All language subtitles for Secrets.of.the.Krays.S01E01.Rise.1080p.AMZN.WEB-DL.DDP2.0.H.264-NTb [SDH]

Ronnie said to me,
"In the mid '60s,

"The Rolling Stones
and The Beatles ruled the pop world,

"Carnaby Street
ruled the fashion world,

"and me and Reg ruled London.

"We were fucking untouchable."

When they walked through the door,
there was danger.

The Krays were a new breed.

I see Reggie and Ronnie beat the man
to pulp until he couldn't stand up.

They had a talent for two things,
that was violence and publicity.

In all clubs
you get an occasional drunk

and sometimes
they have to be slung out.

They wanted to be bigger than just,
if you like, "East End gangsters."

They are as much part of the '60s
as any of the other famous people.

They were known from one end
of this country to the other.

They had an aura of glamour,

but underneath the aura of glamour

was criminality, violence and blood.

I think they're inclined to be,
sort of...

..well, animals, really.

They were taught that to be hard
was the way you survive.

Let's be honest, they did
like to inflict violence on people.

It appears the government
told the police to back off.

And at that point the Krays
were able to do

pretty much whatever
they wanted to do.

They're doing protection rackets,
they're threatening people,

they're killing people.

They were evil, dangerous bastards.

You have to be careful
of making heroes

of people that don't deserve it.

NEWSREADER: 'Violet Kray died
the day before her 73rd birthday

'still fighting to get parole
for her notorious twins,

'the gangsters who were sentenced
to 30 years each

'in 1969 for murder.'

If I was making a film of the Krays,
I'd base it around the mother

cos she is the catalyst

that holds the whole thing
together in a way.

They always went back
to her place anyway.

'Ronnie was first, now classified
as criminally insane

'and serving out his sentence
in Broadmoor,

'where he paints and writes poetry.'

They were both handcuffed
to men over six foot tall,

obviously to make them look small.

'Then came Reggie, also handcuffed,

'from the maximum security wing
at Parkhurst,

'where, a few months ago,
he'd tried to kill himself.'

And the people were calling out

"Free Reggie!" and, "Free Ronnie!"
and, "Hello, Ron!"

And I thought, "God, it's like
a prime minister or a film star

"coming to a burial."
He's waving to people.

'Among the wreaths,
one from train robber Buster Edwards

'and his family,
and one from Charlie Kray

'praising his mother's loyalty
and devotion.'

Well, I didn't know her very well,
but I knew her... slightly.

And what little I knew of her,
I had great respect for her

because...

..first and foremost,
she was a mum.

I knew how much
they loved their mum.

I'd actually seen
the relationship close up.

Nobody could match their mum
in their world.

Their sense of loss
must have been... tremendous.

It was like a light going out
in their life.

But they caused her
so much grief and pain.

Their mum, she was lovely.
Lovely lady.

You felt good when you met her.

Knock knock.

"Hello. Would you like a cup of tea?

"Would you like a piece of cake?"

I'd say, "Yes, please. Cup of tea,
piece of cake, lovely."

For the life of me, whatever
she might've heard about the boys,

she didn't believe 'em.
To her, they were her little angels.

They idolised her.
She idolised them.

DIRECTOR: Thank you.

My name's Maureen Flanagan and I met
Mrs Kray when Charlie Kray,

her first son, had asked me,
do you go to home visits to do hair?

Cos I was a hairdresser.

Um, I'd only been married
a few months.

This is 1961,
I was there every week.

The more I got to know Violet Kray,
the more she confided in me.

She had son Charlie first, and then
apparently she became pregnant

and she had a little girl,
which she really, really wanted,

but this little girl died.

My nan and Violet,
the twins' mum, were sisters.

My mum was their first cousin.

My nan lived in 174 Vallance Road,
Nanny Lee was 176,

and the twins were 178,
so we was all together.

Old Charlie, when I was born,

I got to know him
as a nice, kindly old man.

But he was horrible to her
when she was younger.

He beat her all the time,
constantly jealous of her.

Violet, the twins' mum,
she was heavily pregnant

and he beat her really badly,
kicked her in the stomach.

She went into labour

and she cried out for him
to go and get a doctor.

He went to the pub.

She had to deliver the baby herself.

The baby was born... A little girl.

She lived for three minutes
and she died.

She never forgive him for that.

And then, of course,
you had the twins.

And I used to try to console her
by saying,

"There you are,
God sent you double."

And she used to say,
"Oh, he sent me my boys.

"I'm the only one round here
that's had twins.

"People stop me
and say how beautiful they are."

Well, they were.

And you could tell right away
that the favouritism with the twins

and later, as I began to know her
more and more,

the favourite was Ronnie.

And this is because she always
referred to the diptheria episode

when they were just
coming up for three years old.

NEWSREADER:
'Every year, 3,000 children

'die like this from diptheria.'

This child need not have died.

He could have been immunised
and so protected against diptheria.

She took them to the hospital
and after a day or two

the doctor thought it was best
if they separate them.

Reggie, being the stronger twin,
he got better.

And she took him home and they
wouldn't let her take Ronnie home

because she said they said,
"He's really bad."

But she turned up
one day with her sister

and the doctor said,
"No, you can't remove him."

She said, "Yes, I am."
She wrapped him in a blanket

and carried him home
from the hospital to Vallance Road,

where she put him in the bed
with Reggie. And she said to me,

"Do you know, within two days
he was better."

I think she always thought
she was gonna lose Ronnie

and therefore all her life
she made more fuss.

But he was definitely
the weaker one of the two.

Ronnie always had problems.

I said to me mum, like,
"What were they like at school?"

Cos they went to the same school
and, er, she went, "Well,

"Ronnie was always different."

He was always...
Reggie would play with his mates.

Ronnie was always
a little bit distant.

Sort of, things bothered him more.

Reggie was very protective
of Ronnie.

Always looked out for him

because he knew Ronnie could
take care of himself physically,

but he knew that
he had to watch him.

They grew up with hard men.

They had two grandfathers, instead
of being nice, polite, normal men,

might work on the railway,
or on the roads or whatever,

they were both ex-boxers.

That's how they were taught that
to be hard was the way you survive.

Boxing was terribly important.

They were both
very, very good boxers.

In fact, erm, Reggie,
I think, of the two of them,

could have gone on
to have a professional career.

I think he was London Schools
boxing champion at the age of 16.

Very, very handy with his fists.

They could both hold their hands up.
Big time.

Didn't care about anybody.

Reggie could have been
a professional boxer.

But Ronnie was too mad.
Too undisciplined.

Boasting now about
how he bit a kid in the ring,

and the ref said,
"Oi, oi, oi, no biting."

They were also influenced
by gangster films.

The twins were influenced
by Hollywood.

They were influenced by the Warner
Brothers B movies in particular,

the gangster movies.

They used to pay their little
sixpence to go into the cinema

and I think later in life,

that's where they got
the clothes idea from.

The big names
that created the gangster genre

these were the people
that they were fascinated by,

particularly their style,
how they held themselves,

how they spoke.

You better see a doctor, Mac,
you're in bad shape.

It had a big influence
on both the twins,

but in particular on Ron.

When he was still a teenager

he would have an Italian barber
come to his house every day

and give him a shave.

Cos he found out that that's what,
that's what Al Capone had done.

So they were mimicking
these characters.

I think Ronnie thought
he was a character

in a Hollywood gangster film.

Someone like George Raft,
for example.

And I think they liked the glamour,

the glamour,
also they liked the violence.

I mean, let's be honest.

They did like to inflict
violence on people,

but being younger
and watching films like that,

and you lived in quite
a deprived sort of area,

it was sort of something
that they sort of wanted to do.

I think they was always
gonna do something like that.

I don't think they would have
settled down in a job.

I think they would have been
fidgety.

# Maybe it's because I'm a Londoner

# That I love London so... #

They didn't want to work
like their father.

There's not much to be
in the East End.

If you were born in the East End,
you stay in the East End.

You couldn't get out.

You either ended up a gangster,
or a car thief, or a plumber,

or worked down the docks
or something.

They went to Billingsgate market.
And, er, that didn't last very long.

Erm, getting up at five
in the morning

and being there at quarter to six

and wearing dirty, erm,
old trousers.

They didn't possess a dirty pair
of old trousers and an old jacket,

so that's how they grew up.
Could go and earn a living,

but they didn't want to.

They wanted to do it in the way
they always saw themselves -

as something bigger and better
than the boys they grew up with.

In March 1950,
they're involved in a fight

outside a dance hall in Hackney,
aged 16.

And it's the first time they've
got their names into the newspaper.

So what I have here
is a genuine piece of history.

It is the actual scrapbook
owned by Reggie Kray.

So over a 15-year period, he's
cutting out newspaper cuttings,

and putting them lovingly
into this book.

Hugely important document

and shows that even at an early age,
Reggie wanted to be famous.

He loved reading the newspaper
cuttings about himself.

So here we have their first
appearance in newspapers as youths.

"YOUTH IS BEATEN UP BY GANG."

The magistrate states, "This boy
has been beaten by beasts.

"These people
think they are above the law.

"They have to be taught a lesson."

There is a second article.

The headline reads
"RAZOR THREAT TO GIRL WITNESS."

So, in the text, "A prosecution
witness had been threatened

"that if she gave evidence a razor
would be put across her face."

The article goes on to list the
specific weapons used in the attack.

A piece of bicycle chain,

two lavatory chains with handles
and a cosh.

It's quite a vicious attack.

This is the start of them
appearing in the press.

All through the '50s,
there are incidents of them

getting involved in scraps,

getting involved in some more
serious fights as they got older.

Their father, Charlie Senior,
one day, they heard him shouting.

He didn't know anybody was in.

He come in, pissed, drunk as usual.

Violet, the twins' mum, was doing
some ironing or something.

And he punched her in the nose
just for nothing. No reason.

But Ronnie was upstairs in bed
and he heard, he heard his mum cry.

Ronnie's come down the stairs,

heard the commotion,
he's looked at what's happened.

He's punched his father on the nose,
made his nose bleed.

He went, "You touch my mother again,
I will fucking kill you."

And that was it.

He never touched her again.
Never hurt her again.

So, by the mid 1950s,
they're in their early 20s.

They are definitely
increasing their aspirations.

They are looking for
something exciting.

Something they can
get their teeth into,

maybe a business that they can use
to their advantage

to build their reputation
and to start earning some money.

The Regal Billiard Hall
in the Mile End Road,

they took it over in a classic way
that extortionists always do

in so much as if there was
trouble in the Regal, they said,

"We can do away with the trouble,
if you pay us X amount of money."

And if they didn't pay the money,
if the owners didn't pay the money,

then the trouble got worse.
And, of course,

the trouble was actually created
by the Krays themselves.

It wasn't a place where
straight people went.

It was people that were at it.
People that had been in prison,

come out of prison,
and they'd just been released

and they would go there.

It was like a gang hut for a group
of young men to get together.

It was a place to meet.

They were gonna use it as a base
for their criminal enterprise.

Weapons and stuff
were left in there.

Swords and all that stuff
were left in there, the bayonets,

all stuck in there.

When they went anywhere,
they'd go to the Regal,

get 'em out and go.

'My name is Gerry Parker.

'I was born in the East End
of London

'to a lovely Jewish family in 1926.'

I worked,
I did work with Jack Spot.

Yes, I worked with Jack Spot.

Jack ran the whole of the East End
before the twins.

He was very powerful.

All the traders used to give him
money when he went past.

Couple of pound, two quid,
three quid, you know.

"Morning, Jack, blah, blah, blah."

But he knew, Jack knew in his way,
that these boys were coming up.

I think he respected them.

Because they were dangerous.

I mean, if you had a fight with them
they wouldn't give in

till they'd stabbed you or shot you.
One or the other.

So they got stronger by the day.

They built a reputation, they did
build a reputation very quickly.

Very quickly.

'My name is Chris Lambrianou.

'My connection to the Krays
was I stood in the dock

'on the longest murder trial
in criminal history.

'I was sentenced to 15 years,
alongside them.'

They were dangerous people.

They weren't shy of using a knife,
or using a tool, or whatever.

They were out to make a reputation,
which they accomplished.

Their game was 99% protection.

They gave their name
to pubs and clubs.

And, er, the owners would say,

"Oh, don't start no trouble here,
my friends are the twins."

You know, that's how it worked.
And each week they get a few quid.

The people that the Krays preyed on
were money getters,

that's who they preyed on.

But the dodgy kind of characters,
pornography, er, drinkers, bars,

gambling,
that's where they got their money

And if you had problems,
people would walk away.

They wouldn't go to that club.

And the Krays could give them
plenty of problems.

Well, what happened was, erm,
I joined chambers where...

I was the first woman
to get a tenancy.

Well, one Saturday,

I was taken to see the clients,
who were Ronnie and Reggie Kray.

They were both sitting on the bed
at the end of the cell,

which was just a concrete slab, but
they were extremely smartly dressed.

Their mother had come
early in the morning

to the court to dress them up
and clean them up,

and give them
the clean clothes and clean shirts

and to Brylcreem them.

And they sat there
and they looked like two owls.

They were very solemn.

Unsmiling, white faces

and very dark black, shiny hair

and extremely polite.

There'd been a longstanding feud
between two gangs of young men,

the Watney Street mob, er,
from Watney Street in Stepney,

who were made up mainly of dockers
and young dockers,

and the Bethnal Green mob,
which was really the Krays.

And in 1956,
er, there was a serious event

in the Britannia pub.

This ends up with Ronnie Kray
and a couple of associates

doing some serious damage
with what's described as a bayonet.

It's quite a vicious attack.

Once again, Reggie,
inside his scrapbook,

has recorded what
the Hackney Gazette has had to say.

"The victim received
a stab in the back

"causing a wound
four-and-a-half inches deep.

"Defendants
then jumped into two waiting cars,

"which were driven away
at such a speed

"that they attracted the attention
of a police wireless car,

"which gave chase.

"The car was searched and on
the front seat was a bayonet,

"together with a machete
and a crowbar.

"There were marks of blood
on the side of the car."

So, as a result of the court case,

one of Ronnie Kray's friends
gets seven years,

but Ronnie Kray
gets three years in prison.

I think the separation of the twins

when Ron went to prison
is important.

These were identical twins, er,
used to being together all the time

used to sleeping in the same room.

What happens, though,
is that you see

the different characters
that are starting to emerge

when Ron goes to prison.

Reg becomes far more business-like,
Reg sees opportunities.

When I first met Reggie,
Ronnie was away.

Reggie was brave, game.

Smart, going places.
Nice motor car.

Always clean, collar and tie.

Afraid of nobody
and much to be admired.

Reg opened The Double R Club
in the Mile End Road.

It was gangster chic in many ways.

But the Double R
became a venue to go to.

Relative to that area
in the East End,

yes, it was quite a classy place.

The club is doing very well.

He's got Charlie Kray,
their older brother, in to help him.

And whilst Ronnie is away,
this club isn't having any trouble

and is a good place to visit.

And takings are on the up.

Quite a good little businessman,
was Reggie.

I think, deep down,
Reggie was a villain

who would have quite liked
to have been straight,

or at the very least
semi-straight,

but there was never
any chance of that.

Their Aunt Rose,

that's their mother's sister,
died on Christmas Day.

Ronnie thought the world of Rosie,
he thought the world of her.

He was in prison at the time
and he, he asked to wear, erm,

a black armband, in the
anniversary of his aunt's death.

And the governor refused.

He said no. So Ronnie got into
a fight with one of the officers

and he picked up a little stove
that was in the governor's office

and chucked it at him.

And after that, he was sort of,

he went on a really bad
downhill sort of spiral.

Spiralling out of control. He was
really ill. He was really ill.

Ronnie is having a bit of a bad time

and this absolutely tips
Ronnie over the edge.

Ronnie is now uncontrollable.

He's deteriorating

and not recognising his mother
and Reggie when they visit.

So the prison authorities
move Ronnie Kray

to Long Grove mental institution.

Inside Long Grove, Ronnie Kray
is diagnosed with schizophrenia.

He's given Stemetil,

which is a new drug,
erm, heavy sedation drug

to be taken twice a day.

The medicines he was given
quietened him down

in fact, restored his balance
to the great extent that,

by May, he's itching
to be out and about,

because time in a mental hospital,
in those days at any rate,

did not count towards
one's prison sentence.

So it's decided that Reggie and he
will dress in the same suit.

Reggie arrives for his normal visit
on the Sunday,

he's got a suit
and a cashmere overcoat.

Ronnie puts on the cashmere coat.

After a short period of time,
Ronnie leaves, Reggie's left.

Reggie, after a time,
said to the nurse,

"It's time I went now," and the
nurse said, "Well, you can't go."

He said, "Why not?"

"Well, you're a patient here,
Ronnie."

"No, I'm not. I'm Reggie."

Reggie is held for questioning,
but released

because he doesn't know
what's happened.

He's just come to visit his brother.

Within six months,
he's moved back to prison.

He goes back to Wandsworth,
where he's quite happy.

London prison, London friends.

Serves his sentence out
and is released.

So, in escaping,
it has had a good effect

because Long Grove are almost
washing their hands of him.

He's back in prison

and he's out quicker
than had he remained in Long Grove.

It was easier to get on with Reggie
before Ronnie came home.

People were always saying to me,
"Wait till you see the brother.

"He's worse than the other one."

But he was worse.
He was very much worse.

Ronnie has periods where
he is religious in taking his pills.

He doesn't drink.

As soon as he stops
taking his pills,

which he did on regular occasions,

the descent into madness
starts again.

Some days he'd be fine.
Another day he wouldn't.

He put on a lot of weight.

Years ago, when they was younger,
you couldn't tell the difference.

His appearance
was totally different.

He did look quite unhealthy.

You know, when they get that sort of
puffy look about 'em.

When I first knew them,
I could hear Ronnie upstairs,

shouting and screaming,
absolutely hysterical.

And she'd go out to the bottom
of the stairs and say,

"Reggie, Reggie!" And Reggie would
come out on the landing,

she wouldn't call Ronnie,
she'd call Reggie.

"Has he took his medication?
What's the matter?"

"It's all right, Mum,
it's all right. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

"He's gonna take it now."

She knew that medication
calmed him down.

He confessed to me how mad he was,
out of the blue.

What happened, I was having a drink,
and all of a sudden Ronnie says,

"What did you say, Mick?

"Why are you telling me this?

"What do you mean by it?

"A lot of people are calling me
and Reggie grasses,

"you know that, don't you?

"Why are you telling me this story,
eh, Mick?"

And there's only me and him there.

But another fella came in, one
minute, I was out the door, gone.

So, I went round the house
the next day

and Ronnie said, "Oh, I'm sorry
about last night, Mick."

He said, "You might think
I'm a right prat."

He said,
"I'll tell you what it is.

"I have to take these pills,
you see.

"I've been experimenting
in not taking 'em.

"When I don't take 'em,
it's murder."

Reggie, you could talk to,
but not Ronnie.

When Ronnie come out,
he was more sort of whatever,

if he said, "We've got to do this,
we've got to do it,"

you had to do it.

He was more, whatever,
the predominant one.

But they still had to agree
about it.

Cos if they didn't,
they'd have fights.

They'd fight every day.

They were like a bad husband
and wife.

People used to say
"Don't interfere with them,

"otherwise they'll turn on you.
Leave 'em."

The twins used to have
the most terrible scraps.

I saw it happen one afternoon. I was
there, right outside the front door.

They started in the hall,
shouting at each other,

and then went outside
and Ronnie hit him.

Me and Violet went to the window,

"Oh, my God, Violet,
they're fighting."

And she, "I'll go out in a minute."
But they really fought each other

as though they wanted
to kill each other.

Ronnie was a paranoid schizophrenic.

He wasn't a businessman, Ronnie.

Are we talking here
about clever people?

Are we talking about people
who've got brains and logic

and, and, and top-line criminals?

No, we're not.

What they were good at was violence.

People were frightened of them.

At the start of the 1960s,

they'd built their reputation
and they built it on violence.

They got a name, er,
as being thieves' ponces.

So, if any of the boys went out,
had a jump up, which meant they,

they stole lorries,
or they did blags,

which was out on the pavement,

taking wages,
wage snatches and stuff like that,

they would get to know about it
and they'd want their corner.

They had done nothing.
All they had was fear.

Get money off of those
that have earned it,

get money off of those
that have got it.

That's the way they thought.
They just intimidated people.

They were powerful.
They were much feared.

But I think Reggie and Ronnie,
particularly Ronnie,

always aspired to be better
than they were,

to move into a higher class
of society, if you like.

They wanted to be bigger than just,

if you like,
"East End gangsters."

I think that was the aim.

NEWSREADER: 'At the ABC Cinema,
Mile End, they made film history

'by staging the East End's
first royal premiere.

'The stars came thick and fast.
Charlie Drake to begin with.

'They were all going to see
that slice of East End life,

'Sparrows Can't Sing.
Barbara Windsor stars in it.'

# Ain't it a shame

# Sparrows can't sing

# Think of the joy

# Sparrows might bring... #

It was the first day of shooting
in the East End of London

on the set of Sparrows Can't Sing.

Suddenly, all these black cars drove
up into the middle of the shot.

And out of them got about, er, five
or six guys dressed in dark suits,

and, er, they said, "Who's in
charge?" and everybody was,

the crew was pointing at me

because I was the first AD and they
said, "That geezer over there."

So, these two guys came over to me,

which later on turned out to be
Reggie and Ronnie.

And they said to me, "Who gave you
permission to shoot here?

"Nobody asked us."

And I said, obviously,
"The police, you know,

"because we have permission to shoot
in all the streets of East End."

And he said, "Nobody asked us."

And he said, "You could get into big
trouble." And I said, "Like what?"

They said, "Like getting killed."

And they put the so-called
protection racket on us,

and we had to employ
two of their, er, minders.

We shot in the Kentucky Club,

which was their headquarters
at the time

and the two protectors of us

were appearing in the film
as extras.

Reggie and Ronnie,
they loved being around on the set

and they were very friendly to us.

And the bar was opened for us,
you know, and one day, er,

the bartender charged some money
for one of the crew members,

you know, and two seconds later,

I... I saw him being dragged out
into the courtyard in the back.

And they were beating him up
for taking money from the crew,

and they said,

"These are our guests.
And you cannot charge them money."

Celebrities were
attracted to the Kray twins,

there is no doubt about that at all.

They had a definite appeal
and they loved all that.

The night of the premiere
of Sparrows Can't Sing,

they held the party at the Kentucky
Club and I was behind the bar

and they all marched in
and everyone was,

they was all like that, in there.

And Barbara,
she was dancing around, Barbara.

And, er, it was a lovely evening.

The Krays were extremely
violent people.

But there's a glamour to crime
as much as there is

a glamour to somebody
from the theatre or film.

And it's clear that certain people

saw it as a badge of honour

to have their picture with the Krays

as much as the Krays saw it
as having a picture with them.

Judy Garland
they had in the club

and then they took her round
to Vallance Road.

Oh, my God, can you imagine,

when she told me, Mrs Kray,
"Guess who came here?"

I said, "No?"
"I've met Judy Garland.

"And I sat her down
and gave her a cup of tea."

And Ronnie said, "You know what
that song you sing,

"you sang in the film?
That's my mother's favourite song."

# Somewhere over the rainbow... #

And she'd say, "Oh, your mum
don't want to hear me sing,

"there's no music or anything."
Not that she needed it.

And she sat down and sang
Over The Rainbow for Mrs Kray.

The East End became, briefly,
a fashionable place to visit.

You start to see a change in the way
that the East End is regarded.

And you saw people
moving towards the East End

a lot more for their nightlife.

It was the thing to do.

Barbara and everybody, you know,
it used to be the thing to go there

because to rough it up
in the East End of London,

because it was dangerous.

You saw gangsters, members
of the aristocracy, sportsmen,

all kinds of people coming together
in this very unusual environment

that we hadn't really seen before.

This isn't the underworld,
this is something different.

And we've not seen it since,
actually,

this was absolutely unique
at that time.

Barbara's husband was arrested.
He was a gangster.

So I went down to
the Old Bailey to apply for bail,

and it was the usual thing.

Settled address, er,

strong community ties,
er, charitable activities,

all the cliches, and then
married to a distinguished actress.

And the boys in the press gallery
go barmy.

"Who? Who? Who?" And, er,
it, it can't be hidden any longer.

So, er, Barbara's name is in the
frame and she is absolutely furious.

Barbara was furious with me

and she came up to me
outside the court

and she said,
"You fucking little cow!

"They won't sell me with
a pound of sugar in this business

"now you've let the cat
out of the bag."

And... but in fact
it was quite the reverse.

The press fell in love with her.

They thought she was
the cheeky little cockney sparrow

who stood by her man.

Well, you do what you like
and I'll do what I like.

Ta-ra, everybody. Oh, and, Charlie.
Yep?

I'm glad you're back.

You've got lots of West End types
moving into the East End.

Yet the Krays want to be moving
from the East End

and dragging that across
to the West End.

They wanted to expand their empire.

They wanted to be more than just
a couple of East End boys done good.

They wanted to go west.
Go west, young man.

They were terrific snobs.

They were terrific snobs.

The West End of London
had always been

a honeypot for villains.

It was a place of sex,
drinking clubs.

It was a very attractive place
for gangsters to go to.

This was a big shift for them.

What enabled it, really,
was the 1960 Gaming Act

which legalised gambling in a way
that had never been possible before.

The twins had an opportunity
to take over a West End club,

Esmeralda's Barn.

What they did was...

Now, there was a landlord in London
called Rachman, slum landlord,

and the twins
were nipping him every week.

They wanted their few quid
every week.

So he said to the twins,

"Look, this is driving me mad.
I've got a club in Knightsbridge.

"You can have the club,
call it a day."

They took over the Barn
in Knightsbridge,

that's where they got the club from,
the casino.

They took it over
for a pittance of money.

It was lovely.
Yeah, they painted it all up.

They got me painting it up as well.

What we did, we put on...
CHUCKLES

we put on tuxedos.

Black tuxedos with shirts on,

painting up Esmeralda's Barn.

We was smothered in white paint.

They took Esmeralda's Barn over
because it was upper class.

They weren't gamblers,
neither of them.

Ronnie just thought it was stupid

for you to go on a table with £40
and lose it.

And he used to call them dopey,
mummy's boys.

Of all the people to call people
mummy's boys, Ronnie Kray!

Um, but a different mummy boy.

They're terrified to, to go back
and tell their mother and father

that they've lost, just lost £500

and he said, "But they've lost it
to me." Laughing.

So you had a lot of people

who came from the higher end
of the cultural sphere,

so you had Francis Bacon
and Lucian Freud.

And a lot of them had been involved

in what had previously been
the underground

aristocratic gambling circuit.

So one of the more prominent
customers at Esmeralda's Barn

was the Conservative peer
Lord Boothby.

Good evening, Lord Boothby.
Sound and vision on.

Tonight, this is your life.

He was one of the great political
personalities of the 20th century.

Adolf Hitler had the pleasure
of you calling on him in 1932.

What happened?

Well, he... I was led across
this long room,

he was sitting at the end
in a brown shirt

with a swastika around his sleeve

and as I got up to him,
I was pretty frightened

cos I knew he was
a fairly formidable character.

He rose to his feet, clicked his
feet together and said, "Hitler!"

And I, for once, rose to the
occasion and I clicked my feet

and I put my hand up and said,
"Boothby!"

LAUGHTER

Boothby had worked as private
secretary to Winston Churchill

early on in his career.

He never had the ministerial
career that he'd hoped for,

but he'd gone from frontline
politics into journalism,

and broadcasting most successfully,
and became a household name.

I'm all in favour of general,
genuine, all-round self indulgence.

LAUGHTER

That's what I go in for and I think
it's absolutely splendid.

And I love it and I am a Lord.

Esmeralda's had everything that
he liked in life. It had drink.

A convivial social atmosphere.
The chance to gamble.

And Ronnie Kray and Boothby
were united

by a common interest in sex
with young, good-looking men.

I was aware of Ron's homosexuality,
because he talked openly about it.

Ron would boast about his affairs.

But he said, "It's all right,

"because I'm a giver,
not a receiver."

He was fearless, you see.

He really wasn't frightened
of anybody.

Or ashamed.

When he was quite young, he spoke
to his mum and he said, Ronnie went,

"Mum," he went, "I'm not keen
on women in that way."

"What's that, then?" He said, "I'm
not attracted to them. I like men."

So she went,
"All right, that's all right."

Didn't take any notice. She went,
"It's up to you, boy," like that.

She was very, very,
she's very broad-minded, Violet.

Very broad-minded.

Erm, I don't suppose his dad was
very pleased. Very homophobic.

One day I was in the sitting
in the kitchen,

waiting for Ronnie
to finish eating his lamb stew.

He's got a dog at his feet.

And, er, the door opened and old
Charlie, their father, come in.

And the old boy said,

"Son, what I've heard about you
today,

"what they tell me about you,

"I've never heard anything like it."

He wasn't actually calling him gay
or whatever like that,

he was just telling him
what they'd told him

in whichever one of the bars
he'd been in.

And Ronnie, he's got up and run over
and started hitting old Charlie

and they start having
a bit of a scuffle

and the dog bit old Charlie
on the leg.

He liked me, big time, yeah.

He used to say, "Why don't you
come round my mum's for dinner?"

I said, "I can't, I'm going out
with my girlfriend." "Oh..."

Wherever he went,
people used to see him

and he'd sit there, "Hello, how are
you? Like a drink?" Stuff like that.

And he'd sit there, put his arm
round the back of 'em, like that.

He would do that.
But I took no notice. Didn't care.

Ron Kray became close to Boothby.

He became close to him via this
kind of homosexual underground

that existed in the '60s
when their sexuality was illegal.

The pivotal figure
is a man called Leslie Holt,

who was a young guy
in his 20s in the East End.

Uh, he was, uh, a boxer.

He worked as a croupier
at Esmeralda's,

sometimes a driver for the Krays
as well.

Leslie Holt was having an affair of
some description with Boothby, yeah.

I remember a fella saying to me,
"Here, see that kid over there?"

I says, "Yeah."
He said, "He's been telling me

"he goes up and sees Lord Boothby."

He said,
"And Boothby gets him to bend over

"and smacks his arse
with a slipper."

Boothby started being invited
to Krays' private parties,

and they were notorious parties.

This is an extract from a document
in the MI5 files on Lord Boothby.

"Boothby is a kinky fellow
and likes to see odd people.

"And Ronnie obviously wants to meet
people of good social standing

"as having the odd background
he's got.

"And, of course, both are queers.

"Both are hunters of young men."

What happened was
Boothby, Holt and Ronnie

meet up in Boothby's flat
in Eaton Square.

Ronnie has also invited
a photographer to turn up.

And a number, ten to 12 shots

are taken with Lord Boothby,
Ronnie Kray

and Leslie Holt.

Ronnie has also invited
a member of the firm, Teddy Smith,

to help out with small talk.

Later in life, just before he died,

Teddy Smith recalls

that Ronnie couldn't get a
photograph with Winston Churchill.

One of his loves was Churchill.

Ronnie did listen to records
of Winston Churchill's speeches.

So, the next best thing

was for Ronnie to have a picture
on the mantelpiece

of him and Lord Boothby.

So, following the photographs
on July the 12th,

the Sunday Mirror run a story.

"Public men at seaside parties.
PEER AND A GANGSTER: YARD INQUIRY.

"The peer concerned
is a household name

"and Yard detectives are inquiring
into allegations

"that he has
a relationship with a man

"who has criminal convictions

"and is alleged to be involved
in West End protection rackets."

Now, what you've
got to remember at the time is that

we just had the,
er, Profumo scandal.

The Profumo scandal

had nearly brought down
the government of the time.

And it was felt generally
they couldn't take another scandal.

They just couldn't take
another scandal.

The Conservatives are successful
in burying this story,

because, ultimately, it turns out
that the Labour party

also have an interest
in burying it.

One of their own, er,
an MP called Tom Driberg,

who had recently been
chairman of the party

was every bit as involved
with the Krays as Boothby was.

The Mirror Group paid £40,000
to Boothby, er, for damages,

even though the story
was absolutely true.

And at that point, the Krays
were able to spread their wings.

They had carte blanche to do pretty
much whatever they wanted to do.

The fact that the security services
have been investigating the Krays

as well as the police,
all of that was cast aside

for the good of the reputation
of the British establishment.

And I think that was
a defining moment in their career.

The papers left them alone.

The Old Bill,
nobody knew anything about them.

Whatever they knew,
they kept it for themselves.

Everything was going rosy and dandy.

They really thought
they were untouchable.

And in a way, they were.

But they just pushed it
a little bit too far.

Ron was always living out
his gangster fantasies.

And extreme violence,
ultimate violence, murder,

was very much part of that fantasy.

Cos that's what gangsters do
on screen.

Someone had to die.

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