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Hippie delayed by Notting Hill protests + Greer angry too, but Ferrier advised the director

03 October 2007 at 09:13 PM | by Melty_Girl

Notting Hill residents unhappy with Hippie invasion

Sienna Miller and Cillian Murphy in London
Sienna and Cillian in another famous London locale;
see more photos from the Hippie Hippie Shake shoot

The Independent is reporting that the people of Notting Hill rose up to protest Hippie Hippie Shake coming to their neighborhood for three days of shooting. Apparently, there were

...fears over the disruption caused by three days of shooting and that swathes of resident parking bays were being suspended as film-makers cleared the streets of modern day Toyota Priuses to replace them with authentic Sixties Ford Anglias.

It's not completely clear how long shooting was delayed, though ContactMusic.com says filming was halted on Monday (1 October). Whatever the case, Working Title Films met with concerned residents and is paying them off to put up with the hassle. Well, I wish I could take part in this disruption and compensation! To those of you in London: please if you encounter the Hippie shoot! We love to publish fans' stories and photos.

Neville's cohorts have different takes on Hippie

One of the real people who's being depicted in Hippie Hippie Shake is also angry. Famous sex-positive feminist author Germaine Greer (The Female Eunuch), who's being portrayed by Australian newcomer Emma Booth, blogged caustically for The Guardian this summer:

It's getting harder and harder to be a real person. You used to have to die before assorted hacks started munching your remains and modelling a new version of you out of their own excreta.

Greer's scathing piece is a good read; she makes some good points, and wittily, but also seems to contradict herself a bit. And what's her take on the Hippie principals whom Cillian and Sienna Miller are playing?

As one of the least talented people on the London scene in the 60s, it was probably inevitable that (Richard) Neville would be constantly revisiting it in search of the fame and fortune that continue to elude him. ...Poor Louise (Ferrier) has been dubbed a "siren" with a penchant for threesomes, apparently because she once posed naked with Jenny Kee for an Oz cover. She was actually better known for her Sunday lunches, roast leg of lamb Australian-style (grey to the bone).

With her stance against being portrayed while she's still alive, Greer refused the offer of reading Neville's book before it went to press in 1995 (to vet it for anything offensive about her), and once again she has declined to work with Hippie director Beeban Kidron or Emma Booth, the latter whom she offered but one piece of advice: "Get an honest job."

In contrast, Louise Ferrier, who spoke admiringly of Greer, told The Guardian that she'd met extensively with Kidron.

"It's a hard period to recapture on film," (Ferrier) said. "I think it's very important the script portrays it accurately. Beeban is certainly working to make it authentic."

For more back stories on the wild Oz days, check out the aforementioned Guardian story, and an article in The Daily Mail (that angered Greer). I wonder if the film will include what The Mail says happened when Neville and Greer met:

At a campus party (Neville) ... met 24-year-old Germaine Greer, who was doing a thesis on the romantic poet Lord Byron at Sydney University. Tall and striking, she was already committed to shocking bourgeois sensibilities. By way of introduction, the outrageous Greer reached beneath Neville's Hawaiian shirt, fetchingly unbuttoned to show off his Aussie tan, and tweaked his nipple between her thumb and forefinger. "See how it grows," she crowed to the astounded partygoers, "just like a d**k. Nipples are a mass of erectile tissues. You must learn to masturbate all your male parts."