Imagine – it’s 1933 and Merian C. Cooper and Ernest B. Schoedsack are gearing up for one of the cinematic events of the age…King Kong! Stop-motion animation on a scale previously unseen and one of the first dedicated film scores have sent costs spiralling and the film studio is holding its breath as to whether their future is swatted aside like one of the bi-planes at the ape’s mighty hand. Then, on the eve of release…disaster! The Empire State Building closes down and the owner of the land announces plans to demolish it and replace it with a hot dog stand. The iconic finale of the movie is now rendered confusing and irrelevant, a world left to wonder why there’s a massive building where that nice hot dog place should be.
This week, with no warning whatsoever, The Green Man pub in Grantchester closed its doors, seemingly for the final time. Regulars…and Grantchester being a sleepy typically English village off-season means there are many, are cast adrift, left to find new meeting holes, bidding farewell to tankards now tantalisingly lingering behind locked doors, conversations hanging in the air never to be finished and grooves in well-sat seats. There is also another problem – the pub features heavily in one of ITV’s top dramas, Grantchester.
With ever-increasing rents and some extensive renovation needed, it’s unclear when or if the Green Man will open its doors again, leaving production crews to cleverly mask out cobwebs, “goodbye” signs and an obviously derelict building pretending to be the fulcrum of the village. Fingers crossed they can keep up with the rent at the church.
