“In London Town Tonight” Returns to Historic 22 Frith Street, Soho, Friday 4 September, With an Extraordinary Firsthand Journey Through Hollywood’s Golden Age
LONDON, UK — September 2026 — Hollywood history isn’t coming from an archive this Friday. It’s coming from someone who lived it.
The Andrew Eborn Show – In London Town Tonight returns live on Friday, 4 September 2026, from 5PM London time, broadcasting from historic 22 Frith Street in Soho, with an extraordinary guest at the center of the show: 97-year-old Angela Allen, whose remarkable seven-decade career placed her behind the scenes of some of the most celebrated films and alongside some of the biggest stars in cinema history.
Allen’s memories read like a roll call of Hollywood royalty: Marilyn Monroe, Orson Welles, Humphrey Bogart, Katharine Hepburn, Clark Gable, Montgomery Clift, Ava Gardner and John Huston.
She didn’t simply hear stories about Hollywood’s Golden Age.
She was there.
At only 19, Allen arrived in post-war Vienna and worked on Carol Reed’s The Third Man. Her extraordinary career would eventually take her onto productions including The African Queen, The Misfits, Freud, Moulin Rouge, The Man Who Would Be King and Labyrinth, working with filmmakers including John Huston, Carol Reed, John Frankenheimer and Franco Zeffirelli.
And she remembers what happened when the cameras stopped rolling.
THE WOMAN BEHIND SOME OF CINEMA’S GREATEST MOMENTS
Long before digital filmmaking, instant playback and computers transformed movie production, continuity depended on meticulous notes, photographs, observation — and an exceptional memory.
Allen possessed all of them.
Working in an era when women performing her role could be casually dismissed as “script girls,” Allen became an indispensable presence on major productions. She challenged directors when necessary, protected continuity and performances, solved problems on set and remembered details everyone else had forgotten.
By just 22 years old, she was second-unit directing on The African Queen. She body-doubled for Ava Gardner, helped Montgomery Clift remember his lines and ultimately worked on an astonishing 14 films with legendary director John Huston.
Now, at 97, Allen is opening that extraordinary personal archive for Andrew Eborn.
Among the stories she will share are memories of Marilyn Monroe, Orson Welles and John Huston, along with the reality of working beside the personalities who became Hollywood legends — including the remarkable story behind Monroe’s belief that Allen was having an affair with her husband, playwright Arthur Miller.
This isn’t Hollywood history reconstructed decades later.
It’s Hollywood remembered by someone who was actually in the room.
HOLLYWOOD HISTORY MEETS TELEVISION HISTORY
The setting for Friday’s broadcast couldn’t be more appropriate.
Andrew Eborn returns to 22 Frith Street in London’s Soho, the location of John Logie Baird’s original television workshop and the site associated with his pioneering work in the development of television.
In 1926, members of the Royal Institution were invited there to witness Baird’s working mechanical television system. Experimental images had already been transmitted from the location, including those of office worker William Taynton and Baird’s famous ventriloquist’s dummy Stookie Bill.
A century later, The Andrew Eborn Show is once again broadcasting from the place where television history was being made.
The location also puts the show in the heart of Soho — an area whose music, film, nightlife and personalities have become an important part of In London Town Tonight.
Last week, George Skeggs — “Soho George” — took Eborn through the streets he has known since arriving in London as a teenager in the 1950s, sharing memories involving Ronnie Scott’s, the legendary 2i’s Coffee Bar, Old Compton Street, the French House, Beatles acetates, 1960s gangsters and the late Bernie Katz, the celebrated “Prince of Soho.”
This week, the journey continues.
A SHOW WHERE EVERYONE HAS A STORY
The appearance by Angela Allen captures what has increasingly defined The Andrew Eborn Show: bringing extraordinary personalities from completely different generations and worlds into one conversation.
The guest list has already stretched across entertainment, music, film, television, comedy, sport, psychology, politics, business, royalty and global culture.
Previous guests have included Lord Charles Spencer, Suzi Quatro, Chris de Burgh, Marty Wilde, Charlie Gracie, Toyah, Errol Musk, Tommy Cannon, Bobby Davro, Ann Widdecombe, Jo Wood and composer Randy Edelman, among many others.
The show has also become a platform for conversations that extend beyond entertainment.
Eborn’s Common Ground initiative is designed to encourage respectful conversation and intelligent debate in an increasingly divided world, while Iseult Teran Saint Aubin (“Babba”), founder of Peace & Love CIC, joins Andrew in exploring ways of bringing different voices together. Eborn has been appointed the organization’s first Global Ambassador.
The programme also supports musicians and creators through its relationship with FENIX360, inviting artists each week to create a brand-new theme tune for The Andrew Eborn Show – In London Town Tonight.
But on Friday, one extraordinary woman takes center stage.
Angela Allen.
Ninety-seven years old.
Seven decades of cinema.
Fourteen films with John Huston.
And memories involving some of the most recognizable names ever to appear on a movie screen.
Marilyn Monroe. Orson Welles. Humphrey Bogart. Katharine Hepburn. Clark Gable. Montgomery Clift. Ava Gardner.
For one night in Soho, the birthplace of television becomes a doorway into Hollywood’s Golden Age.
And Angela Allen is holding the key.
THE ANDREW EBORN SHOW – IN LONDON TOWN TONIGHT
Friday, 4 September 2026
From 5PM London Time
Live from 22 Frith Street, Soho, London
LIVE FROM LONDON. LIVE. UNSCRIPTED. UNMISSABLE.
The Andrew Eborn Show – In London Town Tonight continues its mission to capture extraordinary stories while the people who made them are still here to tell them.
MEDIA CONTACT
The Andrew Eborn Show – In London Town Tonight
Andrew Eborn / Octopus TV
Social Media: @AndrewEborn | @OctopusTV