as big then as it is now, especially in London, and most of the independents knew each other well and always helped one another. We met socially and all belonged to organizations like the Variety Club, frequented the same restaurants and shared information. The idea was that we had to work together in order to compete with the major Hol- lywood studios and their London subsidiaries as well as the British studios like Rank, Associated British and British Lion.
When I told Jimmy Carreras that Gerry and I were about to start on two new productions on our own, and that we had a great script [ISLAND OF TERROR] that I particularly liked, he told me that, if we were ready to go, he could make avail- able to us on loan two people whom Hammer had under contract but who were at that moment not working on any projects: Terence Fisher and Pe- ter Cushing. Gerry and I jumped at the chance. Tom Blakeley was delighted; he would never have dreamed of going after them on his own, and prob- ably would not have spent that kind of money any- way without our partnership. On our own, we also got Edward Judd for ISLAND OF TERROR. As far as I was concerned, he was a very good leading man who had already been in some successful pictures like Val Guest’s THE DAY THE EARTH CAUGHT FIRE [1961] and Ray Harryhausen’s FIRST MEN IN THE MOON [1964]. I was happy to have him. In later years, one heard stories that he had been difficult on other movies, but we did not have any problems with him on our picture. I al- ready knew Carole Gray from DEVILS OF DARK- NESS and I was aware that she had some other good credits including CURSE OF THE FLY [1965] and I thought she would be very good as Judd’s girlfriend in our film.
Eddie Byrne [as the island’s doctor] and Niall MacGinnis [as its leading citizen] were good value for money and could be kept within the limita- tions of our budget by scheduling their scenes to be shot together on fixed days so that we did not have to employ them for the entire shooting sched- ule. The same applied to several other supporting players. The film went ahead under the expert guidance of Terence Fisher, who insured that it would come in on budget and on schedule. Production on ISLAND OF TERROR com- menced on November 22, 1965, for five weeks of principal photography. It was shot in its entirety at Pinewood, using their very large back lot that stood in for most of the film’s outdoor settings and also their “lake” which appears in the pre-credits se- quence. Exteriors like the cancer research team’s building, described in the film by Peter Cushing’s
character as resembling Wuthering Heights, were shot around the studio’s permanent buildings. I had met Terence Fisher casually in 1957 when he directed one of my co-productions, called KILL ME TOMORROW, for which I had brought Pat O’Brien to England. It had been a difficult picture to make because Pat O’Brien had a drinking prob- lem, but Fisher handled it very well. He was di- recting all kinds of independent pictures and was in great demand when Hammer signed him to an exclusive contract. I found him great to work with, but he was reclusive. He didn’t like to mix socially with anyone when he was working, and during the filming of ISLAND OF TERROR, at midday when most of us went to lunch, he would lock himself in his office with a sandwich and work on the afternoon’s and next day’s shooting. I never had much opportunity to spend time with him alone— no opportunity at all, really—and I was also pre- occupied with THE PROJECTED MAN. I simply saw him whenever I visited Pinewood during the production to see how it was going. I first met Peter Cushing when I went to Pin- ewood to see what was going on with ISLAND OF TERROR. He was very pleasant, very low-key. The character he played had a sense of humor about him, but I honestly can’t recall whether or not the character was written that way in the original script. My guess would be that the humor was added af- ter it was decided that Cushing was going to play the role, because that’s not the kind of thing that just any actor could do. For instance, it wouldn’t have worked if we’d hired Christopher Lee! After ISLAND OF TERROR, I never met with Cushing again, but some years later, a newcomer named Ken Wiederhorn was trying to put together his first movie—SHOCK WAVES [1977]—and was looking for some actor he could get at a reason- able price to come to Florida and play in it. I sug- gested Cushing as a possibility, but Ken never could get through to him because Cushing’s agent in London, John Redway, wasn’t interested in hav- ing some independent young American who’d never made a movie, come along and try to get one of his actors on the cheap. I told Ken that I could probably put him in touch with Cushing personally, and I did get hold of Cushing on the telephone and he said he’d be happy to talk to Ken. Ken then contacted him directly. The out- come of it was that, despite the agent’s unwilling- ness to cooperate and the fact that there was very little money involved, Cushing thought it would be a nice idea because he could have a holiday in Florida at the same time. Ken very much enjoyed working with him—as did I on ISLAND OF TERROR. When I
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