Philip Jenkinson

Infobox journalist
name = Philip Jenkinson


birth_date = birth date and age|1935|8|17|df=yes
birth_place = England
occupation = Journalist
spouse = Sally Jay

Philip Jenkinson is a cinema specialist, journalist, BBC television presenter and film collector. His collection was known as Filmfinders.

Early life

When Phil was a child living in Manchester hewent on holiday to Butlins and won a talent competition doingGeorge Formby imitations. A talent scout noticed him andarranged an audition with BBC Children’s Hour. That bit himwith the stage bug and he did a lot of radio programmes forthem from Leeds. His parents were not interested at all. Themoney he earned he spent on elocution lessons to get rid of hisManchester accent. In those days no successful actor would havea regional accent.Phil was a very asthmatic child and consequently missed a lotof school, so the milkman gave his mother a 9.5mm projector tokeep him amused, and that’s how he started watching films. Hismother used to give him money to go swimming to build up hisstrength but he used to spend it on going to the cinema instead.His mother didn’t like him doing this because she believed youpicked up germs there. Phil would then put his swimming trunksunder the tap before he went home so that his mother wouldn’tfind out what he had been doing.Cinema has been a life long interest for Phil. When he leftschool he started work as a projectionist, then worked in the theatre,in stage management mainly, and acting. Before TV, therewere so many more local cinemas that people regularly ‘went tothe pictures’ two or three times a week to see new releases, orthere were film societies which you could join to view classics orforeign movies. Phil had always been hiring out films.

Career

Philip Jenkinson said in an interview in 2003: "One day when I was giving a lecture at StMartin’s School of Art, a BBC producer, Mike Appleton, waswaiting at the back to pick up his girlfriend and he caught thelast 10 minutes. He came over and said it was very interesting. ‘Iam a producer of a programme called Late Night Line-Up.Would you like to come along and do something similar on theprogramme?’ They liked it and asked me to come back nextweek and do another one. I initially signed a contract for sixmonths, which grew and grew. I ended up staying with LateNight Line Up for five years. The talk and emphasis was alwaysabout old movies. Film Night came out of Late Night Line Up. Itstarted with me and Tony Bilbow. Tony reviewed the new filmswhilst I related the new films to ones that were made earlier, linkingthem with either a director or a star or the style; somethingthey had in common."

During the 1970s Philip was also doing a weekly column forlistings magazine Radio Times and editing films for music show
Old Grey Whistle Test. Phil was frantically busy during that period. He received upto 50 letters a week askinghim to show certainfilm clips and wassatirised by MontyPython.
In 1971 he started aseries of 13 week lecturesat London’sNational Film Theatreon the history of the musical.

Film Collection and Filmfinders

Phil started building up Filmfinders at this time, as a stockshot library as opposed to being a personal collection. Phil acquired a lot of Mack Sennettand Laurel and Hardy films from collectors who, in those days,were everywhere.It was a real community that included Leslie Halliwell (whowrote The Filmgoers' Companion), author Bill Everson, KevinBrownlow (authority on silent cinema), John Huntley (then at the British Film Institute) and a couple offriends out in Hollywood. They all did swaps, no buying. Theyjust swapped films…