Young Hearts Run Free
Lyn Paul begins 1987 by completing the seven-week run of Dick Whittington and His Cat at the Churchill Theatre, Bromley. Derek Holt, who played Dick Whittington's feline friend, later recalled that the pantomime had not always gone entirely as directed: “Lyn Paul (Dick) tripped over me and he also became separated from ‘the cat’ when several actors trod on it!” (Slough & South Bucks Observer, 11th February 2018)
On 4th April the New Seekers (minus Lyn Paul) return to the singles chart as part of Ferry Aid. The single, a re-recording of The Beatles' classic Let It Be, is a Stock, Aitken and Waterman production. It features top recording artists and celebrities from the 1960s, '70s and '80s including: Andy Bell (Erasure), Boy George, Bucks Fizz, Hazell Dean, Stephanie Lawrence, Paul McCartney, The Nolans and Steve Strange. It spends seven weeks on the chart including three weeks at number 1. Proceeds from the sale of the single are donated to The Sun newspaper's Zebrugge disaster fund.
On 24th July Lyn Paul takes part in -
and wins - the Euro Country Music Masters, which is broadcast on Dutch television (AVRO-TROS). Lyn sings Wind Beneath My Wings, a song written in 1982 by Jeff Silbar and Larry Henley and released as a single by Colleen Hewett (who had a minor hit with the song in Australia in 1982), Lou Rawls (whose version of the song made it to number 65 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1983) and Gary Morris (who took the song to number 4 on the Billboard Hot Country Songs chart in the same year). Wind Beneath My Wings had also been recorded by Sheena Easton (1982), Lee Greenwood (1983), Gladys Knight & the Pips (1983) and Roger Whittaker (1982) but it would not be until Bette Midler recorded the song for the film soundtrack of Beaches that it would become an international hit. Bette Midler's version went on to reach number 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart in June 1989 and won Grammy Awards for both 'Record of the Year' and 'Song of the Year' in February 1990.
During 1987 Lyn meets Alan Young - the man who is to become her second husband. Eleven years later, interviewed in the Weekly News, Lyn described how her best friend Moira had brought them together:
"She'd been going out with Alan's best friend so I knew him on a social basis for about four years... Moira reckoned we'd make an ideal couple... She held a dinner party to which Alan and I were both invited. At a late stage in the evening, I told a joke and Alan roared with laughter... It's weird, but from that moment I saw him in a completely different light. I turned to Moira and said, 'He's not bad, is he?'"
(Weekly News, 22nd August 1998, page 16)
At Christmas Lyn Paul joins The Krankies (Janette and Ian Tough) at the Sunderland Empire for the pantomime Aladdin. Billed as "the girl who taught the world to sing in perfect harmony", Lyn is praised in the Sunderland Echo as "the bonniest Aladdin" ever to grace the stage.
Lyn Paul
pictured outside the Sunderland Empire.
Photo courtesy of the
Sunderland Echo.
 
Recalling the time in an interview in 2005, Lyn said:
"I've worked at the Sunderland Empire many times. It has so much character... although the dressing rooms were awful!
I have terrific memories of 'Aladdin' in particular. I was with Alan, which made it special, but the whole cast and crew were great too.
We used to play darts in the pub next door to the theatre every night and we all became quite proficient by the end of the run." (Sunderland Echo, 6th September 2005)
Aladdin,
Empire Theatre, Sunderland
(promotional leaflet).
Incidentally...
In 1987 Lyn Paul's younger sister Nikki Belsher joins the West End production of Cats at the New London Theatre. playing the role of Jemima. Nikki also appears on television, making her début on 3-2-1 with a song and dance number, Dancing Is Everything, from the Broadway musical The Tap Dance Kid.
In the USA the second series of the popular TV programme The Golden Girls takes to the air in September. One of the episodes, 'Vacation' (first shown in the United States on 29th November) ends with Rose Nylund (played by Betty White) singing the chorus of the New Seekers' hit I'd Like To Teach The World To Sing.
In the UK Lyn Paul and The Krankies are not the only ones starring in Aladdin at Christmas. Other productions include: Jimmy Cricket, Su Pollard and Paul Shane at the Alhambra Theatre, Bradford; Marti Caine and Gareth Hunt at the Apollo, Oxford; Frankie Howerd, Kathy Staff and Keith Chegwin at The Hexagon, Reading; Christopher Biggins at the Orchard Theatre, Dartford; Anita Dobson at the Richmond Theatre; and Wayne Sleep at the Theatre Royal, Norwich.
| In the News - 1987 |
| |
|
| Jan |
Douglas Lovelock, the British police Inspector who accidentally shot and paralysed Cherry Groce during a raid on a house in Brixton in September 1985, is cleared of all criminal charges on 15th January.
On 16th January Hu Yaobang is forced to resign as General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party.
No Sex Please, We're British closes on the same day after 6,761 performances in London's West End.
On 20th January UK police crack down on soccer hooligans with a series of dawn raids at 30 addresses in London, the Home Counties and the Midlands.
On the same day Church of England envoy Terry Waite is taken hostage in Beirut. He had gone to Lebanon in the hope of negotiating the release of four hostages, including the British journalist John McCarthy.
Mikhail Gorbachev begins to implement his policies of glasnost and perestroika.
On 29th January the South African government gives the Commissioner of Police the power to ban media reports on "any matter", effectively reinstating a ban on newspaper adverts for the African National Congress (ANC), which a Court ruling had deemed illegal.
On the same day
the President of the Philippines, Corazon Aquino, sends in troops to flush out a group of armed rebels who had been occupying the Channel 7 television centre in Manila for two days.
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| Feb |
Pianist and entertainer Liberace dies of pneumonia (brought on by AIDS) at his home in Palm Springs on 4th February, aged 67.
The News International dispute is brought to an end on 6th February when the NGA calls off its picketing of Rupert Murdoch's Wapping print works.
On 11th February Cynthia Payne (“Madame Cyn”) is found not guilty of running a brothel at her home in Ambleside Avenue, Streatham.
Andy Warhol dies on 22nd February, aged 58, after a gall bladder operation.
On 26th February the Church of England General Synod votes by 317 to 145 to allow the ordination of women priests, but will study an inquiry by a committee of bishops before it gives the final go-ahead.
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| Mar |
Danny Kaye dies on 3rd March, aged 76.
On Friday, 6th March a car ferry, the Townsend Thoresen Herald of Free Enterprise, capsizes outside the Belgian port of Zebrugge, killing 193 passengers and crew.
The musical Les Misérables opens on Broadway on 12th March at The Broadway Theatre. Colm Wilkinson and Frances Ruffelle reprise their roles from the London production.
Winston Silcott is jailed for life on 19th March for the murder of PC Keith Blakelock in the 1985 Broadwater Farm riots (the conviction was quashed in November 1991).
Thirty-one people are injured on 23rd March, when an IRA car bomb explodes at the British army barracks in Rheindahlen, West Germany.
Platoon wins the Oscar for Best Picture at the 59th Academy Awards ceremony on 30th March.
On the same day Vincent Van Gogh's Still Life: Vase with Fifteen Sunflowers is sold at auction in London by Christie's for £24.75 million.
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| Apr |
Jewellery belonging to the late Duchess of Windsor is sold for £31 million on Friday, 3rd April at a Sotheby's auction on the shore of Lake Geneva.
On 7th April Paul Simon plays the first of six sold-out concerts at the Royal Albert Hall. Anti-apartheid demonstrators including Billy Bragg and Jerry Dammers picket the shows.
On 9th April the Princess of Wales opens the UK's first AIDS ward at the Middlesex Hospital in London.
On the same day the UK government orders an inquiry into the Al-Fayed brothers £650 million purchase of Harrods.
Harvey Proctor, the Conservative MP for Billericay in Essex, is arrested on charges of indecency involving teenage rent boys. He appears at Bow Street Magistrates' Court in central London on 16th April. At his trial in May he pleads guilty and is fined £1,450.
More than 100 people are killed on Tuesday, 21st April when a Tamil Tiger bomb explodes at a bus terminal in Colombo, Sri Lanka.
On 23rd April Margaret Thatcher confirms that former MI5 chief Sir Maurice Oldfield was gay.
On 30th April the Law Lords approve the sterilization of a 17-year-old girl with learning disabilities.
|
| May |
President Botha's National Party is returned to power in the 'whites only' general election held in South Africa on 6th May.
The frontrunner for the Democrats' 1988 presidential nomination, Gary Hart, drops out of the contest on 8th May, a week after allegations had been made of an extra-marital affair with Donna Rice.
On the same day eight members of the Provisional IRA are killed by the SAS in an ambush in the village of Loughgall, County Armagh. A civilian is also killed and another wounded by the SAS after unwittingly driving into the ambush area.
On 9th May Johnny Logan wins the Eurovision Song Contest for Ireland with the song Hold Me Now. In so doing he becomes the first performer to win the contest twice, having previously won for Ireland in 1980 with What's Another Year. The UK entry, Only The Light by Rikki, finishes in 13th place.
Rita Hayworth dies on 15th May, aged 67.
The USS Stark is hit by two Iraqi Exocet missiles on 17th May. 37 of the crew are killed.
On 28th May a 19-year-old West German, Mathias Rust, lands his Cessna plane on Moscow's Red Square, having flown there from Helsinki. He is subsequently sentenced to four years in a Soviet labour camp, where he serves 432 days.
|
| June |
In the UK the Conservative Party wins the general election held on Thursday, 11th June. The Tories win 376 seats and have a Parliamentary majority of 101. Margaret Thatcher becomes the first Prime Minister for more than 160 years to win three successive terms of office. Diane Abbott, voted in as the new Labour MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington, becomes the first black woman to be elected to House of Commons.
Princess Anne is given the title "Princess Royal" on 13th June.
On 14th June, at the age of 73, Willy Brandt steps down after 20 years as head of Germany's Social Democrats.
The number of people unemployed in the UK falls below 3 million for the first time since 1981. The new jobless total of 2,986,453 is announced on 18th June by the new Secretary of State for Employment, Norman Fowler,
Fred Astaire, who co-starred with Ginger Rogers in ten Hollywood musicals, including Top Hat (1935), Swing Time (1936), and Shall We Dance (1937), dies on 22nd June, aged 88. In 1950 Ginger Rogers had presented him with an honorary Academy Award "for his unique artistry and his contributions to the technique of musical pictures."
|
| July |
On 1st July Rupert Murdoch buys the Today newspaper, Britain's only full-colour daily, which had been losing money since its launch in March 1986.
The Nazi war criminal Klaus Barbie, the so-called "Butcher of Lyon", is sentenced to life imprisonment on 4th July. The 73-year-old former chief of Gestapo in Lyon is found guilty on 341 separate charges.
On 24th July Jeffrey Archer wins his libel action against Express Newspapers and the Editor of The Star over allegations that he had paid the prostitute Monica Coghlan £2,000 to sleep with her. He is awarded record libel damages of £500,000.
Kylie Minogue has her first hit in Australia with a cover of Little Eva's The Locomotion.
On Wednesday, 22nd July Naji Salim al-Ali, the Palestinian cartoonist who had been critical of Ayatollah Khomeini, is shot in the face by two men outside his newspaper office in Chelsea. He does not recover and dies five weeks later.
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| Aug |
MTV Europe is launched on 1st August. The first video played is Money For Nothing by Dire Straits, which included the line 'I want my MTV'.
Dr. David Owen resigns as leader of the SDP on 6th August. He is replaced by Robert Maclennan on 27th August.
On 7th August swimmer Lynne Cox becomes the first woman to swim from the USA to the Soviet Union, It takes her 2 hours and 5 minutes to cross the Bering Strait, swimming from the island of Little Diomede in Alaska to Big Diomede.
16 people are massacred in Hungerford on 19th August when a man brandishing a gun runs amok through the town. The assassin, Michael Ryan, takes his own life.
Rudolf Hess, deputy to Adolf Hitler at the start of the Second World War, commits suicide in Spandau Prison on Monday, 17th August, aged 93.
The Montreal Protocol, an international treaty designed to protect the ozone layer, is signed on 26th August. It comes into force two years later on 26th August 1989.
Lee Marvin dies on 29th August, aged 63.
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| Sep |
On 2nd September the UK government launches a new, more explicit AIDS publicity campaign: "Don't die of ignorance".
Twenty-five English football fans involved in the Heysel stadium disaster are extradited to Belgium on 9th September.
Peter Tosh, founder of the reggae band The Wailers, is murdered at his home in Jamaica on 11th September, aged 42.
On 23rd September an Australian court lifts the ban on the publication of Peter Wright's autobiography, Spycatcher.
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| Oct |
On 4th October the weekly announcement of the new BBC singles chart is switched from Tuesday lunchtime to Sunday evening.
On 8th October an inquest into the capsizing of the Herald of Free Enterprise returns a verdict of unlawful killing.
A week-long sonar exploration of Loch Ness, Operation Deepscan, ends on 11th October without finding any traces of the fabled Loch Ness monster.
Hurricane force winds hit London and the south-east of England on 16th October. Eighteen people are killed and hundreds injured. Up to a million trees are uprooted or destroyed and damage to property is estimated at £100 million.
Stock markets around the world crash on 19th October - 'Black Monday' - amidst growing fears of rising interest rates and a falling US dollar. The Dow Jones industrial average plummets by a record 508 points; in London the FT 30-share index dives by 183.7 points.
Lester Piggott is jailed for three years for tax evasion on 23rd October.
|
| Nov |
Eamon Andrews, presenter of This Is Your Life, dies on 5th November, aged 64.
On the same day London City Airport is officially opened by The Queen. The Prince of Wales had laid the foundation stone of the terminal building, designed by R. Seifert and Partners, on 2nd May 1986 and the first plane, a Brymon Airways DHC-7, had landed at the airport just over a year later on 31st May 1987. Commercial flights began on 26th October.
Eleven people are killed on Sunday, 8th November when an IRA bomb goes off at a Remembrance Day service in Enniskillen. A further victim died in 2000, after 13 years in a coma.
On 11th November Vincent Van Gogh's painting Irises is sold at Sotheby's, New York for $49 million (£27 million) - a world record for a work of art.
The musical La Cage Aux Folles closes on Broadway on 15th November after 1,761 performances.
On 18th November an escalator fire at Kings Cross tube station claims 31 lives and leaves 19 others seriously injured.
Demi Moore and Bruce Willis get married on 21st November.
|
| Dec |
Construction work begins on the Channel Tunnel on 1st December.
On 7th December a tribute concert is held at Carnegie Hall to honour Harry Chapin on what would have been his 45th birthday. Among the stars appearing are Judy Collins, Paul Simon and Bruce Springsteen. Chapin wrote the New Seekers' 1972 hit Circles.
On Tuesday, 8th December, at a summit meeting in Washington, the Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev and the US President Ronald Reagan sign an agreement to reduce stockpiles of nuclear weapons in Europe.
On 18th December the Wall Street financier Ivan Boe sky is fined $100 million and sent to prison for three years for insider trading.
On 20th December 4,386 passengers and crew lose their lives when a passenger ferry on its way from Tacloban to Manila, MV Doña Paz, collides with the oil tanker Vector. Both vessels sink into in the shark-infested waters of the Tablas Strait. There are only 25 survivors.
An extra second is added to the end of 1987 to take account of the slowing rotation of the Earth.
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| In the Charts |
| |
UK Chart débuts |
| |
- Belinda Carlisle
- Crowded House
- Primal Scream
- Wet Wet Wet
|
| UK Best-selling Singles |
|
- ABC
When Smokey Sings
- A-ha
The Living Daylights
- Rick Astley
Never Gonna Give You Up
- Bee Gees
You Win Again
- Black
Wonderful Life
- Blow Monkeys
It Doesn't Have To Be This Way
- Boy George
Everything I Own
- Randy Crawford
Almaz
- Terence Trent D'Arby
Wishing Well
- Danny Wilson
Mary's Prayer
- Ferry Aid
Let It Be
- Firm
Star Trekkin'
- Aretha Franklin and George Michael
I Knew You Were Waiting For Me
- George Harrison
Got My Mind Set On You
- Heart
Alone
- Whitney Houston
I Wanna Dance With Somebody (Who Loves Me)
- Hue & Cry
Labour Of Love
- Billy Idol
Mony Mony
- Michael Jackson
and Siedah Garrett
I Just Can't Stop Loving You
- Ben E. King
Stand By Me
- Kiss
Crazy Crazy Nights
- Living In A Box
Living In A Box
- Johnny Logan
Hold Me Now
[Eurovision Song contest winner]
- Los Lobos
La Bamba
- Madonna
La Isla Bonita
- Madonna
Who's That Girl
- Freddie McGregor
Just Don't Want To Be Lonely
- Mel and Kim
Respectable
- Freddie Mercury
The Great Pretender
- George Michael
Faith
- George Michael
I Knew You Were Waiting (For Me)
- George Michael
I Want Your Sex
- Alison Moyet
Weak In The Presence Of Beauty
- Pepsi & Shirlie
Heartache
- Pet Shop Boys
Always On My Mind
- Pet Shop Boys
It's A Sin
- Pet Shop Boys
and Dusty Springfield
What Have I Done To Deserve This
- Labi Siffre
(Something Inside) So Strong
- Carly Simon
Coming Around Again
- Spagna
Call Me
- Starship
Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now
- T'Pau
China In Your Hand
- U2
With Or Without You
- Bruce Willis
Under The Boardwalk
- Jackie Wilson
I Get The Sweetest Feeling
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| One Hit Wonders |
| |
- Club Nouveau
Lean On Me
- Michael Crawford
The Music Of The Night
- John Farnham
You're The Voice
- M/A/R/R/S
Pump Up The Volume
- Mental As Anything
Live It Up
- Morris Minor and The Majors
Stutter Rap (No Sleep 'Til Bedtime)
- Rainmakers
Let My People Go-Go
- Timbuk 3
The Future's So Bright I Gotta Wear Shades
|
Hit Albums |
|
- Communards
Red
- Fleetwood Mac
Tango In The Night
- Nanci Griffith
Lone Star State Of Mind
- George Harrison
Cloud Nine
- INXS
Kick
- Michael Jackson
Bad
- George Michael
Faith
- Alison Moyet
Raindancing
- New Order
Substance
- Dolly Parton,
Linda Rondstadt
and Emmylou Harris
Trio
- Pet Shop Boys
Actually
- Prince
Sign 'O' The Times
- Chris Rea
Dancing With Strangers
- Cliff Richard
Always Guaranteed
- Simply Red
Men And Women
- The Smiths
The World Won't Listen
- The Smiths
Strangeways Here We Come
- Bruce Springsteen
Tunnel Of Love
- Sting
Nothing Like The Sun
- 10,000 Maniacs
In My Tribe
- T'Pau
Bridge Of Spies
- U2
The Joshua Tree
- Rosie Vela
Zazu
- Jennifer Warnes
Famous Blue Raincoat
- Wet Wet Wet
Popped In Souled Out
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| At the Movies |
| |
| |
- Beverley Hills Cop II
- Blue Velvet
- Brighton Beach Memoirs
- Children Of A Lesser God
- Crocodile Dundee
- Cry Freedom
- Dona Herlinda And Her Son
- Duet For One
- 84 Charing Cross Road
- Full Metal Jacket
- Hope and Glory
- Lethal Weapon
- Little Shop Of Horrors
- The Living Daylights
- The Lonely Passion Of Judith Hearne
- Maurice
- A Month In The Country
- The Mosquito Coast
- The Name Of The Rose
- Outrageous Fortune
- Personal Services
- Platoon
- Prick Up Your Ears
- Radio Days (Woody Allen)
- Rita, Sue And Bob Too
- Roxanne
- September (Woody Allen)
- Suspect
- Tenue de Soirée
- Three Amigos!
- Tin Men
- The Voyage Home: Star Trek IV
- The Witches Of Eastwick
- Withnail And I
|
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| On Stage |
| |
Tony Award for Best Musical:
Les Misérables
Laurence Olivier
Award for Musical of the Year:
Follies
|
|
| On Television |
| |
| |
- Alas, Smith and Jones
(Series 4)
- 'Allo 'Allo
(Series 4)
- Blackadder The Third
- Bread
(Series 2 and 3)
- Cagney and Lacey
(USA)
- The Dame Edna Experience!
- Doctor Who (Season 24)
- French And Saunders
(Series 1)
- The Golden Girls
(USA: Series 3)
- In Sickness And In Health
(Series 3)
- Inspector Morse
- Last Of The Summer Wine
(Series 9)
- The New Statesman
- The Secret Diary Of Adrian Mole Aged 13 3/4
(Series 2)
- Spitting Image
(Series 7)
- Thirtysomething
- Three Up Two Down
(Series 3)
- Yes, Prime Minister
(Series 2)
|
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| Sporting Heroes |
| |
BBC Sport
BBC
Sports Personality
of the Year:
Fatima Whitbread
|
Darts: the 1979 Champion John Lowe wins the British Darts Organisation (BDO) World Darts Championship for the second time.
Horse Racing: Maori Venture, ridden by jockey Steve Knight, wins the 141st Grand National.
Rowing: the University of Oxford crew wins the annual Boat Race against Cambridge.
Snooker: Steve Davis wins the World Snooker Championship for the fourth time (18-14), beating Joe Johnson, who he had lost to in the final the previous year. Davis also wins the UK Championship for the fourth time, beating Jimmy White 16-14 in the final.
Rugby Union: France win the Five Nations Championship.
New Zealand win the inaugural World Cup, beating France 29:9 in the final.
Golf: Larry Mize wins the 51st US Masters at Augusta in a playoff against Greg Norman. He takes the title with an improbable birdie 3 on the 2nd playoff hole, chipping-in from 140 feet.
Scott Simpson wins the US Open at the Olympic Club, San Francisco, beating Tom Watson by 1 stroke.
Nick Faldo wins the Open Championship at Muirfield.
Ian Woosnam wins the World Matchplay Championship.
The European team retains the Ryder Cup, beating the USA 15-13 at Muirfield Village, Dublin, Ohio. It is the first time that the US team had been defeated on American soil.
Laura Davies becomes the first British player to win the US Ladies' Open.
Football: Coventry City beat Tottenham Hotspur 3-2 in the FA Cup final when Spurs player Gary Mabutt scores an own goal in extra time.
Everton end the season as Champions of the Football League First Division.
Cycling: Stephen Roche wins the Tour de France.
Tennis: Pat Cash beats Ivan Lendl in straight sets to win the men's singles title at Wimbledon (7-6, 6-2, 7-5).
In the women's singles final Martina Navratilova has a straight sets victory over Steffi Graf (7-5, 6-3). She has another straight sets victory over Graf in the US Open final (7-6, 6-1).
Cricket: on 7th March Sunil Gavaskar of India becomes the first batsman to score 10,000 runs in Test cricket.
Australia win the World Cup.
The England cricket team's tour of Pakistan is disrupted by a row between umpire Shakoor Rana and the England captain Mike Gatting.
Motor Racing: Nelson Piquet wins the Formula 1 World Drivers' Championship for the third time.
|
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| Page-turners |
| |
Man Booker Prize
Winner:
Penelope Lively
Moon Tiger
Chinua Achebe
Anthills Of The Savannah
Peter Ackroyd
Chatterton
Nina Bawden
Circles Of Deceit
Brian Moore
The Colour Of Blood
Iris Murdoch
The Book And The Brotherhood
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