Crossroads - unrealistic? PAH!

[Daniel Freeman]

A lot of mentions in the media about the old Crossroads is that it was so unrealistic and far-fetched. Well I worked my first ten years in a hotel - very similar - between 1976-86. Believe me - Crossroads was quite accurate! (and far from unrealistic)
I'll summarise this....otherwise I'll be here all night! (I could write a novel).
It was the St.Nicholas Hotel in Scarborough (opposite the famous Grand Hotel) - a privately-owned 200+ bedroomed hotel, run by a widow and her two sons. One son went off to go into farming, the other stayed as a manager at the hotel. Believe me - she was NO MEG! She was a right snob. She expected to be called 'Madame' by everyone (She married into the business - her hubby had been the bread-winner!)[she was originally called Joyce Briggs from Wales! NOW - she was Mrs Craig-Tyler).
We had a bunch of foreign staff from Portugal (previously employed by Madame's dead husband), who could hardly speak a word of English, an Irish alcoholic Restaurant Manageress (who had previously had an affair with Madame's husband), an alcoholic good-looking young manager who shagged anyone going, (not me - he was straight ), a flirty female assistant manager who used to shag my best-mate the night-porter, the flirty Head Receptionist had an affair with the married Chef, and Madame's favourite married son (the manager) discovered his wife was having an affair with the new dishy barman! Her other son (the farmer) turned up with a 'wife-to-be' - a bit of a commoner as far as Madame was concerned! Needless to say - the wedding never happened!!
Ahhh such fun days!  But I can guarantee that Crossroads is NOT as far-fetched as it seems! I could tell a lot more....does anyone else have any 'far-fetched' stories that ' wouldn't happen in real-life' ?

[oorshughie]

Were there any cleaners suspected of being Russian spies like Amy Turtle? lol

[Daniel Freeman]

Were there any cleaners suspected of being Russian spies like Amy Turtle? lol

No, Ooershughie - but we did have an old lady cleaner called Joan Lobb who did the two main bars - she knew EVERYTHING about EVERYBODY! And we had a dear old lady lounge waitress who served teas and coffees in the reception area called Nancy Corlyon....she spent all her time chatting to customers about her arthiritis and her husband's lumbago!

[oorshughie]

Apprently really cheery,but its quite common for guests to slip their mortal coils in hotels and the staff have to cover it up discreetly

unlike Basil Fawlty then.

[Daniel Freeman]

Funny you should say that!!
We had a guest die - and 'Madame' insisted it was kept quiet......we had to have the lift to the front entrance fully screened off (with whatever we could find....luckily we had some proper folding screens - and it was only about 10 feet distance from the lift to the main door!) But it was quite obvious to the guests that someone had popped their clogs!!  Entrance blocked off, flashing ambulance outside which could be seen from our huge bay windows!
I think Basil Fawlty's method of chucking her into a laundry basket would've been far more discreet! 

[Lucky]

There's nout stranger than folk!

Never worked in a hotel but have worked with many strange people in offices. There was:
the girl who was obsessed by necrophylia;
the guy who had a nervous breakdown (over about 2 weeks) and used to hallucinate regularly in the office and thought some girsl he worked with were trying to kill him;
the girl who was deliberately goading an old letch to step out of line with her after having already declared to colleagues she was after a claim for sexual harassment;
the girl whose handbag was returned to her in work by the police after being found abandoned in a public park the previous evening...with her knickers inside.

Oh and I can't forget to mention the alcoholic man who buried his same grandmother three times - every time he went off work for weeks on a bender he was 'burying his grandmother' - don't know why he didn't just say his aunt or uncle etc etc, not a very good liar it seems!

And thats just the tip of the iceberg.

I think quite often real life scenarios wouldn't be believed in TV shows. Or maybe I've just worked with very strange people!

[Daniel Freeman]

Not at all Lucky!
I'm sure we've all met many 'strange' people or seen many weird scenarios!
I also knew someone (a neighbour) who had been a Major in the war - Major Wilf - we called him....he was just like the Major from Fawlty Towers! Without a doubt! 

[Aston Cross]

Apprently really cheery,but its quite common for guests to slip their mortal coils in hotels and the staff have to cover it up discreetly

unlike Basil Fawlty then.

It's such a story that inspired the Fawlty Towers episode The Kipper and the Corpse.  Cleese and Booth were struggling a little for ideas and they asked their friend Andrew Leeman - who worked at the Savoy at the time - what one of his greatest bugbears was.  The first thing that Leeman came out with was, "Oh, all the bloody stiffs!"  Hence the episode was written and the guest who passed on was named Mr Leeman.

[oorshughie]

I suppose Crossroads on a serious note had the suicide of Mrs Bailey as the sudden death at the Motel.

The waitress(surely they got have given her a name)was shouting away in reception when they first thought Mrs Bailey had died a

few weeks earlier.

[Lucky]

Its surprising there wasn't more deaths at the motel over the years. If it was still on air today I don't know how many suspicious deaths there would have been by now - just look at Emmerdale for example! There must have been about 20 murders/suspicious deaths in that village alone and in most cases the body was moved/buried/tampered with.

[Aston Cross]

You're not wrong, Lucky.  There'd be the mysterious death in the lift shaft, the serial killer (obv.), the psychotic killer who blows things out of all proportion and of course numerous deaths in countless massive explosions.  Soap standards today ain't what they were...