THE HAPPY FAMILY

GB
1952
1hr 26mins
Dir: Muriel Box
Starring: Stanley Holloway and Kathleen Harrison

A family refuses to allow a road to be built through their home for the Festival of Britain

The film was an adaptation of a play called The Happy Family by Michael Clayton Hutton and was originally to have been called South Bank Story. The character played by Stanley Holloway is a British Railways train driver who has worked on the railways for 35 years and who is just about to retire. To emphasise this fact there is a fantastic shot of Holloway at Nine Elms Motive Power Depot climbing down from the footplate of then brand new BR Standard Class 7MT ‘Britannia’ 4-6-2 No.70009 Alfred the Great at the end of his final shift. Ex-LBSCR Class E4 0-6-2T No.32493 runs past light but other locos in the background are indiscernible. The title sequence features a view of the River Thames and Hungerford Bridge is prominent in the foreground with the elevated signal box at the entrance to Charing Cross station clearly visible. The very final scenes show actual footage of the Festival of Britain exhibitions on the South Bank and a British-built steam locomotive just creeps briefly into view in two of the shots. It is Indian Government Railway WG Class 5’ 6” gauge 2-8-2 No.8350 built by the North British Locomotive Co. of Glasgow in 1950.

The opening title card with Hungerford Bridge visible in the foreground and Charing Cross station’s elevated signal box at its right hand end
E4 0-6-2T No.32493 running backwards past the camera light engine. This is Nine Elms depot, south west London.
As the E4 passes out of shot it reveals BR Britannia Pacific No.70009 Alfred the Great crawling up to the camera.
That is Stanley Holloway leaving the cab. What a way to make a living.
In this overall shot of the running sheds at Nine Elms Motive Power Depot at least eight other locos are visible in the background.
Isn’t it amazing what crops up in films. This actual footage of the Festival of Britain exhibitions on the South Bank shows a locomotive in the right hand foreground. Indian Government Railway WG Class 5’ 6” gauge 2-8-2 No.8350 built by the North British Locomotive Co. of Glasgow in 1950.