MIDNIGHT FEASTS, DOUBLE MATHS AND LASHINGS OF FUN
They might not be at school themselves, but children can still enjoy Enid Blyton’s classic Malory Towers as the BBC brings forward its inspirational new adaptation
JUST when Enid Blyton seemed consigned to the politically incorrect dustbin of history, a new generation is being introduced to her work with the first ever television adaptation of her boarding school series Malory Towers. Its post-war context, in which a group of young girls have suffered unparalleled loss but come together to make a better, kinder and more understanding society, has been deemed so relevant to the current school closures that its launch has been brought forward by two weeks for children now at home.
The whole 13-part series is now on the BBC iPlayer and begins on CBBC next month.
It marks something of a turnaround for Blyton, whose reputation in recent years has diminished amid rows over alleged sexism and racism in her books.
A year ago, it was revealed the author, who published more than 300 books between 1922 and 1966, had been rejected from featuring on a commemorative 50p coin amid claims she was a “racist, sexist homophobe and not very good writer”.
It is true, some of her characters, notably the golliwog in Noddy and her frequent “dusky-skinned” villains, have dated badly. But that hasn’t stopped young readers enjoying books like The Famous Five, The Enchanted Wood and Malory Towers, the story of the feisty 12-year-old schoolgirl Darrell Rivers who battles bullying and jealousy, enjoys high jinks and exciting adventures, as she navigates her way through school and who is now on our screens.
Blyton has sold a record-breaking 600 million books, making her one of the world’s most popular authors.
Malory Towers, written between 1945 to 1951, has never been out of print, romanticising the world of boarding schools, long before Harry Potter entered the scene.
WHILE it may not have wizards and magic, Malory Towers has something just as special: midnight feasts, silly tricks on the indomitable matron and a society of youngsters finding their place in the world.
“It has always been one of my favourite book series,” says the show’s co-writer Sasha Hails. “Even as a teenager I would go back to it – I would hide it in my Dickens.
“They are fantastic stories, really exciting, and still have so much to teach us about friendship and how to navigate the world.”
Blyton was inspired to write the books by her own daughters’ education at Benenden School in Kent, which relocated to the Cornish seaside during the war.
While all girls may be classically middle class and privileged, many of them harbour trauma and deep secrets.
“We see it as a bit like Downton Abbey for children,” says producer Grainne McNamara of the series, filmed in Cornwall, Devon and Canada.
“It is a snapshot of a different time in a beautiful setting but the young women featured still had many of the same problems they have today.
“The books have a strong empowerment theme which is also just as important. The way Blyton represented those girls in the school is you can go out and be anything and do anything you want.
It has a really strong message and the TV series has really tried to lift that out of the book and focus on it.”
Writer Sasha adds: “It was a changing world when Blyton wrote these books but it was also a pivotal point for women. It is an amazing chance to show the kids of today what the world then looked like and how far things have moved.
“There has always been a quietly feminist message in the book.
“The headmistress Mrs Grayling is very progressive and the lead character is a fiery girl with a temper which isn’t something you see depicted on television very much.”
Her co-writer Rachel Flowerday adds: “This is a world without helicopter parents and screens. The children had the freedom to make decisions and to learn from them. They have an autonomy our kids can only imagine – they are pretty much left alone to take responsibility for themselves and they really have to learn to stand on her own two feet.”
The story focuses on Darrell Rivers as she joins the school.
She wants to be a doctor, just like her dad, but the other new pupil, Gwendoline Lacey, tells her that girls can only be nurses.
The series follows Darrell as she finds out who her true friends are, avoids matron, and tries not to fight – too much – with the alwaysdifficult Gwendoline. “She isn’t the smartest person in school, which is kind of like me,” says young star Ella Bright who plays Darrell. “She also has a big temper – I just think about the way my two sisters annoy me when I have to do one of those scenes.
“But she also wants to do the best. It might not always be the right thing, but it’s what feels best at the time. She’s a bit of a feminist – even though I don’t think that word had been invented – and she’s also a bit of a role model to the other girls. “I’d listened to the
audio books with my mum and I never could have imagined being Darrell. I love all the ideas of the pranks that we play on matron and also the midnight feasts.
“I used to be really against the idea of boarding school but now I want to do it so badly. It looks like so much fun.”
The series has been made by David Walliams and Miranda Hart’s production company, King Bert, which won the chance to create it after agreeing to keep the book’s 1946 setting.
AS SOON as it was announced, the production company was inundated with letters and emails from fans desperate to find out more about it, and often sharing their hatred of Gwendoline.
As it is a co-production with a Canadian company, the cast went out to Canada to shoot the interior scenes. “It was like a real boarding school experience,” says Ella, who is 13.
“And it definitely made us closer. We have all become the best of friends.”
The school was also shot at the picturesque Hartland Abbey in Devon which has an incredible view out to the sea (its cottage was used in the BBC drama The Night Manager) and the tidal pool at Trevone in Cornwall is also featured.
The series may look chocolate box nostalgic, and the lives of the girls idyllic, but the setting is a nation still scarred from the Second World War and all that it entailed. Miss Grayling’s office features the picture of her dead fiancé with a black ribbon on it – nothing is said but it is there.
The series features a multicultural cast that was not in the original books but reflecting the fact this a contemporary series and also that girls from the Empire would have been at a British boarding school.
The Sri Lankan-born,
Canadian actor Imali
Perera plays one of the nicer teachers, Miss Potts.
There are also a host of new characters with modern day experiences like dyslexia.
There is also a bigger look at the psychology of the characters as they deal with the universal experiences of shifting friendships, peer pressure, bullying and self-doubt.
Even the vicious and spoilt Gwendoline earns some sympathy.
“She’s a funny character because she isn’t nice but she has a reason for the way she behaves,” says Danya Grivers, the 13-year-old actress who plays her. “Her whole life she has only been with governesses and hasn’t had to mix with other children. She doesn’t know how to make friends.”
Even Matron is nuanced, not just Blyton’s one-dimensional villain.
“I don’t think she likes children very much and that’s what makes her so vile. She’s terrifying; she screams and shouts and would probably be violent if she could,” says Ashley McGuire, the This Country star who plays the character. “It’s interesting because the other day I had to go and improvise terrifying them and I really did it; all of them were under my command. You can see how these people become monsters – power corrupts and that’s as true now as it was then.”
Sasha adds that Blyton’s writing has “an honesty and a truth which cuts through the years – however different we are. The emotional and social intelligence in her books remains universally appealling and it’s exciting to be able to introduce this in a different way to a whole new generation of children.”