Oliver Reed's Adventures in Guernsey

What I want people to realise from reading this hub is what a funny and genuinely nice guy Oliver was, even if he did enjoy a few too many drinks when socialising. Yes he liked to be outrageous, but underneath all of this was a wonderful man who loved animals and would happily talk to anybody that approached him.

Now for reasons regarding his current employment I am not able to say the real name of the person who knew Oliver and told me these stories, so I shall call him Bob". Bob moved to Guernsey in 1988 it wasn't too long before he met Oliver Reed. Now during my growing up years Oliver had frequently been in the local paper for behaving somewhat riotously after various drinking sessions in local pubs. I remember my Father shaking his head and often commenting negatively on this outrageous behaviour, and so I grew up thinking Oliver was rather a scary person.

It was many years later I met Bob but he told me so many stories about his friendship with Oliver Reed that made me laugh one minute, and emotional the next, my whole opinion of the man changed for the better. I now feel it is important others realise what a genuinely nice guy he was in real life and really hope many will read this hub to find out for themselves.

Oliver loved to be outrageous, yet inside him was truly kind heart. An obvious illustration of this is the fact all of his dogs, (around six I believe), were dogs he had found as street dogs whilst on location filming. These dogs he fell in love with he arranged to be placed in quarantine so he could bring them back to his Guernsey home which he shared with his young wife Josephine.

I remember one occasion Bob told me he had spent the evening at Oliver's house and had finally called a taxi to take him home. Oliver had gone to bed when the taxi arrived, yet when Bob got into the taxi around three of Oliver's dogs jumped into the taxi with him. Having shared a good few drinks with Oliver earlier, Bob thought nothing of taking the dogs back home with him. Even the taxi driver said to Bob, "I didn't know you had dogs", and Bob said, "I don't, they are Oliver's".

The following morning Bob's girlfriend came downstairs to find three dogs asleep in their kitchen, (ironically the same house I ended up renting many years later).

It wasn't long before Oliver was on the phone asking Bob if he had any idea what had happened to his dogs, and of course Bob told him they were safely asleep in his house. Oliver jumped straight in his car and arrived to collect the somewhat bemused canines to take them home.

Another time Bob was out with Oliver when a lady came around the pub collecting for her disabled daughter. The collection was in order to buy her daughter a special kind of electric wheelchair that would cost at least a couple of thousand pounds.

Upon her approaching Oliver he asked her how much the chair would cost. She told him, and Oliver promptly phoned Josephine (his wife), and told her to bring his cheque book down to the pub in question. He then wrote out a cheque for the full cost of the wheelchair, and told the lady to use any funds she had already collected to buy anything else the little girl needed, and donate any surplus to the appropriate charity.

These are the kind of generous acts by Oliver Reed which people don't normally hear about, yet they are the most heartwarming ones of all.

Then there was the occasion that Oliver told Bob he had a real craving for a certain brand of Salmon Paste, the problem being that this was really hard to get hold of in Guernsey at the time, although it was possible to get hold of combination paste such as "Salmon and Shrimp".

Fortunately for Oliver Bob worked for a local wholesalers at the time, and quite by chance they received an incorrect delivery which contained a large full case of this particular brand of Salmon Paste rather than the variety they had ordered. Bob promptly purchased the case of paste and took it to Oliver's house, surreptitiously covered in a blanket hidden in a shopping trolley.

When Oliver opened the door to his house, like any good dodgy dealer Bob lifted the corner of the blanket and showed Oliver what he had got. Delighted, Oliver invited Bob in immediately so he could have Salmon paste and black pepper on toast. What Bob hadn't expected was that two film producers and the actor Richard Harris were already sitting in the kitchen. Before too long all of them were tucking in to Salmon Paste on toast.

On yet another occasion Oliver and Bob were enjoying a drink in a Guernsey pub when a bus party of late teenagers came in to have a round of drinks.

Now on Guernsey they operate a party bus service which allows groups of people to hire a large bus for the evening which takes them on a tour of the local pubs and bars. At each bar they stop for one drink before the bus goes on to the next venue. Usually the party-goers wear fancy dress and all get very inebriated.

Well, on this particular night the bus party poured into the bar where Oliver and Richard were enjoying their drink. Clearly impressed by meeting Oliver Reed in person, they asked if him and Bob would like to join their bus party. Oliver agreed, and before long the whole bus including Oliver and Bob were trundling off towards another local bar/hotel called "The Imperial".

Upon arriving at "The Imperial", Oliver asked the teenagers to give him a couple of minutes before coming into the bar. He then entered the bar and spoke to the manager and said, "I have a few of my illegitimate children with me tonight. Is it okay if I bring them in?"

Obviously excited that such a star as Oliver Reed had arrived in his hotel the Manager readily agreed, and so Oliver went back out to the car park and beckoned in the entire busload of teenagers. As they entered the hotel altogether the Manager's face must have been a picture only your imagination can create. There must have been at least 30 of these kids, all in fancy dress, and surely not at all what the Manager was expecting.

In the grounds of Oliver's house was a garage converted into Oliver's private bar. This quickly became known as "The Garage Club", and a certain test had to be passed before anyone could become a member.

The test consisted of each potential new member sitting in the bar, on their own, wearing nothing except a tie, whilst the rest of the club remained in Oliver's House. The task was to drink a single measure of every drink along all of the optics, (no easy task from what Bob tells me), without being sick. If they managed this they became a member, and could come and go whenever they wanted. Obviously Bob passed this test, and spent many hours in "The Garage Club" and made many friends who are still alive today.

The Garage Club also had a wooden box called "The Juke Box", and each member of the club had to take it in turns to be locked in this box for a while and sing to the other members, (whether they could sing in tune or not). After a few drinks this was hilarious, but everyone would have to have a turn as the weeks went on.

Bob spent many happy hours in "The Garage Club" and has very fond memories of it and the fun they all had.

One of the funniest stories Bob ever told me was about a trip Oliver, Bob and a number of members of the "Garage Club" took together. I can't remember what the trip was for now, but the story had me in fits of laughter.

Apparently it was impossible for all of them to sit together on the flight, so Bob ended up sitting with a rather deaf elderly lady who was clearly terrified of flying, whilst the other guys ended up sitting more or less together further towards the front of the aircraft.

The elderly lady said to Bob, "Would you mind awfully if I held your hand whilst we take off, as I am really scared of flying?".

Bob agreed, and the lady duly clutched onto Bob's hand for dear life. The problem he had was that even after take off she didn't let go, so some half hour into the flight when Oliver decided to go to the toilet, he spotted Bob with a 70+ lady clinging onto his hand.

Oliver being Oliver he didn't keep quiet about it, instead he called up the plane at the top of his voice to the rest of the guys and said, "Hey, look over here, Bob has "pulled" already!"

Luckily the lady was too deaf to hear what he said, but it goes without saying that Bob got a whole load of ribbing over that from the rest of the guys on the trip.

This story is brief to say the least, but in his days on Guernsey Oliver would occasionally get into scrapes that required stitches.

To avoid his name appearing in the local paper, (which were at the time always desperate for an exciting story), Oliver would avoid going to "Accident and Emergency" at the hospital, and would instead go to a local Vet whose name I won't mention here for obvious reasons. This vet was a little strange, and is no longer on Guernsey, but he did occasionally stitch wounds on Oliver to help keep the papers from publishing any further events in Oliver's private life.

One particular night Bob really fancied a beer, but all the pubs had long since closed. The one place he knew there was beer was Oliver's house.

Bob arrived at Oliver's and found the house in darkness. Having had a few drinks already Bob thought it was a good idea to break into the house.

Carefully cutting the wires to the burglar alarm Bob then used a crowbar to open Oliver's kitchen door in order to raid his fridge. Sometime later Oliver woke up and came downstairs to find Bob drinking his beer sitting at the kitchen table. He actually saw the funny side, and said to Bob words to the effect of, "You know, Josephine has thousands of pounds worth of jewellery upstairs, yet you are the only person I know who would break into my house to steal a beer and ignore the jewellery".

Oliver decided he needed a new bathroom and arranged for a very expensive one to be put in one day whilst he was out of the house. At the end of the day he came back to the house bringing Bob with him.

"Come and see my new bathroom" he said to Bob.

Once they got up to the newly refurbished bathroom, (which Bob said was gorgeous by the way), Oliver decided he didn't like it at all, and promptly got a sledgehammer and destroyed the entire new suite of bathroom furniture, tiles etc. He then phoned the company that had fitted the bathroom and got them to come and fit another one, happily paying for both bathrooms.

Now Bob had an elderly relative who lived in England whose Birthday was due. This relative had always been a huge fan of Oliver Reed and when asked who she wanted to invite to her Birthday party she jokingly said, "The only guest I want is Oliver Reed".

Bob decided to see if he could arrange this for real, and having explained the situation to Oliver was delighted when Oliver immediately said "no problem, I'll book the flights".

Oliver literally dropped everything he was doing and paid for him and Bob to fly to the UK and attend the old ladies birthday party. When they told her she had a surprise guest and Oliver walked in she was over the moon, and what's more Oliver took the time to make a huge fuss of her throughout the evening.

Bob has many fond memories of the time he spent with Oliver Reed. He remembers them sharing cans of beer sitting on the stone bridge that is now a part of my current Husband's and my fishing lake. They passed many hours sitting around the large kitchen table in what is now my kitchen, sharing more alcohol and conversation. Oliver even spent nights staying in this very same house so he didn't have to bother getting a taxi home.

Then there was the famous arm wrestling match Oliver had with a Guernsey local renowned for being unbeatable. Oliver was also excellent at arm wrestling and had huge muscles. The challenge match was destined to be a popular event and many people turned up to watch including Bob. On this particular occasion Oliver lost the match, but copious amounts of beer were consumed all round and the event was highly publicised in the local paper.

Bob has sat in Oliver's kitchen many times drinking with all kinds of well known actors and celebrities including Richard Harris, the snooker player Alex Higgins etc etc. The nice thing is that it wasn't about them being famous, they were just a group of blokes having a drink together, chatting and laughing like any other person does.

My regret is that I never got to meet Oliver Reed myself, and I truly wish I had as I feel he had much the same outrageous sense of humour I have, and also so many admirable traits such as kindness, compassion, talent and a great love of animals. This is the real man, not the actor, and so what if he liked to have fun when he went out socialising, he enjoyed his life and no-one can take that away from him!