Be My Guest (1965)

Dave Martin (David Hemmings) and his beat band – The Smart Alecs – have a new place to play when his family inherits a seaside hotel (the Seaview Guest House in Brighton) in this follow-up to 1964’s Live It Up!.

The group write a song (called Be My Guest) and rehearse it at the Brighton Hippodrome for the producer of a musical talent contest, Hilton Bass (David Healy).

However, Bass’s stage manager Artie Clough (Tony Wager) and his glamorous girlfriend – pop singer Wanda (Joyce Blair) – recognise the song’s hit potential and hatch a plan to rip off the boys by conning them into selling it so they can give it to a local group, Slash Wildly and The Cutthroats (played by The Zephyrs).

Guest artists include Jerry Lee Lewis (backed by The Nashville Teens) and some obscure British groups you’ve never heard of.

The late Small Faces/Humble Pie singer Steve Marriot is the drummer in Hemmings’ band.

The film’s musical score was compiled and co-written by the celebrated American producer Shel Talmy who’s mostly known now for his groundbreaking work with British bands like The Kinks and The Who.

Filmed largely on location in Brighton, Be My Guest is a lovely nostalgia piece, even though its depiction of youth seems naïve these days and probably did even in 1965. The film was originally released as the support feature to the Morecambe and Wise’s big-screen debut The Intelligence Men.

Dave Martin
David Hemmings
Ricky
Steve Marriott
Phil
John Pike
Erica
Andrea Monet
Herbert Martin
Ivor Salter
Margaret Martin
Diana King
Mrs Pucil
Avril Angers
Wanda
Joyce Blair
Hilton Bass
David Healy
Artie Clough
Tony Wager
Routledge
David Lander
Mathews
Robin Stewart
Dyllis
Monica Evans
Zena
Pamela Ann Davies
Steward
Douglas Ives
Slash Wildly and the Cut Throats
The Zephyrs
Rocky Steel and the Sparks
Kenny & The Wranglers
The Niteshades
Themselves
The Plebs
Themselves
Jerry Lee Lewis
Himself
The Nashville Teens
Themselves

Director
Lance Comfort