michael_gothard_archive

Ange has kindly shared these memories with this archive.

I had a short relationship with Michael in the 1960s, and adored him, but it did not have much of a future. He was exquisitely sensitive; I tend to be over-sensitive too, so it was not a good match.

I think he tortured himself about everything when I first met him - typical of a man who grew up without his dad. Even when you are beautiful, you feel just as ugly as the ugliest person, if you are not sure you are acceptable. Makes no difference what you see in the mirror as you only see the imperfections and mind distortions.

We always think we are the one to heal this, but it seems no one did enough. Some men have gay friendships with an older man to work through it, but Mike was very fond of females!

I think I went to the upstairs venue with him for one of the lunchtime productions in Kentish Town or that area, and he was full of it, but I did not see it. I think maybe it was just over.

Hard to see him as a head boy or great athlete. Maybe he did a lot of marijuana or something in the interim, as he seemed far too moody and arty to have ever been that sort of person when I knew him. Mike was prone to sulks if he did not have all the attention.

I cared for him much more than most men I met, and he remains one of the big might-have-beens of my life. I tried to make it up with him after a row about nothing, but could not make out whether he wanted to or not.

I never forgot him, and seeing his floppy-haired, tall figure in the street now and then – we both were in Hampstead – used to cheer me up a lot, but we never talked. People round Hampstead used to say he looked like Mick Jagger but he was cuter than Jagger to look at! I suppose the reason I never met him socially again, after the end of round one, was that he had gone to live over Kentish Town way.

About 10 - 15 years later, I met him somewhere or other, and we stayed up talking all night – until he left in a mood, looking cross. I can't remember anything we talked about, except that when we first met, he had told me his dad was Swedish, but when I mentioned this, he looked bemused and puzzled, and said his dad was a doorman, at a theatre or hotel, I think, in London. Perhaps he had located his dad as an adult.

I was devastated to hear of his death. I am inclined to think Sean McCormick is right - I am sure the pills killed him, as I have seen it so often with people. We moody buggers usually cope with being down, because we know we will feel happy again at some point. But add pharmaceuticals to the mix ...

It is good that someone has made a memorial for him. I hope he knows he is not forgotten, and has a strong web presence. It is so sad he did not live into a philosophical and respected older age, to appear in The Grand Marigold Hotel. Imagine that!

In 1964, Michael landed the lead role in an underground film, ‘Herostratus.’ In it, he plays a young man, Max, who decides to commit suicide, and arranges with an advertising firm that they may capitalise on his death in any way they wish, provided it generates a lot of publicity.

Per the cover notes from the 2009 British Film Institute DVD release, an agent found Michael Gothard the role. “An intense three-hour audition for director Don Levy got him the lead role of the seething, suicidal poet Max; as such, Gothard’s performance is anarchic, intense, restless and angry.”

Per Amnon Buchbinder, who was involved with bringing out this DVD, and knew the director personally, Don Levy "had his pick of young talent – the one other actor I remember him mentioning having auditioned for the role was John Hurt."

When interviewed in 1973, Don Levy said: “It’s not necessary for the actors to know what they’re doing. What they’ve gotta know, is – what they are. In fact, that’s all I require of them."

Perhaps the audition process was designed to find out whether Michael had this essential knowledge.

Filming started on 20th August 1964, and took 8 or 9 months.

The budget for 'Herostratus' was around £10,000. The unpaid cast and crew use public transit to reach shooting locations.

Max's grafitti

The walls of Max's flat are decorated with drawings and scribble which must have taken a considerable amount of time to complete. As the film was made on a shoestring budget, it seems improbable that any professional set dressers were employed. Don Levy probably prevailed upon Michael Gothard to design the space his character was to inhabit, and eventually destroy.



Michael's adopted sister, Wendy, says: "I'm sure at least some of the writing is Michael's. There's a lot of capital letters, but some look and feel like his, and I'm pretty sure the drawing was his. It looks like something he would have done."



Of Michael Gothard, Don Levy said: "In fact, it wasn’t until about ninety percent of the shooting was done that the lead actor, Michael Gothard, who’d been going through these incredible convolutions, came to me one day and said, ‘Don … what’s this film really about?’, because he’d just started to understand that there was much more – beyond what he’d been doing – in this whole film, and it had really gotten him curious.”
[Transcribed from the DVD release booklet's interview section.]

Other quotations from interviews with Don Levy, found in articles held at the BFI library, show his callous disregard for the safety and the mental health of his actors and crew, and how far he was prepared to go, to get the take he wanted.

“Everything was shot on location and they didn't have to pretend it was cold or raining or dangerous. Mike Gothard, the leading actor, can't stand heights. But we had him standing on the edge of the roof of an 18-storey block, with no safety devices and in a howling gale. He was terrified, but he did it.”

Of Gabriella Licudi, he said: “In the final scene I had to get something very difficult out of Gabriella – difficult because she didn't want to give it, to admit to this in herself. I stood and shouted at her (that's my voice you hear on the film right at the end) until eventually she broke down.

She kept switching from herself to Clio and back again – she couldn't separate her own guilt as an individual from that in the part she was playing.

The camera crews had to stand and watch this in silence for an hour and a half. They were horrified, and argued fiercely about the morality of it. But I got the response I needed.”

In another interview he says of Michael:

“At one point in the film Max has to stand on the edge of a high building in a howling wind. The actor who plays the part, Michael Gothard, is terrified of height – but I made him do it. Most scenes really happened like this. The love scene is an act of love.”

'Herostratus' came out in June 1967, and was the opening exhibition at London’s ICA cinema in May 1968.

Other releases:
Australia: 15 June 1970 (Adelaide Film Festival)
Sweden: 29 October 1970

A detailed discussion of the film can be found here: You CAN Get Out: Herostratus Now: September 3, 2009 by Amnon Buchbinder

Speculation: Michael Gothard and Don Levy: Herostratus and afterwards.

IMDB entry

Most of these memories were recounted by Harold Chapman, the photographer who took photos in and around the Beat Hotel during the 1960s. Harold's earlier memories of Michael and the Beat Hotel are here.

"I ran into a friend of Mike’s in Paris, who told me about a tiny café Mike had bought in a seedy part of London which was very rough, and asked, would I like to visit Mike in London?¹

This friend of his was a journalist working on a local paper in the area where the café was. His name was also Chapman, absolutely no relation whatsoever of mine. He told me that Mike was quite upset, as the police were constantly raiding the café, but never finding anything: just sheer harassment, I imagined. Chapman the journalist wrote an article about this in the local paper. The harassment then ceased.

Mike had explained to me that the café barely made a living, because the only people that came in there were a rough crowd of young delinquents, engaged in all sorts of nasty activities, such as collecting protection money from small shopkeepers, small robberies, muggings and the like. The previous owner had sold up because he didn't like the tough customers who had taken over the café! He could have got it for peanuts. Any other customers had long since been driven away by police harassment.

Naïve as I was, I thought that that would be a wonderful opportunity to take pictures of these characters. So, moving into the café and sleeping on a couple of tables at night, I helped out during the day serving behind the bar.

This area was a war damage/slum clearance site; the cafe was more or less a dump. As far as I can remember, there was no flat or anything above it, and Mike certainly did not live on the premises. When he went home, I simply cleaned up, tidied up, and slept on a couple of tables pushed together. It was very small.

I explored a tiny cellar below the cafe which was, as I saw it, a disused gambling den with a couple of small tables for playing cards. It could be that when the café opened up again, the police thought the cellar was being used as an illegal gambling den, but certainly nothing was going on while I was there.

I had my camera round my neck all the time, so that everybody would get used to it, and I should, once I had gained their confidence, be able to take photos of them.

I can clearly remember them; a small gang. They definitely were not teddy boys, mods, rockers, greasers, and certainly not punks as that was still sometime away.

There was probably a floating group of about six to ten young teenagers, scruffy, uneducated, and dressed in neutral clothes ... just the typical grey working-class clothing of the time. They were all white, with short back and sides haircuts or "crew-cuts" but not skinheads. They were certainly not in any way Mods or any other sub-group. They were just what was called roughly at the time 'layabouts'.

The leader of all this was quite tall and older, also wearing grey clothes, and he was the one who everybody followed, as I saw it.

They were always trying to wind him [Michael] and me up, with a whole lot of silly tricks, such as heating up soup spoons by placing them on a heater, putting them in the soup bowl, and saying, 'the soup is cold, heat it up again', hoping we'd pick up the hot spoon and burn our fingers, which no doubt would have delighted them no end.

However, both he, and I, were quite observant, and used to pick the soup spoon out with a tea towel and replace it with a new one.

I remember Mike saying, they all came from the high rise concrete flats that were being built to replace the rotting housing, a lot of it war-damaged, but this was a slum clearance area anyway. I remember one day, one of them rushed in, very dramatically, shouting, 'Put this away, Mike,' and handed him a jemmy, and rushed out. Mike quickly hid it, and never made reference to it again, and nor did I.

He always kept his cool and remained quite impassive and was un-provocable, but the atmosphere in the café was permanently tense and almost about to burst into a café wrecking spree, so I never was able to take the picture.

After about a week of this, I went out to get something from the car that I had parked out there. Scrawled on the dusty windscreen was ‘YOUR FACE NEXT’, and one tyre had been badly slashed. I decided to heed the warning and left, there and then, and returned to Paris.

I can quite clearly understand why he wouldn't talk [to girlfriend N.B.] about his past. He must have got himself together somehow, and completely changed his lifestyle, and could do all those amazing things later on; it's quite clear that he would have never had that cafe later on in life.

This, as far as I can remember, was in the so-called beatnik era. I cannot remember the name [of the café], but the juke box was endlessly playing ‘Hit the Road, Jack’, which is all I really remember that could date it.²"

Perhaps it is this period in his life that Michael was contemplating, when he said, in a TV Times interview in 1973: “Most of us are channeled into various functions, for better or for worse. This is how things are constructed, but you always get the odd one who slips through, who doesn't fit too well. I mean, people either find something they like doing or they end up gangsters or just plain bums. It comes down to that, doesn't it?”

Michael's former girlfriend from that period, 'Jazz', remembers: "I’d go to his café in Kentish Town, 96 Torriano Avenue, NW5. They were a mixed bunch there, mainly teenagers, who, in retrospect, were perhaps a bit deprived. Michael made soup and sandwiches, tea and coffee for them, if my memory serves me right."

More of Jazz's memories are here

¹ Michael must have been running this café during 1961 - 62.

² “Hit the Road, Jack” first came out in 1960.

A lady who knew Michael in the early 1960s found out about the tree planted at Woodchester in his memory, and got in touch through Woodchester's Forester. She has given me these memories of their time together, to share.

To Michael Alan Gothard, from Jazz, 1960 – 61

I first met our Michael when I was 16, coming up to 17. It was snowing, and we met in Ken Colyer’s Jazz Club in London. I didn’t wear shoes in those days, and he was also bohemian and quite serious, intelligent and kind, with longish, very blond hair; a person I would think of always as a gentle gentleman.

I was working as a children’s nanny to three youngsters, and lived with the family on the edge of Hampstead Heath. I remember Michael occasionally coming on walks with me and the children to the lake on the Heath.

Other times, on evenings off, I’d go to his café in Kentish Town, NW5. They were a mixed bunch there, mainly teenagers, who, in retrospect, were perhaps a bit deprived. Michael made soup and sandwiches, tea and coffee for them, if my memory serves me right.

Sometimes he seemed very tense.

Wherever we went, he always took me home to where I worked, and we’d sit outside the door and talk for ages.

He came to my mother’s sister, Auntie Kathie, for Christmas. The two sisters, Auntie, in Bournemouth, and Mum, in Surrey, used to do alternate Christmases. Michael was an only child, and to be confronted by five teenagers, a five year-old (who still remembers that Christmas, and Michael) and five adults, must have been daunting for him!

On the train going back to London on either Boxing Day or the day after, he asked me to marry him – I said yes! He said we would have five children, and the first would be a boy, and we’d call him Simon. Back in London, he bought me a beautiful Indian silver bracelet.



Our relationship foundered, and I went to work as a nanny in Paris, then went hitch-hiking over Europe. Since then, I’ve discovered that before we met, Michael lived in Paris and back-packed through Europe.

Our Michael was a lovely, kind and intelligent gentle man, and I shall never forget him, and the love we shared.

Michael left Haverstock Comprehensive School in Summer 1957.

He seems not to have done National Service, though this wasn't phased out until around 1960.

I asked Sean McCormick, whose uncle, Dan Bush, knew Michael in the 1960s: "Do you happen to know why Michael didn't do National Service? Was he considered unfit, or did he go to the Continent to avoid it?"

Sean replied: “Europe, I believe.”

Some of what Sean has told me was learned from Michael himself, and some of it came via Dan Bush.

Michael's childhood friend Baz remembers Michael having very poor eyesight, and says: "The call-up in those days required draftees to have – if not 20-20 vision – good eyesight, that may have to be aided by glasses under certain circumstances, reading and sighting firearms. It is my firm belief Michael did not go to Paris to dodge the draft. I suggest he failed the medical through poor eyesight."

Perhaps draft-dodging just sounded cooler than failing a medical!

From 'X'-Films Interview: 1973 “I was living in Paris for about a year, just bumming around if you like, just drifting about …”

From TV Times: 8 February 1973:

"I left school when I was 17 or 18 with little idea of what I wanted to do. I think this would be true of most people if left to their own devices. Most of us are channeled into various functions, for better or for worse.

This is how things are constructed, but you always get the odd one who slips through, who doesn't fit too well. I mean, people either find something they like doing or they end up gangsters or just plain bums. It comes down to that, doesn't it?"

This seems a strange way for Michael to speak of himself, considering his glittering school career as described by school-friend H. He was a Prefect, then Head Boy, good at sports and academically gifted. Something seems to have happened between 1957 and 1960, to change him from the confident, out-going young man H. knew, to the "man of few words" Harold Chapman remembers from the Paris days.

He tramped around Europe. "I drifted from country to country, washing a lot of dishes, but I ended up spending a lot of time in Paris where everybody goes to find their way.

When I was there, the beat thing was quite new. I lived in an hotel in the Latin Quarter¹ which was full of the beat celebrities of the day: Ginsberg, Burroughs. They were held in considerable awe, but I don't think I ever said more than 'bonjour' to them."

From: Petticoat interview 6 October 1973

Before [he became an actor] he did a variety of odd jobs, working in restaurants, as a house cleaner, building site labourer – even as a model in Paris. He spent a year in Paris, living in the student section, near Boulevard St. Michel.

“Paris has a wonderful communal feeling to it,” he says, “it’s a great place for meeting people, or for just sitting around talking.”

He didn’t feel he was much of a success as a model. “I was as stiff as a board and I couldn’t overcome my sense of the ridiculous. I was a clothes hanger, an object, not a person.”

It is not clear, from the way this article is written, whether the various jobs he tried were on the Continent or in London, either before after he got back home.

Susie Morgan was contacted someone who met Michael:

"One woman, I think from one of the Slavic countries, had known him from before he got into acting, when he was travelling around France ... What I remember was she said he was a very deep thinker, very thoughtful but even then a little troubled."

From Michael's friend from the 1980s, Sean McCormick:

"In 1959 (just out of high school) my dad and his best friend (since they were 12 years old) Dan, hitch-hiked across Europe together, starting in Norway, working on a family farm and eventually ending up in Spain.

There, they decided to part ways ... Dan landed finally in Paris, circa 1960/61 where he shared a flat with another Yank, and a very intense Englishman named Michael Gothard.

Together they scrounged for food, bummed around, and got hooked on jazz and heroin.

After a year or so, Dan went back to the States.

Michael stayed, and I believe the third guy was killed in a drug deal in New York City.

Well, Michael and Dan remained friends and continued to correspond."



Photo courtesy Sean McCormick.

Research by Belsizepark:

"... When I researched published material of the Beat Generation I came across the photographer Harold Chapman who lived at [The Beat Hotel] from 1957 – 1963 when it closed ... He could remember [Michael Gothard] and shared the information that Michael had a café in London."

Harold Chapman's memories of the times he met Michael in Paris and London can be found here here.

On seeing these photos from The Beat Hotel, taken by Harold Chapman, Sean's Uncle Dan (Dan Bush) replied, "Yep, I knew most of these cats..."

An extract from a press book for "Up the Junction" paints a somewhat different picture of Michael's time in Paris:

"After leaving school, Michael went to Paris and studied French culture at the Sorbonne. ... on holiday from University studies in Paris, [he] was persuaded by a friend to take part in a home movie he was producing with a cheap ciné camera. Michael was so good that he took over the lead in the mini-film and so impressed his friend that the latter asked him why he didn’t take acting up professionally. Michael decided to throw up his studies and do just that. He enrolled at the Actors’ Workshop in London – and has never looked back…"

It has been suggested that Michael may have listened in to the courses at the Sorbonne as an "auditeur libre" (non-registered student). He wouldn't have got the degree - just listened to the teaching.

However, it is also possible that the people who wrote the press book felt that "studying at the Sorbonne" was a more acceptable way of describing Michael's activities in Paris than washing dishes, working on building sites, or listening to jazz.

Michael was in London on 21 October 1961, when he was present at his mother's re-marriage. At that time, according to childhood friend Baz, he was working for the Kensington Post as a trainee reporter. Harold Chapman thinks Michael continued to travel between London and Paris, though it is not known for how long; possibly until he began working on 'Herostratus' in 1964, or even longer.

It is not known where he was living when in London. Dan Bush said that when Michael was studying theatre but had not yet landed a film, he was "living in an obscure garret/loft somewhere in the city.”

¹ The legendary "Beat Hotel"

I was lucky enough to be contacted by a friend of Michael’s from his teenage years, H. He very kindly provided the valuable new information and photos below.


‘I came across your website yesterday after seeing a rerun of 'For Your Eyes Only' and was very touched that you planted a tree in his memory.

Michael and I went to the same school, Haverstock Comprehensive in Chalk Farm in North West London, and were in the same class probably from 1953/4 till 1957.

I usually called him Mike or Mick. Michael was a close friend of mine, and was a frequent visitor to our home. My parents always treated him as a member of our family.’

Home

‘He lived with his mother in Gloucester Avenue just off Primrose Hill and I went to his place on a number of occasions.

Both Michael and his mother were very well spoken and she appeared to be well educated.

I always understood that Michael's father died at Dunkirk. Michael was born in June 1939, the Second World War started in September 1939 and the Battle of and Evacuation of Dunkirk took place in May/June 1940.’

When told that Michael’s mother was actually divorced, H. said:

‘At that time, divorce tended to be frowned upon. It is possible this may have been a white lie told by his mother to explain that his father was not present.

As far as I am aware, I never met Jack Walker [Michael's 'Uncle Jack', who was on the electoral roll for the address, 1952 - 8] and I cannot remember either Michael or his mother ever mentioning him to me.’¹

Character

‘Michael always chose his words carefully but he did not appear to be at all shy and was very self assured.

He was always outgoing, and as far as I was concerned I never saw him in a depressed state of mind.’

School

‘I think Haverstock was one of the first Comprehensive Schools in the country, so we were quite lucky in the education we received. All the teachers appeared to be doing their best to give us a good education. I remember our Geography teacher who became our 6th form teacher had to upgrade his qualifications to continue to teach us. He eventually became the Headmaster of another school.

The teachers were very broad minded from a political point of view – so if and when we talked politics it covered the whole gamut.

From memory the uniforms were dark blue with grey trousers and the tie was yellow and red stripes.

The school had a house system. I think our house name was Camden.

Michael was a good student and always did well in exams. His good looks always attracted the girls. As far as I was aware, he did not have any particular girlfriends but he was always very popular with the girls, very self assured and confident. He may have had girl friends, but never mentioned them.

He got on well with all his teachers, his peers and other pupils.

During the time I knew him, he did not have any problems with authority.

Michael did not smoke whilst at school. I can't remember ever seeing him smoking cigarettes or anything else. He was too keen on sports and his fitness and health. There were other students who smoked cigarettes round the back of the school toilets.

Michael was an excellent athlete: good in most sports but he excelled in the 100, 200 and 400 yards races.



Michael and senior girl at sports day on Parliament Hill Fields at the bottom of Hampstead Heath probably 1954/55.

In our last two years at school in Sixth Form, we both studied Advanced History and Geography. Because the 6th form subject classes were so small each student was virtually given personal tuition.

We were both prefects; I believe the prefects were selected by a committee of teachers together with the Headmaster.



Michael and the prefects appointed in 1955/56.

Michael was the Head Boy in his final year at school.

During our 6th and 7th years, Michael and I, together with others, went on three geographical/geological trips together – to Dale Fort in Pembrokeshire, to the Yorkshire Dales to study the limestone areas and to Scotland on a trip from Inverness to the Isle of Skye.

Michael never mentioned his Welsh grandparents, which is strange because, as I mentioned above, we traveled by train to Dale Fort in Pembrokeshire and St David’s together. Maybe he was able to compartmentalise these things.



Michael with other students at Dale Fort.



Michael near Dale Fort.



Michael and other students from the group who went to Dale Fort.



Near the Aviemore Youth Hostel in Scotland, 1956: Michael and another student who was also in our class, and would have been 17 or 18 at the time.


I'm not certain whether Michael did his A-levels or not – probably we should assume he did take his A levels but left shortly thereafter. I do know that he did not stay to the end of the school year.

I'm not certain why he did not go on to do further education.’

Music

‘I had always been interested in music and, in particular, Jazz and took up the drums in my early teens. Michael also started to play the clarinet. Soon we had a group rehearsing at our place just off Primrose Hill.

We often listened to jazz records, traditional, mainstream and modern. On my eighteenth birthday I remember Michael giving me an LP 'Tribute to Benny Goodman' with Jess Stacy and the Famous Sidemen – I still have the LP.



I remember one time, Michael, I and another friend went to see Ken Colyer (a leading traditional jazz trumpeter in the 1950s and 60s) and his band somewhere I believe in Camden Town. I believe the gig was either at a Trade Union Club or a Communist Club.’

Dancing

‘Both my parents and Michael's mother were very keen on us learning ballroom dancing and I remember Michael, myself and another friend enrolling to learn to dance at a studio in Baker Street. We managed to learn how to get round a dance floor without any major problems, but I only ever saw him dancing either at school dances or at parties.

As far as I can remember, the only jazz club we went to together was the Ken Colyer gig and we certainly didn't dance there.’

Leaving home/school

‘I was not aware that Michael had left his home after leaving school. One reason for him travelling to Europe may have been that Conscription to the Army was still in place for all males aged 18 years and over and was so until 1960.’²

I asked: ‘Was Michael already forming leftist political opinions at this age?’

H. replied: ‘At the time we really did not get into politics. I suppose one should remember that we were in the middle of the Cold War and the Suez Crisis had just taken place in 1956 and so the population, and young people in particular, were worried about what was happening around them so travelling might not have been so bad an idea.

Prior to 1956 no American Jazz musicians were allowed to play in the U.K. In addition there were quite a few American jazz musicians living in France and other parts of Europe in order to get away from the racial intolerance in the USA and these reasons together with the urge to travel and see a bit of the world may have contributed to his going overseas.

The school actively encouraged students in linguistic studies, and this also may have influenced him in his decision to travel to France. A couple of years prior, [to leaving school] we went on a school trip to Europe.

After leaving school, I became an articled clerk to a firm of Chartered Accountants in the City and continued studying for the next five years. I lost touch with Michael and other members of our group during that time.

In some ways it didn't surprise me that Michael became an actor - when I found out I was really quite proud that I had once known and been a close friend of his.

I heard of Michael's untimely death a number of years ago which came as a huge shock.



Michael with two other students (also in our class) punting on the River Cam. I can't remember what we were doing in Cambridge - obviously a class excursion.’

¹ Baz, another schoolfriend of Michael's, who knew him from a few years earlier than H, remembers knowing that Michael's parents were separated, and that Jack Walker was a part of Michael's life.

² Baz believes Michael failed the medical on the grounds of his poor eyesight.

The creators of this Archive are very grateful to H. for sharing these memories and photographs.

From 05/09/1950 to 26/07/1957, Michael Gothard attended Haverstock Comprehensive School.

Around 1951, Michael was a member of the 15th St. Pancras Boy Scout Troop, as part of a patrol listed below:
L Clark
D Fielder
M Gothard
B Hillier
B Janes
J Kesner
D Parr
J Smith
R Murphy
R Corrie

According to the electoral roll, from 1952 to 1958, a man named Jack Walker was living at 1 Gloucester Court with Irene. Jack was Irene's new partner, and an unofficial step-father for Michael.

A more detailed account from H. of Michael's teenage years can be found here.

Michael does not appear on the electoral roll for 1 Gloucester Court, so he must have left home before he was old enough to vote, at 18. His mother still lived there alone until her re-marriage in 1961.

Aileen McClintock communicated with Marcella Crisan, a librarian fan of Michael's, who had met and interviewed him on a number of occasions in order to write a thesis on his life. However, on being diagnosed with terminal cancer, Marcella and destroyed all her notes. She remembered that Michael said he was brought up by his mother, as a single parent.

Marcella also recalled that Michael had suffered a nervous breakdown while a teenager. It seems surprising that a mentally fragile teenager could have survived travelling around Europe, alone, as Michael did after leaving school.

Members of Angharad24's family lived in the same area as Michael's family, Park Village East, at the time when Michael was growing up. Through family connections, Angharad24 tracked down a lady called Ritva, who also lived nearby between 1948 and 1952. Ritva was 96 years old when interviewed on 7 September 2012, but still very alert and keen to share her memories.

When asked if she knew a family in Park Village East called Gothard, mostly a mother and son, called Irene and Michael, she said that she did.

She even remembers their first meeting, because it was unusual.

It was in about 1948 she thinks, [probably 1949] when she was living there in Regent's Park Road just around the corner from where they lived. [Michael would have been about 10 years old.]

She was walking along one day when she saw a little lad being carried by his mum. Ritva remarked that he was a bit heavy, but the young woman said that he'd been taken ill at school so she'd had to carry him home.

Several days later, Ritva saw Irene again, and asked after Michael, to be told he'd had a few days off school, but was better.

Irene seemed happy to have someone to talk to as she missed the friends she'd made [probably in Brent.] She also hoped that the little lad would make new friends, as there were fewer boys of his age in the new area.

Ritva knew that the lady, Irene, was definitely not a Londoner. Her accent was much softer. She was a very attractive woman, dressed smartly, and looked young. She worked in a building society so that she could be at home in time for her son. She didn't want him coming home to an empty house.

There was a man around whom Ritva presumed was the father. She thought he was an estate agent. She couldn't be sure that he was there when she (Ritva) left in 1952.

An elderly couple used to visit, [presumably Michael's maternal grandparents] and during the holidays Michael would go away to the country.

The little boy was quite pale and delicate-looking, but with a lovely face. Ritva described his hair as being a reddy-brown.

Irene told Ritva that when he was little, due to a lazy eye, Michael had to wear glasses with a patch on, which was very common in those days. Eventually he graduated to better pairs, which he wore on and off. He hated them. He used to hang them on a washing line, or bury them in the garden. Irene was quite amused when she told this story, not cross.

Michael was no taller than other people of his age when Ritva first met him, but really shot up when he was about 12.

According to Michael’s mother, he was clever. Ritva thinks he went to the Church of England school, which was held in the church hall until it went to new buildings. She thinks it was called Christchurch. [Ritva’s own daughters went to Jewish School in Golders Green.]

He had a nice bike, and Ritva thought he went to music lessons but she couldn't be absolutely sure.

Irene and Michael used to go to the cinema, because Ritva remembers Irene saying that they shouldn't have B movies which were scary. They had A movies, which were the main films but the B-movies were often documentary-style re-enactments of real murders. The one that scared Michael was a Scotland Yard true story about a body thrown down a well, or something like that.

[This is interesting, given the great attention Michael was to pay, in later life, to current affairs, per Sean McCormick and The Runewriter.]

Ritva said that Irene and Michael seemed very close, and that Irene was anxious that Michael should have every opportunity.

Ritva had no idea that Michael had had a successful acting career, until Angharad24 told her. She asked what he'd appeared in, and was amazed that he'd been in so much. She said he had seemed so shy, and that Irene would have been very proud.