The life of Peter Jewell, who has died aged 90, was indelibly entwined with that of the Scottish film director Bill Douglas. They were friends from the age of 19 until Bill’s death from cancer in 1991, aged 57.
Over the course of Bill’s five films, Peter was his “ideas man” when scripts stalled; mediator between Bill’s cinematographers and editors; and script-editor on the “poor man’s epic” Comrades (1986). This charted the union and deportation of the Tolpuddle martyrs, a tale told partly by a character called “the lanternist” using pre-cinema-era artefacts.
From 1961 onwards Bill and Peter had hunted down items from the early days of cinema – magical peep shows, a praxinoscope, reams of silent photoplays and Hollywood ephemera – which they crammed into their minuscule flat in Soho, London, and which grew into a famed collection. This formed the basis of the Bill Douglas Cinema Museum at Exeter University, founded in 1994.
Peter was a Barumite (a native of Barnstaple, Devon), the youngest of three sons of Geoffrey Jewell, a railway engineer, and his wife, Marjorie. He boarded at Allhallows school in Rousdon, and then was called up for national service in the RAF. In billet 89 in Abu Suier, Egypt, in 1954 he met Bill, who asked him: “I wonder if you could give me a fill of ink for my pen?”
The third film in what became known as the Bill Douglas Trilogy, My Way Home, shot in 1976 in Egypt, depicted this first meeting, and while the trilogy should not be perceived as autobiography, the character of Robert (played by Joseph Blatchley) closely resembled Peter.
As well as Bill’s feature films, Peter and Bill made 20 home movies, in various locations and genres. Peter, having graduated from the LSE in 1969, worked as a welfare officer for Southwark council in London. During the course of his work, he itemised the possessions of a forgotten silent film actress and watched Charlie Chaplin’s childhood home demolished; both experiences became home movies. Six of these were premiered at the Glasgow Short Film Festival in 2024. Peter told the audience they were dreadful, but he was delighted at their reception.
Jack Archer’s 2023 documentary Bill Douglas; My Best Friend was foremost a film about Peter: his wit, erudite wordplay, and gentle, unabashed lack of inhibition guided much of the film.
He continued to live mainly in London until 2020, when he returned to Devon, which had been a second home to him and Bill since the mid-60s. A steady stream of Douglas devotees, including myself, intrigued and grateful for the two men’s bond, visited Peter at the home in Newport, Barnstaple, where, opposite the alley-like conservatory, honeysuckle planted days before Bill’s death flourished each summer.
Peter is survived by two nieces and three nephews.
Source: theguardian.com
