Luke Evans To Topline BBC’s ‘Great Train Robbery’ Serial

[hagios]

This looks very interesting to me, "just my cup of tea!"

The BBC has cast the first installment of its two-part drama The Great Train Robbery with Luke Evans set to play Bruce Reynolds, the mastermind behind Britain’s infamous 1963 heist.

Created by Broadchurch and Camelot exec producer Chris Chibnall, the two 90-minute movies will tell the story of the gang behind the crime and the team of detectives who sought to bring the perpetrators to justice. The first part, The Robbers’ Tale, will be directed by Julian Jarrold (The Girl); James Strong (Broadchurch) will direct part two, A Coppers’ Tale.

Also joining the cast as members of the criminal team are Jack Roth (Bedlam), Neil Maskell (Utopia), Paul Anderson (Sherlock Holmes: A Game Of Shadows), Martin Compston (Line Of Duty), Del Synnott (The Silence) and Jack Gordon (Panic Button).

The first film kicks off in 1962 and ends in the immediate aftermath of the August 8, 1963 robbery of a Royal Mail train from Glasgow that scored £2.6M. Reynolds, who spent five years on the run before being jailed until 1978, died last month in London.

The second film, which focuses on detective Tommy Butler and Scotland Yard’s bafflement and frustration in the face of the crime, has yet to be cast. Shooting starts on part one this month with Simon Heath exec producing for World Productions and Polly Hill for the BBC. Julia Stannard produces. There’s no air date yet for BBC One, but given this August marks the 50th anniversary of the heist, it’s likely to fall around that time – just ahead of the BBC’s 50th anniversary tributes to Doctor Who which take place in November.


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[Show spoiler]Jim Broadbent To Star In BBC’s ‘Great Train Robbery’ Serial



Oscar winner Jim Broadbent will play Tommy Butler, the detective who relentlessly sought to bring the gang behind the infamous August 8, 1963 robbery of a Royal Mail train to justice. The BBC‘s two-part drama The Great Train Robbery kicks off with The Robbers’ Tale, the story of how the heist was planned and executed. Luke Evans will play Bruce Reynolds, the mastermind behind the heist. The second part, A Coppers’ Tale, will feature Broadbent leading the Scotland Yard team Butler assembled to bring the thieves to justice in a race against time. Also joining A Coppers’ Tale are Tim Pigott-Smith (Downton Abbey, Alice In Wonderland), Robert Glenister (Law & Order: UK, Hustle), Tom Chambers (Waterloo Road), Tom Beard (Salmon Fishing In The Yemen), James Wilby (Titanic) and James Fox (W.E., Utopia).

Created by Broadchurch and Camelot exec producer Chris Chibnall, the films are produced by World Productions for BBC One. Part two will be directed by James Strong (Broadchurch). Simon Heath and Polly Hill are exec producers, and Julia Stannard is producer. Part 1 began shooting in March. There is no airdate, although this August marks the 50th anniversary of the heist.

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[Show spoiler]Great Train Robbery: Policeman describes case breakthrough



Fifty years after a crime dubbed as one of the greatest of the 20th Century, the police officer who found the abandoned mailbags from the Great Train Robbery, tells BBC News his memories of discovering the gang's Buckinghamshire hideout.

In August 1963, 25-year-old Brill village policeman, John Woolley, responded to one of hundreds of tip offs from the public.

They were keen to help officers find a gang who had robbed the night mail train from Glasgow to Euston, making off with over £2.5m.

John Woolley - 1963 John Woolley said he was a "rosy-cheeked 25-year-old" in 1963
As PC Woolley made his way to the empty Leatherslade Farm, near Brill, he was moments away from making a breakthrough in the investigation.


John Woolley said he was a "rosy-cheeked 25-year-old" in 1963

Window ajar

"The middle of nowhere suddenly became the spotlight of the world," said the now retired officer from Upton.

It was at 03:00 BST on 8 August that the train was stopped by a gang of thieves between Linslade and Cheddington.

They broke into the High Value Package coach and made off with 120 mailbags weighing about two and a half tonnes stuffed with £2.6m in used banknotes (about £41m in today's money).

Police called for public vigilance in their search for the offenders and about 400 calls a day were being taken at the incident room in Aylesbury.

It was a tip off from a neighbour which brought Mr Woolley his moment in history.

He and a colleague, Sgt Ron Blackman, went to the supposedly empty farm after a worker became suspicious of activity at the site.

Robbers' provisions

"It finally hit home and we knew without any doubt whatsoever that this was the train robbers' hideout”

John Woolley

Retired policeman

After spotting an upstairs window slightly ajar, Mr Woolley used an old door to climb up to it.

"I climbed in and on the bedroom floor were a number of sleeping bags, a lot of blankets and a little patch of candle stubs," he said.

The pair found the kitchen "absolutely chock a block" with provisions.

"All over the work surfaces, in the cabinets, the larder, it was full of tinned food, packaged food, crockery and cutlery - all you would need for quite a considerably length stay," he said.

Any remaining doubt it was the robbers' was quickly removed when Mr Woolley spotted a trapdoor in the floor, just off the kitchen area.

"I went down the first two or three steps and could see the cellar was absolutely full of bulging sacks," he said.


The gang's hideout was discovered by John Woolley and a colleague on 13 August 1963

"I pulled one of those sacks over to me and saw it was a canvas mail bag - as the top flopped open I could see parcel wrappers, bank note wrappers, consignment notes, all bearing the names of high street banks.

"That was when it finally hit home and we knew without any doubt whatsoever that this was the train robbers' hideout."

The former officer said he felt "excitement and elation" at becoming part of the story of what Fleet Street was already styling the crime of the century.

Forensic experts subsequently found fingerprints at the farm, mostly of convicted criminals, meaning the robbers were unmasked.

Half a century on, Mr Woolley said the crime's continued notoriety was a result of media coverage and misunderstandings.

How the robbery was carried out

Glasgow-London Euston train stopped at Sears Crossing in Bucks on 8 August 1963
Train driver Jack Mills assaulted and forced to drive a short distance to Bridego Bridge (pictured) where a lorry was waiting
£2,631,684 was taken, mostly in £1 and £5 notes; most of it has never been found
Train crew were told not to move for half an hour so police felt sure a hideout must be within 30 minutes of the scene
Twelve men jailed in 1964 (one later proved innocent); three others eventually jailed, others have never been caught

"The story captured the imagination of the public, but it was because they could not really avoid it," he said.

"There was mass coverage by the press, and the story was never let go.

"It was also erroneously seen as a victimless crime because although the injured driver suffered long term effects, this was minimised by the criminals at their trial."

Indeed Mr Woolley said seeing the gang's criminal records brought home their true characters.

"I knew they were far from being latter day Robin Hoods, they were vicious, greedy criminals who made livings from violent crime," he said.

But as the latest anniversary is reached Mr Woolley believes the story will begin to fade from the spotlight with the 50th likely to be the last milestone to be marked.

"How many of us [who were involved] will [still] be here to remember it?" he said.

"I think it will quietly and fittingly come to rest."

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[Show spoiler]Great Train Robbery: How Bruce Reynolds became a writer


It's nearly 50 years since the heist which became known as the Great Train Robbery. Novelist Jake Arnott got to know Bruce Reynolds - the leader of the gang - towards the end of his life.

At 3am on 8 August 1963, the night mail train from Glasgow to Euston was stopped in Buckinghamshire by a gang of thieves. They broke into the High Value Package coach and made off with 120 mailbags stuffed with £2.6m in used banknotes (something in the region of £41m in today's money).

The raid soon became known as the Great Train Robbery and 50 years on it still occupies a unique place in the history of British crime. The gang carried no firearms, although the train driver was coshed in the melee - an act of violence that the leader of the gang, Bruce Reynolds, always expressed regret for, right up until his final interview.


I knew Bruce, and though he may be remembered for his life of crime, it was as a man of letters that he always impressed me.

His memoir, The Autobiography of a Thief, is an exceptional book, not simply because of the extraordinary life it documents but because it's so well written. And in person he had an artful way with words. When we first met, at a book reading 13 years ago, I was struck by his wit and erudition and by that literary knack of of hoisting just the right allusion to illuminate a story.


Scene from 'The Great Train Robbery', BBC drama to be broadcast in 2013

Standing on Bridego Bridge awaiting his greatest coup, he saw himself as Lawrence of Arabia on the Hejaz railway, his ear to the ground listening for the oncoming train.

Calling on a tradition of adventurism he also conjured: "Visions of Drake and his motley crew at Panama, of Max, my old cell mate who had continually exhorted me: 'You've got to sack a city.'" I remember Bruce quoting William Burroughs, whose art manifesto "Les voleurs" declared: "Steal everything in sight, everything belongs to the inspired and dedicated thief."



He cut something of a Burroughsian figure himself. Gaunt and elegant with a laconic and deadpan delivery, a southern drawl to his voice - albeit of Battersea rather than St Louis. He was the true literary outlaw.

Bruce could evoke the glamour and excitement of crime as well as the heavy costs his way of life incurred.

His descriptions of the haute couture of an elite villain were so vivid that I was reminded of Daisy Buchanan bursting into tears at the beauty of Gatsby's shirts in F Scott Fitzgerald's great American novel. But he was direct and honest about his own failings and vulnerabilities, and never flinched from describing the ill effects of his activities on himself and those around him. His life and works were the perfect illustration of the old Spanish proverb: "Take what you want, then pay for it."

Born in 1931 in South London, Bruce had an unsettled childhood that was further disrupted by wartime evacuation. He left school at 14 and, having failed his eyesight test to join the Royal Navy, decided that he wanted to be a foreign correspondent. He even found the confidence to apply in person to Northcliffe House, home of the Daily Mail and Evening News. He ended up as a messenger boy and then in the accounts department.

He longed for adventure but reasoned that he was unlikely to find it in an honest living. So, unfortunately, he applied his intelligence and ingenuity to larceny, graduating from petty theft to more and more serious crimes



Bruce Reynolds in 1963 (left); after his arrest in 1968 (right)


By the time he organised his most famous heist Bruce had become a major league villain and had created a character for himself out of his aspirations. Renting a villa in the south of France, driving fast cars and wearing exquisitely tailored clothes, he sought not just the trappings of wealth, but the sense of culture and entitlement that went with it. "I was the image that I created," he said of that time.

The Great Train Robbery took place in 1963, the "annus mirabilis" of Larkin's poem, "between the end of the Chatterley ban and the Beatles first LP" and right on the crest of a nascent social revolution.

It was also the year of the Profumo scandal and a sense that the new permissive society would need its ne plus ultra. The robbers had stolen the Queen's money, there was a feeling that the Establishment had been given a bloody nose and it duly lashed out. In the first trial, gang members were given 30-year sentences at a time when there was no parole system.


Members of the gang
It's believed 17 men were involved in the robbery. Among the most notorious were:

Ronnie Biggs: Minor member of gang who became famous after escaping to Brazil and resisting several extradition attempts - returned to UK in 2001, released from jail eight years later
Charlie Wilson: Caught and sentenced, Wilson also escaped prison and spent four years on run before recapture - released in 1978, he was murdered by hitman in Spain in 1990
Ronald "Buster" Edwards: Fled to Mexico but homesickness led to voluntary return to UK - served nine years, and was later subject of 1988 film, Buster, starring Phil Collins

Bruce evaded capture for five years and went on the run, living the high life in Mexico with his wife Angela and young son Nick until the money ran out. Then he took the extremely risky decision to come back to England to plan another coup. The tenacious Scotland Yard detective Tommy Butler finally caught up with him in Torquay in 1968. Bruce was characteristically cavalier on his arrest, remarking: "C'est la vie, Tom."

Long-term imprisonment took its toll, however. The dull horror of incarceration, the pain of readjusting to the outside after a long sentence. He struggled to maintain and develop a strong relationship with his son Nick. And though their marriage broke down when he was in prison, Angela and Bruce were eventually reconciled. When she fell ill he committed himself to caring for her until her death in 2010.

And he became a writer. His own life was like a novel, but what was astonishing was his ability to set it down so clearly.

I believe that it was his love of words and his ability to use them that really set him free. Self-reflective, philosophical, for want of a better word, rehabilitated. When he came to my book launch a year ago we talked of the looming 50th anniversary of the Great Train Robbery.

He told me: "A lot of people are going to want to talk to me but I'm feeling a bit Greta Garbo about the whole thing, to tell you the truth." I wasn't sure he would agree to an interview.

When he came to the studio this January he was a little frail, he'd had a hard winter. But in front of the microphone he really went to work with his inimitable style. He talked for two hours. It was his final testament



Bruce Reynolds, pictured in 2003

At the end he said: "I got what I wanted out of life, what I considered a good life. I wanted to live a life like Hemingway. When I was in Mexico the people I knew were bullfighters and motor racing drivers. But when you're in the position where you can do anything it no longer has the same attraction.

"You realise it's all tinsel to a degree. I only ever wanted to live in a place that I felt comfortable in, which, ironically I suppose, is about the size of a cell."

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[Show spoiler]Great Train Robber Bruce Reynolds dies aged 81


Great Train Robbers Ronnie Biggs (left) and Bruce Reynolds in 1999

Bruce Reynolds, who was the key planner behind the £2.6m Great Train Robbery in 1963, has died aged 81.

Reynolds evaded capture for five years, mainly spent overseas, but after returning to England was caught in 1968. He spent 10 years in jail.

The 15 men's haul from a mail train in Cheddington, Buckinghamshire, was a record at that time.

Train driver Jack Mills was struck over the head during the robbery and never worked again. He died in 1970.

The £2.6m haul from the Glasgow-to-London overnight mail train, which the gang brought to a stop by changing a signal to red on 8 August 1963, is equivalent to £40m in today's money.

Reynolds had used inside information on mail movements to plan the raid and 15 gang members, wearing helmets and ski masks, ran on board and made off with 120 bags of money.

Reynolds' son Nick said his father had died in his sleep in the early hours of Thursday.

"He hadn't been well for a few days and I was looking after him," he said.

"I really can't talk at the moment. I can confirm that he has passed away and he died in his sleep

Film consultant


Reynolds was captured five years after the Great Train Robbery

Family friend John Schoonraad said Reynolds had had a "chest complaint".

He described Reynolds as a "lovely chap", and a changed man who no longer believed in crime.

"He said to me 'crime doesn't pay'. He's done his time, and he turned into a very nice man. I've always known him to be a real gentleman," said Mr Schoonraad.

Michael Biggs, the son of Reynolds's fellow Great Train Robber Ronnie Biggs, paid tribute to "a very intelligent man, educated and very loyal to his friends".

"Regardless of whatever mistakes Bruce made in his life, Bruce was a very, very kind person who was a true gentlemen who made many friends in his life," he told BBC Radio 5 live.

Mr Biggs, 38, said his father "showed a lot of emotion" and "there were tears" when he learned of Reynolds' death.

In the late 80s he worked briefly as a consultant on a film about the robbery, Buster, and went on to publish The Autobiography of a Thief in 1995.

Borstal


The gang members escaped with 120 bags of money

By then, he was living on income support in a south London flat supplied by a charitable trust.

Reynolds, the son of a trade union official at the Ford plant in Dagenham, east London, left school at 14 and worked as an accounts clerk, hospital laboratory assistant and cycle fitter.

It was not long before he was in trouble with the police and he was sent to borstal twice for theft.

After his national service in the Army, he returned to a life of crime and served four jail terms, mainly for breaking into shops.

In 1963, he joined forces with Biggs, Buster Edwards, Charlie Wilson and other gang members to carry out the Great Train Robbery.

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[Show spoiler]Who were the Great Train Robbers?

Bruce Reynolds, the man who planned the £2.6m Great Train Robbery in 1963, has died aged 81.

The haul the 15 men secured from a mail train, stopped in Buckinghamshire, was a record at that time.

So who were the other gang members and what is know about what happened to them in later life?


Bruce Reynolds


In his 1995 memoirs, Bruce Reynolds said the robbery was a curse (Getty Images/PA)

Bruce Reynolds, a thief and antiques dealer, planned the robbery that has become one of the most notorious in British criminal history.

Nicknamed "Napoleon", he first fled to Mexico on a false passport then later to Canada with his wife Angela and son Nick.

In 1968, five years after the crime, Reynolds returned to England and was captured in Torquay and jailed for 25 years.

He was released in 1978 and lived alone and broke in a small flat off London's Edgware Road. He was jailed again in the 1980s for three years for dealing amphetamines.

After his second release, Reynolds went on to work briefly as a consultant on a film about the robbery, Buster, and published the Autobiography of a Thief in 1995. His son Nick said his father had died in his sleep in the early hours of 28 February 2013

Ronnie Biggs

In 2001, Ronnie Biggs told the Sun he was willing to return to Britain (Getty Images/Reuters)

Ronald Arthur "Ronnie" Biggs was jailed in 1964 for his part in the robbery, but his subsequent escape from prison and his life as a fugitive for 36 years gained him notoriety.

After fleeing over the wall of London's Wandsworth prison in April 1965, Biggs had plastic surgery and moved firstly to Australia and then Brazil, evading a number of arrests, extradition and even kidnap. During this time he courted the media with his story.

Eventually in 2001, when he was very ill, he decided to return to Britain to face arrest.

His health continued to deteriorate while serving the remainder of his sentence, and he was finally freed in 2009 on "compassionate grounds" by then Justice Secretary Jack Straw


Ronald 'Buster' Edwards

Edwards gave himself up in 1966

Ronald "Buster" Edwards, who is perhaps best known as the subject of the 1988 film Buster, in which he was played by singer Phil Collins, is widely believed to have wielded the cosh used to hit train driver Jack Mills over the head.

Like Reynolds, the former boxer and club owner fled to Mexico after the robbery, but gave himself up in 1966.

After serving nine years in jail, he became a familiar figure selling flowers outside London's Waterloo station. He was found hanged in a garage in 1994 at the age of 62.

Two wreaths in the shape of trains accompanied his funeral cortege


Charlie Wilson

Wilson went on trial at Aylesbury Crown Court in 1964

Charles Frederick Wilson was the "treasurer" who gave each of the robbers their cut of the haul.

He was captured quickly and during his trial earned the nickname "the silent man" because he refused to say anything.

He was jailed for 30 years but escaped after just four months only to be captured again in Canada after four years on the run. He served another decade behind bars.

When he finally emerged from prison in 1978, he moved to Spain where he was shot and killed by a hitman on a bicycle in 1990.


Roy James

Roy James, who was the chief getaway driver and nicknamed "Weasel", left a crucial fingerprint at the gang's farm hideout and was eventually caught after a rooftop chase.

A silversmith and proficient racing driver, he planned to invest his share of the cash in new car technology.

After serving 12 years of a 30-year sentence, he sold silver at a market before moving to Spain.

In 1993 he was jailed again for six years for shooting his wife's father and hitting her with a pistol. He died soon after getting out of prison, aged 62


Brian Field

A crooked solicitor, Brian Field was used to make the arrangements to buy the farm hideout used immediately after the robbery.

He was sentenced to 25 years in jail, but that term was later reduced to five. He died in a motorway crash in 1979


Tommy Wisbey

A bookie and self-confessed "heavy", it was Tommy Wisbey's role to frighten the train staff. He was sentenced to 30 years and released in 1976, but he was jailed for another 10 years in 1989 for cocaine dealing.

After his release, he ran a flower stall and went to live in north London. He suffered several strokes as his health deteriorated.


Bobby Welch

Nightclub boss Bobby Welch was sentenced to 30 years and released in 1976. He was later left crippled when an operation on his leg went wrong.

After jail he became a car dealer and gambler in London.


Gordon Goody

A hairdresser who was jailed for 30 years and released in 1975, Gordon Goody moved to Spain to run a bar after release

James Hussey

A decorator known as "Big Jim", James Hussey was sentenced to 30 years and released in 1975. After working on a market stall, he later opened a restaurant in Soho.

In 1989 he was jailed for seven years for a drug smuggling conspiracy with fellow train robber Wisbey.


Roger Cordrey

Florist Roger Cordrey was arrested in Bournemouth after renting a lock-up from a policeman's widow.

He was jailed for 20 years, reduced to 14 on appeal.

Following his release in 1971, he went back to the flower business and moved to the West Country.


Jimmy White

Jimmy White, a former paratrooper, was known as "quartermaster" for the robbery.

He was caught in Kent after three years on the run and sentenced to 18 years. He was released in 1975 and moved to Sussex


Bill Boal

Engineer Bill Boal was arrested with Cordrey in possession of £141,000, charged with receiving stolen goods and jailed for 24 years, reduced to 14 on appeal.

Reynolds claimed Boal was not involved in the robbery and was "an innocent man". He died of cancer in jail in 1970.


Leonard Field

A merchant seaman, Leonard Field was sentenced to 25 years, reduced to five. He was released from jail in 1967 and moved to north London.


John Wheater

A solicitor who was convicted of conspiring to pervert the course of justice. He was sentenced to three years and released in 1966. He went to live in Surrey.


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