The Boys from the Bridge

In 1976, twenty-one-year-old Sebastian Abineri was cast in Richard Attenborough's epic war film, A Bridge Too Far. He joined "Attenborough's Private Army" (APA), a group of fifty young British actors, who were brought together to train under the eagle eye of a former director of The SAS to represent the heroic band of Paratroopers who held Arnhem Bridge against insurmountable odds in 1944. The APA worked for six months alongside major stars such as Anthony Hopkins, Sean Connery, Michael Caine and Sir Laurence Oliver. It was one of the hottest summers on record; so hot that the APA drank the local bars dry! The Boys from the Bridge recounts their extraordinary story. Sebastian Abineri, the author and narrator of The Boys from The Bridge was a member of Attenborough's Private Army (APA a company of young actors put through military training for the film) and this is his account of the making of A Bridge Too Far and the adventures of this group of young actors.