From Black County... to silver screen How a Midland town became the backdrop for a 1950s blockbuster
LEGENDARY filmmakers Ealing Studios will forever be associated with London’s big screen boom.
But on one occasion they shot on location in the Black County – and brought the day’s biggest stars to the fringes of Wolverhampton.
Ealing Studios are today remembered for their gentle, black and white comedies – such classics as The Ladykillers, Kind Hearts and Coronets and Whisky Galore!.
But The Man in the Sky, released in January 1957, was quite different. It was an action thriller in which top box office draw Jack Hawkins played the pilot of a damaged perately trying to land.
The film was set in Wolverhampton and Pendeford airfield and some of the neighbouring streets were used for the location filming.
The director of the film was Charles Crichton, one of the all time greats of British cinema. His other films include Hue and Cry (1947), The Lavender Hill Mob (1951), The Titfield Thunderbolt (1953) and, bringing his CV up-to-date, A Fish Called Wanda (1988).
Alongside Hawkins, the film featured Elizabeth Sellars, Donald Pleasance, Lionel Jeffries, Megs Jenkins, aircraft des- Victor Maddern and John Stratton, stars of countless classic British movies and TV series from the 1940s to the 1980s.
The story revolves around a test pilot and his wife, played by Hawkins and Sellars.
He works for a small Wolverhampton aviation company that has designed a new type of transport aircraft – a Bristol Freighter was actually used for in the film.
Without a big order the company will go bust, but on a flight for a potential customer an engine catches fire.
The crew bail out, but Hawkins