Just once, that’s all. Just tonight.’ Back in 1997) Tom Wilkinson’s unemployed foreman Gerald reluctantly consented to joining fellow jobseekers Dave (Mark Addy), Horse (Paul Barber), Guy (Hugo Speer), Lomper (Steve Huison) and ringleader Gaz (Robert Carlyle) in an unlikely venture: a one-off, money-spinning strip show at a working men’s club in front of an audience of local women. They would, as the eponymous film’s unforgettable freeze-frame climax confirmed, be going The Full Monty.
Made for £3m and reaping over £200m worldwide, The Full Monty wasn’t just the highest-grossing film ever at the British box office (albeit for just a few months, before a little film called Titanic left harbour), but a genuine cultural phenomenon that transformed the careers of all concerned, spawned a thousand unofficial spin-offs and even saw the then-Prince Charles joining Speer to recreate the famous Hot Stuff dole-queue dance.
For a long time, screenwriter Simon Beaufoy agreed with Gerald: just once, that’s
