QPR Screen References: No.16 – ‘The Sweeney’ – Episode: ‘I Want The Man’

Although there is no verbal reference to the R’s, this one is included because of the superb visual shots of Loftus Road. This episode is from Series 2 and was first transmitted at 9pm on 10th November, 1975. The opening scene shows Popeye, Regan’s ‘Snout’, calling him from a phone box facing towards Julie’s restaurant in Portland Road about two suspects who have just entered. He is then bundled into a car by some villains before Regan arrives with his team. They burst into the restaurant where Frankie Little, played by Roy Kinnear, is meeting Christine, the girlfriend of the gang’s leader. They take him away after the girl had done a runner out the back into Hippodrome Place and discarding her wig in the process.

Whilst the investigation is going on, we see Regan emerging from the South Africa Road Stand to question Popeye’s mate, Jimmy Dancer, who’s sweeping the Loft terrace. When he sees him walking towards him, he legs it, but Regan anticipates which way he’s making his escape and catches him at the back of the Loft. As they walk up the steps back to the Loft terrace, Jimmy scampers off again only to be finally apprehended in the South Africa Road Stand where he continues to question him about Popeye. Frankie Little eventually does a deal with Regan and then meets up with the gang at their hideaway.

Jimmy Dancer gets a serious hiding and Frankie phones through a coded message to his daughter which Regan’s boss, Det. Chief Inspector Haskins, works out that the gang’s next target is a security van delivering used notes. They attack the van but Regan and his team soon arrive on the scene and after a fight they are all arrested.

The restaurant is on the corner of Portland Road and Clarendon Road and according to the unofficial website of ‘The Sweeney’, unusually, it’s referred to by its real name. Although not shown, the doorway to the left of the restaurant was used for a while as the entrance to the Winchester Club in ‘Minder’. Later, there is a scene where Regan and Carter meet up in their squad cars and this is in Colet Gardens, Hammersmith. Their excellent website can be found at: www.thesweeney.info/

Roy Kinnear was only 54 when he died of a heart attack in a Madrid hospital following a fall from a horse whilst filming. ‘The Return Of The Musketeers.’ Henry Woolf plays Jimmy Dancer and is well known for his portrayal of Frankie Barrow in ‘Steptoe’.

Steve Russell

2 thoughts on “QPR Screen References: No.16 – ‘The Sweeney’ – Episode: ‘I Want The Man’

  1. Excellent stuff Steve! If anyone wishes to view it, it can be found on The Sweeney Series 2 DVD Box Set – Episode 11.

    There was also an episode of Minder in the very early 80s where Dennis Waterman was chatting to someone whilst he was sat in the front row of the Ellerslie Road stand. Does anyone know any more details?

    Martin

  2. Most of my formative years seemed to be spent watching the Sweeney being filmed in and around Notting Hill/North Kensington.. In fact a scene from the first episode was filmed on the Edward Woods Estate in the summer holidays about 74/75. We were playing football and were asked to appear in a shot where Jack was buying an ice cream from an ice cream van and the vendor was his snout.We had to be queuing around him as he spoke his lines to his snout. They did it about 8 times and I was in about 5 of them.Then we got bored and went back to our ‘match’.When the programme was shown on TV ,they had used one of the takes I wasn’t in!!!!!. I could’ve been the next John Mills or Gielgud. Instead my thespian dreams went for a (Richard)Burton.

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