Journalism
Below is a small sample of features I’ve written for print and online press:
Andrea Arnold (Red Road), writer-director of Fish Tank (Curzon Magazine)
For Andrea Arnold filmmaking is all about instinct. Like her decision to cast Michael Fassbender, the star of Hunger, in her new film Fish Tank. “I cast Michael after seeing him in a clip of Irvine Welsh’s Wedding Belles,” says Arnold, who at the time was unaware of the actor’s celebrated turn in Steve McQueen’s film. “I made a decision on the strength of that clip, on instinct. We didn’t even get to meet because he was in South Africa filming, but he felt absolutely right.” Arnold’s instincts proved to be spot on. Hardly surprising really given the successful track record she’s notched up since making her first short film eleven years ago.
Leading British producer Stephen Woolley has spent a lifetime steeped in movies, from tearing cinema tickets in 1970s London to producing a string of award-winning box-office hits including The Crying Game and How to Lose Friends and Alienate People.
But when he’s not busy working with stars such as Tom Cruise, Julia Roberts, and Simon Pegg, there’s nothing Stephen loves more than relaxing at home in Dyrham, his haven of peace and tranquility for the past thirteen years.
Mark Strong (Body of Lies, RocknRolla, Nottingham) on The Young Victoria (The List)
‘You cannot play an “evil” character without finding the humanity in them. That’s what I find very interesting. You’re not asking for sympathy, but you’re not just painting a one-dimensional character,’ says Mark Strong. Having played his fair share of menacing men, he speaks from experience. Who can forget his performance as gangster Harry Starks in the small-screen version of Jake Arnott’s The Long Firm? Or his penchant for ripping out fingernails as the Iranian agent Mussawi in Syriana? Or even his murderous pursuit of the throne as ruthless royal Septimus in Stardust?
Julian Fellowes, screenwriter of The Young Victoria (Agenda)
Screenwriter, novelist, actor, director, and producer. Is there anything Julian Fellowes can’t do? The answer is navigate, or so he tells me as we sit in a huge multiplex cinema in Milton Keynes. I’m here thanks to an invitation to a sneak preview of his latest film The Young Victoria, a wonderfully lavish drama about the turbulent early years of Queen Victoria’s reign and her romance with Prince Albert. Julian’s here thanks to a satnav.
Steve ‘Lips’ Kudlow and Robb Reiner, stars of Anvil! (Little White Lies)
In their teens, Toronto school friends Steve ‘Lips’ Kudlow and Robb Reiner made a pact to rock together forever. The result was heavy metal band Anvil. Over the years they influenced a musical generation including Metallica, Slayer, and Anthrax. But instead of selling millions of albums like those bands, Anvil’s career took a nosedive into obscurity. Now in their fifties, the Canadian rockers are back with their thirteenth album and their first film, Anvil! The Story of Anvil, which follows frontman Kudlow and drummer Reiner as they juggle family life, living the musical dream, and the effects of ageing.
Coventry-based author and screenwriter Geoff Thompson is a man with big ambitions, one of which is to see the Midlands right at the heart of the UK’s filmmaking map. And he’s hoping his debut feature film Clubbed, shot in Birmingham and co-funded by Screen West Midlands, will help make that happen.
Iain Softley, director of Inkheart (BBC Cambridgeshire)
Iain Softley is one versatile director. He made his big-screen debut with the Beatles biopic Backbeat. Then came teen computer drama Hackers with Angelina Jolie, and Henry James adaptation The Wings Of The Dove starring Helena Bonham Carter. Next up was sci-fi movie K-PAX with Kevin Spacey, followed by supernatural thriller The Skeleton Key featuring Kate Hudson in a rare non-rom-com outing.
Stephan Elliott, director of Easy Virtue (BBC Cambridgeshire)
“Doing a film like this never appealed to me,” says Australian writer-director Stephan Elliott about his new movie Easy Virtue. “I don’t like drawing-room dramas, so initially I wondered why the producers had come to me in the first place! Then I thought, ‘How can we play with this a bit and keep it alive? How can I keep myself entertained?’ It was like making a big mess on a period carpet.”
Terence Davies, director, Of Time And The City (Kamera)
The city of Terence Davies’ youth, Liverpool, is at the heart of much of the sixty-two-year-old director’s work, from his powerful Trilogy through his debut feature Distant Voices, Still Lives to the Palme d’Or-nominated The Long Day Closes. After adaptations of John Kennedy Toole’s The Neon Bible and Edith Wharton’s The House Of Mirth, followed by eight years away from the director’s chair, this month sees Davies return to the spotlight and his hometown with Of Time And The City, a visual ode to post-World-War-Two Liverpool which premiered at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival to rave reviews.
Julian Jarrold, director of Brideshead Revisited (BBC Cambridgeshire)
Taking a well-loved novel from a white page to the silver screen is never easy. First, there are the legions of loyal fans never backward in coming forward with their opinions on the celluloid version of their favourite tome. And what if you’re not the first to give that prized paperback a movie makeover? Then it’s not just the literature lovers you have to contend with, but also fans of the first (or fiftieth, depending just how popular that book is) film version.
Rainn Wilson, star of The Office and The Rocker (Agenda)
Red carpet premieres, awards ceremonies, and glitzy parties: all part and parcel of an actor’s glamorous existence, right? Well, not always. Sometimes being an actor means being strapped to the roof of a speeding van in the middle of the night or being hosed down repeatedly with six kinds of synthetic sweat, as Rainn Wilson found out on the set of his latest film The Rocker, a seriously funny comedy about a failed drummer who gets a second chance at the big time… in his nephew’s teen band.
Rupert Wyatt, director and screenwriter of The Escapist (Film Ireland)
After developing features for Miramax in New York, working in British television, and writing and directing several successful short films, Rupert Wyatt makes his feature debut with The Escapist, a prison escape drama about a life-prisoner who decides to break out of prison when he discovers his daughter is critically ill.
Brian Cox, star of The Escapist (The List)
As Brian Cox welcomes me into the interview room at London’s Gibson Guitar Studio, he points out a picture of Syd Barrett, ‘a son of Cambridge’, on the wall. It’s been just a few months since the Dundee-born actor was treading the boards on Broadway to the sounds of Pink Floyd, playing a communist Cambridge don in Tom Stoppard’s Rock ‘n’ Roll.
Jaume Balaguero, director of [REC] (The List)
Having studied media at university in Barcelona, Balagueró worked in radio before cutting his filmmaking teeth on several shorts. His feature film debut came in 1999 with an adaptation of British horror writer Ramsey Campbell’s The Nameless, and was followed, three years later, by box-office success Darkness.
