Learning on ScreenJohn English
Series
- Series Name
- The Pacemakers
Issue
Story
- Story No. within this Issue
- 1 / 1
- Summary
- COI synopsis: John English is a solidly built, argumentative, cheerful, bearded man in his fifties. He’s the founder and guiding light of the Midlands Arts Centre for young people in Birmingham, England, in the middle of Britain’s industrial belt. For John English this place fulfils a personal dream, and he’s sure it’s a pointer to the needs of the world in the next decade. In less than ten years he has built a new centre containing an experimental theatre, a puppet theatre, music studios, art studios, pottery kilns, and open-air theatre for pop festivals and Greek drama, and a library. The new permanent theatres to house the professional company are being built now even though the company is already at work. Their existence is due to John English’s capacity to persuade money from city council, and businessman alike, and to his vision for the future. For twenty years John English worked as an industrial chemist, in a world where dirt, dust, smoke, noise and long boring working hours characterised the nature of life for many people. Today the dirt, noise and dust are going: modern travel, modern homes and - above all - automation are changing the quality of life. As John English puts it: "These changes are the really important purpose of the second industrial revolution. To free people to do things other than work. And what are they going to do: that’s the question isn’t it?" He is sure he’s got the answer. Non-stop facilities across the whole spectrum of the arts for young people as participants and spectators, from age five to twenty five. He just hasn’t the money or space to provide for them after that age. At twenty five they’re thrown out, with John English’s hope that they’ll spread the word elsewhere, that their horizons will be broader and that they’re better equipped to cope with the 21st century. John English says: "I like to think of the Midlands Art Centre as a piece of social engineering, an exercise in social - cultural education. It’s been very exciting to be able to spend the last part of one’s life doing this." Exciting to him, invaluable for us. He gives a lead we can’t ignore.
- Keywords
- Buildings and structures; Performing arts
- Written sources
- COI Catalogue Cards [BFI National Archive]
Viewing Copy - BFI National Archive
COI Microfilm Roll 16 [BFI National Archive] Used for synopsis
- COI Reference
- MI 1461/7
- Credits:
This series is held by:
Film Archive
- Name
- British Film Institute (BFI)
- For BFI National Archive enquiries:
nonfictioncurators@bfi.org.uk
For commercial/footage reuse enquiries:
footage.films@bfi.org.uk - Web
- http://collections-search.bfi.org.uk/web
- Phone
- 020 7255 1444
- Fax
- 020 7580 7503
- Address
- 21 Stephen Street
London W1T 1LN - Notes
- The BFI National Archive also preserves the original nitrate film copies of British Movietone News, British Paramount News, Empire News Bulletin, Gaumont British News, Gaumont Graphic, Gaumont Sound News and Universal News (the World War II years are covered by the Imperial War Museum).
- Series held
- View all series held by British Film Institute (BFI)
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