Return to Bern (Part One) - Smiley's People Locations
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Welcome back to Bern!
Many films and television series are shot out of sequence, so it seems appropriate that we are following up our article about events in episode six of Smiley's People with one that covers episode five! Previously, our focus was on Grigoriev and although he does appear briefly in these scenes, the star of this piece is unquestionably the beautiful city of Bern.
There is a good reason why the city features so prominently - John le Carré loved Bern! He had been a student at the University and was first recruited into the British Intelligence services after meeting a pair of consular officials at a church one Christmas Day.
In terms of cities, only Paris has more screen time in Smiley's People. There was clearly a decision made by the production team to show Bern off to its best advantage, with no opportunity missed to include a picturesque location.
After Smiley and Guillam burn Vladimir's negative at the London airport safe house, Bern appears on screen for the first time. We open on this view...
This establishing shot is taken from the Kirchenfeld Bridge. The building on the right is the Bellevue Palace Hotel and the building with the dome is the Bundeshaus, a federal palace which is the seat of government and parliament of the Swiss Confederation. We will see more of the parliament building in our final article in this series. This is how the view looks today...
We then get a close up of the exterior of the hotel itself...
...before the film crew set up on the other side of the building to capture Smiley's arrival, as his taxi comes up Kochergasse...
...and pulls in to the hotel forecourt.
This location has not changed at all.
The concierge, Franz, who greets Smiley is played by Inigo Gallo. Gallo was a Swiss comedian, radio personality and a stage and film actor who regularly starred in Swiss German language productions.
The stills below highlight the beautiful lobby and glass-ceiling reception area...
When I watched the series on its original transmission, I remember thinking this hotel was somewhere James Bond would be more likely to stay than George Smiley. It turns out that during his time in Bern, Le Carré frequented the hotel regularly, so it is no surprise that he would have Smiley stay here. Here he is at the hotel in 2010:
He justifies this lavish choice for Smiley in the novel:
“George Smiley quietly left for Switzerland, using the workname Barraclough…and made straight for the Bellevue Palace Hotel, an enormous, sumptuous place of mellowed Edwardian quiet, which on clear days looks across the foothills to the glistening Alps, but that evening was shrouded in a cloying winter fog. He had considered smaller places; he had considered using one of Toby’s safe flats. But Toby had persuaded him that the Bellevue was best. It had several exits, it was central, and it was the first place in Bern where anyone would think to find him, and therefore the last where Karla, if he was looking out for him, would expect him to be. Entering the enormous hall, Smiley had the feeling of stepping onto an empty liner far out at sea.”
Excerpt from Smiley's People
Smiley's suite was also very impressive...
...and it doesn't look too dissimilar to the layout of the Tower Suite at the hotel today.
Smiley goes to his balcony and looks out across the River Aare to the other side of the Kirchenfeld Bridge.
The building we see in front of him in silhouette is the Bern Historical Museum. It was designed by André Lambert and built in 1894. It is clear from looking at it that Lambert took inspiration for the design from various historic castles. The museum is significant because Smiley and Esterhase have arranged to meet in front of it.
All the scenes of Smiley arriving at the hotel and being shown around his hotel room were filmed on Tuesday 10th November 1981.
We next see Smiley (below right) crossing the Kirchenfeld Bridge.
As he reaches the other side of the bridge we can see Casino Bern behind him.
Casino Bern first opened in 1909 and remains an important social and cultural meeting place today. The photo below was taken around the time the Casino opened.
Smiley proceeds to the ITU (International Telegraph Union) Monument which is situated in front of the Bern Historical Museum. He waits on the right hand side of the monument, as we look at it in the photo below...
He watches Esterhase drive round behind the monument and pull up directly in front of the Bern Historical Museum. (In the novel, Toby meets Smiley on a dark and foggy evening at the Nydegg bridge in an orange Volvo.)
We can see the geography of this set up a little bit more easily in the image below.
Talking of geography, let's have a look at a map showing the location of everything we have described so far - key buildings already identified on the map are outlined in red.
Smiley and Esterhase now drive off down Thunstrasse in a yellow Volvo Estate. I do not pretend to know much about cars but there was quite the discussion about this one on the IMCDB a while back. The consensus seems to be the vehicle may have been involved in a crash, as it has been modified from the original design. With Smiley previously ruling out the use of stolen Swiss postal vans for the operation, ("economic though it may be"), I can imagine Esterhase picking up such a vehicle cheaply for surveillance!
As the vehicle pulls away in the photo below, we catch sight of what looks like a public urinal on the other side of the road.
We can see that the building is still there on the left hand side in this recent street view image below.
By this point, it is apparent that Smiley and Esterhase have company for their drive.
Sylvia Jost (Bernese Housewife) and Brigitte Soravia (Child) are in the back seat of the Volvo to provide some cover for the actual purpose of the journey. Jost has had a successful career as an actor but I can't find any acting credits for Soravia.
On their journey to observe Grigoriev, Smiley and Esterhase pass a number of different properties. We know Grigoriev is a diplomat so it makes sense that we see some embassy buildings in the diplomatic district of Bern. We have been able to confirm that all the properties seen on screen during the drive were specifically chosen by the production team. The people we see are all paid extras and any vehicles that appear on screen were placed there as part of the production. If you had wondered whether any of these shots had been filmed candidly, we can confirm they definitely were not.
But where were the properties? I'm pleased to say we have managed to find all of them, with a little diplomatic help!
The first property we see was the easiest one to find.
By searching for embassy buildings in Bern, the Canadian Embassy came high up the listings. The Canadian Embassy is at Kuchenfeldstrasse 88 and you can see a recent image below.
We will look at where all these properties are located on a map shortly.
Next, we have a property that may be intended to look like an embassy for a country in the middle east.
This building is just a few houses down from the Canadian Embassy in Kuchenfeldstrasse. Here is how the property looks today.
I have my long-time collaborator Chris to thank for finding perhaps the most important location on our 'diplomatic drive' - Grigoriev's residence.
He found this close by the other properties on the corner of Steinerstrasse and Thunstrasse.
It is home today to Touring Club Switzerland. TCS has been committed to safe, sustainable and self-determined mobility for Switzerland for over 125 years. No doubt that keen cyclist ‘Uncle Anton' would approve!
There was one more property we see on screen (below) that had me stumped for a while.
Looking on street view in the same general area had turned up nothing but eventually I found this photo via a reverse image search...
This photo was found on a page profiling Bill Longhurst, the Deputy Head of Mission and Consul at the British Embassy in Bern. There was an email address on the profile page, so I dropped Mr Longhurst a line. Fortunately, Bill is a fan of John le Carré‘s work and was happy to confirm the property was the official residence of the British Ambassador in Bern. It can be found at Brunnadernrain 11, just next to the Dählhölzli forest in the Elfenau neighbourhood.
What is interesting is that the novel name checks this property and the vehicle we see in front of it specifically:
“They descended a gentle hill, passing the British Ambassador’s residence on their right, and his Rolls-Royce parked in the sweep.”
Excerpt from Smiley's People
My thanks to Bill, as I doubt we would have found this location without his help - the house is a little way from the other properties and is no longer clearly visible from the road in street view images.
We can confirm all the 'diplomatic drive' scenes were filmed over the 12th and 13th November 1981. As promised, we can now look at all the properties Smiley and Esterhase passed on their journey (and the order in which they passed them) on the map below...
Next up, Toby swaps out his Volvo Estate for a Renault 4. We will cover this and a few more remaining scenes when we 'Return to Bern' one last time, in an upcoming article.
If you have any information about the making of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy or Smiley's People that you think would be of interest to visitors to this website feel free to get in touch at guinnessissmiley@icloud.com
Screenshots from Smiley's People (c) BBC 1982
Street view images and maps by Apple and Google
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