3 November 2018
A STRAINED START FOR THE BOMBER GIRLS
Doverley House has felt frustratingly reminiscent of Soviet Russia pre-glasnost this past week, with its iron gates heavily secured, and all cast and crew prohibited from giving unauthorised interviews. And – spoiler alert – no interviews have been authorised.
We at The Screen know that this kind of radio silence tends to mean someone’s trying to keep something from getting out, and we love nothing more than ferreting out what that something is.
So, we’ve been doing lots of digging (you’re welcome), and can now disclose that Doverley has been proving almost as cursed for Emma Jameson as it was for ill-fated Clare Holmes, who Emma is playing.
According to our new inside source – who wishes to remain anonymous – Emma has been down and out with severe food poisoning most of the week, causing massive scheduling headaches, and budget spikes.
Without giving anything away to those of you who haven’t yet read the book (and again, who even are you?), Emma hasn’t been contracted for the same length of time that Claudia and her bomber boys have.
‘The original plan was to frontload Emma’s scenes, then free her up,’ our source said, ‘but that’s fallen by the wayside.
It will be a major concern for the studio, who are already worried about the huge costs involved with this production.
Ana (Ashley) didn’t want them panicking, so has been trying to keep it under wraps. ’
Whoops!
Emma is at least on the mend now, as you can see from these aerial shots of her and Claudia Baxter out and about in uniform yesterday, accompanied by the dog who’s been cast as Piper.
(A groodle. We’ll allow it.) They’ve reportedly put a whole stack of overtime in, playing catch-up, and their first scenes together have been shot without a hitch.
‘Ana’s got us all under the pump,’ said our source, ‘but the results are speaking for themselves. This thing is going to blow everyone away. I was sceptical about Nick (Turner) at first. His casting with Claudia felt like a publicity stunt. But he’s something else, and so’s Claudia.
It’s a bit disturbing, watching her work. It’s as though she disappears.’
She’s apparently been disappearing plenty off-set, too, taking herself on long solitary walks in the woods.
‘They’re clearly not doing her any good,’ said our source. ‘She seems more fragile by the day. Like with one nudge, she’d shatter.’
We can only hope that she hasn’t shattered, given the media storm that’s just broken, in which many less scrupulous sites than ours have printed extracts from leaked clinical documents confirming that her long-rumoured pregnancy last year was not only real, but ended tragically in a late miscarriage.
And if you’re hoping for more intel on that here, we’re happy to disappoint you. That kind of thing’s not our jam.
And to anyone reading this who’s got themselves involved in the speculation over whether Felix Jade rather than Nick Turner was the real baby daddy, shame on you.
There’s a line, people.