Carry On Camping is a 1969 British comedy film, the seventeenth in the series of Carry On films to be made. Returning cast members included Sid James, Charles Hawtrey, Joan Sims, Kenneth Williams, Terry Scott, Bernard Bresslaw, Peter Butterworth and Barbara Windsor.
Plot[]
Sid Boggle (Sid James) and his friend Bernie Lugg (Bernard Bresslaw) are partners in a plumbing business. They take their girlfriends, prudish Joan Fussey (Joan Sims) and meek Anthea Meeks (Dilys Laye), to the cinema to see a film about a nudist camp called Paradise. Sid has the idea of the foursome holidaying there, reasoning that in that environment their heretofore chaste girlfriends will relax their strict moral standards. Sid easily gains Bernie's co-operation in the scheme, which they attempt to keep secret from the girls.
They travel to the campsite named Paradise. After paying the membership fees to the owner, money-grabbing farmer Josh Fiddler (Peter Butterworth), Sid realises it is not the camp seen in the film, but merely a standard family campsite. Furthermore, it is no paradise but a damp field, the only facilities being a very basic toilet, and washing block. They reluctantly agree to stay after Fiddler refuses a refund and the girls approve of the place. There is further disappointment when the girls will not share a tent with the boys.
Sid and Bernie soon set their sights on a bunch of young ladies on holiday from the Chayste Place finishing school. The ringleader of the girls is blonde and bouncy Babs (Barbara Windsor). In charge of the girls is Dr. Soaper (Kenneth Williams), who is fervently pursued by his lovelorn colleague, the school's matron, Miss Haggard (Hattie Jacques). The girls soon leave for Ballsworth Youth Hostel, where Babs and her friend Fanny (Sandra Caron) change the room numbers on Dr. Soaper's and Miss Haggard's doors and convince Dr. Soaper that the female washroom, where Miss Haggard is, is the male washroom. Dr Soaper leads an outdoor aerobics session, during which Babs' bikini top flies off; he catches it.
Other campers are Peter Potter (Terry Scott), who hates camping but must endure his jolly yet domineering wife Harriet (Betty Marsden), with her hideous braying cackle, and naive first-time camper Charlie Muggins (Charles Hawtrey).
Chaos ensues when a group of hippies arrive in the next field for a noisy all-night rave led by band The Flowerbuds. The campers club together and successfully drive the ravers away, but all the girls leave with them. However, there is a happy ending for Bernie and Sid when their girlfriends finally agree to move into their tent. Their joy is short-lived when Joan's mother (Amelia Bayntun) turns up, but Anthea lets loose a goat that chases Mrs Fussey away.
Trivia[1][]
- Filmed during a rainy autumn that produced loads of mud. This can be seen frequently through the film, including people sinking & slipping. To hide the mud, green paint was used. The leaves (which had by now either dropped or turned brown) were spray-painted
- Betty Marsden said during filming to Dilys Laye that she always wanted to die with a glass of gin in her hand. In Denville Hall, a home for old actors, twenty four hours after arriving in July 1998, this is exactly what happened. Miss Marsden collapsed and died at the home's bar, whilst drinking gin.
- Premiered in Hull, England, people were literally queuing around the block to see it. It was the highest grossing film in the United Kingdom in 1969. Carry On Up the Khyber (1968) was the second grossing film that year.
- There is an in house joke in the scene when Doctor Soaper and Miss Haggard discuss love in the tent, Miss Haggard refers to her previous job in a hospital. This refers to Carry on Doctor (1967).
- Betty Marsden (Harriet Potter) was terrified of riding the tandem bicycle which was an important part of her scenes during filming.
- The famous bra flying scene when Babs and the girls are doing the exercises, caused some problems for Barbara Windsor. He bra was connected to a fishing line and an old stagehand was to pull it off at the given time, but he pulled her over in to the mud. When it was successfully done, she was determined to keep covered up at all costs, but then Kenneth Williams says "Matron - take them away", and so Matron grabs her arm, uncovering her for all to see. The yell she lets out at this point is real.
- There were holes (due to rust) under the door of the car used in the film and water leaked inside during the rain scene. There was five inches of water in the car.
- Trisha Noble (Sally) was always late for filming, which caused upset on the set. There were concerns that she did not fit in with the rest of the team. Ironically, she actually had the first line on the first day of filming, during the girls campsite shower scene.
- Barbara Windsor wanted to play the school girl 'Babs' with a public School accent, but the first day of filming, the shower where she looks through the knot hole and sees Sid's beady eye, she blurts her line out in typical Cockney style. Gerald Thomas didn't want to do another take, so she was stuck with it for the rest of the film
- There was a deal with Saxa Salt and there was blatant product placement in the film during one scene with Charles Hawtrey. This was unusual in the UK in the 1960's.
- The girl Babs is fighting with in her first scene, is Anna Karen. This is the same actress who later found fame as frumpy Olive in London Weekend Television's long-running TV series "On the Buses" and the 3 spin-off movies.
- Standfast Abbey is based on Buckfast Abbey, Devon, as the film is supposed to be set there.
Goofs[2][]
- Set in the summer, but filmed in November, Peter Potter's breath condensation is visible when he is being attacked by a bull, and also from his wife Harriet in the scene directly following.
- Reflection of Boom microphone in car window when Sid and Bernie walk towards the car carrying their luggage as they are about to leave on their holidays.
- When Sid and Bernie go to the Department Store, the lady in the white trousers has already gone past them, but when they get out of their car, she walks past them again.
- When Charlie Muggins is pulled into the tent, in the exterior shot he is entering through the flap with the window, and in the interior shot, the flap without the window.
- When Miss Haggard goes over to Dr Soaper's tent, she has the top button of her night dress done up, but when she enters the tent it has been undone.
- The Potters on their tandem pass a car, then as they pass Charlie Muggins they pass it again.
- Charlie Muggins is left in the field sleeping in a brown-patterned sleeping bag by the Potters. The next time we see him sleeping with the Potters again at the camp site he is back sleeping in the original blue bag and the brown one is nowhere to be seen (or, rather, the brown one is seen everywhere else - it appears in all sorts of different places around the campsite throughout the film).
- When we first see the girls doing exercises, Babs isn't with them.
- When Sid and Bernie go to the Department Store, they are seen to stop well in front of a signpost, but when they get out of the van, they are only just in front of it.
- Miss Haggard's blue towel "turban" disappears and reappears between shots when Babs's bra comes off.
- Interior and exterior shots of the Potters' front door do not match.
- The wide angle and close up shots of the Farmer's front door do not match.
- When Sid and Bernie pick up Joan and Anthea from Mrs Fussy's house, Sid hands Bernie an umbrella. Bernie then clearly wedges it in the left hand side of the roof rack. As the camera cuts to the left hand side of the car, the umbrella has gone. It is not visible when the luggage comes off the roof either.
- When the girls are fighting in the room, Miss Haggard stops and enters. The shot from the corridor shows Miss Haggard grab the handle in her left hand and push the door with her right. In the next shot, from inside the room, Miss Haggard is now holding and pushing the handle with her right hand and holding onto the door frame with her left.
- When Peter Potter's pants catch fire, he runs past Charlie Muggins inside the tent, but when he opens the flap of the tent, Charlie Muggins is not visible.
- When Dr Soaper and Miss Haggard discuss what the Birds and the Bees do on the coach, they pass a red lorry, but in the next shot the red lorry disappears.
- When Matron visits Doctor Soaper in his tent she opens the zip and only a blue background can be seen behind her, not the camp site.
- Mr Tanner falls over Sally in the youth hostel and pulls Babs' clothing off. Sally is seen on the floor lying sideways away from the camera when this happens. In the next shot she's sitting up, facing the camera.
- When Joan tells Sid that they are already "soaking wet" after having put up the tents, their clothes appear dry and not wet.
- As they are about to leave in the car in front of the house, Mrs. Fussey is right behind Sid as he walks round the car. However, when you see the next shot she is far behind him.
- On the first night at the camp site, it is raining and Bernie accidentally inflates the rubber dingy, but the outside shot of the dingy inflating in the tent shows it is not raining.
- In the cinema, Sid's ice lolly changes a few times.
- Sid drives his car around a bend in the street on his way to pick up Joan and Anthea, but in the next shot he's on a straight piece of road.
- When Sid drives around the bend in Joan and Anthea's street, he passes two girls walking down the pavement, but they do not appear in the shot from the rear window.
- When Doctor Soaper and Miss Haggard talk about the Birds and the Bees on the coach to the girls, they are quite clearly going down a dual carriageway, but in the next shot of the bus, they are seen driving down a country lane.
- When Charlie Muggins is about to be passed by Peter and Harriet Potter, a white car is some way behind him, but as he is passed, the white car is only a few feet from him.
- When Bernie accidentally tips water over Sid, Sid has to move his head to get the water on him.
- When Sid is trying to talk to Babs through the wall in the shower block and he says to Bernie he can hear her, but what is actually heard is Babs saying, "Sorry for bursting in on you last night sir," to Dr Soaper from the hostel scene earlier in the film.
- The clip attached to Babs's bra which helps it come off is visible in the close-up shots.
- Obvious stunt double for Mr. Tanner when he drives the bus with the girls, Doctor Soaper and Matron down the country lane.
- When Mr Muggins and Potters struggle to get undressed in the tent, the ridge pole of the tent collapses behind Mr Muggins, but the tent stays upright and in later shots the pole has been reassembled.
- When Mr. Potter turns off the lamp in the tent, it's not lit in the first place.
- Set in the summer, but filmed in November, breath condensation is visible from the actor's mouths in various scenes, such was when the Potters arrive at the camping and when Sid and Bernie leave their tent to go to the bathhouse.
- Babs's bra falls off in a downwards direction, but it still manages to hit Doctor Soaper in the face.
- When Babs is forced to leave the shower by matron the girl in the next shower booth is not naked and is clearly seen wearing a blue costume.
Cast[]
- Sid James as Sid Boggle
- Kenneth Williams as Doctor Kenneth Soaper
- Joan Sims as Joan Fussey
- Charles Hawtrey as Charlie Muggins
- Terry Scott as Peter Potter
- Barbara Windsor as Babs
- Bernard Bresslaw as Bernie Lugg
- Hattie Jacques as Miss Haggard
- Peter Butterworth as Joshua Fiddler
- Julian Holloway as Jim Tanner
- Dilys Laye as Anthea Meeks
- Betty Marsden as Harriet Potter
- Sandra Caron as Fanny
- Trisha Noble as Sally
- Amelia Bayntun as Mrs Fussey
- Brian Oulton as Camping store manager
- Patricia Franklin as Farmer's daughter
- Derek Francis as Farmer
- Michael Nightingale as Man in cinema
- George Moon as Man at campsite
- Walter Henry as Man in cinema
- Valerie Shute as Pat
- Elizabeth Knight as Jane
- Georgina Moon as Joy
- Vivien Lloyd as Verna
- Jennifer Pyle as Hilda
- Lesley Duff as Norma
- Jackie Pool as Betty
- Anna Karen as Hefty girl
- Sally Kemp as Girl with cow
- Valerie Leon as Miss Dobbin, the camping store assistant
- Angela Grant as Schoolgirl (uncredited)
- Peter Cockburn as Film Commentator (uncredited)
- Gilly Grant as Sally G-string (uncredited)
- Michael Low as Lusty youth (uncredited)
- Mike Lucas as Lusty youth (uncredited)
- Michael Low as Lusty youth (uncredited)
- David Seaforth as Camper (uncredited)