‘It’s a shame we never got to do a sequel’
David Salamone, who sourced the Minis for The Italian Job and even played one of the getaway drivers, reveals the secrets behind the car’s most famous screen role
David Salamone – aka red Mini-driving Dominic in The Italian Job – reveals why the model was chosen to pester Turin’s rooftops
To speak with someone that you’ve grown up watching on screen is always a privilege. Especially where the party concerned is David Salamone, who played Dominic – the driver of the red Austin Mini Cooper 1275S, registration HMP 729G – in The Italian Job. The car-chase classic is one of a select group of pictures that entered national consciousness, with entire generations being able to cite the irate response of Michael Caine to an exploded Morris-commercial LC5. Says David: ‘We never envisaged the film becoming such a cult hit. ‘I think television was partially responsible – it seemed to be on every Christmas!’ When considering the many and varied screen appearances of the Mini we could easily have focused on the Radford Mini de Villes of A Shot in the Dark or from BBC Television, Adam Adamant Lives! Some might contend that the 1000 used by Mr Bean represents the ultimate Mini starring role while others would argue that this honour goes to the unforgettable Goodbye Pork Pie, the 1980 road movie that used a number of New Zealand Motor Corporation Mini 1000s – complete knock-down kit versions of the Uk-spec MKIV. But to celebrate 60 years of the Mini, the focus has to be The
Italian Job, mainly because of the stunt work by L’équipe Rémy Julienne but also because the picture marked the culmination of nearly a decade of Mini screen appearances. Its film career began in a low-key fashion, with cameos and background roles in The Young
Ones, the (not very good) Spike Milligan vehicle Postman’s Knock or various Edgar Wallace B-features. The glimpse of an Austin Seven or a Mini-minor was a virtual harbinger of automotive and social revolution amongst Standard Vanguards and trilby-hatted extras.
By the early Sixties, the professional classes increasingly regarded a Mini to be fashionable transport, as demonstrated by the wicker-panelled Morris driven by Dirk Bogarde in Doctor in Distress. The Chelsea set started to favour Minis as town cars and the early Morris Cooper that features in 1962’s The Fast Lady is an intriguing example of this phenomena, with Julie Christie playing a debutante who might have strayed from the pages of Queen magazine.
As the decade progressed, the Mini featured in films of virtually every budget from kitchen sink drama, as represented by the Mini Traveller in 1965’s Life
at the Top, to comedies such as the Austin-badged Super De Luxe in Here We Go Round the Mulberry Bush (1967). Further down the cinematic hierarchy, we shouldn’t forget the Riley Elf in The Witches, a minor Hammer horror from 1966, while on television, Patrick Mcgoohan’s Agent John Drake in Danger Man (1964-66) favoured a Taurus-tuned Austin Cooper 1071S.
As a sign of how the Mini was a part of the fabric of British life by the late Sixties, James Booth’s police inspector favoured a Morris Cooper MKI rather than a black Wolseley 6/110 in the 1967 crime thriller Robbery. One of the drivers involved in the production was a young David Salamone, ‘It was the start of my film career. My father Phil was the proprietor of Blenheim Motors; we used to provide cars for the film stars of the day. We sold Robert Shaw’s Aston Martin DB6 Volante to Simon Dee, and also used to deal with Peter Sellers.’
‘One of Blenheim’s specialisations was sourcing film cars and providing on-set location services. We worked on Robbery alongside such well-known stunt professionals as Joe Wadham from Action 99, who always drove police cars in films. Eventually, Stanley Baker [Robbery star and producer] invited me to work on The Italian Job. My own transport at that time was an Alfa Romeo Giulia Super. It was a brilliant sports saloon; it took me from London to Leicester in no time’.
The role of the chinless wonder Dominic represented David’s first credited appearance as a thespian in a major picture. ‘Driving the Cooper was much less terrifying than saying lines,’ David says with a chuckle. ‘I was a driver, not an actor, and I didn’t find the experience of apprehensively waiting for my moment to say my piece especially pleasurable. Besides, all of the Mini drivers ended up being dubbed anyway!’ The name of the party who re-voiced Dominic’s line ‘Shouldn’t we synchronise our watches’ and Chris’ ‘t-t-terribly sorry Charles’ has been lost to the mists of time, but it does sound very much like Jeremy Lloyd.
The shooting of the film commenced in 1968 in Italy, and principal videography concluded with the interior of the Bedford VAL 14 Harrington Legionnaire, where Charlie has his ‘great idea’. ‘The combined location and studio work took probably about three months in total; six weeks in Turin and six in Ireland and London.
‘Benny Hill made a notable impression on me. When you’re a junior member of the team, it can be very much a them-and-us type situation, but he would chat to us drivers. On his days off he’d disappear to go and ‘people-watch’ from cafés, but this resulted in panic in case he was urgently needed for any re-scheduled scenes.’
I’m curious about the involvement, or lack thereof, of BLMC in the film; after all, just a few years earlier, EON had to beg Aston Martin to borrow the DB5 in Goldfinger. Says David, ‘The scriptwriter Troy Kennedy Martin always intended to use Minis; he regarded them as both classless and mocking of the gang’s chauvinism. British Leyland loaned six Minis to the film, and Rémy Julienne came over from France to specify how they were to be prepared for the production in terms of stripped interiors, the engines and so forth.’ The main cars – two of each repainted in red, white or blue – were augmented by a fleet of Minis acquired by the production crew along the way; 25 are believed to have been used.
‘The Minis’ main strength as a film vehicle was that they were brilliant-handling, front-wheel-drive small cars,’ continues David. ‘Remy and his team were responsible for the main stunts such as the church steps scene, and I would drive the red car through the courtyards and so forth. I did go on onto the domed roof of the Palazzo delle Mostre building, which was quite an experience.’
‘The Minis were chosen because they mocked the gang’s chauvinism’
Of David’s fellow drivers, Barry Cox could be seen in the white Mini as Chris and Richard Essome’s Tony in the blue Cooper S; Essome actually owned the gang’s E-type roadster, 848 CRY. Of the many set-pieces of The Italian
Job, a particular sequence remains in David’s mind. ‘It’s not the famous coach sequence – which was done using hydraulics – but rather the death-defying leap at the Fiat factory. I didn’t do the driving myself in that sequence; Julienne himself was at the wheel of the red Cooper, and the stunt was his idea. When you see the film it’s difficult to appreciate just how high that gap was from the ground.’ It’d be an understatement to say the potential for disaster of leaping some 60 feet – and landing on a building that was 12 feet lower than the launching point – was immense.
The Minis were famously supported by a high-profile automotive cast. Other than 848 CRY, there was a 1962 E-type coupé, a DB4 Convertible, and of course the Lamborghini Miura. Then there was a Lancia Flaminia Cabriolet disguised as the Aston Martin, plus a number of background Fiat 500s and Raf Vallone’s Dino 2000 Coupé. Recalls David, ‘I remember one nightmare journey in the Dino. We never used transporters, so I had to drive it back from Italy to Twickenham Studios and I made it with just one and a half minutes to spare! One of my favourite memories from working on the film was actually an off-screen adventure – Barry Cox and I racing two Minis back to the UK. And, no, I cannot remember who won after all these years!’
Blenheim Motors also supplied the British background vehicles, such as the Ford 400E Thames and the Land Rover 109; George Innes, who played Bill Bailey, had to learn to drive for the scene where the Land Rover tails the bullion van through Turin. The company also sourced the Daimler DR450 that Lorna uses to pick up Charlie from prison; David remembers the car mysteriously having real-world diplomatic credentials.
The film was released on 5 June, 1969. Says David, ‘It was a shame that Paramount never made a sequel; we could’ve escaped from the coach! I went on to work with Michael Caine in The Last Valley, and my film career also included five films with Michael Winner.’
Meanwhile, the exploits of Charlie Croker et al became familiar to a new generation of enthusiasts via regular viewings on the small screen – and so the exploits of the cheeky trio of Minis immortalised the model as an icon, both on- and off-screen.