Training
In order to create realistic soldiers it is very important to give actors and extras the necessary training to help them understand their roles and appear like the genuine article.
We have a huge library of original training manuals and booklets which we can call upon for virtually any period we are asked to cover. Everything from foot and rifle drill to much more obscure things such as drill for Cyclists!
Contary to popular belief, modern soldiers or Territorials do not make ideal extras for period films and television work. The training, drill, weaponry and even attitude of British soldiers has changed constantly over the years. The drill of a soldier of The Boer War is very different to a soldier of The Great War. Similarly Great War drill differs from Second World War drill - and, again, for National Servicemen. It costs very little to be able to make a great deal of difference.
For All The King's Men the scenes in Norfolk were extremely realistic as everyone was drilled as Great War soldiers for a short time each day. This proved particularly hard work for many of the extras who were local TA soldiers and who had to forget their modern drill and learn all about Great War drill in a matter of hours.
For the BBC2 series The Trench an essential (and sadly unshown) aspect was the 10 days of training the 25 volunteers received from us at Catterick Barracks in Yorkshire. There was no point in taking 25 modern men and throwing them into a trench system - they needed to be trained exactly as Great War soldiers had been. They all learnt the original foot and rifle drill, bayonet fighting, bombing, gas drills, and found themselves on route marches and exercises which men of 1915-1916 would have been familiar with. By the end of the training even hard-bitten Regular modern army NCOs were impressed - as were the BBC - click here to see what we mean!
A very worthwhile aspect of the work on The Trench feature film was taking ten of the main cast members away for 24 hours training at a reconstructed Great War trench system in Essex. The ten actors were matched with ten of The Khaki Chums. Over 24 very uncomfortable hours, the actors were initiated into many unsavoury aspects of Great War trench life, including a two hour session of filling sandbags under 'shell fire' and 'standing-to' for an hour before dawn. All actors who took part agreed that this was invaluable help when getting to know their characters.
Training the NCOs for ITV1's Lad's Army and Bad Lad's Army was often hard work too. The 1950s drill is very different to the drill of today and it is especially difficult for modern NCOs to keep to the period but, on both occasions, with much coaching, the end results were very good.
There is an international demand for our expertise too; in 2006 Taff took a team of seven Khaki Chums to Canada to train 140 young Canadians who had relatives who fought in The First World War as Great War soldiers for a ground-breaking documentary series.
Everyone lived under canvas in camp conditions and, despite the extremely hot weather, the training was very successful and Galafilm was delighted with the results.
