady Macbeth. A pirated recording of a 1972 performance of Macbeth from the Teatro Petruzzelli in Bari affirms that Tynes was an imposing, atypically sympathetic Lady Macbeth. Like Verrett, Tynes was an adventurous singer whose solid technical footing enabled her to impress in parts as different as Amaltea in Rossini's Mosè in Egitto and Strauss's Salome. Again, the parallel with Othalie Graham is unmistakable.
Latina artists have also excelled as Lady Macbeth, both in and beyond North America. Though none of them enjoyed opportunities to sing the part at the MET, sopranos Nora López, Gilda Cruz-Romo, and Áurea Gomes (1942 - 2018) wielded unique traits in their performances of the rôle. Now primarily familiar only to aficionados, the Chilean López sang Lady Macbeth in a memorable 1961 Rai Torino broadcast performance, sparring excitingly with the Macbeth of Mario Sereni. In nearly fifteen years on the MET roster, her Mexican colleague Cruz-Romo refined her Verdian credentials with interpretations of Violetta in La traviata, Leonora in Il trovatore and La forza del destino, Amelia in Un ballo in maschera, Elisabetta in Don Carlo, Aida, and Desdemona in Otello, in addition to a stunning turn as Odabella in Attila with Lyric Opera of Chicago. As Lady Macbeth, Cruz-Romo was simultaneously vituperative and vulnerable. Rightly lauded with fervor in her native Brazil, Gomes was an impassioned Lady Macbeth, one whose tale was indeed 'full of sound and fury.'
It is maddening that in 2019, when the indignities endured by people of color on every continent are more visible—and more rectifiable—than ever before, occasional productions of Porgy and Bess are still fêted as increased diversity in opera. Porgy and Bess deserves a place in the standard operatic repertory, but George and Ira Gershwin would surely have agreed that staging their work more frequently should be but a small component of the initiative to make opera more demographically inclusive. As artistic representatives of a wonderfully diverse city, Opera Carolina productions have often featured artists of color in prominent rôles, including the cast of Richard Danielpour's and Toni Morrison's Margaret Garner (2006); Lisa Daltirus as Leonora and Denyce Graves as Azucena in Il trovatore (2011); Gordon Hawkins in the title rôle of Nabucco (2014); and Kevin Thompson as Zemfira's father in Rachmaninov's Aleko (2016). Casting Mark Rucker and Othalie Graham as the sinister spouses in Macbeth perpetuates the company's commitment to obliterating prejudices and stereotypes in the Performing Arts. Moreover, Graham's rôle début as Lady Macbeth—a milestone for the artist, Opera Carolina, and Macbeth—honors a storied past in which ladies of several ethnicities have proclaimed that the only colors that are important in opera are those projected by the voice.
Graham and Rucker are joined in Opera Carolina's production of Macbeth by Zaikuan Song as Banco, Valentino Buzza as Macduff, and Jonathan Kaufman as Malcolm. Opera Carolina's Artistic Director James Meena will conduct.
Click here to read a Voix des Arts profile of Othalie Graham.
For more information about Othalie Graham's career and future engagements, please click here to visit her official website.
Opera Carolina's production of Verdi's Macbeth opens in Belk Theater at Charlotte's Blumenthal Performing Arts Center on Thursday, 7 November 2019. Additional performances are scheduled for 9 and 10 November. Click here to learn more about and to purchase tickets for the production.
September 2019 RECORDING OF THE MONTH: Ludwig van ...
ARTS IN ACTION: Luck be a Lady - noteworthy rôle d...


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Hammer Film Productions
Title: Hammer Film Productions
Subject: Horror fiction/This day in horror archive, Did you know nominations/Tales of Frankenstein, The Kiss of the Vampire, Scars of Dracula, The Mummy (1959 film)
Collection: 1934 Establishments in the United Kingdom, Cinema of the United Kingdom, Companies Established in 1934, Film Production Companies of the United Kingdom, Hammer Film Productions
William Hinds, James Carreras
Simon Oakes
(CEO & President, Hammer)
Hammer Films or Hammer Pictures is a British film production company based in London. Founded in 1934, the company is best known for a series of Gothic "Hammer Horror" films made from the mid-1950s until the 1970s. Hammer also produced science fiction, thrillers, film noir and comedies — and, in later years, television series. During its most successful years, Hammer dominated the horror film market, enjoying worldwide distribution and considerable financial success. This success was due, in part, to distribution partnerships with major United States studios, such as Warner Bros.
During the late 1960s and 1970s the saturation of the horror film market by competitors and the loss of American funding forced changes to the previously lucrative Hammer formula, with varying degrees of success. The company eventually ceased production in the mid-1980s. In 2000, the studio was bought by a consortium including advertising executive and art collector Charles Saatchi and publishing millionaires Neil Mendoza and William Sieghart.[1] The company announced plans to begin making films again after this, but none were produced.
In May 2007, the company was sold again, this time to a consortium headed by Dutch media tycoon John de Mol, who announced plans to spend some $50m (£25m) on new horror films. The new owners also acquired the Hammer group's film library, consisting of 295 movies. Simon Oakes, who took over as CEO of Hammer, said: "Hammer is a great British brand — we intend to take it back into production and develop its global potential. The brand is still alive but no one has invested in it for a long time".[2] Since then it has produced the feature films Let Me In (2010), The Resident (2011) and The Woman in Black (2012).
Early history (1935 to 1937) – Hammer Productions 1.1
Resurrection (1938 to 1955) – Hammer Film Productions 1.2
The birth of Hammer Horror (1955 to 1959) 1.3
The Curse of Frankenstein 2.1
Dracula 2.2
The Mummy 2.3
Non-horror films 2.4
Sequels (1959 to 1974) 3
Frankenstein 3.1
Cave Girls 3.4
Psychological thrillers 3.5
Others 3.6
Market changes (early 1970s) 4
The Karnstein Trilogy 4.1
Later years of film production (later 1970s) 5
Revival (2007–present) 6
Revival films 6.1
Critical response 7
Television series (1980s) 8
Hammer House of Horror 8.1
Hammer House of Mystery and Suspense 8.2
Tribute and parody 9
Early history (1935 to 1937) – Hammer Productions
In November 1934 William Hinds, a comedian and businessman, registered his film company, Hammer Productions Ltd.[3][4] It was housed in a three-room office suite at Imperial House, Regent Street, London. The company name came from Hinds' stage name, Will Hammer, which he had taken from the area of London in which he lived, Hammersmith.[5]
Work began almost immediately on the first film, The Public Life of Henry the Ninth at the MGM/ATP studios, with filming concluding on 2 January 1935. The film tells the story of Henry Henry, an unemployed London street musician, and the title was a "playful tribute" to Alexander Korda's The Private Life of Henry VIII which was Britain's first Academy Award for Best Picture nominee in 1934.[6] During this time Hinds met Spanish émigré Enrique Carreras, a former cinema owner, and on 10 May 1935 they formed a film distribution company Exclusive Films, operating from an office at 60-66 National House, Wardour Street.[7] Hammer produced four films distributed by Exclusive:
The Bank Messenger Mystery (1936)
The Mystery of the Mary Celeste (US: The Phantom Ship) (1936), featuring Bela Lugosi
Song of Freedom (1936), featuring Paul Robeson
Sporting Love (1937)
A slump in the British film industry forced Hammer into bankruptcy and the company went into liquidation in 1937. Exclusive survived and on 20 July 1937 purchased the leasehold on 113-117 Wardour Street, and continued to distribute films made by other companies.[8]
Resurrection (1938 to 1955) – Hammer Film Productions
James Carreras joined Exclusive in 1938, closely followed by William Hinds' son, Anthony. At the outbreak of World War II, James Carreras and Anthony Hinds left to join the armed services and Exclusive continued to operate in a limited capacity. In 1946, James Carreras rejoined the company after demobilisation. He resurrected Hammer as the film production arm of Exclusive with a view to supplying 'quota-quickies' - cheaply made domestic films designed to fill gaps in cinema schedules and support more expensive features.[9] He convinced Anthony Hinds to rejoin the company, and a revived 'Hammer Film Productions' set to work on Death in High Heels, The Dark Road, and Crime Reporter. Not able to afford top stars, Hammer acquired the film rights to BBC radio series such as The Adventures of PC 49 and Dick Barton: Special Agent (an adaptation of the successful Dick Barton radio show).[10] All were filmed at Marylebone Studios during 1947. During the production of Dick Barton Strikes Back (1948), it became apparent that the company could save a considerable amount of money by shooting in country houses instead of studios. For the next production – Dr Morelle - The Case of the Missing Heiress (another radio adaptation) – Hammer rented Dial Close, a 23 bedroom mansion beside the River Thames, at Cookham Dean, Maidenhead.[11]
On 12 February 1949 Exclusive registered "Hammer Film Productions" as a company with Enrique and James Carreras, and William and Tony Hinds as directors. Hammer moved into the Exclusive offices in 113-117 Wardour Street, and the building was rechristened "Hammer House".[12]
In August 1949, complaints from locals about noise during night filming forced Hammer to leave Dial Close and move into another mansion, Oakley Court, also on the banks of the Thames between Windsor and Maidenhead.[13] Five films were produced there: Man in Black (1949), Room to Let (1949), Someone at the Door (1949), What the Butler Saw (1950), The Lady Craved Excitement (1950). In 1950, Hammer moved again to Gilston Park, a country club in Harlow Essex, which hosted The Black Widow, The Rossiter Case, To Have and to Hold and The Dark Light (all 1950).
In 1951 Hammer began shooting at its best-remembered base, Down Place, on the banks of the Thames (later known as Bray Studios). The company signed a one-year lease and began its 1951 production schedule with Cloudburst. The house, virtually derelict, required substantial work, but it did not have the construction restrictions that had prevented Hammer from customizing previous homes. A decision was made to remodel Down Place into a substantial, custom-fitted studio complex.[14] The expansive grounds were used for almost all later location shooting in Hammer's films, and are a key to the 'Hammer look'.
Also in 1951, Hammer and Exclusive signed a four-year production and distribution contract with Robert Lippert, an American film producer. The contract meant that Lippert and Exclusive effectively exchanged products for distribution on their respective sides of the Atlantic – beginning in 1951 with The Last Page and ending with Women Without Men (AKA Prison Story, 1955).[15] It was Lippert's insistence on an American star in the Hammer films he was to distribute that led to the prevalence of American leads in many of the company's productions during the 1950s. It was for The Last Page that Hammer made a significant appointment when they hired film director Terence Fisher, who played a critical role in the forthcoming horror cycle.
Toward the end of 1951 the one-year lease on Down Place expired, and with its growing success Hammer looked towards more conventional studio-based productions. A dispute with the Association of Cinematograph Technicians blocked this proposal, and instead the company purchased the freehold of Down Place. The house was renamed Bray Studios after the nearby village of Bray and it remained as Hammer's principal base until 1966.[15] In 1953 the first of Hammer's science fiction films, Four Sided Triangle and Spaceways, were released.
Hammer Horror contributors
Directors and writers
Michael Carreras, sometimes as Henry Younger - writer and director of The Curse of the Mummy's Tomb and director/producer of The Lost Continent
Terence Fisher - director of Dracula, The Curse of Frankenstein, The Mummy and others
Freddie Francis - director of The Evil of Frankenstein and Dracula has Risen From the Grave
Tudor Gates - writer of The Vampire Lovers, Lust for a Vampire, and Twins of Evil
John Gilling - writer and director of Shadow of the Cat (1961), The Plague of the Zombies (1966), The Reptile (1966) and The Mummy's Shroud
Anthony Hinds, as John Elder - writer of The Brides of Dracula, The Curse of the Werewolf and others
Jimmy Sangster - writer of Dracula, The Curse of Frankenstein and others; director of The Horror of Frankenstein and Lust for a Vampire
Peter Sasdy - director of Taste the Blood of Dracula and Countess Dracula
Harry Robertson - musical director of Countess Dracula, Twins of Evil and others
Other crew
The scores for many Hammer horror films, including Dracula and The Curse of Frankenstein, were composed by James Bernard.
Production designer Bernard Robinson and cinematographer Jack Asher were instrumental in creating the lavish look of the early Hammer films, usually on a very restricted budget.
Hammer's horror films featured many of the same actors in recurring roles; these actors are sometimes called the "Hammer repertory company".
Shane Briant
Miles Malleson
The birth of Hammer Horror (1955 to 1959)
Hammer's first significant experiment with horror came in a 1955 adaptation of Nigel Kneale's BBC Television science fiction serial The Quatermass Experiment, directed by Val Guest. As a consequence of the contract with Robert Lippert, American actor Brian Donlevy was imported for the lead role and the title was changed to The Quatermass Xperiment to cash in on the new X certificate for horror films. The film was unexpectedly popular, and led to the popular 1957 sequel Quatermass 2 – again adapted from one of Kneale's television scripts, this time by Kneale and with a budget double that of the original: £92,000.[16] In the meantime, Hammer produced another Quatermass style horror film, X the Unknown, originally intended as part of the series until Kneale denied them the rights.[17] At the time, Hammer voluntarily submitted scripts to the British Board of Film Censors (BBFC) for comment before production. Regarding the script of X the Unknown, one reader/examiner (Audrey Field) commented on 24 November:
"Well, no one can say the customers won't have had their money's worth by now. In fact, someone will almost certainly have been sick. We must have a great deal more restraint, and much more done by onlookers' reactions instead of by shots of 'pulsating obscenity', hideous scars, hideous sightless faces, etc, etc. It is keeping on and on in the same vein that makes this script so outrageous. They must take it away and prune. Before they take it away, however, I think the President [of the BBFC] should read it. I have a stronger stomach than the average (for viewing purposes) and perhaps I ought to be reacting more strongly."[18]
The Curse of Frankenstein
As production began on Quatermass 2, Hammer started to look for another U.S. partner willing to invest in and handle the American promotion of new product. They eventually entered talks with Associated Artists Productions (a.a.p.) and head, Eliot Hyman. During this period, two young American filmmakers, Max J. Rosenberg and Milton Subotsky, who later established Hammer's rival Amicus, submitted to a.a.p. a script for an adaptation of the novel Frankenstein. Although interested in the script, a.a.p. were not prepared to back a film made by Rosenberg and Subotsky, who had just one film to their credit. Eliot Hyman however, sent the script to his contact at Hammer. Rosenberg would often claim he 'produced' Curse of Frankenstein, an exaggeration repeated in his obituary.
Although the novel by Mary Shelley was long since in the public domain, Anthony Hinds was unsure about the script, as Subotsky's script adhered closely to the plot of the 1939 Universal film Son of Frankenstein, featuring a second-generation Baron Frankenstein emulating his father, the original monster-maker. This put the project at risk of a copyright infringement lawsuit by Universal. In addition a great deal of polishing and additional material was needed, as the short script had an estimated running time of just 55 minutes – far less than the minimum of 90 minutes needed for distribution in the UK. Accordingly, comments on the script from Hammer's Michael Carreras (who had joined his father James as producer in the early 1950s) were less than complimentary:
"The script is badly presented. The sets are not marked clearly on the shot headings, neither is DAY or NIGHT specified in a number of cases. The number of set-ups scripted is quite out of proportion to the length of the screenplay, and we suggest that your rewrites are done in master scene form."[19]
Further revisions were made to the script, and a working title of Frankenstein and the Monster was chosen. Plans were made to shoot the film in Eastmancolor – a decision which caused worry at the BBFC. Not only did the script contain horror and graphic violence, but it would be portrayed in vivid colour.[20]
The project was handed to Tony Hinds who was less impressed with the script than Michael Carreras, and whose vision for the film was a simple black-and-white 'quickie' made in three weeks. Concerned that Subotsky and Rosenberg's script had too many similarities to the Universal films, Hinds commissioned Jimmy Sangster to rewrite it as The Curse of Frankenstein. Sangster's treatment impressed Hammer enough to rescue the film from the 'quickie' treadmill and to produce it as a colour film.
Sangster submitted his script to the BBFC for examination. Audrey Field reported on 10 October 1956:
"We are concerned about the flavour of this script, which, in its preoccupation with horror and gruesome detail, goes far beyond what we are accustomed to allow even for the 'X' category. I am afraid we can give no assurance that we should be able to pass a film based on the present script and a revised script should be sent us for our comments, in which the overall unpleasantness should be mitigated."[21]
Regardless of the BBFC's stern warnings, Hinds supervised the shooting of an unchanged script.[22]
The film was directed by Terence Fisher, with a look that belied its modest budget. Peter Cushing's performance as Baron Victor Frankenstein, and Christopher Lee's as the imposingly tall, brutish monster provide the film with a veneer of polish. With a budget of £65,000 and a cast and crew that would become the backbone of later films, Hammer's first Gothic horror went into production.[22] The use of colour encouraged a previously unseen level of gore. Until The Curse of Frankenstein, horror films had not shown blood in a graphic way, or when they did, it was concealed by monochrome photography. In this film, it was bright red, and the camera lingered on it.
The film was an enormous success, not only in Britain, but also in the USA, where it inspired numerous imitations from, amongst others, Roger Corman and American International Pictures (with their series largely based on Edgar Allan Poe - the so-called "Poe Cycle"). It found success on the European continent, where Italian directors and audiences were particularly receptive.
The huge box office success of The Curse of Frankenstein led to the inevitable desire for a sequel in The Revenge of Frankenstein, and an attempt to give the Hammer treatment to another horror icon.[23] Dracula had been a successful film character for Universal in the past, and the copyright situation was more complicated than for Frankenstein. A legal agreement between Hammer and Universal was not completed until 31 March 1958 – after the film had been shot – and was 80 pages long.[24]
John Van Eyssen as Jonathan Harker.
Meanwhile, the financial arrangement between a.a.p. and Hammer had broken down when money promised by a.a.p. had not arrived. Hammer began looking for alternatives, and with the success of The Curse of Frankenstein signed with Columbia Pictures to distribute the sequel The Revenge of Frankenstein and two films from the defaulted a.a.p. deal The Camp on Blood Island and The Snorkel. Hammer's financial success also meant the winding-down of the parent film distribution company Exclusive, leaving Hammer to concentrate on filmmaking.[25]
Work continued on the script for Dracula, and the second draft was submitted to the BBFC. Audrey Field commented on 8 October 1957:
"The uncouth, uneducated, disgusting and vulgar style of Mr Jimmy Sangster cannot quite obscure the remnants of a good horror story, though they do give one the gravest misgivings about treatment. [...] The curse of this thing is the Technicolor blood: why need vampires be messier eaters than anyone else? Certainly strong cautions will be necessary on shots of blood. And of course, some of the stake-work is prohibitive."[26]
Despite the success of Curse of Frankenstein, the financing of Dracula proved awkward. Universal was not interested,[27] and the search for money eventually brought Hammer back to a.a.p.'s Eliot Hyman, through another of his companies, Seven Arts (which later merged with Warner Bros., now the successor-in-interest to a.a.p.). Although an agreement was drawn up, it is alleged that the deal was never realised and funding for Dracula eventually came from the National Film Finance Council (£33,000) and the rest from Universal in return for worldwide distribution rights.[28] However, recent research suggests that the issue of who exactly funded Dracula is still not entirely clear (see Barnett, 'Hammering out a Deal: The Contractual and Commercial Contexts of The Curse of Frankenstein (1957) and Dracula (1958)', Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, published online 19 November 2013).
With a final budget of £81,412, Dracula began principal photography on 11 November 1957.[29] Peter Cushing starred as Van Helsing and Christopher Lee as Count Dracula, with direction by Terence Fisher and a set design by Bernard Robinson that was radically different from the Universal adaptation – so radical, in fact, that Hammer executives considered paying him off and finding another designer.[30]
Dracula was an enormous success, breaking box-office records in the UK, the United States (released as Horror of Dracula), Canada, and across the world. On 20 August 1958 the Daily Cinema reported:
"Because of the fantastic business done world-wide by Hammer's Technicolor version of Dracula, Universal-International, its distributors, have made over to Jimmy Carreras' organisation, the remake rights to their entire library of classic films."
In 1960 another film title, Brides of Dracula, was supposed to start with Peter Cushing and Christopher Lee, but Lee did not play the role of Dracula.
With the agreement in place, Hammer's executives had their pick of Universal International's horror icons and chose to remake The Invisible Man, The Phantom of the Opera and The Mummy's Hand. All were to be filmed in colour at Bray Studios, by the same team responsible for Dracula, Curse of Frankenstein and Revenge of Frankenstein. The Mummy (the title used for the remake of The Mummy's Hand, which incorporated significant story elements from that film's sequel, The Mummy's Tomb) was made in 1959, The Phantom of the Opera followed in 1962, and Hammer collaborated with William Castle on a remake of The Old Dark House (1963). The Invisible Man was never produced.
Principal photography for The Mummy began on 23 February 1959 and lasted until 16 April 1959. Again it starred both Peter Cushing (as John Banning) and Christopher Lee (as the Mummy, Kharis) and again directed by Terence Fisher with a screenplay from Jimmy Sangster. The Mummy went into general release on 23 October 1959 and broke the box-office records set by Dracula the previous year, in the UK and the U.S. when it was released there in December.[31]
Non-horror films
During the period 1955-1959 Hammer produced other, non-horror films, including The Hound of the Baskervilles starring Peter Cushing as Sherlock Holmes, and comedies such as Don't Panic Chaps!. Nevertheless, it is The Curse of Frankenstein, Dracula and The Mummy that set the direction and provided a template for many future films and for which the company is best known.
Sequels (1959 to 1974)
Hammer consolidated their success by turning their most successful horror films into series. Six sequels to The Curse of Frankenstein were produced between 1958 and 1974:
The Revenge of Frankenstein (1958)
The Evil of Frankenstein (May 8, 1964)
Frankenstein Created Woman (1967)
Frankenstein Must Be Destroyed (1969)
The Horror of Frankenstein (November 8, 1970)
Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell (1974)
All starred Peter Cushing as Baron Frankenstein, except The Horror of Frankenstein (not a sequel, but a tongue-in-cheek remake of The Curse of Frankenstein), where Ralph Bates took the title role. The Evil of Frankenstein stars Cushing but has a re-telling of the Baron's history in flashbacks and a Baron Frankenstein with a very different personality and thus is not a sequel in the sense of a chronological continuation.[32]
Hammer also produced a half-hour pilot titled Tales of Frankenstein (1958) that was intended to premiere on American television; it was never picked up but is now available on DVD. Anton Diffring played Baron Frankenstein.[33]
Hammer produced eight other Dracula films between 1960 and 1974:
The Brides of Dracula (1960)
Dracula: Prince of Darkness (1966)
Dracula Has Risen from the Grave (1968)
Taste the Blood of Dracula (May 7, 1970)
Scars of Dracula (November 8, 1970)
Dracula A.D. 1972 (1972)
The Satanic Rites of Dracula (1973)
The Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires (1974)
The first five were direct sequels to the original. Brides of Dracula did not include Dracula but is still considered part of the series since Peter Cushing repeats his role as Van Helsing to battle vampire Baron Meinster (David Peel) and the film makes several direct references to the 1958 original. The Kiss of the Vampire did not include Van Helsing or Dracula; it continued the theme of Brides of Dracula, showing vampirism as a plague infecting other pockets of unfortunates. Christopher Lee as Dracula returned in the following six films, which employed ingenuity in finding ways to resurrect the Count. Hammer upped the graphic violence and gore with Scars of Dracula in an attempt to re-imagine the character to appeal to a younger audience. Its commercial failure led to a change of style with the following films, which were not period pieces like their predecessors, but had a then-contemporary 1970s London setting. Peter Cushing appeared in both films playing a descendant of Van Helsing.
Christopher Lee grew increasingly disillusioned with the direction the character was being taken and with the poor quality of later scripts — although he did improve these slightly himself by adding lines of dialogue from the original novel. Lee speaks at least one line taken from Bram Stoker in every Dracula film he appeared in, except for Prince of Darkness — in which the Count does not speak. (Lee claimed he was appalled by his dialogue in that film and refused to speak it, but Jimmy Sangster rebutted that no dialogue was written for the character.) He was also concerned about typecasting. After Satanic Rites, he quit the series.
Hammer produced three other mummy films between 1964 and 1971:
The Curse of the Mummy's Tomb (1964)
The Mummy's Shroud (1967)
Blood from the Mummy's Tomb (1971)
These "mummy" movies were unrelated to the 1959 remake and one, The Mummy's Shroud, was relegated to second feature status. Blood from the Mummy's Tomb was a modern-day take on Bram Stoker's The Jewel of Seven Stars and featured Valerie Leon as a reincarnated Egyptian Princess, rather than a mummy. The same novel served as the basis for the 1980 Charlton Heston film The Awakening and a later direct-to-video feature, Bram Stoker's The Mummy, starring Lou Gossett Jr.
By the mid-1960s, the Mummy series and some of Hammer's other horror output were intended for double billing. Two films would be shot back-to-back with the same sets and costumes to save money. Each film would be shown on a separate double-bill to prevent audiences noticing any recycling, as for example in The Plague of the Zombies and The Reptile (both 1965).
Cave Girls
Hammer also produced a series of 'cave girl'-themed films:
One Million Years B.C. (1966), with Raquel Welch.
Slave Girls (1968), released in the US as Prehistoric Women
When Dinosaurs Ruled the Earth (1970)
Creatures the World Forgot (1971)
These films were parodied in Carry On Up the Jungle (1970).[34]
Psychological thrillers
Running alongside production of the Gothic horror films, Hammer made a series of what were known as "mini-Hitchcocks" mostly scripted by Jimmy Sangster, and directed by Freddie Francis and Seth Holt. These low-budget suspense thrillers, often in black-and-white, were made in the mould of Les Diaboliques (1955), although more often compared to the later Psycho. This series of mystery thrillers, which all had twist endings, started with Taste of Fear (US: Scream of Fear, 1961) and continued with Maniac (1963), Paranoiac (1963), Nightmare (1964), Hysteria (1965), Fanatic (1965), The Nanny (1965), Crescendo (1970), Straight on Till Morning (1972) and Fear in the Night (1972).[35]
Other films include:
The Abominable Snowman (1957)
The Two Faces of Dr. Jekyll (1960), a version of Robert Louis Stevenson's Jekyll and Hyde
Never Take Sweets from a Stranger (1960), starring Patrick Allen and Felix Aylmer
The Curse of the Werewolf (1961), Oliver Reed's first starring role
The Phantom of the Opera (1962), starring Herbert Lom
The Gorgon (1964),
She (1965), based on the novel of the same name by Rider Haggard
The Plague of the Zombies (1966)
Quatermass and the Pit (1967); US title "Five Million Years to Earth" (1968)
The Anniversary (1968), with Bette Davis
The Lost Continent (1968) starring Eric Porter
On 29 May 1968, Hammer was awarded the Queen's Award to Industry in recognition of their contribution to the British economy. The presentation ceremony took place on the steps of the Castle Dracula set at Pinewood Studios, during the filming of Dracula Has Risen from the Grave.[36]
Market changes (early 1970s)
In the late 1960s, with the release of successful films like Roman Polanski's Rosemary's Baby (1968), the studio struggled to maintain its place in the market. It responded by bringing in new writers and directors, testing new characters, and attempting to rejuvenate their vampire and Frankenstein films with new approaches to familiar material.
While the studio remained true to previous period settings in their 1972 release Vampire Circus, their Dracula AD 1972 and The Satanic Rites of Dracula, for example, abandon period settings in pursuit of a modern-day setting and "swinging London" feel. These films were not successful, and drew fire not only from critics, but from Christopher Lee himself, who refused to appear in more Dracula films after these. Speaking at a press conference in 1973 to announce The Satanic Rites of Dracula, then called Dracula is Dead... and Well and Living in London, Lee said:
"I'm doing it under protest... I think it is fatuous. I can think of twenty adjectives - fatuous, pointless, absurd. It's not a comedy, but it's got a comic title. I don't see the point."[37]
The film indulges the turn toward self-parody suggested by the title, with some humour appearing in the script, undercutting any sense of horror.
Hammer films had always sold, in part, on their violent and sexual content. After the release of films like Bonnie and Clyde (1967) and The Wild Bunch (1969), audiences were increasingly able to see more explicit gore, more expertly staged, in relatively mainstream films. Night of the Living Dead (1968) had set a new standard for graphic violence in horror films. Hammer tried to compete as far as possible - Frankenstein and the Monster from Hell (1974), for example, features a scene where the Baron kicks a discarded human brain - but realised quickly that, if they couldn't be as gory as new American productions, they could follow a trend in European films of the time, and play up the sexual content of their films.
Hammer Films had commercial success with some atypical output during this period: the film version of the ITV situation comedy series On the Buses (1971). This was popular enough to produce two sequels, Mutiny on the Buses (1972) and Holiday on the Buses (1973) where Hammer returned to making film spinoffs as with PC 49 and Dick Barton.
The Karnstein Trilogy
In the Karnstein Trilogy, based loosely on Sheridan Le Fanu's early vampire novella Carmilla, Hammer showed some of the most explicit scenes of lesbianism yet seen in mainstream English-language films. Despite otherwise traditional Hammer design and direction, there was a corresponding increase in scenes of nudity in the films during this era. The Karnstein Trilogy comprises:
The Vampire Lovers (1970), featuring Polish actress Ingrid Pitt
Lust for a Vampire (1971)
Twins of Evil (1971)
These were written by Hammer newcomer Tudor Gates, who was recruited at about the same time as Brian Clemens (creator of The Avengers). Clemens wrote two unusual films for Hammer. Dr. Jekyll and Sister Hyde (1971) featured Ralph Bates and Martine Beswick, and Captain Kronos, Vampire Hunter (1974), which Clemens also directed, were not successful at the time, but have become cult favourites. The experimental films of this period represented an attempt to find new angles on old stories, but audiences did not seem interested.
Later years of film production (later 1970s)
In the latter part of the 1970s, Hammer made fewer films, and attempts were made to break from the then-unfashionable Gothic horror films on which the studio had built its reputation. Neither The Legend of the 7 Golden Vampires (1974), a co-production with Hong Kong's Shaw Brothers which attempted to combine Hammer's Gothic horror with the martial arts film, nor To the Devil a Daughter (1976), an adaptation of the Dennis Wheatley novel, were successful. Hammer's last production, in 1979, was a remake of Hitchcock's 1938 thriller The Lady Vanishes, starring Elliott Gould and Cybill Shepherd. The film failed at the box office and almost bankrupted the studio.
Revival (2007–present)
In the 2000s, although the company seemed to be in hibernation, frequent announcements had been made of new projects. In 2003, for example, the studio announced plans to work with Australian company Pictures in Paradise to develop new horror films for the DVD and cinema market.
On 10 May 2007, it was announced that Dutch producer John De Mol had purchased the Hammer Films rights via his private equity firm Cyrte Investments. In addition to holding the rights to over 300 Hammer films, De Mol's company plans to restart the studio. According to an article in Variety detailing the transaction, the new Hammer Films will be run by former Liberty Global execs Simon Oakes and Marc Schipper. In addition, Guy East and Nigel Sinclair of L.A.-based Spitfire Pictures are on board to produce two to three horror films or thrillers a year for the U.K.-based studio.
The first output under the new owners is Beyond the Rave, a contemporary vampire story which premièred free online, exclusively, on Myspace in April 2008 as a 20 x 4 min. serial.
The company began shooting a new horror/thriller film in Donegal in 2008, backed by the Irish Film Board. The film is titled Wake Wood and was scheduled for release in the United Kingdom in the Autumn of 2009.[38] The film was produced in collaboration with the Swedish company Solid Entertainment, makers of the vampire film Frostbiten, which pays homage to the Hammer vampire films among others. It was given a limited UK/Ireland theatrical release in March 2011.
In the of summer 2009, Hammer produced in the U.S. Christopher Lee.[39][40] It was released in the US and UK in March 2011.
In 2010, Hammer, in partnership with Overture Films and Relativity Media, released Let Me In, a remake of Swedish vampire film Let the Right One In.[41]
In June 2010, it was announced that Hammer acquired Wake, a script by Chris Borrelli for an action feature to be directed by Danish filmmaker Kasper Barfoed.[42]
In February 2012, the Hammer and Alliance Films adaptation of The Woman in Black was released. Daniel Radcliffe stars as lawyer Arthur Kipps. Jane Goldman wrote the film's screenplay, with James Watkins in the director's chair.
In April 2012, the company announced it was to make a sequel to the The Woman in Black titled The Woman in Black: Angels of Death. Also in 2012, Hammer and Alliance Films announced two more films going into production during 2012, entitled The Quiet Ones and Gaslight.[43] The Quiet Ones tells the story of an unorthodox professor (Jared Harris) who uses controversial methods and leads his best students off the grid to take part in a dangerous experiment: to create a poltergeist. It was released on 10 April 2014 in the UK and 25 April in the USA.
Revival films
Beyond the Rave (2008)
Let Me In (2010)
The Resident (2011)
Wake Wood (2011)
The Woman in Black (2012)
The Quiet Ones (2014)
The Woman in Black: Angel of Death (2015)
The Hammer Horror films were often praised by critics for their visual style, although rarely taken seriously. "Altogether this is a horrific film and sometimes a crude film, but by no means an unimpressive piece of melodramatic storytelling" wrote one critic of Dracula in The Times in 1958.[44] Critics who specialise in cult films, like Kim Newman, have praised Hammer Horror more fully, enjoying their atmosphere, craftsmanship and occasional camp appeal. In A History of Horror, Mark Gatiss remarked that Hammer's earlier films were taken seriously at the time, in comparison to the trademark camp appeal of their later works.
In a 2013 retrospective for The Guardian, Michael Newton wrote:
Shot in Eastmancolor, the first batch of Hammer Horror movies - Terence Fisher's The Curse of Frankenstein (1957), Dracula (1958) and The Mummy (1959) - are among the loveliest-looking British films of the decade... The early Hammer films offer a last gasp of British romanticism, the solid sets drenched in a soft brilliance of shadows, of greys, reds and blues; when these films stray into the far woods, it's always autumn there, never spring. The leaves fall, and the light shines golden and clear; compared with the well-lit contemporary look of the "angry young men" films, Hammer's mournful sumptuousness must have been even more striking. They play out a 1950s reverie of contagion, lust and post-Suez anxiety. Questions of guilt circulate in these films, where the virtuous can be transformed into vampires through one moment of sexual weakness...[45]
Television series (1980s)
Hammer House of Horror
In 1980, Hammer Films created an anthology series for British television, Hammer House of Horror. Shown on ITV, it ran for 13 episodes with a running length of approximately 51 minutes each. In a break from their cinema format, these self-contained episodes featured plot twists which usually saw the protagonists fall into the hands of that episode's horror at the end. The series featured a different kind of horror each week, including witches, werewolves, ghosts, devil worship and voodoo, but also included non-supernatural horror themes such as cannibalism, confinement and serial killers. All the stories were set in contemporary England.
Hammer House of Mystery and Suspense
A second television anthology series, Hammer House of Mystery and Suspense, was produced in 1984 and ran for 13 episodes. The stories were originally to have been the same 51 min. length as their previous series, but it was decided to expand them to feature-length to market them as 'movies of the week' in the US. The running time varied from 69 to 73 minutes. The series was made in association with 20th Century Fox (who broadcast films as Fox Mystery Theater) and as such, the sex and violence seen in the earlier series was toned down considerably for US television. Each episode featured a star, often American, known to US viewers. This series was Hammer's final production of the 20th century, and the studio went into semi-permanent hiatus.
Tribute and parody
The initial success of the Hammer Horror series led to tributes and parodies:
Carry On Screaming! (1966) pays tribute to the Hammer Horror films in particular as well as satirising the horror film genre overall.
The Rocky Horror Picture Show (1975) has many locations, sets, and props that were used in Hammer Horror films. The "pretty" monster is, perhaps, a reference to The Revenge of Frankenstein (though no ulterior motive by Baron Frankenstein is present in the Hammer film).
Bloodbath at the House of Death uses Hammer Horror films as the inspiration for its setting.
The British TV series Dr. Terrible's House of Horrible (2001) featured spoofs of Hammer Horror films. Noteworthy in this regard was the episode entitled "Lesbian Vampire Lovers of Lust".
Singer Kate Bush immortalised the range of films in her song, "Hammer Horror", referencing The Hunchback of Notre Dame, Dracula and Frankenstein.
British rock band Maxïmo Park paid tribute to the series with their song "Hammer Horror", from their B-sides collection Missing Songs.
The dark feel of the Hammer Horror films were the inspiration for the atmosphere used in the comic-horror, Dracula: Dead and Loving It.
In the DVD commentary of Sleepy Hollow, director Tim Burton credits Hammer horror films as a primary influence for the film. Sleepy Hollow featured Hammer veterans including Michael Gough and Christopher Lee.
The faux trailer for Don't featured in Grindhouse was intended to be a spoof of the Hammer Horror series.
Tom McLoughlin claims that Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives was heavily influenced by the Hammer films.
Tale of the Mummy, a 1998 low-budget mummy film by Russel Mulcahy, is a tribute to Hammer's mummy pictures with a cameo role by Christopher Lee and a scene which references to the poster art of Hammer's 1959 mummy adaption.
The parody serial "The Phantom Raspberry Blower", in British comedy sketch series The Two Ronnies, was highly evocative of the Hammer Horrors, particularly the Dracula films.
Much of the dark side of the BBC comedy series The League of Gentlemen written by and starring Reece Shearsmith, Steve Pemberton and Mark Gatiss is based on the Hammer Horror films of which they and co-writer Jeremy Dyson are great fans.
In 2010, Mark Gatiss devoted part of the second episode of his BBC documentary series A History of Horror to Hammer Horror films, including interviews with key Hammer figures.[46]
The British black/death metalgroup Akercocke have drawn influence from the Hammer House of Horror, adopting in their works the tropes of devil worship and sexuality present in the 1980s series and based an album (Choronzon) on the episode 'Guardian of the Abyss'.
The British radio dramatist Marty Ross acknowledged a debt to Hammer with regard to his two serials for BBC Radio 7; Ghost Zone, influenced by Hammer science fiction such as The Damned and the Quatermass films, and Catch My Breath, influenced by The Kiss of the Vampire and The Brides of Dracula.[47]
The Midsomer Murders episode "Death and the Divas" (series 15, episode 4, first broadcast 2 January 2013) is an homage to Hammer Horror films, featuring mock-clips from a variety of 1960s horror movies; the plot concerns an actress famous for her roles in British horror films.
In an interview for the new Blu-ray release of Lifeforce, director Tobe Hooper said that he "had made a 70mm Hammer Film."
List of Hammer films
^ Meikle 1996, p. 3.
^ Hearn & Barnes 1997, p. 8.
^ Sheridan 1978, p. 40.
^ "BFI Most Wanted: The Public Life of Henry the Ninth" BFI Retrieved 28 October 2010
^ Kinsey 2005, p. 9.
^ Kinsey 2005, p. 11.
^ Kinsey 2005, pp. 20-22.
^ a b Kinsey 2005, p. 22.
^ Pixley 2005, p. 18.
^ Michael Carreras' letter to Max Rosenberg, quoted in Kinsey, p51.
^ The original title of the script was Blood of Frankenstein.
^ The agreement was between Cadogan, a Hammer subsidiary, and Universal. See Kinsey (2005) p.86
^ Kinsey 2005, pp. 67, 91.
^ Universal itself was having financial difficulties at the time. The talent agency MCA would buy out the company in 1962.
^ Kinsey 2005, p. 166.
^ Meikle 1996, pp. 59-60.
^ McKay 2007, p. 105.
^ Hardy 1986, p. 137.
^ Rigby 2000.
^ The Resident at the Internet Movie Database
Official Hammer web site
Hammer Film Productions at the Internet Movie Database
Hammer Horror BFI Screenonline article
Hammer Horror Films List
Hammer Film Productions films
Dracula films
Taste the Blood of Dracula (1970)
Scars of Dracula (1970)
The Curse of Frankenstein (1957)
The Evil of Frankenstein (1964)
The Horror of Frankenstein (1970)
Mummy films
The Mummy (1959)
Dick Barton films
Dick Barton: Special Agent (1948)
Dick Barton Strikes Back (1949)
Dick Barton at Bay (1950)
Quatermass films
The Quatermass Xperiment (1955)
Quatermass 2 (1957)
Robin Hood films
The Men of Sherwood Forest (1954)
Sword of Sherwood Forest (1960)
A Challenge for Robin Hood (1967)
On the Buses films
On the Buses (1971)
Mutiny on the Buses (1972)
Holiday on the Buses (1973)
The Woman in Black films
Hammer filmography
Gothic horror films
The Two Faces of Dr. Jekyll (1960)
The Curse of the Werewolf (1961)
The Shadow of the Cat (1961)
The Kiss of the Vampire (1963)
The Gorgon (1964)
Rasputin the Mad Monk (1966)
The Reptile (1966)
Hands of the Ripper (1971)
Dr. Jekyll and Sister Hyde (1971)
Countess Dracula (1971)
Vampire Circus (1972)
Captain Kronos – Vampire Hunter (1974)
To the Devil a Daughter (1976)
The Mystery of the Marie Celeste (1935)
Demons of the Mind (1972)
Man in Black (1949)
The Black Widow (1951)
The Snorkel (1958)
Hell Is a City (1960)
The Full Treatment (1960)
Taste of Fear (1961)
Cash on Demand (1961)
The Maniac (1963)
Paranoiac (1963)
Fanatic (1965)
Hysteria (1965)
Crescendo (1970)
Straight On till Morning (1972)
Fear in the Night (1972)
Four Sided Triangle (1953)
Spaceways (1953)
X the Unknown (1956)
The Man Who Could Cheat Death (1959)
The Damned (1963)
The Lost Continent (1968)
Moon Zero Two (1969)
Mystery films
Death in High Heels (1947)
Dr. Morelle: The Case of the Missing Heiress (1949)
The Rossiter Case (1951)
Whispering Smith Hits London (1952)
Lady in the Fog (1952)
Mantrap (1953)
The Saint's Return (1953)
Blood Orange (1953)
The Glass Cage (1955)
Crime drama films
Cloudburst (1951)
The Last Page (1952)
Wings of Danger (1952)
Stolen Face (1952)
The Gambler and the Lady (1953)
The Flanagan Boy (1953)
Face the Music (1954)
The House Across the Lake (1954)
Murder by Proxy (1954)
Five Days (1954)
A Stranger Came Home (1954)
Third Party Risk (1954)
Women Without Men (1956)
Song of Freedom (1936)
Never Look Back (1952)
Mask of Dust (1954)
Break in the Circle (1955)
Never Take Sweets from a Stranger (1960)
Captain Clegg (1962)
Man at the Top (1973)
Ten Seconds to Hell (1959)
The Stranglers of Bombay (1959)
The Devil-Ship Pirates (1964)
Shatter (1974)
The Jack of Diamonds (1949)
Passport to China (1961)
The Terror of the Tongs (1961)
The Pirates of Blood River (1962)
The Scarlet Blade (1963)
She (1965)
One Million Years B.C. (1966)
The Viking Queen (1967)
The Vengeance of She (1968)
The Public Life of Henry the Ninth (1935)
The Lady Craved Excitement (1950)
Someone at the Door (1950)
What the Butler Saw (1950)
Life with the Lyons (1954)
The Lyons in Paris (1955)
Up the Creek (1958)
I Only Arsked! (1958)
Further Up the Creek (1958)
Don't Panic Chaps! (1959)
The Ugly Duckling (1959)
Watch it, Sailor! (1961)
A Weekend with Lulu (1961)
The Old Dark House (1963)
The Anniversary (1968)
That's Your Funeral (1972)
Love Thy Neighbour (1973)
The Steel Bayonet (1957)
The Camp on Blood Island (1958)
Yesterday's Enemy (1959)
The Secret of Blood Island (1964)
Use British English from November 2013
Film production companies of the United Kingdom
1934 establishments in the United Kingdom
Companies established in 1934
Mary Shelley, Horror fiction, Lord Byron, John Milton, Percy Bysshe Shelley
Christopher Nolan, James Cameron, Hammer Film Productions, Wales, British nationality law
Bram Stoker, Transylvania, Horror fiction, Whitby, Nosferatu
United Kingdom, City of London, Paris, Greater London, Australia
Let Me In (film)
Matt Reeves, Kodi Smit-McPhee, Hammer Film Productions, Dvd, John Ajvide Lindqvist
Horror fiction/This day in horror archive
2005, 2001, 2004, PlayStation, 2006
The Kiss of the Vampire
Hammer Film Productions, Don Sharp, Anthony Hinds, Edward de Souza, Jennifer Daniel
Scars of Dracula
Bram Stoker, Hammer Film Productions, Roy Ward Baker, Emi, Dvd
The Mummy (1959 film)
Hammer Film Productions, Terence Fisher, Jimmy Sangster, Universal Studios, Peter Cushing

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaCommonCrawl


text:
Riccardo Scamarcio (Andria, 13 november 1979) is een Italiaans acteur.

Filmoverzicht
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 L'uomo perfetto, regie Luca Lucini (2005)
 Texas, regie Fausto Paravidino (2005)
 Romanzo criminale, regie Michele Placido (2005)
 Manuale d'amore 2 - Capitoli successivi, regie Giovanni Veronesi (2007)
 Ho voglia di te, regie Luis Prieto (2007)
 Mio fratello è figlio unico, regie Daniele Luchetti (2007)
 Go Go Tales, regie Abel Ferrara (2007)
 Prova a volare, regie Lorenzo Cicconi Massi (2007)
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 Italians, regie Giovanni Veronesi (2009)
 Éden à l'ouest, regie Costa-Gavras (2009)
 Il grande sogno, regie Michele Placido (2009)
 La prima linea, regie Renato De Maria (2009)
 L'uomo nero, regie Sergio Rubini (2009)
 Mine vaganti, regie Ferzan Ozpetek (2010)
 La nostra vita, regie Daniele Luchetti (2010)
 To Rome with Love, regie Woody Allen (2012)
 Third Person, regie Paul Haggis (2013)
 Pasolini, regie Abel Ferrara (2014)
 Burnt, regie John Wells (2015)
 London Spy, regie Jakob Verbruggen (2015; tv-drama)
 John Wick: Chapter 2 (2017)

Italiaans acteur

redpajama_set_name: RedPajamaWikipedia


How to make money being an affiliate marketer is a question often asked and Internet marketers tend to get completely overwhelmed by the 101 things they need to do (or think they need to do) to be successful online.
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If you're thinking you can't do this, it simply means you're out of practice.
All children have imaginary conversations in their heads, and you did as well. This is your chance to let your subconscious mind go to work, filling in the words your persona would say to you in a conversation. You'll be surprised by what you discover because you're opening the door to knowledge you didn't even know you had.
Now then, once you're got a good sense of who your persona is, go ahead and write that blog post or article or sales message directly to your persona, just as you would write a personal letter.
Be sure to connect with them on an emotional as well as intellectual level. Your persona is the only one that matters when you are writing because it is just the two of you having an intimate conversation.
Which one is a vague abstraction and which one can you sink your teeth into? Which one is more believable?
If the headline says you can increase traffic, your skepticism is high. But if it says you can increase your opt-in traffic by 33%, now we're starting to believe and keep reading. If your headline isn't promising something specific, you might want to rewrite it.
This last ingredient is "authority." For many people, especially in the United States, they believe in an authority. What authority are you incorporating into your marketing message?
For example, if you've got a testimonial from a well-known person, are you putting it at or near the very top of your sales letters and videos? If not, you might want to place it where it can't be missed and split test to see how much of an increase in sales it means for you.
Bottom line: Even the strangest product can be sold to the right market. IF you've got the right message. Be sure your headline captures attention and uses specificity, backup your claim with third-party authority, and you can sell most anything.
As an example of 'out of the box thinking' how could you Profit from Bin Laden's death?
He set a website up that night, working until 3:30 in the morning. By the next evening, he had sold more than 10,000 items at $12 a piece that's $120,000 gross in 24 hours – not bad for an evening's work. Don't believe it? – check out this link.
Even if only $10,000 or $20,000 of that was profit (after he paid for the shirts to be made and shipped out), that's still awesome money for one night's work. And thats of course doesn't include the sales he went on to make in the following days and weeks.
Whether you think this guy is brilliant or morbid it got me to thinking… how can I profit from what's in the news?
"Believe me, I no longer look at CNN or the other news sites quite the same, and it gets my head spinning with ideas. How about you?
But the evening news isn't the only place to find the latest trends, nor is it practical for most of us to race home and build a website to sell t-shirts. So how do you find what's going to be hot next?
Well, the internet makes it easier than never before to keep your finger on the pulse of the latest and hottest trends. I've compiled a list below of websites to consult, and would recommend one word of caution: It could be easy to get overwhelmed by this sheer volume of information available. Thus, when you find a great idea, I suggest you immediately stop looking and begin optimizing it straight away.
There is a tremendous advantage to those who are first to hit the market with the information or product that consumers want, for one thing, it can be surprisingly easy to score high in the search engines.
For another, you can become part of the story, generating free publicity for your website and product. But if you bounce from one idea to the next without taking action, well, you know what will happen. Nothing. So look to your heart's content, but when you find a winner, stop looking and start moving.
Are you excited, thinking about all that you're going to accomplish online?
Are you filled with the hope of building a big business and dreams of earning lots of cash? Do you daydream about how you will spend that cash? What about when you get a new idea, do you grin from ear to ear just thinking about how great it's going to be? If so, then I have one word for you. STOP.
That's it. Just start. Start building that business. Take the first step now. Not tomorrow, not next week but right now. Nothing ever gets accomplished from hoping, wishing and dreaming.
True, it makes you feel good, for a short time, yes it programs your subconscious mind but don't, let an opportunity slip through your fingers.
Take action. Get that online education, Get started with Wealthy Affiliate and you can start for free right now and learn how to make money as an affiliate marketer.
Great post Peter! Wow, I didn't know you were living in overseas. I knew you traveled a lot, but didn't know you actually resided out of the country. I get your real estate investor buyer list emails almost daily. I'll bookmark this site and scope around.
Hi there! I haven't heard of affiliate marketing before. But my first impression with it is that it is too complicated. Not until I have read your article, I already understood how it really works. By the way, can I try it even if I don't have any previous experience in it? I wanted to do it because I heard that it can really give me a source of income. Thanks in advance for your response.
Wow what a fantastic site. I am new to affiliate marketing and this is exactly what i want to learn. After viewing this I think i will blow mine up. I bookmarked this site for future reference. Looks like a lot of good info. I am hving some difficulty getting my business to rank. I will be referencing this site a lot.
I have a short story to tell about product price points. One of my websites are focused around selling mattresses online and the brand that I am promoting is very expensive.
There was a day when ONE sale generated $300 for me. I almost fell of my chair because I never though this to be possible. I am now done promoting low priced products because higher priced ones do pay more.
I really like this way of breaking things down into the mathematics of what you need to do to achieve that level of success. I think I am going to do this kind of calculation when planning what new niche I am going to create a website about. Before I commit to it, I need to know how much work I will need to put in to make a good amount of profit. That way I will be able to see whether or not it is worthwhile.
Have you managed to earn $100,000 in a year yet?
Making money as an affiliate marketer is not easy and to be successful you need a proper education. Many people think that it's just about adding a couple affiliate links while in reality it requires many skills, knowledge and experience. Of course, making $100.000 a year is very achievable but requires years of hard work. I think the key to success is through sticking to one direction and keep working until you achieve your goal. BTW, what is your main motivator being an affiliate marketer?
Hi Peter, this is an excellent site and a very well written article here on affiliate marketing, thanks so much for sharing. I started my Internet Marketing around 5 months ago with Wealthy Affiliate and I can honestly say it was the best decision I made, worth every penny or cent for those in the US. I particularly like the way you talk about interviewing someone and asking them their 'story' to build pictures in the readers mind, great article.
This is an incredible site! You break it down so well here! I did have a question regarding online affiliate marketing. What books would you most highly recommend for a beginner to read to plan success? I will make sure to read a few more posts on your site and follow you.
thank you for this article it will help me a lot. The main question I have and I think the majority of new internet marketers is how to get ranked in google.
I have been ranked in google chrome for all my pages but no other browsers, I then logged out of my google plus account and I wasn't ranked at all !!
I use Jaaxy i see you do as well, i pick keywords with under 100 QSR with some traffic not much, but am still not on the first page.
Awesome informational website about how to make money online. I am new to this industry of making money online but your website contains as much helpful information as any site I have read on the subject. I have bookmarked the site so that I can reference it later. You provided detailed tips and in-depth information that anyone wanting to make a success online business can use as a reference or educational tool.
Peter, excellent article, dude! Oftentimes people "can't see the forest though the trees" and get all overwhelmed and confused about online marketing and how to be successful at it. This well-put post breaks down the process in simple, categorized, easy to see and understand increments, making the process seem, indeed, quite "doable".
Also, advising to "tell your own story" is cogent counsel. I had a sales mentor who always reminded me that, "Facts tell, but stories sell".
I hope your website and articles are well read by many people who are searching for answers re: online marketing for success, because you certainly do provide valuable advice here. Nice job, and keep it up!
what a great post! You make it sound so easy, yet as a reader, I really enjoyed the main points from the beginning to the end. It makes sense to commit and start. With your break-down of the earnings, the goal of 100k looks achievable.
I enjoyed the story of the T shirt producer, I made and sold T shirts once, but not that many. I am looking at 'selling' in a different light and I really appreciate a lot of good advise in this post. I wrote a blog for 18 months before I realised I could turn this blog into an income generator, 350+ posts and that's how I came to WA. "Focusing" is my biggest challenge, but I am working on it. I wish you well and thank you for sharing your knowledge.
I really enjoyed your article. There is so much to learn to do this and make it work.
I joined Wealthy Affiliate University about 3 and a half years ago and I love the place.
Taking action is the name of the game and this place teaches you step by step how to do that.
How do you like living in China?
Hello Peter … very professional site. I can see you've been around the block a few times. I think I'm suppose to limit my comments to this page. You have so much content on you site that is hard to do.
What I found interesting is that many of you post titles look almost the same, but you have managed to make the content very different. You writing skills are very evident.
Also your SERPs are doing quite well. As they say "content is king" in the SEO world. I've bookmarked your site for future reference. Hope you don't mind.
Hi Peter – Another great post. The information you have supplied is really spot on.
Recently my style of writing has begun to change to how you recommend it should be, I've still got a long way to go though.
I agree entirely its easier to tell a story about yourself than it is to write facts. I recently did a post about how I started Ju-Jitsu and how my emotions were in turmoil. Not only did this bring back good memories the content of the page flowed .
I really like your idea and mindset of breaking things down into a weekly schedule. If you succeed in doing things this way you are a lot less likely to lose faith in the log run.
Great story about the T-Shirt entrepreneur – just goes to show, if you can come up with a popular idea, you can make a lot of money from it.
Thanks for the tips about sites on the net where I can find out hot topics – you never know I could be lucky enough to come up with a brilliant idea!
I agree totally with your idea that the best type of writing is when it sounds like a natural conversation. I find that it really is the most engaging style when reading blogs or posts on websites.
I also enjoyed the breakdown of the $100,000 a year scenarios. It shows just how that huge amount of income really is possible.
I read about Wealthy Affiliate on one of your other pages, it sounds like it teaches a lot of skills I would need to be successful online, but do I need any prior experience or need to be really good at computers?
I like the example of how to earn $100k a year in this post. It shows that affiliate marketing IS doable. I get so caught up in writing content for my site that I forget the potential we have. It excites me all over again and gets me thinking about new goals. Also so true about writing in personal tone for your readers. I love reading blog posts that tell stories and use actual examples because then I know that the writer is like me and not just some out of touch robot.
Peter I sent for your e-book but don't remember receiving it. May I request it again?
Thank you again for a very well done piece.
Favorited this website, hope to be referring to it in the near future! great article.
I was looking for how to make money as an affiliate marketer. I would like to start out in the niche that I am absolutely passionate about: Surfing.
I like your post but I don't understand what you mean by creating the Headline. I thought that your keyword is simply the Headline or am I wrong?
Hi, thank you for information. It is a lot what to learn from your blogs. All the best, regards. Nemira.
Wow, great info Peter! You sounded like a pro indeed! Look forward for your next article too!
My difficulty as an affiliate marketer is writing a good post. I will practice to write in a conversational and story like format to an imaginary friend like you taught us here. Thank you Peter, for sharing your wisdom.
Looks like you know your stuff! Looking forward to reading more articles from you.


I took a couple of pictures of this sign over a shop in Valle de Bravo, Mexico, in February – not because it was picturesque or folkloric but precisely because it was such an odd mix of digital and hands-on technologies. The plaque and the letters were all made of wood, but the letters were all obviously digital in origin: carved in wood by machine from digital letter forms. The bold caps of 'CONSULTORIO MEDICO," in fact, look like Arial – the most digital of digital fonts. Yet the letters were also clearly carved separately from the plaque, and later attached; the seams were easy to see, and the spacing was what you might get from someone placing each letter by hand, while standing on a teetering ladder. If you look closely, you can even see that the n in "pone" ("pone a su disposicion") is backwards – something that could only have happened from a physical mistake, not a digital one.
Vernacular typography? Yes, Jim, but not as we know it.


If you've been watching the news, you'll know that earlier today Russian President Vladimir Putin declared Crimea a part of Russia in a ceremony at the Kremlin. After a speech in front of parliamentarians and various regional governors, Putin sat down with leaders from the peninsula and signed a draft treaty annexing Crimea. We couldn't help but notice that there was a watch prominently displayed on his wrist. After a little research we deduced that Putin was wearing the Blancpain Grande Date Aqua Lung, a limited edition from nearly a decade ago.
The Grande Date Aqua Lung is a special edition watch from the Léman collection. Here Putin is wearing the stainless steel version, though there was also an edition in rose gold. The case is 40mm and relatively slim at 11.4mm, which is why it slides under a suit cuff so easily. The styling harkens back to vintage Blancpain dive watches, but with the addition of the panoramic date complication at 6 o'clock.
Powering the Grande Date Aqua Lung is the automatic caliber 6950, which has a 72 hour (3-day) power reserve. You can see the movement at work through the sapphire case back. Retail price on the Grande Date Aqua Lung was $11,700, though only 2005 of these watches were made and they sold out long ago.
Last year we gave you a look at Putin's massive watch collection, worth more than six years of his salary, and you can revisit the story here.
For more on the Blancpain Grande Date Aqua Lung, click here.


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- - - Dudi Shaul - - -
"When you become the guitar and your heart at the fingertips that's when the music begins..."
דודי שאול, גיטריסט מורה ומלחין המושפע ממוסיקה אפרו-ברזילאית וספרדית ושואב
השראה ממגוון תרבויות הנקרות בדרכו החל מהמזרח התיכון ועד אוסטרליה ארץ ילדותו.
Dudi Shaul is a guitarist, composer and teacher who has developed his own unique voice on the classical guitar. Originally influenced by the music of Spain and Brazil, Dudi takes his playing beyond borders to a place that feels like home.
Dudi Shaul is a guitarist, composer and teacher who has developed his own unique voice playing the classical guitar. Originally influenced by the music of Spain and Brazil, Dudi takes his compositions beyond borders, to a place that feels like home.
Born in Israel with Iraqi and Polish heritage, and migrating to Australia as a child, Dudi first started playing whilst overlooking the green subtropical mountains of the east coast. Calling Melbourne home in his early 20's, Dudi graduated from the Victorian College of the Arts and Melbourne Conservatorium of Music, receiving first place in Foundation Music Performance. Dudi has performed in countries including Sweden, Slovenia, Germany, France, Croatia, Cyprus, Spain, Portugal, Brazil, Israel, New Zealand and Australia, and in festivals such as the Woodford Folk Festival (Aus), Festival Mediterranee (Israel),
Andanças (Portugal), Bellingen Winter Music Festival (Aus), and Mullum Music Festival (Aus).
As a teacher, Dudi enjoys sharing his insights into the world of music and beyond. His experience as artistic leader at Ethno Australia and guitar facilitator at Bellingen Camp Creative, combined with his passion for the Alexander Technique, have led to a creative and intuitive way to teach what he loves.
Trio with Special guests
Jerusalem Post:
Jerusalem Post Article.pdf
www.dudishaul.com
https://www.facebook.com/dudishaulmusic/
Instagram - @dudi.shaul
https://www.instagram.com/dudi.shaul/
dudi.shaul@gmail.com
Saravá


Sight & Sound Theatres has teamed up with Virgil Films & Entertainment to release the filmed version of their original stage production MOSES. This epic retelling of the adventurous Bible story provides a spectacular entertainment experience for all ages.
2018 Earth Day (April 22) is approaching and what better way to celebrate then with the help of Ranger Rob!
1,400 years ago, Bilal, a seven-year-old boy, finds himself and his sister under the tyranny of slavery. Throughout his life he undergoes many hardships, through which he discovers an inner strength he did not realize he possessed. Through these experiences,Bilal comes to realize that if he is brave enough to raise his voice and choose his own path – everything becomes possible. It is through his courage, that he frees himself and ultimately his community; It is through the power of his voice and faith that his lifelong dream of freedom comes true. Bilal grows into a man who will inspire and forever change the world.
Here is a clip of Marvel Studios' THOR: RAGNAROK spotlighting Oscar® winner Cate Blanchett as Hera and what goes into making a great Marvel Cinematic villain!
Are you in love with the new Disney Junior show, Mickey and the Roadster Racers? It is a great look at our favorite classic characters including Mickey, Donald and more The first season – Mickey and the Roadster Racers: Start Your Engines is available on DVD today!
Mickey and the Roadster Racers are back and cruising full speed towards fun adventures around the globe! MICKEY AND THE ROADSTER RACERS: START YOUR ENGINES will be zooming towards its Disney DVD debut on August 15th, and you will want to keep up with Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Daisy and Goofy! Join Mickey and the Roadster Racers for the ride as they encounter the world's best spy, compete in a hot-air balloon race, and even help the Queen with her stolen Royal Ruby! At the heart of MICKEY AND THEROADSTER RACERS: START YOUR ENGINES is friendship, teamwork, and exciting adventures that will make you want to be a part of the gang!
Here is the moment that Marvel fans worldwide have been waiting for – the reveal of the trailer for Black Panther, staring Chadwick Boseman.


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As we march into the future, RMC remains committed to the actualization of the vision behind its establishment – that of becoming a major reference point for excellence in medical service delivery in Nigeria.
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Dr. Dayo Ajayi is a Nigeria and UK-trained medical practitioner with over thirty years' post-graduation experience both in Nigeria and in the UK. He holds fellowships of the Royal College of Surgeons, the Nigerian Medical College of Surgeons and the West African College of Surgeons. He is also a UK-certified general practitioner.
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As Team Lead of the hospital's medical officers, Tomiwo coordinates the activities of RMC's in-house doctors. Holder of an MB BS from the Igbinedion University, Okada and an MBA from the National Institute of Business Management, India,
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Dr. Igboko holds an MBBS from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka. He is a fellow of the West African College of Surgeons (Anaesthesia).
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A multiple award winner for academic and professional excellence, Dr. Osho has over 25 years of quality experience in medicine. A world renowned expert in Cardiology and a retired Colonel of the Nigerian Army, Dr. Osho's medical career has taken him to different parts of the world such as Britain, Egypt, Cyprus and Israel.
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Why you need a health proxy and how to choose an agent | Dunlap & Seeger, P.A.
On behalf of Dunlap & Seeger, P.A. posted in Estate Planning on Thursday, November 29, 2018.
A health care proxy, or health care directive, is a document that names a person, or proxy, who expresses another person's wishes and makes health care decisions on that person's behalf if he or she is unable to do so him or herself. One does not have to be terminally ill to create a health care directive in Minnesota, and in fact, one should not wait until he or she has received a terminal diagnosis to follow through with such an important task as selecting a health care agent.
According to Forbes, when families have not had the conversation of what to do if a loved one becomes terminally ill and unable to make decisions for him or herself, they often find themselves stuck at the sick person's bedside with many factors weighing on them. One such factor is emotional ties. It is not uncommon for individuals to let their emotions take over and prevent them from doing what they know in their hearts and minds needs to be done. Emotions also cause families to argue over who should make the decisions and what those decisions should be. If anything, individuals should create a health care directive if only to save loved ones the emotional anguish of having to make tough decisions on their own.
Deciding to create a health proxy is only one half of the equation. The other half is deciding who to name as an agent. FindLaw lists five factors one should consider when selecting his or her healthcare proxy. Those are proximity, assertiveness, family dynamics, longevity and financial agent. Ideally, one's health care agent should be someone who lives nearby, can make tough decisions in the face of adversity and will be around for a while. Also, though one should never let family members sway his or her decision in this matter, it is important for individuals to consider how his or her decision will impact the overall family dynamics. Finally, one should refrain from appointing the same person to be his or her financial agent and health care agent, as this could end up causing conflicts of interest.


With prime focus on quality, our company is manufacturing and exporting the topmost quality of Castle Nuts. These nuts are the most widely used fittings in the industry. We offer these Castle Nuts to clients in standard dimensions and sizes to meet their exact needs. It is made of best quality materials. In market, these nuts are offered to clients at pocket friendly prices.


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Five people jailed for their role in £100k drugs ring in South Yorkshire
TOP R-L: Mohammed Anwaar, Luke Padley, Arsalan Hussain, Shazad Hassan BOTTOM R-L: Nilopher Kauser, Tabassum Mohammed, Zahide Parveen, Gemma Doherty. Credit: SYP
Published: 11:32 Updated: 11:33 Saturday 04 January 2020
Two men and three women have been jailed for their role in a drug ring in South Yorkshire.
Police seized more than £90,000 in cash when they smashed the ring after an investigation into a gang who they suspected were dealing class A and B drugs across Sheffield.
They also found a CS gas canister, a quantity of cannabis, five 100 gram gold bars, 25 packages of crack cocaine and 24 packages of heroin.
The raids were carried out by the Fortify Team in Sheffield, a dedicated team set up to tackle serious and organised crime.
A total of eight people were arrested and charged by police following warrants which were executed at four properties in Sheffield. Each property was linked to Mohammed Anwaar, 31, of no fixed abode, who will be sentenced for his role later this month.
The others were; Luke Padley, 28, of no fixed abode, Arsalan Hussain, 30, of West View Lane, Sheffield, Gemma Doherty, 34, Nilopher Kauser, 29, of Holmhirst Way, Sheffield, Shazad Hassan, 22, of Holmhirst Way, Sheffield, Tabassum Mohammed, 27, of Holmhirst Way, Sheffield and Zahide Parveen, 50, of Holmhirst Way, Sheffield.
South Yorkshire Police run out of prisoner cells with one 999 call every 12 seconds
Thieves use crowbars and disc cutters in Christmas burglary at Yorkshire wildlife site
DCI Jamie Henderson, of South Yorkshire Police, said: "With all eight suspects released under investigation following their arrests, we continued building our case and samples of the cash recovered were analysed by experts.
"Bank notes were found to contain traces of cocaine, heroin and cannabis. Through financial enquiries, we also discovered that significant cash deposits were being transferred abroad from some of those under investigation.
"Despite the fact that the group knew they were under investigation, they were brazen in continuing with their criminal activity. One evening in April 2017, officers attempted to stop a car in Sheffield city centre, before it drove away at speed, with the occupants throwing items from the vehicle.
"Padley was found to be the passenger of the car and Hassan the driver. After searching the car, an amount of cash was recovered and 15 bags of cannabis were found to have been thrown from the vehicle."
Following a two-week trial, Mohammed, Hassan and Parveen were found guilty at Sheffield Crown Court on November 26 last year and subsequently sentenced on January 3, alongside Padley and Kauser who had admitted previous offences.
More than 160 people arrested for drink and drug driving over Christmas period in Leeds - the highest number in West Yorkshire
Leeds casino member stole £1,300 of chips from roulette table
The offences and sentences for the gang were:
- Mohammed, guilty of concealing criminal property and converting criminal property. She was jailed for two years.
Leeds businessman subject to first "McMafia" order over alleged links to organised crime has £1.13m frozen
- Hassan, guilty of concealing criminal property and possession with intent to supply cannabis. He was jailed for two years.
- Parveen, guilty of concealing criminal property and converting criminal property. She was jailed for two years.
- Padley pleaded guilty to two counts of conspiracy to supply Class A drugs and possession with intent to supply cannabis. Padley failed to attend the sentencing hearing at Sheffield Crown Court and was sentenced to five years and two months imprisonment in his absence.
- Kauser pleaded guilty to concealing criminal property, converting criminal property and possession of a prohibited weapon. Kauser was sentenced to two years and eight months.
The remaining offenders pleaded guilty to the following offences at an earlier date are to be sentenced later this month:
- Anwaar pleaded guilty to two counts of conspiracy to supply Class A drugs, concealing criminal property and possession of cannabis.
- Hussain pleaded guilty to being concerned in the supply of Class B drugs and converting criminal property.
- Doherty pleaded guilty to concealing criminal property and possession of a prohibited weapon.
DCI Henderson added: "This has been a complex, lengthy and significant investigation which has ultimately resulted in the disruption of a criminal drugs network operating across Sheffield.
"We've removed quantities of Class A drugs from the city and now eight people are facing the consequences. Officers from the Fortify Team and other specialist teams across Sheffield and the whole of South Yorkshire, are working incredibly hard to disrupt and dismantle the activities of organised crime groups, stop their supply of drugs and cash flow, identify those involved and bring them before the courts."