Portobello Road & Market in The Media
The 1950 Ealing Studios police thriller, The Blue Lamp, starring Dirk Bogarde and Jack Warner, as P.C. George Dixon, a character later revived in the long running TV drama, Dixon of Dock Green, featured location filming in the Paddington / Notting Hill / Portobello area. It features good shots these locations in pre-Westway days, and includes a thrilling car chase along largely traffic-free roads, including Portobello Road.
In an memorable passage in the 1960 novel The Chinese Agent by author Michael Moorcock, a world-renowned jewel-thief more than meets his match when he attempts to swipe a brooch from a Portobello Road market stall, and is hunted down through the streets like a dog by the sharp-eyed market traders.
The market was featured in the 1971 musical film, Bedknobs and Broomsticks in a scene involving a song (Portobello Road) and dance in and around the market staged on sets built at Disney's Burbank studios. The lyrics refer to the market and the people who live and work there.
In 1978, the rock band Dire Straits sang about the road in the song "Portobello Belle" on their second album Communiqué.
The cult British character Paddington Bear, featured in the books written by Michael Bond, enjoys visiting Portobello Market on a daily basis. His friend Mr. Gruber owns an antique shop on the Portobello Road, with whom Paddington has his elevenses every day.
The street and its name also appeared regularly on the hit TV series Minder.
The board game Portobello Market is named after this market.
BBC One's daytime antiques-based gameshow Bargain Hunt regularly features contestants buying items at the market to later sell at auction.
It is also referenced in the song "Blue Jeans" by alternative rock band Blur, from the 1993 album Modern Life Is Rubbish, in which the opening lyrics are "Air cushioned soles, I bought them on the Portobello Road on a Saturday."
It was the setting for the 1999 film Notting Hill, with much of the filming taking place on the street. The famed blue door, however, no longer exists, having been sold.
In 2006, the 20 minute documentary Portobello: Attack of the Clones won London awards and was screened a number of times at the infamous Electric Cinema. The film showed how Portobello Road is threatened by high street stores changing the street's independent spirit. It featured a large number of local stallholders and influencers, and was made by local filmmakers Paul McCrudden and Alex Thomas for TAG Films.
It is the setting for Paulo Coelho's 2007 novel, The Witch of Portobello.
In 2008, Ruth Rendell published a novel set in the area entitled, Portobello.
The B-side of British Singer-Songwriter Cat Stevens' 1966 single "I Love My Dog" is titled "Portobello Road" and discusses a walk through the famous street and market. The track also appears on Cat Stevens' 1967 debut album Matthew and Son.
One of the most famous TV show, from 1977 to 1983, in Italian television broadcast RAI was named Portobello after Portobello Road. The programme was suspended after the arrest of the anchorman Enzo Tortora for drug selling. Afterwards in 1987 Tortora was declared innocent and became a symbol, in Italian popular culture, of the victim of miscarriages of justice. In 1987, Tortora come back in television with Portobello.
In Caetano Veloso's "Nine Out Of Ten" song from the 1972 album Transa, he sings "walk down Portobello Road to the sound of reggae". The Brazilian artist lived in London in the late 1960s and early 1970s because of his exile from Brazil.
In the Only Fools and Horses episode Cash and Curry, Conmen who con Del Boy and Rodney Trotter using a statue of Kubera bought it from Portobello Road. The idea for the episode is as the writer, the late John Sullivan visited the street and it gave him an idea for a new episode.
There was a 2 bedroom house selling at BBC'S Homes Under the Hammer.
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Famous quotes containing the words road, market and/or media:
“A broad-backed ox can be driven straight on his road even by a small goad.”
—Sophocles (497–406/5 B.C.)
“To throw obstacles in the way of a complete education is like putting out the eyes; to deny the rights of property is like cutting off the hands. To refuse political equality is like robbing the ostracized of all self-respect, of credit in the market place, of recompense in the world of work, of a voice in choosing those who make and administer the law, a choice in the jury before whom they are tried, and in the judge who decides their punishment.”
—Elizabeth Cady Stanton (1815–1902)
“Few white citizens are acquainted with blacks other than those projected by the media and the so—called educational system, which is nothing more than a system of rewards and punishments based upon one’s ability to pledge loyalty oaths to Anglo culture. The media and the “educational system” are the prime sources of racism in the United States.”
—Ishmael Reed (b. 1938)