Queen Elizabeth II’s career was, well, being queen. Her life changed at 10 years old when her uncle, King Edward VIII, abdicated, cementing her status as a future queen. However, in later years, she admitted if a career outside the royal family had been an option, she knew what she would’ve selected.
An entertainer’s World War II visit inspired the queen’s alternate career choice Queen Elizabeth II | Jonathan Brady/Pool/Afp via Getty Images
Think the queen would’ve made a career of breeding dogs or racing horses, given her lifelong love of dogs and horses? Wrong. Sure, she bred both horses and dogs. But, if given the opportunity for a different career path, neither would’ve been her first choice.
As royal author Gyles Brandreth told Radio Times, it went back to a certain entertainer who paid a World War II-era visit to Windsor Castle when...
An entertainer’s World War II visit inspired the queen’s alternate career choice Queen Elizabeth II | Jonathan Brady/Pool/Afp via Getty Images
Think the queen would’ve made a career of breeding dogs or racing horses, given her lifelong love of dogs and horses? Wrong. Sure, she bred both horses and dogs. But, if given the opportunity for a different career path, neither would’ve been her first choice.
As royal author Gyles Brandreth told Radio Times, it went back to a certain entertainer who paid a World War II-era visit to Windsor Castle when...
- 9/9/2023
- by Mandi Kerr
- Showbiz Cheat Sheet
Frankly, it’s a surprise it took this long. Given that Die Hard launched an entire action sub-genre of ‘shootouts in tall buildings’, and that famous skyscrapers make for eye-catching locations to hook setpieces around, it was only a matter of time before someone made a movie set in, on, or around London’s jagged cloud-poker, The Shard. Now, it’s finally happening, it’s got Daisy Ridley_.
In tribute to the building itself, we’ll get to the point: Campbell’s film is titled Cleaner, and while that sounds like a biopic of 'When I'm Cleaning Windows' singer George Formby, it actually stars Ridley as ex-soldier turned window cleaner Joey who’ll battle a batch of eco-terrorists in present-day London, while simultaneously sticking it to the world’s most egregious corporate pollutants. Oh, and it’s largely set to take place 90 stories up in the air, on The Shard’s gleaming glass surface.
In tribute to the building itself, we’ll get to the point: Campbell’s film is titled Cleaner, and while that sounds like a biopic of 'When I'm Cleaning Windows' singer George Formby, it actually stars Ridley as ex-soldier turned window cleaner Joey who’ll battle a batch of eco-terrorists in present-day London, while simultaneously sticking it to the world’s most egregious corporate pollutants. Oh, and it’s largely set to take place 90 stories up in the air, on The Shard’s gleaming glass surface.
- 5/12/2023
- by Ben Travis
- Empire - Movies
Prince became a superstar in the 1980s. The “Purple Rain” singer was a transcendent talent who blended pop with rock ‘n’ roll. While the singer was known to keep to himself, he publicly criticized a few artists, including Keith Richards and Adam Levine. Prince once criticized The Beatles for a song they released 15 years after John Lennon’s death.
Prince said The Beatles’ ‘Free as a Bird’ was ‘demonic’ Prince | Michael Montfort/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images
In 1995, the remaining Beatles released Anthology, a collection of behind-the-scenes stories and unreleased demos in the format of a documentary and compilation albums. Part of Anthology included a new song from The Beatles called “Free as a Bird”. The song included unfinished audio of Lennon, who could never complete this track.
McCartney, Harrison, and Starr came together to finish the song and clean up Lennon’s audio, so it sounded like The Beatles were performing together once again.
Prince said The Beatles’ ‘Free as a Bird’ was ‘demonic’ Prince | Michael Montfort/Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images
In 1995, the remaining Beatles released Anthology, a collection of behind-the-scenes stories and unreleased demos in the format of a documentary and compilation albums. Part of Anthology included a new song from The Beatles called “Free as a Bird”. The song included unfinished audio of Lennon, who could never complete this track.
McCartney, Harrison, and Starr came together to finish the song and clean up Lennon’s audio, so it sounded like The Beatles were performing together once again.
- 4/30/2023
- by Ross Tanenbaum
- Showbiz Cheat Sheet
A lot goes into making an album, but some fans believe bands do even more work than is apparent by slipping hidden messages into their songs. Some of these supposed secret transmissions from musicians are nefarious or conspiratorial, while others are relatively benign. Regardless, here are three bands that some believe placed hidden messages in their songs.
Freddie Mercury, John Deacon, and Brian May | Express Newspapers/Getty Images The Beatles
John Lennon sparked conspiracy theories when he admitted to placing a backward message in a song.
“On the end of ‘Rain’ you hear me singing it backwards,” he told Rolling Stone in 1968. “We’d done the main thing at Emi and the habit was then to take the songs home and see what you thought a little extra gimmick or what the guitar piece would be.”
From there, fans began poring over the band’s lyrics in search of other hidden messages.
Freddie Mercury, John Deacon, and Brian May | Express Newspapers/Getty Images The Beatles
John Lennon sparked conspiracy theories when he admitted to placing a backward message in a song.
“On the end of ‘Rain’ you hear me singing it backwards,” he told Rolling Stone in 1968. “We’d done the main thing at Emi and the habit was then to take the songs home and see what you thought a little extra gimmick or what the guitar piece would be.”
From there, fans began poring over the band’s lyrics in search of other hidden messages.
- 4/23/2023
- by Emma McKee
- Showbiz Cheat Sheet
George Harrison liked “highbrow” music, but that doesn’t mean he was more musical than his fellow Beatles. The guitarist admitted many times that he should’ve practiced more.
John Lennon, George Harrison, and Paul McCartney of The Beatles | Keystone Features/Getty Images George said he liked ‘highbrow’ music but wasn’t sure if he was more musical than the other Beatles
The guitarist interviewed himself in a November 1964 issue of The Beatles Book Monthly (per Beatles Interviews). George asked the questions he thought reporters missed, including if he thought he was the most musical out of The Beatles.
George replied that it depends. He explained that some people have said he is only because he admitted to liking Segovia’s guitar playing, “and they think that’s all very highbrow and musical.”
George believed he loved his guitar more than the others loved theirs. For John Lennon and Paul McCartney,...
John Lennon, George Harrison, and Paul McCartney of The Beatles | Keystone Features/Getty Images George said he liked ‘highbrow’ music but wasn’t sure if he was more musical than the other Beatles
The guitarist interviewed himself in a November 1964 issue of The Beatles Book Monthly (per Beatles Interviews). George asked the questions he thought reporters missed, including if he thought he was the most musical out of The Beatles.
George replied that it depends. He explained that some people have said he is only because he admitted to liking Segovia’s guitar playing, “and they think that’s all very highbrow and musical.”
George believed he loved his guitar more than the others loved theirs. For John Lennon and Paul McCartney,...
- 2/9/2023
- by Hannah Wigandt
- Showbiz Cheat Sheet
Royal fans are remembering Queen Elizabeth II’s musical taste following her death at 96.
Tributes have been pouring in from around the world after Her Majesty passed away in Balmoral on Thursday.
The days after her death have seen well-wishers look at some of the things in life that brought her great joy - and music was among them.
The Queen was a big musical theatre fan and, perhaps surprisingly, she even enjoyed some Gary Barlow.
In 2016, the Queen’s cousin Lady Elizabeth Anson said that the monarch was “a fantastic dancer” with “great rhythm”.
Speaking on BBC Radio documentary Our Queen: 90 Musical Years, she explained: “The Queen loves the theatre and musicals like Showboat, Oklahoma! and Annie Get Your Gun.
“These were the tunes that remained in one’s head and were very danceable to.”
Others told the documentary that her taste was “mainstream”, with “no airs and graces...
Tributes have been pouring in from around the world after Her Majesty passed away in Balmoral on Thursday.
The days after her death have seen well-wishers look at some of the things in life that brought her great joy - and music was among them.
The Queen was a big musical theatre fan and, perhaps surprisingly, she even enjoyed some Gary Barlow.
In 2016, the Queen’s cousin Lady Elizabeth Anson said that the monarch was “a fantastic dancer” with “great rhythm”.
Speaking on BBC Radio documentary Our Queen: 90 Musical Years, she explained: “The Queen loves the theatre and musicals like Showboat, Oklahoma! and Annie Get Your Gun.
“These were the tunes that remained in one’s head and were very danceable to.”
Others told the documentary that her taste was “mainstream”, with “no airs and graces...
- 9/11/2022
- by Isobel Lewis
- The Independent - Music
Stage performer and actress Barbara Perry died Sunday from natural causes in Hollywood. She appeared in several films and TV shows including Samuel Fuller’s Shock Corridor (1963) and The Naked Kiss (1964) as well as The Dick Van Dyke Show and most recently, Baskets as well She was 97.
Born in Norfolk, Va. on June 22, 1921, Perry was a performer at a young age when she was a member of-of the children’s ballet of the Met’s corps de ballet, making her big stage debut in Madame Butterfly. She went on to study dance — with a specialty in tap — and performed at the Hollywood Bowl in the 1930s. Her talent for dancing was later on showcased at a variety of nightclubs including the Hotel Nacional de Cuba, the Chez Paris in Chicago, the Cocoanut Grove in Los Angeles and the Café de Paris in London. She also had the honor of opening...
Born in Norfolk, Va. on June 22, 1921, Perry was a performer at a young age when she was a member of-of the children’s ballet of the Met’s corps de ballet, making her big stage debut in Madame Butterfly. She went on to study dance — with a specialty in tap — and performed at the Hollywood Bowl in the 1930s. Her talent for dancing was later on showcased at a variety of nightclubs including the Hotel Nacional de Cuba, the Chez Paris in Chicago, the Cocoanut Grove in Los Angeles and the Café de Paris in London. She also had the honor of opening...
- 5/5/2019
- by Dino-Ray Ramos
- Deadline Film + TV
Director Stephen Cookson gives us 80 minutes of confusion, laughter and peculiarity all rolled into one. Stanley, A Man of Variety stars Timothy Spall as Stanley, a middle-aged man locked up in a Victorian era style psychiatric facility who undergoes physical and mental seizures. As he comes into his fifteenth year of his isolation, due to his seizures, he has hallucinations of his heroes; George Formby, Frank Randall, Noel Coward and Max Miler (as well as ten others) just to name a few.
It’s a bizarre film and highly disorientating at times, but the concept is different and something not seen often on screen. Timothy Spall is simply excellent and the way he plays 14 completely different manifestations as well as being Stanley, is first-rate. The oddness of these characters is entertaining, they’re almost twisted and demonic like but each with a very good sense of humour.
To earn the...
It’s a bizarre film and highly disorientating at times, but the concept is different and something not seen often on screen. Timothy Spall is simply excellent and the way he plays 14 completely different manifestations as well as being Stanley, is first-rate. The oddness of these characters is entertaining, they’re almost twisted and demonic like but each with a very good sense of humour.
To earn the...
- 6/17/2018
- by Alex Clement
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
The actor’s new film – Stanley, A Man of Variety – echoes David Lynch and a dark Ealing classic. Here he tells why he chose to re-create the giants of music hall as ‘English noir’
Timothy Spall has often played characters that stick in the mind – from Barry in the BBC hit series Auf Wiedersehen, Pet to his award-winning performance as the great British painter in Mike Leigh’s 2014 film, Mr Turner. But Spall’s latest film goes several steps further.
In Stanley, A Man of Variety released in cinemas next month, he concocts a blistering string of recreations of several of the great comic variety acts of the past, incuding Max Wall, George Formby and Noël Coward. It is an extraordinary tour de force, but not a comfortable one to watch. Spall and his collaborator on the film, the director and writer Stephen Cookson, have a deeply unsettling argument to...
Timothy Spall has often played characters that stick in the mind – from Barry in the BBC hit series Auf Wiedersehen, Pet to his award-winning performance as the great British painter in Mike Leigh’s 2014 film, Mr Turner. But Spall’s latest film goes several steps further.
In Stanley, A Man of Variety released in cinemas next month, he concocts a blistering string of recreations of several of the great comic variety acts of the past, incuding Max Wall, George Formby and Noël Coward. It is an extraordinary tour de force, but not a comfortable one to watch. Spall and his collaborator on the film, the director and writer Stephen Cookson, have a deeply unsettling argument to...
- 5/26/2018
- by Vanessa Thorpe Arts and media correspondent
- The Guardian - Film News
What's on Queen Elizabeth's royal playlist? Showtunes, big band sounds, songs from the WWII era and hymns are among the monarch's favorite genres of music, friends and family have revealed. • Want to keep up with the latest royals coverage? Click here to subscribe to the Royals Newsletter.Her top 10 songs includes "Oklahoma" from the musical of the same name by Rodgers and Hammerstein and "Anything You Can Do" from Annie Get Your Gun and the popular classic number "Leaning on a Lampost," sung by British ukulele player George Formby. Other favorite tunes include "Cheek to Cheek" by Fred Astaire and...
- 6/7/2016
- by Simon Perry, @SPerryPeoplemag
- PEOPLE.com
Ron Moody in 'Oliver!' movie. Ron Moody: 'Oliver!' actor nominated for an Oscar dead at 91 (Note: This Ron Moody article is currently being revised.) Two well-regarded, nonagenarian British performers have died in the last few days: 93-year-old Christopher Lee (June 7, '15), best known for his many portrayals of Dracula and assorted movie villains and weirdos, from the title role in The Mummy to Dr. Catheter in Gremlins 2: The New Batch. 91-year-old Ron Moody (yesterday, June 11), among whose infrequent film appearances was the role of Fagin, the grotesque adult leader of a gang of boy petty thieves, in the 1968 Best Picture Academy Award-winning musical Oliver!, which also earned him a Best Actor nomination. Having been featured in nearly 200 movies and, most importantly, having had his mainstream appeal resurrected by way of the villainous Saruman in Peter Jackson's The Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit movies (and various associated merchandising,...
- 6/12/2015
- by Andre Soares
- Alt Film Guide
One of my happiest memories of TV as a child was the Stars In Their Eyes grand final night. The Matthew Kelly years of the show may look rather quaint in an era of spinning chairs, dancing celebrities and X Factor shoutiness, but it was actually ahead of its time as an entertainment format.
From turning Reg the butcher and Barbara from accounts into stars for five minutes, to public phone votes for the winner, it was in many ways a proto-Pop Idol and X Factor.
The key difference between Stars In Their Eyes and what followed was the complete absence of cynicism or profiteering. It probably helped Basil from Basingstoke raise a few more quid with his George Formby covers act, but there was never any pretense that the show would be life-changing.
Like most Saturday night shows in the pre-Popstars/Simon Cowell/Big Brother era, the heart...
From turning Reg the butcher and Barbara from accounts into stars for five minutes, to public phone votes for the winner, it was in many ways a proto-Pop Idol and X Factor.
The key difference between Stars In Their Eyes and what followed was the complete absence of cynicism or profiteering. It probably helped Basil from Basingstoke raise a few more quid with his George Formby covers act, but there was never any pretense that the show would be life-changing.
Like most Saturday night shows in the pre-Popstars/Simon Cowell/Big Brother era, the heart...
- 1/9/2015
- Digital Spy
There’s one of two things you can be almost guaranteed of when you see a story that takes place on a train – romance, or a murder.
Mummy On The Orient Express
By Jamie Mathieson
Directed by Paul Wilmshurst
As a farewell fling, The Doctor takes Clara on a trip aboard the Orient Express in space, exactingly copied from the original, except for the bit about being spaceworthy. It becomes quickly apparent that all is not well on the craft – a mysterious unseen beast is killing people exactly 66 seconds after the victim sees it – and no one else does. It turns out this particular journey is a massive two-fold trap – the ship is filled with scientists versed in areas of research that pertain to the beast, and are pressed into service to capture it, by any means necessary.
The Doctor quickly joins the press gang, understanding that the only way...
Mummy On The Orient Express
By Jamie Mathieson
Directed by Paul Wilmshurst
As a farewell fling, The Doctor takes Clara on a trip aboard the Orient Express in space, exactingly copied from the original, except for the bit about being spaceworthy. It becomes quickly apparent that all is not well on the craft – a mysterious unseen beast is killing people exactly 66 seconds after the victim sees it – and no one else does. It turns out this particular journey is a massive two-fold trap – the ship is filled with scientists versed in areas of research that pertain to the beast, and are pressed into service to capture it, by any means necessary.
The Doctor quickly joins the press gang, understanding that the only way...
- 10/13/2014
- by Vinnie Bartilucci
- Comicmix.com
Hilary Mantel, Jonathan Franzen, Mohsin Hamid, Ruth Rendell, Tom Stoppard, Malcolm Gladwell, Eleanor Catton and many more recommend the books that impressed them this year
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Five Star Billionaire by Tash Aw (Fourth Estate) is a brilliant, sprawling, layered and unsentimental portrayal of contemporary China. It made me think and laugh. I also love Dave Eggers' The Circle (Hamish Hamilton), which is a sharp-eyed and funny satire about the obsession with "sharing" our lives through technology. It's convincing and a little creepy.
William Boyd
By strange coincidence two of the most intriguing art books I read this year had the word "Breakfast" in their titles. They were Breakfast with Lucian by Geordie Greig (Jonathan Cape) and Breakfast at Sotheby's by Philip Hook (Particular). Greig's fascinating, intimate biography of Lucian Freud was a revelation. Every question I had about Freud – from the aesthetic to the intrusively gossipy – was...
Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Five Star Billionaire by Tash Aw (Fourth Estate) is a brilliant, sprawling, layered and unsentimental portrayal of contemporary China. It made me think and laugh. I also love Dave Eggers' The Circle (Hamish Hamilton), which is a sharp-eyed and funny satire about the obsession with "sharing" our lives through technology. It's convincing and a little creepy.
William Boyd
By strange coincidence two of the most intriguing art books I read this year had the word "Breakfast" in their titles. They were Breakfast with Lucian by Geordie Greig (Jonathan Cape) and Breakfast at Sotheby's by Philip Hook (Particular). Greig's fascinating, intimate biography of Lucian Freud was a revelation. Every question I had about Freud – from the aesthetic to the intrusively gossipy – was...
- 11/23/2013
- by Hilary Mantel, Jonathan Franzen, Mohsin Hamid, Tom Stoppard, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, William Boyd, Bill Bryson, Shami Chakrabarti, Sarah Churchwell, Antonia Fraser, Mark Haddon, Robert Harris, Max Hastings, Philip Hensher, Simon Hoggart, AM Homes, John Lanchester, Mark Lawson, Robert Macfarlane, Andrew Motion, Ian Rankin, Lionel Shriver, Helen Simpson, Colm Tóibín, Richard Ford, John Gray, David Kynaston, Penelope Lively, Pankaj Mishra, Blake Morrison, Susie Orbach
- The Guardian - Film News
When the stars of the squared circle try their hand at cinema, the results can be mixed
They may have made their names by dressing up in spandex and pretending to hit other men, but professional wrestlers are some of the most engaging performers in the entertainment world.
Some of the industry's biggest stars have made the transition from the squared-circle to the silver screen, with varying degrees of success – and quality.
Here are five of the most memorable films starring professional wrestlers – can you think of any others? Let us know in the thread below.
1. Mr Nanny
It's odd to think that a man who looked constantly sunburnt and sported a bleached Fu Manchu moustache could be such a hit with the kids, but Hulk Hogan was a huge star in the 80s and 90s, when Hulkmania ran wild across the globe.
Hogan's film credits read like an essay in naffness: Suburban Commando,...
They may have made their names by dressing up in spandex and pretending to hit other men, but professional wrestlers are some of the most engaging performers in the entertainment world.
Some of the industry's biggest stars have made the transition from the squared-circle to the silver screen, with varying degrees of success – and quality.
Here are five of the most memorable films starring professional wrestlers – can you think of any others? Let us know in the thread below.
1. Mr Nanny
It's odd to think that a man who looked constantly sunburnt and sported a bleached Fu Manchu moustache could be such a hit with the kids, but Hulk Hogan was a huge star in the 80s and 90s, when Hulkmania ran wild across the globe.
Hogan's film credits read like an essay in naffness: Suburban Commando,...
- 7/10/2013
- by Guardian readers
- The Guardian - Film News
The good news is that Adam Sandler, executive producer of Here Comes the Boom, doesn't appear on screen. The bad news is that overweight, baby-faced Kevin James does. He plays Scott Voss, a lazy, unmotivated 42-year-old biology teacher at a failing Boston high school, who returns to his university sport of wrestling to save the school's music department from being disbanded and its dedicated elderly teacher (a prissy Henry Winkler) from being made redundant. He does this by becoming a human punchbag competing as a mixed martial arts cage fighter.
Even less prepossessing than George Formby or Norman Wisdom, who had similar romantic yearnings, James sets his heart on wooing the school's beautiful nurse (Salma Hayek). The film aims to be simultaneously a coarse sentimental little-guy comedy, a tale of embracing the American dream, and an increasingly serious underdog fight movie on the lines of Rocky. It fails on all three counts.
Even less prepossessing than George Formby or Norman Wisdom, who had similar romantic yearnings, James sets his heart on wooing the school's beautiful nurse (Salma Hayek). The film aims to be simultaneously a coarse sentimental little-guy comedy, a tale of embracing the American dream, and an increasingly serious underdog fight movie on the lines of Rocky. It fails on all three counts.
- 11/11/2012
- by Philip French
- The Guardian - Film News
A secret? Eric Cantona is a giggler
Ken Loach, 75, was born in Warwickshire. After grammar school, he went to Oxford University where he read law. He started his career in the theatre and went on to become a BBC television director in 1963. He worked on Z Cars and then the Wednesday Play, where he directed the classic Cathy Come Home. In 1969, Loach made the award-winning film Kes. His other movies include Land And Freedom, Sweet Sixteen, The Wind That Shakes The Barley and Looking For Eric. The Angels' Share, his new film, is out now.
What is your greatest fear?
I would have said relegation for Bath City, the football club I support, but we've just been relegated.
What is your earliest memory?
Getting my fingers trapped in a deckchair when I was three or four.
Which living person do you most admire, and why?
Tony Benn, for moving to...
Ken Loach, 75, was born in Warwickshire. After grammar school, he went to Oxford University where he read law. He started his career in the theatre and went on to become a BBC television director in 1963. He worked on Z Cars and then the Wednesday Play, where he directed the classic Cathy Come Home. In 1969, Loach made the award-winning film Kes. His other movies include Land And Freedom, Sweet Sixteen, The Wind That Shakes The Barley and Looking For Eric. The Angels' Share, his new film, is out now.
What is your greatest fear?
I would have said relegation for Bath City, the football club I support, but we've just been relegated.
What is your earliest memory?
Getting my fingers trapped in a deckchair when I was three or four.
Which living person do you most admire, and why?
Tony Benn, for moving to...
- 6/1/2012
- by Rosanna Greenstreet
- The Guardian - Film News
Presenter of the BBC's Late Night Line-Up and Film Night, he was a wildly enthusiastic historian of the cinema
The broadcaster, journalist and film collector Philip Jenkinson, who has died aged 76, was for a few years one of the most popular and familiar faces on British television. His ubiquity was such that the Monty Python team saw fit to satirise him as a machine-gunned victim in a spoof on Sam Peckinpah's movies. He was also enrolled into that hall of fame accorded to guests of the Morecambe and Wise show. In a 1977 Christmas special, he and a gaggle of co-presenters, all dressed in sailor suits, performed There Is Nothing Like a Dame.
Such celebrity might not have come his way had he not been noticed, in 1967, by the BBC producer Mike Appleton, who attended a film lecture given by Jenkinson at St Martin's School of Art, in London.
The broadcaster, journalist and film collector Philip Jenkinson, who has died aged 76, was for a few years one of the most popular and familiar faces on British television. His ubiquity was such that the Monty Python team saw fit to satirise him as a machine-gunned victim in a spoof on Sam Peckinpah's movies. He was also enrolled into that hall of fame accorded to guests of the Morecambe and Wise show. In a 1977 Christmas special, he and a gaggle of co-presenters, all dressed in sailor suits, performed There Is Nothing Like a Dame.
Such celebrity might not have come his way had he not been noticed, in 1967, by the BBC producer Mike Appleton, who attended a film lecture given by Jenkinson at St Martin's School of Art, in London.
- 4/23/2012
- by Brian Baxter
- The Guardian - Film News
Singer, comic actor and stalwart of Coronation Street
Betty Driver, who has died aged 91, was a gutsy and durable comic actor who meant one thing to young audiences and quite another to those who could remember the second world war and the years immediately after it. To the youthful, she will be remembered as Betty Turpin (later Betty Williams), the barmaid, shoulder to cry on and wife of the policeman Cyril Turpin in Granada television's Coronation Street, whose cast she joined in 1969.
To a much older audience, she will also be remembered for her appearances in repertory theatres and in stage revues; as the child star who took over from the popular singer Gracie Fields on a stage tour, doing some of her best-known numbers; and as the principal singer for a year with the leading dance orchestra leader of the time, Henry Hall, on his BBC radio programme,...
Betty Driver, who has died aged 91, was a gutsy and durable comic actor who meant one thing to young audiences and quite another to those who could remember the second world war and the years immediately after it. To the youthful, she will be remembered as Betty Turpin (later Betty Williams), the barmaid, shoulder to cry on and wife of the policeman Cyril Turpin in Granada television's Coronation Street, whose cast she joined in 1969.
To a much older audience, she will also be remembered for her appearances in repertory theatres and in stage revues; as the child star who took over from the popular singer Gracie Fields on a stage tour, doing some of her best-known numbers; and as the principal singer for a year with the leading dance orchestra leader of the time, Henry Hall, on his BBC radio programme,...
- 10/16/2011
- by Dennis Barker
- The Guardian - Film News
Elizabeth Mary Driver was born on May 20, 1920 in Leicester. The daughter of a policeman, her family moved to Manchester when she was two, where by her own admission she experienced an unhappy childhood. Driver and her sister Freda were never given any affection by their mother Nellie, and she was pushed into becoming a child star at the tender age of eight after her mother discovered she could sing. "I was the meal ticket for the entire family," she later revealed. At 12, she was touring the UK and attending different schools every week. When Driver reached 14, she secured the leading role in the revue Mr Tower of London. George Formby later cast her in Boots! Boots!, but her scenes as a cabaret singer were left out of the final cut at the insistence of Formby's wife, Beryl, who didn't want to be upstaged. By the age of 21, Driver finally had...
- 10/15/2011
- by By Colin Daniels
- Digital Spy
Frank Skinner will front a BBC Four documentary about the life of musician and film star George Formby. Skinner's show will attempt to uncover the secret behind Formby's success and enduring legacy. Formby made the equivalent of £3 million-a-year in his pomp. He made 19 movies between 1934 and 1946, and was signed by Columbia Pictures in 1941. He also released more than 200 records, including his most famous hits 'Leaning on a Lamp Post' and 'With My Little Stick of Blackpool Rock'. The latter was famously banned by the BBC because it was considered too adult for general broadcast. When Formby died in 1961, more than (more)...
- 10/11/2011
- by By Alex Fletcher
- Digital Spy
Billed as a “best of British” ensemble, Cold War thriller Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy can be expected to dominate next year’s BAFTAs with a cast that brings together a plethora of probable future knights of the realm. Gary Oldman, Colin Firth, John Hurt, Mark Strong, Tom Hardy, Toby Jones, Ciarán Hinds, Benedict Cumberbatch, Stephen Graham and Kathy Burke are part of a stellar line-up who bring this adaptation of the John le Carré novel to life. The 70s set movie is replete with locally specific detail too, as Oldman’s protagonist, semi-retired intelligence officer George Smiley, sucks down on a pack of Trebor mints and dines at a local branch of unfashionable burger chain Wimpy (knife and fork and all).
Officially the film is a French co-production, with StudioCanal stumping up the cash, but it’s an unmistakably British enterprise. So how does a director born on the small island of Lidingö,...
Officially the film is a French co-production, with StudioCanal stumping up the cash, but it’s an unmistakably British enterprise. So how does a director born on the small island of Lidingö,...
- 9/19/2011
- by Robert Beames
- Obsessed with Film
Gary Oldman gives us a Smiley to equal Alec Guinness's in this triumphant adaptation of John le Carré's masterpiece
Directed by Tomas Alfredson, who made the subtly suggestive Swedish vampire movie Let the Right One In, and adapted by the British husband and wife team, Peter Straughan and the late Bridget O'Connor, this is as lucid and accomplished a screen version of a long, complicated novel as I have seen. John le Carré is still best known for The Spy Who Came in From the Cold, his realistic 1963 riposte to the then burgeoning cult of James Bond, the title of which immediately entered the language alongside Graham Greene's The Third Man and Our Man in Havana.
But the book that changed the course of espionage fiction came 11 years later. Following his single excursion into conventional psychological fiction (The Naive and Sentimental Lover), le Carré's Tinker, Tailor, Soldier,...
Directed by Tomas Alfredson, who made the subtly suggestive Swedish vampire movie Let the Right One In, and adapted by the British husband and wife team, Peter Straughan and the late Bridget O'Connor, this is as lucid and accomplished a screen version of a long, complicated novel as I have seen. John le Carré is still best known for The Spy Who Came in From the Cold, his realistic 1963 riposte to the then burgeoning cult of James Bond, the title of which immediately entered the language alongside Graham Greene's The Third Man and Our Man in Havana.
But the book that changed the course of espionage fiction came 11 years later. Following his single excursion into conventional psychological fiction (The Naive and Sentimental Lover), le Carré's Tinker, Tailor, Soldier,...
- 9/17/2011
- by Philip French
- The Guardian - Film News
With Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy in cinemas, we were caught up with director Tomas Alfredson and writer Peter Straughan to talk about the film’s making...
With Tomas Alfredson’s chill retelling of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy out in cinemas today, we spoke to its Swedish director Alfredson, whose previous movie was the excellent Let The Right One In, and British screenwriter Peter Straughan, who penned the screenplay for The Men Who Stare At Goats, about John le Carré, the Cold War, Swedish melancholy, what they would do if the chance to do a Bond film ever came their way, and why Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy isn’t a spy thriller…
Why now for a second adaptation of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy? Is there a sense that a modern feeling of betrayal in government might make this the perfect time for a story about treachery and double-crossing?
Peter Straughan: If I’m honest,...
With Tomas Alfredson’s chill retelling of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy out in cinemas today, we spoke to its Swedish director Alfredson, whose previous movie was the excellent Let The Right One In, and British screenwriter Peter Straughan, who penned the screenplay for The Men Who Stare At Goats, about John le Carré, the Cold War, Swedish melancholy, what they would do if the chance to do a Bond film ever came their way, and why Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy isn’t a spy thriller…
Why now for a second adaptation of Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy? Is there a sense that a modern feeling of betrayal in government might make this the perfect time for a story about treachery and double-crossing?
Peter Straughan: If I’m honest,...
- 9/16/2011
- Den of Geek
Tomas Alfredson’s adaptation of John Le Carre’s celebrated novel Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy is a captivating piece of restrained direction and impeccable work from its ensemble cast – rarely has a film made good on its promise in quite this way.
It is primarily the story of the hunt for a mole within the Secret Service of the 1970s but there is far more at play here. Alfredson keeps the drive of the main plot in the forefront while slowly building up the complex crosshatch of personal and professional agendas which is fertile ground for the select group of actors the Swedish director has assembled.
Alfredson’s evocation of this vanished world of ‘Wet Tweed’ espionage is particularly satisfying now that we are post-Bourne and used to having our spy thrillers cluttered with technology and delivered with rapid fire editing and awash with steadicam use.
The film is old-fashioned in the best possible way,...
It is primarily the story of the hunt for a mole within the Secret Service of the 1970s but there is far more at play here. Alfredson keeps the drive of the main plot in the forefront while slowly building up the complex crosshatch of personal and professional agendas which is fertile ground for the select group of actors the Swedish director has assembled.
Alfredson’s evocation of this vanished world of ‘Wet Tweed’ espionage is particularly satisfying now that we are post-Bourne and used to having our spy thrillers cluttered with technology and delivered with rapid fire editing and awash with steadicam use.
The film is old-fashioned in the best possible way,...
- 9/15/2011
- by Jon Lyus
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
The long awaited big screen adaptation of John Le Carre’s seminal spy novel Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy is released in UK cinemas this Friday, the 16th of September.
What is initially apparent, and something which features heavily in the film’s marketing, is the film’s impressive cast but film is first and foremost a collaborative process and the two men who sit alongside Le Carre in terms of importance to the success of the film are the writer Peter Straughan and the film’s director Tomas Alfredson.
Both men brought with them a love of Le Carre’s work to the film and in this roundtable interview they talk about the process of adaptation, the gathering of the cast and the British flavour inherent in the film.
Before the men entered the room the collected journalists were talking of a very brief scene in a landmark of 70s life – The Wimpy Bar…...
What is initially apparent, and something which features heavily in the film’s marketing, is the film’s impressive cast but film is first and foremost a collaborative process and the two men who sit alongside Le Carre in terms of importance to the success of the film are the writer Peter Straughan and the film’s director Tomas Alfredson.
Both men brought with them a love of Le Carre’s work to the film and in this roundtable interview they talk about the process of adaptation, the gathering of the cast and the British flavour inherent in the film.
Before the men entered the room the collected journalists were talking of a very brief scene in a landmark of 70s life – The Wimpy Bar…...
- 9/14/2011
- by Jon Lyus
- HeyUGuys.co.uk
Does China have the chops to take on the panda?
The big story
The Us and China are going to war. And Kung Fu Panda struck the first blow. Not content with whispers about cyber attacks, squabbles over currency values and set-tos at environmental summits, the two global powers are widening their conflict to the more violent field of animated film.
China, after decades of using panda gifts as tools of diplomacy, appears to have been caught out by the approach of one of the sex-shy shoot-munchers travelling in the opposite direction. Hollywood's Kung Fu Panda hit the box office hard in China three years ago and now its sequel has arrived with another onslaught on its mind.
Beijing is about to strike back in the form of Legend of a Rabbit, featuring a belligerent bunny with, coincidentally, a ruthless panda for a foe. But that is unlikely to be...
The big story
The Us and China are going to war. And Kung Fu Panda struck the first blow. Not content with whispers about cyber attacks, squabbles over currency values and set-tos at environmental summits, the two global powers are widening their conflict to the more violent field of animated film.
China, after decades of using panda gifts as tools of diplomacy, appears to have been caught out by the approach of one of the sex-shy shoot-munchers travelling in the opposite direction. Hollywood's Kung Fu Panda hit the box office hard in China three years ago and now its sequel has arrived with another onslaught on its mind.
Beijing is about to strike back in the form of Legend of a Rabbit, featuring a belligerent bunny with, coincidentally, a ruthless panda for a foe. But that is unlikely to be...
- 6/2/2011
- The Guardian - Film News
A resurgence in the popularity of the ukulele could rekindle our bizarre affection for the oddball singer-comedian
Britain has apparently gone mad for ukuleles. An extraordinary resurgence in the popularity of the instrument must surely revive memories of that extraordinary figure in British pop history, George Formby. (To be exact, Formby played the banjo-ukulele.) It's easy to assume that Formby was a marginal comedy figure comparable to, say, Peter Glaze on the BBC children's TV show Crackerjack. Actually, Formby was massive, the highest-earning comedian in British cinema from the mid-30s to the mid-40s, and just before the war, the biggest British star in any genre. How did he do it?
He just looked so weird. Something in the posture required to play the ukulele – shoulders hunched, elbows akimbo – probably encouraged a perky grinning manner: it's probably impossible to play the ukukele in any other way. Maybe if Jimi Hendrix had played the ukulele,...
Britain has apparently gone mad for ukuleles. An extraordinary resurgence in the popularity of the instrument must surely revive memories of that extraordinary figure in British pop history, George Formby. (To be exact, Formby played the banjo-ukulele.) It's easy to assume that Formby was a marginal comedy figure comparable to, say, Peter Glaze on the BBC children's TV show Crackerjack. Actually, Formby was massive, the highest-earning comedian in British cinema from the mid-30s to the mid-40s, and just before the war, the biggest British star in any genre. How did he do it?
He just looked so weird. Something in the posture required to play the ukulele – shoulders hunched, elbows akimbo – probably encouraged a perky grinning manner: it's probably impossible to play the ukukele in any other way. Maybe if Jimi Hendrix had played the ukulele,...
- 6/2/2011
- by Peter Bradshaw
- The Guardian - Film News
Virtually all the movies currently made under the tax benefits provided by the Isle of Man are set elsewhere in Britain or as far away as Washington DC, so it's good to see one actually set there. This lively 3D documentary celebrates, as did the 1936 George Formby comedy No Limit, the annual Tourist Trophy motorcycle races that have been run there since 1907, resulting in 231 deaths and untold injuries.
The speeds on such narrow, winding public roads are hair-raising and superbly photographed, the crashes spectacular and the riders far more likable than anyone involved in Formula One. Particularly engaging is the zanily amusing, leathered lunatic Guy Martin, a Lincolnshire lorry repair mechanic by day.
DocumentaryPhilip French
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2011 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds...
The speeds on such narrow, winding public roads are hair-raising and superbly photographed, the crashes spectacular and the riders far more likable than anyone involved in Formula One. Particularly engaging is the zanily amusing, leathered lunatic Guy Martin, a Lincolnshire lorry repair mechanic by day.
DocumentaryPhilip French
guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2011 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds...
- 4/23/2011
- by Philip French
- The Guardian - Film News
Like his fellow Britons, George VI dreaded another war so soon after the slaughter of the trenches. But in 1939 this nervous, sickly, stammering man forced himself to confront the inevitable and became an unlikely symbol of national resistance
In the build-up to the coronation of George VI in May 1937, London's 26,000 busmen went on strike. They wanted shorter hours and better conditions, as well an inquiry into the dangers to their health of the new larger buses, which travelled at a dizzying 30mph instead of just 12mph. The general secretary of their union, future Labour minister Ernest Bevin, conscious of the nation's patriotic mood as the coronation loomed, urged them to think again, but they walked out anyway. With no buses, London's trams were packed to capacity, while the streets were full of illegally parked cars and the railway stations flooded with commuters.
Yet as the big day approached, short-term inconveniences were forgotten.
In the build-up to the coronation of George VI in May 1937, London's 26,000 busmen went on strike. They wanted shorter hours and better conditions, as well an inquiry into the dangers to their health of the new larger buses, which travelled at a dizzying 30mph instead of just 12mph. The general secretary of their union, future Labour minister Ernest Bevin, conscious of the nation's patriotic mood as the coronation loomed, urged them to think again, but they walked out anyway. With no buses, London's trams were packed to capacity, while the streets were full of illegally parked cars and the railway stations flooded with commuters.
Yet as the big day approached, short-term inconveniences were forgotten.
- 1/3/2011
- The Guardian - Film News
Let’s go back to when Britain had its own cinema and see who some of our homegrown stars were then. If we dissolve back to 1960, we find a plethora of movie stars - enough to guarantee full houses in all the West End, and regional theatres, in the country. Here are just some of them: Margaret Rutherford, Joyce Grenfell, John Mills, Leslie Phillips, Joan Sims, Virginia McKenna, Denholm Elliott, Fenella Fielding, Alec Guinness, Leo McKern, Diana Dors, Terry Thomas, Richard Burton, Dirk Bogarde, Peter Sellers, Laurence Olivier, Joan Greenwood, Hermione Baddeley, Moira Lister, Oliver Reed, Dennis Price, Michael Hordern, Robert Shaw, Michael Redgrave, Robert Morley, Laurence Harvey, Paul Scofield, Richard Harris, Tom Courtenay, Leslie-Anne Down, George Formby, Peter Ustinov, Peter Finch, Harry Andrews, Maxine Audley, Nigel Stock, Eric Porter, Noel Coward, Dinsdale Landen, Bernard Cribbins, Patrick Wymark, Shirley-Anne Field, and Moira Redmond…...
- 12/23/2010
- by Jonathan Gems
- Pure Movies
Knockabout clown in the music hall tradition who found enormous success in the cinema
Engulfed by helpless, gurgling mirth, Norman Wisdom would subside to the ground as if suddenly rendered boneless: it needed someone only to look at him to make him fall down. Often, the person looking at him – and sternly, at that – was Jerry Desmonde, doyen of variety straight men, who represented the figure of authority in many of Wisdom's hugely successful film farces of the 1950s and 1960s.
Wisdom, who has died aged 95, was almost the last in a great tradition of knockabout, slapstick clowns, a performer who relied less on words than on an acrobatic physical dexterity to gain his laughs. He was usually derided or ignored by the serious critics, but in his day he was adored by the public, and because of its nature his craft travelled well – he was immensely popular in many other countries,...
Engulfed by helpless, gurgling mirth, Norman Wisdom would subside to the ground as if suddenly rendered boneless: it needed someone only to look at him to make him fall down. Often, the person looking at him – and sternly, at that – was Jerry Desmonde, doyen of variety straight men, who represented the figure of authority in many of Wisdom's hugely successful film farces of the 1950s and 1960s.
Wisdom, who has died aged 95, was almost the last in a great tradition of knockabout, slapstick clowns, a performer who relied less on words than on an acrobatic physical dexterity to gain his laughs. He was usually derided or ignored by the serious critics, but in his day he was adored by the public, and because of its nature his craft travelled well – he was immensely popular in many other countries,...
- 10/5/2010
- The Guardian - Film News
The Smiths guitarist Johnny Marr has reportedly blocked Harry Hill from releasing a medley of the band's tracks. The TV Burp star, who is releasing an album of comedy songs, apparently wanted to include a short selection of Smiths songs sung in the style of George Formby. However, Marr has refused the comedian permission to release the parody, according (more)...
- 10/5/2010
- by By Christian Tobin
- Digital Spy
Producer, director and cinematographer of many well-loved British film classics, including Oliver Twist, Tunes of Glory and The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie
The producer, director, writer and cinematographer Ronald Neame, who has died aged 99, played an important role in British cinema for more than half a century. The critic Matthew Sweet once called him "a living embodiment of cinema, a sort of one-man world heritage site". Neame was assistant director to Alfred Hitchcock on Blackmail (1929), the first British talkie; he was the cinematographer on In Which We Serve (1942), Noël Coward's moving tribute to the Royal Navy during the second world war; he co-produced and co-wrote David Lean's Brief Encounter (1945) and Great Expectations (1946); and he directed Alec Guinness in two of his best roles, in The Horse's Mouth (1958) and Tunes of Glory (1960). As if this wasn't enough, Neame also conquered Hollywoo d with one of the first and most successful disaster movies,...
The producer, director, writer and cinematographer Ronald Neame, who has died aged 99, played an important role in British cinema for more than half a century. The critic Matthew Sweet once called him "a living embodiment of cinema, a sort of one-man world heritage site". Neame was assistant director to Alfred Hitchcock on Blackmail (1929), the first British talkie; he was the cinematographer on In Which We Serve (1942), Noël Coward's moving tribute to the Royal Navy during the second world war; he co-produced and co-wrote David Lean's Brief Encounter (1945) and Great Expectations (1946); and he directed Alec Guinness in two of his best roles, in The Horse's Mouth (1958) and Tunes of Glory (1960). As if this wasn't enough, Neame also conquered Hollywoo d with one of the first and most successful disaster movies,...
- 6/20/2010
- by Ronald Bergan
- The Guardian - Film News
This edition of the podcast looks forward to Sam Taylor-Wood's John Lennon biopic Nowhere Boy with actor Anne-Marie Duff, reviews James Cameron's 3D spectacular Avatar, and looks back over the Golden Globe nominations announced this week.
First up, Anne-Marie Duff tells Jason Solomons about Nowhere Boy, which is out on Boxing Day. The actor, already a critical favourite for her work on TV and stage, shares what it was like to be directed by an artist making her first feature, how she got under the skin of Lennon's wayward but little-known mother, and how she had to learn to play the banjo (and do a George Formby impression) for the film.
Xan Brooks then joins Jason to review the week's key releases: the much-hyped James Cameron's Avatar, the most expensive film ever made; Daniel Day-Lewis and a bevy of beautiful women in Rob Marshall's musical Nine; and Lynn Shelton's Humpday,...
First up, Anne-Marie Duff tells Jason Solomons about Nowhere Boy, which is out on Boxing Day. The actor, already a critical favourite for her work on TV and stage, shares what it was like to be directed by an artist making her first feature, how she got under the skin of Lennon's wayward but little-known mother, and how she had to learn to play the banjo (and do a George Formby impression) for the film.
Xan Brooks then joins Jason to review the week's key releases: the much-hyped James Cameron's Avatar, the most expensive film ever made; Daniel Day-Lewis and a bevy of beautiful women in Rob Marshall's musical Nine; and Lynn Shelton's Humpday,...
- 12/18/2009
- by Jason Solomons, Xan Brooks, Jason Phipps
- The Guardian - Film News
Ex-children's' TV host Johnny Ball was booed offstage during a talk in London about climate change on Tuesday night. The former Think Of A Number presenter gave a speech denying that climate change was man-made at the Nine Lessons And Carols For Godless People event at the Bloomsbury Theatre. Ball disputed considerable scientific research which suggests that burning fossil fuels has lead to a dangerous build-up of CO2 in the atmosphere. The 71-year-old performed a song about John Dalton's atomic theory in the style of George Formby before claiming that CO2 levels were too negligible (more)...
- 12/17/2009
- by By Alex Fletcher
- Digital Spy
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