Crowning glory for Keiss
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Keiss was transformed on Sunday as the cast and crew of big-budget Netflix royal drama The Crown descended upon it.
Filming for season three of the popular TV series involved key scenes shot on location at Lybster and Keiss harbours.
Last week, Leftbank Pictures – the team behind the production – completed the Lybster shoot which involved recreating Port Leith in the Falklands for a scene set in 1982 when Argentinians were discovered salvaging scrap metal and set the wheels in motion for the major conflict between Britain and Argentina.
On Sunday afternoon, veteran stage and screen actor Charles Dance was seen among other cast members at Keiss harbour. In the key scene of the drama about the royal family, Dance plays the Queen's second cousin, Lord Louis Mountbatten of Burma.
The harbour was used to create a mock-up of Mullaghmore in Ireland – the site where Lord Mountbatten was killed by an IRA bomb 40 years ago on his fishing boat, Shadow V.
On August 27, 1979, IRA man Thomas McMahon sneaked onto the Shadow V, planted and then detonated a radio-controlled bomb on the vessel on which Mountbatten and six friends and relatives were fishing. The boat was destroyed by the blast and Mountbatten died of his injuries along with his grandson, a crew member and the socialite Doreen Knatchbull.
The sun shone as Mr Dance was seen speaking with cast and crew, sporting a vintage check Daks jacket, striped top and casual light trousers typical for the period. One of the location crew said he had been "very pleasant to work with" and filming was going well.
There was a definite 1970s feel to the area as actors dressed in period Irish police uniforms mingled with others dressed in old-school trenchcoats and flared trousers as classic Ford Cortinas and Vauxhall Victor cars were driven around the streets.
Mark Greenwood from south London supplied the vintage cars on set. "The police car is a Mark V Cortina from 1981. It's got a four-speed gearbox and there's no air conditioning but it's real nice car to drive. I drove it up here myself in fact," he said.
Keiss resident Chris Aitken, a teacher at Wick High School, said: "My grandfather, Tony Blunden, has been hired as an extra for this. He's playing a carpenter working on one of the boats."
Mr Aitken said that his grandad was "delighted" to be involved in the production and "was having a grand day".
"It's great to see this happening in the village. There's been great community support for it here and it's a chance to show off our lovely harbour as well. I heard they'll be blowing up some models of the Mountbatten boat just outside the harbour."
Mr Aitken said he was particularly pleased to see that the right props had been used in the production too. "I really like the old fashioned wicker lobster pots they have. Unfortunately, they're plastic lobsters that are in them," he laughed.
The Crown: Season 3 debuts on Netflix on Sunday, November 17 and features, among its star-studded cast, the likes of Olivia Colman as the Queen, Helena Bonham Carter as Princess Margaret and Tobias Menzies as the Duke of Edinburgh.
