Bill Maynard on GMTV in 1994

Interview with Bill Maynard on GMTV talking about his own country version of the Heartbeat song.
Date about 1994.

[@mariajukejax9649]

I'm nearly an old age pensioner! Absolute legend. My favourite character in Heartbeat.

[@alexlazebat839]

was it nearly or merely

[@PeterOHalloran-hf2ho]

Great looking back at the great Bill Maynard one of the nicest man to grace our screens RIP Bill ❤

[@lexluthor6497]

Hello from🇫🇮.This guy was just gold.Who does not love mr. Greengrass.I'm sure he did alot more great stuff to.I have seen the complete series of heartbeat twice.It has been a few years so I think it is about time again.In my opinion maybe the best tv program ever.cheers

[@janinapalmer8368]

Heartbeat WAS Claude Jeremiah !! What a great character and guy !!

[@peterohalloran5954]

Always in good form Bill a majestic character actor and classic greengrass r I p I always remember his magnificent lines in Heartbeat always witty

[@davidgiblin4934]

Bill a heartbeat legend sadly missed

[@daleparfitt8078]

Legend x

[@andrewcrouch2362]

Brilliant video upload yes this is a very good interview so funny of a man he was r.i.p greengrass love that he says he loves country music and all the banjoes yes good music all round ive watched the nick Berry video upload to good but this one is better funny bloke greengrass was ok

[@Embracing01]

He was great, and although Nick Berry was the main actor (and the highest paid of the show) Bill Maynard's interviews are the best, he was just full of character and funny, but Nick came across as a shy and not very talkative person despite his good looks (and a wooden actor IMO). I always felt Nick wanted nothing more to do with TV work after Heartbeat, although he did go on to do Harbour Lights and also starred in another crime drama with I think Stephen Tomkinson, after that he stopped doing anything.

[@andrewcrouch2362]

@@Embracing01 yes nick Berry was a great actor really was in heartbeat well didant leave till series 7 yes he was in a lot of episodes yes after the other programmes he did didant hear much of him then but surpose that happens with a lot of people out there but anyway he was good nick Berry was a shy sort of bloke but my favourite interviews as to be greengrass so funny bloke proper legend

[@Embracing01]

@@andrewcrouch2362 I wish I had the start of the interview though, I think it's missing because I probably didn't know he was going to come on the show and they probably announced it just before the break, so I probably was scrambling around for a spare tape to record it lol. Anything Heartbeat related that was shown on TV I would whip out a VHS tape and start taping it, and back then I was still at secondary school and nearly late.

[@andrewcrouch2362]

@@Embracing01 yes m8 I no what you mean rushing around looking for a vhs tape to put in and record I used to do it to the programme land of the giants loved that always wanted to record it did miss some because I didant always have a tape handy lol

[@Embracing01]

​@@andrewcrouch2362 I used to record all kinds of stuff that interested me back then, often news reports of science related stuff like dinosaur discoveries and space missions (the days of my naïve youth when I believed everything the news told me lol), now I don't record anything at all because I rarely watch TV. I noticed how little Bill Maynard aged much at all throughout the 90s. If you look at him in this 1994 interview and the interview in 2000, he barely looks any different. I don't know if you can answer this, but one of the behind the scenes GMTV Heartbeat videos I uploaded from 1996, for some reason you hear the woman voice-over say that they are filming the xmas special (which was the Xmas 1996 ep) and it is October. If she was referring to Oct 1995 then that means that xmas episode took over 12 months to be shown on TV the following year, which surely can't be right as I don't think it takes that long for them to film an episode and for it to be broadcast on TV. I think I heard an ep is filmed about 4 months before being aired, so if they film an ep say in July then it will be shown around Sept/Oct. Unless maybe it was a really long filming schedule that lasted a couple months into early 1996. It was definitely the Xmas 96 ep she was referring to as it shows Jo talking to Greengrass about not having her turkey.

[@eytonshalomsandiego]

besides NicBerry and Niamh Cusack, the fella made the show, Heartbeat...Greengrass is an amazing Chekhovian Dickensian Beverly Hillbillies character...

[@Embracing01]

He was like the stereotyped lovable scruffy rouge, yes something straight out of Dicken's novel or something like that, a Hillbillly of sorts, and I bet there used to be lots of those characters years ago. I never knew his dog Alfred was played by 3 different dogs, the first called Tramp (I'm surprised they never used that name instead of Alfred - wonder where they got Alfred from?), the second Rosie and then Boots, all supposed to be the same dog.

[@wilfy7744]

The Gaffer RIP sir

[@David-h4z2s]

What a character this man was Loved him in Heartbeat.

[@austinreid5032]

Legend

[@Embracing01]

I just discovered that Bill also starred in a film in 1978 called It Shouldn't Happen to a Vet, which was the sequel to All Creatures Great and Small (I presume the film version starring Anthony Hopkins not the TV series). I wonder why that's never been shown on TV for years, you'd think the Talking Pictures TV channel would show it.

[@alexlazebat839]

yes there are 2 films on that the 1975 get shown

[@geoffreycarson2311]

His Sidekick DAVID was A Clever Actor 👍 and In It For SO LONG 😮g

[@Marie0575]

VHS 📼 tape, they were a menace weren't they. Claude Greengrass, RIP Bill Maynard🕊

[@Autopsy6]

Magic!

[@alexthomas637]

😎😎😎👍

[@PlayMoreGolf-RipOff]

This is Peak 90’s

[@Embracing01]

When the song Heartbeat is brought up in conversation, they either mention the Buddy Holly version or the version by Nick Berry - that's it, yet the Hollies actually did a cover of the song as well. Why doesn't the Hollies version get mentioned?. There is an episode from series 10 during the end credits where the Hollies version is used.

[@alexlazebat839]

the difference is Heartbeat use riddly pat whereas Buddy Holly uses piddle-de-pat the sound of a heartbeat. they do use that tune for the first 5 eps they changed it to a more 60's theme

[@Embracing01]

@@alexlazebat839 Thanks for pointing that out, I never knew the lyrics in the Buddy Holly version where different where he says that line. It is abit odd that they used Nick's version with the familiar instrumentals, but at other times they used a Buddy Holly themed one but still with Nick singing, and also at the start of each series episode they used a Buddy Holly theme as a sort of intro to the next series; I don't think they did this after Greengrass had left though but it was still used from series 8 ep 1.

[@alexlazebat839]

@@Embracing01 you only notice the full lyrics if its a long intro ep1 of every early series whether somebody changed it or thought they heard riddly pat i dont know

[@Embracing01]

I only just realised after watching a series 4 episode the other day that they used Bill Maynard's version of Waking the Dog during a scene where Greengrass is walking Alfred. The video from that song appears to have been made at the same time as Bill's version of Heartbeat, yet, oddly, neither Bill nor the presenters here made any mention of him doing that song. Thought that was abit odd.

[@alexlazebat839]

yes that was a year later i think but weird to put the song in there as he is not walking the dog, 2nd time they used it worked better

[@geoffreycarson2311]

I Loved ROSIE CLARK 😈😉I Love Real CLASSIC M Bikes too 👍g

[@Embracing01]

If this is from August 1994 it is strange that listings I have from the Liverpool Echo for that month make no mention of Bill Maynard appearing on GMTV, nor do they mention the Heartbeat Week special from October 1996. Other guests are mentioned but not the Heartbeat cast. I get the feeling that alot of the TV guides and newspaper editors hated Heartbeat, why this is I don't know. Reviews and articles I've come across are mostly negative. I loved HB but it seems the majority of the public didn't, they'd much rather watch crap like Corrie and Eastenders, today it's all the propaganda crime dramas on Netflix and ITVX.

[@alexlazebat839]

arent actors on morning shows a bit haphazard

[@alexlazebat839]

weird how in the christmas special we believe she goes into labour doesn't happen until another 2 eps

[@Embracing01]

Come to think about it, yeah that was abit weird. Instead of the following episode showing her going into labour, we see Nick and Kate go to the village hall to watch the live gig where the mods arrive and throw a brick through the window. Maybe Kate had a false alarm, which I suppose does happen, but the xmas special was supposed to show her going into labour.

[@alexlazebat839]

@@Embracing01 that happens quite a lot in other programmes

[@Embracing01]

@@alexlazebat839 I agree does, can't think of any examples as Heartbeat was the only series I ever watched, though it's common for actors to depart part way through and another actor/actress takes over the character (ie in Where the Heart is). I wonder what the explanation is for the mess up with Xmas special, could've been a last minute script change or episodes weren't filmed in order. It is annoying when they do that. They obviously wanted the Xmas episode for something dramatic to happen at the every end leaving viewers wanting to see the next episode, but by the series 5 aired and Kate is yet still pregnant people would've forgot she was going into labour.

[@alexlazebat839]

@@Embracing01 weirdly she went 3 eps in to series 5 most leave at the end of the series or production block but earlier point is that some eps in series don't seem to run side by side because eg ep 4 is a follow up on ep2

[@Embracing01]

@@alexlazebat839 You're right there, I've often wondered that too about her going out of it mid series rather than at the end of the series. It's like they didn't know what they were doing or which version of the script to go with.

[@alexlazebat839]

never says anything about his family online

[@Embracing01]

Oh right, that's strange. When you think about if you never hear anything of his family.

[@alexlazebat839]

@@Embracing01 not on imdb or wiki he mentioned a son in this interview and after in 2000

[@Embracing01]

@@alexlazebat839 Maybe he never liked to talk about his family apart from his son. It is strange he never mentions his wife, how long they've been married for etc, the usual things actors and celebs talk about.

[@alexlazebat839]

@@Embracing01 i know strange though Phillip Franks is another private person

[@Embracing01]

@@alexlazebat839 Like I said maybe he didn't want to talk about them, but Bill always seemed to be someone who liked to talk about anything. I wouldn't go to IMDB for info about a certain actor/celeb on there as IMDB isn't the most accurate place.