Actor John Bardon Explains: The Wit and Wisdom of Jim Branning
By Larry Jaffee
The first time I met John Bardon (Jim Branning) was in the BBC canteen at the EastEnders studio. I was about to grab a sandwich when Michael Greco (Beppe di Marco) and Marc Bannerman (Gianni di Marco), who both remembered meeting me the year before in their dressing rooms when they had just started on EastEnders, asked me to join them. John, whom I hadn't met before, was with them. John was impressed by my being from New York, and immediately asked about "the lines round the block" for East Is East, a well-received film about the assimilation of a Pakistani family in northern England, in which he had a featured role.
I told him I wasn't sure about the line, but it was a pretty full house the night I saw the film in Greenwich Village. "Did they tell you I made only 150 quid on that?"
Wasn't it a small independent film by a first-time director? I responded. "It wasn't my first film!" John replied, with the three of us laughing. The exchange perfectly captured the wit and wisdom of his alter ego, the inimitable Jim Branning.
We met again a year or so later in the foyer of the interior sets, and we vowed that one day we'd make the time to do a "proper" interview. Thanks to Wendy Richard, that took place in November 2005. Wendy had e-mailed me that John and his wife were taking a pre-Christmas holiday in New York.
Eileen Fulton of As the World Turns was ecstatic that she was going to get to meet an EastEnders actor, and she asked me to invite John to a small dinner party at the famous Friars Club in New York while he was in town. He's also going to make time to meet his New York-area fans at our favourite local Irish pub, Fiddlesticks. The following conversation took place over the telephone. John did not disappoint.
Walford Gazette: Did you watch EastEnders before you landed the part?
John Bardon: Not really. I knew about it. But I wasn't an avid watcher.
WG: I think discerning EastEnders fans would like to know how your character was introduced as Carol's dad, and you hadn't been around for several years, and they brought you back.
JB: Right, it was first at the wedding. I suppose they thought he was a smashing character, and they brought me back three years later. They had me to the office, and asked, "Would you like to be a regular character?" They said, "It will change your life forever", which it has done. And they put me in a nursing home. I was recovering from a hip operation to bring me back. That was my first appearance. They took three months to write the character in.
WG: At what point did they decide to make you a couple with Dot?
JB: There was a bit of courting that went on first. She was just a mate really, just a friend. No way did the pair of us want to get married because we thought if we got married, we'd sit indoors and watch the telly every night. As it happened, we've had some nice things to do. And we are married, and it's worked out all right.
WG: I remember the first time you and I met at the studio canteen, and the previous night on BBC1 they had Jim chatting up Dot sitting on the stairs, flirting with her basically. And that point, she wasn't interested.
JB: She didn't want to know, at all.
WG: Eventually she fell under the spell of Jim?
JB: Yes, she softened to my charms, yes. That's it, mate.
WG: To what extent is your wife is similar to Dot?
JB: Is she what? Nothing at all, thank God! Larry, please! Nothing at all. No.
WG: Do June and Enda compare notes at all?
JB: They get on very well together. We took June on holiday with us this year for a week to our place in Turkey. She had a wonderful time. People don't recognise June when she doesn't have the wig on. They know me. I get spotted wherever I go. But with June, it was sort of an after thing. They'd say, "Oh, you're here as well!" It blew their mind, some of them, to see me and her walking down the street in Turkey.
WG: So EastEnders is on in Turkey?
JB: Yes, BBC Prime. We've had Turkish people come to us and say, "It's Jim. My wife is English. She watch you, and I watch too. I learn English." We get that as well, yep.
WG: Getting back to Jim when he was first introduced, it seemed like the character was somewhat bigoted, not unlike your character in East Is East. But then his best friend becomes Patrick Trueman (a black man soon to be introduced to PBS audiences).
JB: I see what you mean. You can't get away with it anymore. Everything needs to be PC. Politically correct stuff, that's what it is. He was bigoted, yeah, yeah. But he's softened.
WG: Right, at first he objected to Carol getting married to Alan.
JB: "You've not married THAT," was what he said. But you can't get away with it now, not over here any way.
WG: I was looking at your CV and I noticed that you're one of the few actors on EastEnders who has also appeared in Coronation Street. Jill Halfpenny (Kate) is another.
JB: Yeah, she was a regular character.
WG: I was just curious with the big rivalry between the two shows, whether it ever became an issue.
JB: Not much. In prize-giving, one side gets the hump of the other side. But that's it really. They're all actors earning a living, that's all.
WG: I noticed on the official BBC EastEnders Web site when you recently gave an interview, you said, "June works in a different way from me." Could you please be a little more specific, different in what ways?
JB: We're all Method actors because that's the way you do it. Otherwise, you wouldn't get it right. But you do it at home. She takes it to extremes. I love her to bits really. But she's got to know what's in her handbag. She's got to know where she's come from, why she's there, where she's going, what she's had for breakfast. She takes it to too extreme.
WG: I guess that helps establish the relationship between the characters on-screen (i.e., opposites attract)?
JB: I suppose that's what comes across on the screen, but I do love her to bits, as it happens.
WG: And a couple of months ago the two of you won "Best On-Screen Partnership".
JB: We've won that four times actually, me and her.
WG: It must be a great honour for both of you.
JB: Of course it is.
WG: I noticed that you personally won the Laurence Olivier Award for your performance in Kiss Me Kate.
JB: I'm very proud of that.
WG: I wonder if at some point we will see you sing on EastEnders?
JB: (big laugh) I'll tell you what I can do. I don't how long this brunch will take. I'll give them a verse of it. I'll brush up the Shakespeare because that's what I did.
WG: Is your wife in the entertainment business at all?
JB: No, no. She's a lovely lady. We're only married three years. I was 62 when I met her, and she's the jewel of my life. I'm so lucky. I've got a lovely job, a lovely wife. Everything's wonderful.
WG: One thing EastEnders also brings out is your versatility, in terms of being able to do both comedy and drama. Obviously Sonia has gone through some really rough periods over the years, and you were there to help her through it. And obviously the comical side of you comes out fairly often. I think one of my favourite moments in EastEnders history was Jim inadvertently vacuuming up the budgie (Dot's pet parakeet).
JB: That's everyone's favourite (laughs). They'll forever show that. It's clever how they did that; they reversed the tape.
WG: Also I wanted to let you know that the Walford Gazette is running an advert for the "Viva Jim" t-shirt from Tonic Shirts, to benefit your favourite charity, Help the Aged.
JB: Yes, that's them. They sell hundreds of the bloody things.
WG: It's a great shirt. It really captures the essence of Jim.
JB: (big laugh) It is great, innit?
WG: Also, I looked you up on imdb.com, and it says your given name is John Michael Jones.
JB: Yeah, that's it.
WG: How did you settle on Bardon?
JB: That's my grandmother's maiden name. I couldn't use my own mother's maiden name because it was Alcock. That wouldn't look too good on the billings. (More laughter)
WG: I also wanted to ask you about your stand-up comedy act. How would you describe it?
JB: I did a one-man show about a comedian called Max Miller. I did it for five years, eight weeks in the West End, and showed it all over the place. I did see Max Miller work. In 1933 he was in a film called The Good Companions made from a novel by J.B. Priestley. Then later I was in a musical of The Good Companions, for which Andre Previn and Johnny Mercer wrote the music and words. J.B. Priestley said, "That film made a star of Max Miller, and this is going to make a star of you." He wasn't too right about that. But it gave me the idea of getting stuff together to do this show. I'll bring a copy of the tape and you can have a look at it. It's an hour long. Very simple gags he does. I do it every now and then. I don't get the time any more.
WG: I'm sure the New York fans would love to see a little glimpse of that, and see another side of your talent.
WG: Eileen Fulton from As the World Turns told me the reason she likes EastEnders is that they give such meaty parts to the older characters, unlike the American soaps, where she said after 40 they just put you into the background.
JB: Well, we're the mainstay of the bloody thing. June Brown and Wendy Richard are sticklers for the whole history. They know when somebody died, and they'll she wouldn't have done that because so and so. And they stand up for it. And if it wasn't for them, the thing would fall apart really. I've got a little bit of history now.
WG: I have to thank Wendy for telling me about your holiday here.
JB: She's a funny old thing, Wendy, but she's got a heart of gold. She's a good soul really.
WG: You mentioned that the last time you were in New York was 1958. What were the circumstances of that visit?
JB: I worked in a shop on Regent Street called Austin Reed, and they had shops on the boats, the Queen Mary and Elizabeth. It was just my turn to go. It wasn't very nice. I didn't enjoy it because we were staying on the boat. We had to go back through the docks every night. It was a bit like On the Waterfront.
WG: Well, New York has changed a lot since then.
JB: It's the wife's birthday and Christmas present combined.
WG: Has she been here before?
JB: No, her brothers and sisters have. I think she has relations out there. She's Irish from Belfast. So they've all got relations out there somewhere.
WG: You mentioned that you belonged to a club similar to the Friars Club here in New York.
JB: It's called The Grand Order of Water Rats.
WG: I was in London last year and went to a concert at a pub called the Water Rats near Euston Station.
JB: That's where we have our meetings-over the pub. It's nothing like the Friary, of course. That's what they're hoping to make it like some day. I wish I knew you were there because upstairs in the museum it's amazing. Bob Hope was a Water Rat. Laurel & Hardy were Water Rats. Maurice Chevalier. George Raft. Peter Lorre. Sidney Greenstreet. There are quite a few of them.
WG: Any other EastEnders actors?
JB: No, not really. They don't really have actors these days. They're variety acts. I'm very honoured to be amongst them.
WG: Have you done panto at all?
JB: Yeah, I normally play Dame, female, the Ugly Sister. I've played Cinderella's dad in a couple.
WG: All right, Jim-I mean John.
JB: Only once, Larry! Only one time allowed. That's all. You better warn the others as well.
WG: I will. I'm glad we did this after having met briefly twice before. We'd put it off.
JB: Yeah, we did. God bless, Larry mate.
WG: Give my best to your wife. See you both soon.
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