Firth, Spacey to star in ‘Catalonia’
Hugh Hudson will direct the bigscreen adaptation of George Orwell’s “Catalonia,” with Colin Firth and Kevin Spacey attached to star. Arclight Films is repping the film at the Cannes market.
Hudson (“I Dreamed of Africa,” “Chariots of Fire”) will direct from a script by Bob Ellis.
Orwell’s book revolves around the real-life story of how he and his wife Eileen traveled to Barcelona to fight Stalinism. There, Orwell joined the Anarchist brigade and fought in the Spanish Civil War. Film will highlight the relationship between Orwell and Georges Kopp, the charismatic commander of the brigade.
Al Clark is producing with veteran French producer Alian Sarde and Fernando Meirelles through his Brazilian company O2 Films.
Clark was co-producer on the last film adaptation of an Orwell book, “1984,” toplining John Hurt and Richard Burton.
Sarde’s credits include Roman Polanski’s “The Pianist” and Mike Leigh’s “Vera Drake.”
Hudson is scheduled to begin lensing in the first half of 2010 in England, Spain and then Buenos Aires, Montevideo and Uruguay.
source: variety
Eileen Atkins, Colin Firth, Jude Law, Stephen Rea et al. Set for National’s Harold Pinter Tribute
The work of the Nobel Prize-winning British playwright Harold Pinter, who passed away on Christmas Eve at the age of 78 after a long battle with cancer, will be celebrated with a stellar one-off evening of readings and performance excerpts in the National’s Olivier Theatre on June 7 at 7 pm. Ian Rickson will direct.
Amongst the high-profile actors who will be taking part in Harold Pinter: A Celebration are Eileen Atkins, David Bradley, Kenneth Cranham, Janie Dee, Lindsay Duncan, Colin Firth, Henry Goodman, Sheila Hancock, Douglas Hodge, Jude Law, Gina McKee, Sophie Okonedo, Stephen Rea, Alan Rickman, Michael Sheen, Indira Varma, Samuel West, Lia Williams, and Penelope Wilton, most of whom have numerous Pinter credits to their names already. The evening will also feature students from LAMDA.
A number of Pinter’s plays premiered at the NT: Betrayal, No Man’s Land, Other Places and Mountain Language and his adaptation (with Di Trevis) of Proust’s Remembrance of Things Past. Other productions of the playwright’s work at the National over the years included The Hothouse, The Caretaker, The Birthday Party, and The Homecoming.
Tickets are priced £10 and are available in person or by telephone from the National Theatre box office on 0207 452 3000.
For more information, visit www.whatsonstage.com.
source: theatermania.com
