by Rupert Smith
Finally, when I was on the brink of being lured by Phyllis into another bout of respectability, Nick made a great announcement. ‘It’s happened at last,’ he said, ‘the opportunity we’ve been waiting for. Fame by the end of the year, I think we said?’ (It was February 1965, a depressing winter.) ‘Let’s revise that. I think we can count on immortality by August. You’re on TV.’
Television! The medium to which I truly aspired, the one which I understood most fully. But when Nick described the job to me, I was disappointed. It wasn’t a lead in a dramatic series, or a witty comedy. It was an advertisement. I rebelled and sulked and told him he was a fool. How wrong I was.
There’s one strange footnote to this chapter. I owe so much of my early career to the brief intervention in my life of the man I’ve called Brian. After that one-night-stand in La Bohème, when I changed the future of rock & roll on a tiny makeshift stage, I never saw him again. I was bitter for some time, hurt that he’d broken a promise so easily given. It was with great shock and sadness that I read, in 1967, of his death by suicide.
CHAPTER THREE
Before 1965, TV commercials were amateurish affairs with little artistic flair; no performer of my calibre would ever have considered appearing in one. Nowadays we’re used to seeing superstars promoting everything from trainers to toilet paper, but in the sixties the only ‘stars’ of commercials were anonymous, second-rate actors who’d do anything for money That was about to change.
There was a groundswell of talent in the advertising industry – names who would dominate the media for the next twenty years. Suddenly, adverts were art, and I was the first bona fide British star to elevate the lowly commercial to its current status. The job was one of the most influential campaigns of its time (what we’d now call a ‘lifestyle’ campaign) advertising healthy eating. Remember, this was long before British people were conscious of what they ate; I was instrumental in introducing the idea of dietary fibre to a nation more used to chips and gravy. The product (in case anyone reading this is too young to remember!) was a brand new breakfast cereal called Bran Pops, and I was cast as the healthy, active epitome of young British manhood – or, as the adverts had it, the ‘Regular Guy’.
Bran breakfast cereals had always been regarded as a joke, a food for the elderly and constipated. In the Regular Guy adverts we were tackling a deep-seated British taboo about the human body, educating a nation about health and establishing one of the most enduring images of the sixties. I still get fans who ask me to sign autographs not as Marc LeJeune but as ‘the Regular Guy’. Far be it from me to dismiss the fame that Bran Pops brought me, and the pleasure that the advert brought to millions!
The Regular Guy campaign started in the press. Nick and I were called to the first meeting with the advertising agency ‘creatives’ in a dingy office on Greek Street, where we were shown drawings and ‘storyboards’ and introduced to the woman who was to be my co-star in the campaign, a stunning blonde named Janice Jones. In many ways she was my perfect match, epitomizing all that was contemporary in women’s grooming as I did in men’s. She was a little older than me and looked it; late nights, hard drinking, heavy make-up and teenage childbirth had seen to that. But she was full of life, exuding an irresistible sexual energy that no man (apart from Nick) could ignore.
Our first task was to model for a print campaign that would introduce readers of newspapers and magazines to the Regular Guy and his girl. Of course, I was an old hand at modelling – I’d been a professional for well over a year now, and my photographs featured in some of the most important collections in the country. But I was disappointed when we showed up at the shoot to discover that we would be working in a freezing old warehouse in Chelsea with a photographer who looked as if he’d just stepped off a building site. He was a sleazy, unclean character who chainsmoked and stank of drink – but, it turned out, a genius. On that first afternoon he photographed Janice and me running and jumping in front of a stark white backdrop, in outfits provided by a team of stylists who created the uniquely sporty look that would soon be seen on every British high street. I enjoyed myself and gave my best. For one shot, I had to carry Janice – sweeping her off her feet with one strong, graceful movement – and I knew we’d created something special. I remember the moment well. I was wearing a white tennis shirt, my precious silk cravat, navy slacks and pumps; Janice was wearing a short powder-blue mac and a polka-dot headscarf. I heaved her into the air, smiled insouciantly as Janice gave a little scream. Thus was born one of the icons of the swinging sixties.
But after the shoot, I felt depressed. The whole job, I told Nick, was stupid; I was being made to look foolish, I’d be associated forever with a laxative product and had been saddled with an unprofessional co-star who totally lacked charisma. I don’t know why I was so negative; perhaps it’s a feeling that other artists share when they’ve finished an important piece of work. I didn’t realize that the creative sum would far transcend the parts, that every element of the campaign – my looks, Janice’s easy sexuality, the overtones of health and carefree enjoyment – would coalesce into a powerful social statement. (My misgivings about Janice, however, were not misplaced.)
Three weeks later Nick summoned me to his West End ‘office’ – a cafe just off Long Acre that he had ‘adopted’ for business meetings. I ordered a coffee and sat down moodily. Without a word, he produced from his attache case a small stack of magazines and thumped them down on the table in front of me. Woman’s Own, Woman’s Weekly, Health and Strength – I forget the others.
‘What are these?’ I asked, hardly daring to believe the suspicion that was forming in my mind.
‘See for yourself. Read them.’
I picked up the first one and started feverishly flicking through it; I could find nothing but page after page of knitting patterns, recipes and romantic fiction.
‘Inside back cover,’ said Nick in his driest tones.
And there I was. In glorious black and white, the simple, timeless image of me whisking Janice into the air, under the single line of copy ‘He’s a regular guy’. At the bottom of the page there was a small, hardly noticeable picture of a packet of Bran Pops and a few lines of sound dietary advice in eight point type. It was magnificent. I could hardly believe my eyes.
‘Look at the others,’ snapped Nick, stemming my confused flow of thanks and praise. And there it was in every one – inside back cover, full page. I was overwhelmed.
‘Well?’ said Nick, a mischievous little twinkle around his eyes. I could see that he was as excited as I was; small beads of sweat were visible around the edge of his wig.
‘Very nice,’ I replied, all sang froid. ‘Not bad.’
Then we could contain ourselves no longer. We both shrieked and jumped in the air, hugging each other, oblivious to the disgusted stares of the other customers.
I ran straight out of the cafe to a newsagent and bought a dozen copies, dashed to the post office and mailed them to my parents.
Fame came fast, and I was ready for it. I laugh when I read of other stars who say they found it difficult to adjust to their first experience of celebrity. To me it was the most natural thing in the world. I was recognized everywhere I went, observed, discussed and criticized, and I loved it. After the magazine campaign came the billboard campaign – close-ups of my beaming face with Janice gazing in adoration. ‘He’s a regular guy’ became a national catchphrase in playgrounds, on buses, even in the House of Commons. I received a half-bashful letter from my father telling me to ‘show them all’ and to ‘stick at it’ and saying how much ‘your mother and I are looking forward to meeting your girlfriend’. Like millions of others, they believed that the Regular Guy and his girl were real.
And soon it was hard even for me to believe that Janice Jones and I weren’t ‘an item’. We were photographed doing everything together – shopping, eating in cafes, walking in the park, relaxing by the pool. I regarded what we were doing as just a job; but Janice, naïve and unstable as she was
, found it harder to separate the fantasy from the reality.
Let me give you some idea of Janice Jones, the woman. Physically, her image endures: the archetypal blonde bombshell, uncannily similar to my own beloved Marilyn but with none of her softness, intelligence and vulnerability. Janice had the looks and the figure for sure, but there was a hardness in her, a reckless streak, something that at times looked very much like madness. She was tall – at five foot ten almost taller than me – with long, long legs and a perfect hourglass figure (remember, this was 1965, before Twiggy had ‘banned the bust’ and before feminists had ‘burned the bra’!). She wore her hair in a deep fringe, backcombed up from the crown and severely nipped in at the neck; sometimes for evening dates she’d put it all ‘up’ in a chignon, combing her fringe over one eye in a voluptuous ‘peek-a-boo’. She had great skin – a disastrous skincare regime hadn’t wrought its havoc yet. And she was always flawlessly groomed, her make-up as perfect as a doll’s face, her clothes just so. Yes, on the surface Janice Jones was the perfect mate for the Regular Guy
But there was more to Miss Jones than met the eye. Firstly, she was a two-fisted drinker. She could drink Nick, me and any other man under the table. Her ‘tipple’ was anything that was available: wine, spirits, even beer (which women did not drink in those days) were poured down indiscriminately She was hopelessly unpunctual, but somehow she always managed to shine the moment the camera turned on her. And she was prone to terrible depressions, crying jags that could last for days and which, I was fast discovering, revolved largely about her failure with men, her estrangement from her family and the difficulties of raising a three-year-old child.
Janice’s personal history was not a happy one. I could see so much of myself in her – the self I could have been without the advantages of a loving home background and some lucky breaks. Janice had been drawn to the stage at an early age, had performed in plays, musical revues and even films. But her parents had disapproved of her career, and, when she announced at the age of sixteen that she was pregnant, turned her out of their house. Janice drifted to London, living at first with the father of the child and later, as money came in from modelling jobs, in a series of flats and bedsits. She never stayed anywhere long; irregular personal habits combined with her noisy baby made her an unpopular tenant even in liberal London. Now at the peak of her career, she could afford a decent flat, a live-in maid who also acted as a nanny to little Noel, and gallons and gallons of booze.
Noel was an uncanny creature. I remember him sitting in studios where Janice would park him during shoots, watching the flashing lights with a solemn expression on his pale face, as quiet as a mouse while we were working. But as soon as Janice picked him up to go home he would howl as if his heart was breaking. It seemed that Noel, too, had show business in his blood. Little did I know back in 1965 that I was ‘Uncle’ Marc to a household name in the making!
Nick and Janice never got on. Nick was a man’s man, uncomfortable in the company of women, and fiercely critical of Janice’s personal eccentricities. ‘She’s a cut-rate Jean Harlow,’ he’d mutter, ‘and she’s going exactly the same way.’ He told terrible, vindictive stories about her sexual life which, if they were true, added a criminal cachet to her already considerable chic. Janice, in turn, grew to fear and despise Nick, and would go out of her way to avoid him. She started asking photographers if Nick could leave the studio during shoots, claiming that he ‘inhibited’ her, which added to the friction of this crazy, creative time.
I regretted the day that I gave Janice my home number. She’d phone me at all hours of the day and night asking for advice about her latest trauma, telling me how much little Noel needed a father figure in his life, how much she was looking forward to our next job. At first I was flattered – what man wouldn’t be flattered by the attentions of one of the world’s most beautiful women ? But soon Janice’s attentions became a burden, particularly when Phyllis got to the phone first.
Phyllis – there was another thorn in my side. He was dismissive of my work; it was not what he regarded as ‘serious’. To him, the modern world was ‘hideous’, ‘vulgar’, ‘insincere’, where to me it was daring, exciting and fun. He hated the fact that I was ‘publicly associated with a trollop’. He told me I was wasting my talent, for he failed to understand that the boundaries between art and commerce were collapsing and that the new era – the Pop Era, of which I was an icon – was with us.
Finally we were ready to take the Regular Guy into the television studio to make our first commercial. The studio (a cleverly converted railway arch near King’s Cross station) was booked for a Friday – just one day. I spent the whole week in preparation, trying on clothes, having my hair done, enduring a regime of facials and massages: I wanted everything to be perfect. And most of all, I wanted my parents to be proud of me. For so long they had disapproved of my work; here at last was something that they could boast to their friends about. So I invited them up to London for the day to meet ‘the gang’ and to watch as we made television history. Once again I met them at Waterloo – under what very different circumstances from their last visit! They seemed to have shrunk. Were those timid little figures who emerged from the train really my parents? And they treated me with a strange deference due solely to my sudden fame. As we walked to the taxi rank, my mother caught sight of my enormous image on a billboard above the station clock and practically genuflected.
Caterers had been brought into the studio to provide a slap-up ‘brunch’ for the cast, crew and guests. Mum feebly complained that they’d had breakfast before they left, but after a couple of glasses of bucks fizz (common enough now, but unimaginably elegant then) she perked up and became her outgoing, sociable self. I was glad of a drink myself – I had been secretly dreading the first meeting between Mum and Dad and Nick and Janice. Nick was in full managerial mode, smoking a cigar and wearing a suit; he was polite, distant, imposing. Janice was a different matter. She greeted my parents like long lost friends, kissing my mother on the cheek and embracing my father, who underwent a complete personality change the moment he felt the impress of my co-star’s ample bust. He became jocular, raffish – and actually affectionate towards me. ‘She’s a smasher,’ he whispered in my ear. ‘If I was twenty years younger I’d have her off you!’ Never before had we engaged in this kind of rough, man-to-man humour. I felt ten feet tall.
Leave it to Janice, though, to take things too far. ‘Oh, Mrs LeJeune,’ I heard her gush to my mother, Marc is the perfect man. So attentive, so romantic. Don’t be too shocked if he has a little surprise for you some time soon!’ Just then, as Janice was topping up my mother’s glass and knocking back her umpteenth drink, little Noel appeared out of nowhere and tugged on Janice’s dress. She looked round and for one split second anger flashed across her face. Then she collected herself, beamed down at the child and said, ‘Oh, what a sweet little boy! What’s your name, precious? Someone take him away and give him a sweetie!’ Noel shuffled off and hid under a table.
By the time brunch was over, my father had taken on the role of a jaunty retired colonel, twirling imaginary moustaches and beaming with blurry bonhomie at the assembled crew. My mother was dashing about blabbing to anyone who’d listen, telling tales of my mischievous childhood and how she’d encouraged me on my first steps to stardom.
The shoot took a little over four hours. That’s nothing by today’s standards, but at the time I was amazed that it could take so long to produce a thirty-second film. In between ‘takes’ I relaxed with a coffee and a cigarette while Janice grazed through the leftover hospitality By the end of the shoot she was plastered, screaming and hooting as I whisked her around the studio, even at one point heaving a breast out of her low-cut dress and exclaiming to the astonished crew, ‘Get a load of these Bran Pops, boys!’ My father nearly choked.
Despite Janice’s best endeavours, the shoot was a great success and ensured our TV immortality Edited and dubbed, it was a little masterpiece – ‘a national treasure’ as
I recently saw it described in a learned article on advertising art. We’re even in a museum – part of the Museum of the Moving Image’s collection of classic commercials. It’s primitive enough by today’s standards, shot in black and white with no special effects, just a boy and a girl and a song, the immortal ‘My Guy’ by Mary Wells that became a hit thanks to Bran Pops and launched the Motown sound.
We finished at seven o‘clock, and I saw my parents off with fond farewells (Janice, fortunately, was having a lie-down at this point and couldn’t embarrass me any further). Stepping out of the studio, we were surprised by a small but vocal gang of girls who screamed when they saw me and had to be fought off by Nick and my father. I went back indoors to have a stiff drink and prepare for the ‘wrap’ party
It was quite a bash. Nick had rounded up every journalist he knew and invited them all to dinner at an Italian restaurant on Villiers Street, whither we repaired in a fleet of limousines as soon as Janice had recovered sufficiently to be baying for more booze. Once there, we let our hair down and partied in true sixties style, eating, drinking and dancing till dawn. I spent much of the evening trying to fend off Janice’s amorous advances as she breathed alcoholic fumes into my ear and told me how much she loved ‘Mummy’ and ‘Daddy’ and how she hoped one day that Noel might call them ‘Grandma’ and ‘Grandad’. I fled to another table and chatted to a group of journalists, trying to distract their attention from the antics of my co-star, who was now doing one of her party pieces – standing on a table and singing ‘Burlington Bertie’ at the top of her tuneless voice, slurring, staggering and occasionally pulling her skirt over her head and screaming, ‘Look at my lovely legs, everyone! Aren’t they lovely, my lovely legs!’ Finally she grew quiet and passed out with her head in her supper. (After this incident, Nick always referred to Janice as ‘Pizza Face’.) Little Noel, fortunately, didn’t witness any of this; it was only the next day that we discovered he’d been left behind at the studio.
