Just last week I told you that Alicia Vikander has replaced Michelle Williams in FIREBRAND historical movie in which Jude Law plays Henry VIII and
Erin Doherty starred in Chloe and Crown
Vikander will play his last wife Catherine Parr, and now from Daily Mail comes news that Chloe's Erin Doherty has been cast too as Protestant martyr Anne Askew, who was tortured at the Tower of London then burnt at the stake. Among other storylines, the film will also cover Henry's adviser Stephen Gardiner, the Bishop of Winchester (Simon Russell Beale), and his ruthless investigation to uncover high profile heretics, as part of a campaign to destroy Parr. Gardiner ordered Askew to be taken to the Tower, hoping she would betray the queen. But Askew refused to give up names, despite enduring torture so barbaric even the Tower's constable begged Henry to stop.
A PLAGUE TALE GAME
TO BECOME A TV SERIES
A Plague Tale is getting an adaptation
In other epic genre news, there are rumours coming from Allocine, that the French producers will turn Bordeaux based game developer Asobo's A PLAGUE TALE game into a television series directed by Mathieu Turi. Taking place in 14th century France, A PLAGUE TALE follows the story of Amicia de Rune and her brother, Hugo, who has been ill since birth. The pair flee their home from the French Inquisition and must navigate their way to safety while avoiding soldiers as well as rats that are carrying the black plague. The world wide popular video game has been sold in over one million copies since its release back in year 2019.
Channel 4 has sent us photos from their new mini series THE BIRTH OF DANIEL F. HARRIS with Lewis Gribben as Danny, an 18- year-old whose mother was killed in a car accident when he was a baby. Danny's father Steve (Rory Keenan) bought a house in the middle of
No airing date has yet been announced by Channel 4
nowhere after his wife died and then locked Danny in, telling him the world outside was full of monsters waiting to take him away, just like they took his mum! For 18 years they lived a happy existence together, listening to records
Rory Keenan plays Dannys father in the series
and watching old movies with no sad endings. And that’s how Danny grew up. It was all he knew, all he needed - him and his dad against the world. But when Danny turns 18, everything he’s ever known explodes in an instant!
NORTHERN COMFORT COMEDY
STARRING TIMOTHY SPALL
I also have the first photo from Icelandic English language comedy movie NORTHERN COMFORT starring Lydia Leonard, Timothy Spall, Sverrir Gudnason, Ella Rumpf, Simon Manyonda and Rob Delaney. The film
The film is currently shooting in Iceland, UK and France
is a comedy in which a motley group of people with a chronic fear of flying are stranded in the wintry north. The theme of managing fear and vulnerability lies at the core of the story.
Based on a Sarah Perry's book, Apple TV's six part mini series ESSEX SERPENT will arrive May 13th. The story will see Claire Danes playing London widow Cora Seaborne as she moves to Essex to investigate reports of a mythical serpent. She forms an unlikely bond with the hot village vicar Will Ransome (Tom Hiddleston), but when tragedy strikes, locals accuse her of attracting the creature! The cast of the mini series also includes Frank Dillane, Hayley Squires, Clémence Poésy, Jamael Westman, Dixie Egerickx and Michael Jibson.
NEWLY WIDOWED CORA
(Claire Danes) arrives at the small village of
Aldwinter in Essex, ready for a fresh start after her husband's death
released her from an abusive marriage. She soon becomes intrigued by a local superstition about a mythical
creature known as the Essex Serpent that has allegedly returned to the
area.
Meanwhile, trusted community leader Will Ransom (Tom Hiddleston) has to
deal with the mysterious rumours as they begin to spread.
ANATOMY OF A SCANDAL
TV SERIES TRAILER IS HERE
Anatomy of a Scandal arrives this April
Netflix has released a trailer for their new mini TV series ANATOMY OF A SCANDAL which will stream from April 15th!
A psychological thriller and gripping courtroom drama, the series infiltrates Britain's elite through personal and political scandal, where the truth lies between justice and privilege. James (Rupert Friend) and Sophie (Sienna Miller) Whitehouse live in a blissful and rarified world. A Minister in Parliament, a loving family at home, James' trajectory appears without limits. Until a scandalous secret suddenly comes to light. Barrister Kate Woodcroft (Michelle Dockery) has a trajectory of her own, and her prosecution threatens to tear into Westminster, the Whitehouse marriage, and her own personal esteem. Check out the trailer below:
With work already on the way, BBC One has announced new four part series BEST INTERESTS a story of a family driven apart by having to make choices no parent would ever want to make. Sharon Horgan and Michael Sheen are a couple whose daughter Marnie (Niamh Moriarty) has a life-
Michael Sheen and Sharon Horgan will play the parents
threatening condition. The doctors believe it is in her best interests to be allowed to die, but her loving family disagree. And so begins a fight that will take them through every stage of a legal process, as they struggle to contemplate this huge decision. Who decides? And in whose best interests will it be?
MATT BOMER TO JOIN
BRADLEY COOPER IN MAESTRO?
Oh, how will we survive such a hunkfest? According to reports, Matt Bomer is to join Bradley Cooper in MAESTRO, a Leonard Bernstein biopic at Netflix. To be also directed by Cooper, the film will span over 30 years in telling the beautifully complex story of the marriage between
Bradley Cooper is starring, writing and directing
Bernstein and his wife, Felicia Montealegre (Carey Mulligan)! He had his conducting debut at the New York Philharmonic at 25 when the conductor took ill; without even rehearsing, Bernstein did so well his star was launched the next day when his feat made the front page of The New York Times. Bomer will play one of his gay lovers that he had outside the marriage.
STRANGE NEW WORLDS ADS
PAUL WESLEY AS CAPTAIN KIRK
Although he is to guest star only in season 2, Paramount + has unveiled a photo of Paul Wesley as young Captain Kirk in STAR TREK:
Young captain Kirk is to appear in the second season
STRANGE NEW WORLDS series which starts May 5 with Anson Mount as Christopher Pike, who captained the U.S.S. Enterprise before Kirk took
The first season will start on Paramount Plus this May
over. Rebecca Romijn stars as Number One and Ethan Peck as Science Officer Spock! It is not known how will Kirk be incorporated into the story.
Earlier last Autumn I informed you that an eight part series Courage on Demand on Varian Fry, who organised a rescue network in Nazi controlled France, is in works and now this Netflix mini series has been renamed into
Cory Michael Smith will take the lead role
TRANS ATLANTIC with young Cory Michael Smith taking the lead role. Gillian Jacobs, Corey Stoll, Grégory Montel, Lucas Englander, Ralph Amoussou, Deleila Piasko and Amit Rahhav round out the international cast of the series set in 1940-1941 Marseille, and based on the true story of Varian Fry, Mary Jayne Gold and the Emergency Rescue Committee. Risking their lives to help more than 2000 refugees escape occupied France, including many artists on the Nazis’ most-wanted list, an international gang of young superheroes and their famous charges occupy a villa at the edge of the city, where the threat of mortal danger gives way to unexpected collaborations and intense love affairs.
WHO WILL BE WHO?
Cory Michael Smith plays a character inspired by Varian Fry. He’s a
Harvard educated American journalist who, foreseeing the horrific events
of the Holocaust to come volunteers for a job no one wanted: Finding
and saving the artists and intellectuals trapped in Europe. Gillian
Jacobs plays a
Corey Stoll and Gillian Jacobs will also star in the series
character inspired by Mary Jayne Gold. An American
heiress, she throws herself, and her trust fund, into Fry’s refugee
rescue operation, excited to dedicate her considerable resources and
energy to a worthy cause.
Corey Stoll plays Patterson, the American Consul in Marseille who sees
the refugees as an existential threat to American values.
Here's a hilarious one: funny British comedian Catherine Tate will play a number of different characters in HARD CELL prison comedy show which streams on Netflix from April 12th! The series, which is both written and created by Tate, will follow the inmates, staff and visitors of a fictional female prison, HMP Woldsley, with her playing multiple characters! Set over a six week period, HARD CELL follows the inmates as they rehearse a musical directed by ex-EastEnders star Cheryl Fergison. Described as funny yet surprisingly moving, the series sees Tate play Laura, HMP Woldsley’s governor who's "a bleeding heart liberal in kitten heels"; Ros, a popular and bouncy inmate; and Ange, an innocent and timid first-timer. She also plays Big Viv, a terrifying inmate who is feared by everyone but develops a passion for theatre; Marco, a guard from Essex who's more committed to his appearance than his job; and Anne Marie, Ros' mother and a mean ex-con who visits her when she's run out of money. Before Tate's gags in this British women's correctional facility, you will also be able to watch her in cinemas as her NAN: THE MOVIE is out this weekend as a spin off of her show in which she plays a cranky and vulgar old nan with a nasty tongue and an even nastier mood. I shall ad the trailer here as soon as we get it.
To the delight of our readers who always ask me for more international projects, today we are going back again to good old Matushka Rossiya: this one started shooting back in 2019, but then we had the covid outbreak and I'm not sure where is this project currently at, whether it is still in post production or not, but I do have first photos from Russian historical movie ILIYA MUROMETS (Илия Муромец) from director Karen Oganesyan with the ensemble that includes Yegor Pazenko, Andrey Merzlikin, Olga Medynich, Danila Yakushev, Anton Pampushny, Vladislav Demin and other actors!
WHAT'S THE STORY?
Russia, XI century. The state is in danger. From the south, its borders
are threatened by hordes of Polovtsy, wild steppe pagans, and from the
inside, an internal war is sharpening, which Prince Vladimir Monomakh
is trying to stop with all his might. It is in times like these that
legends are born. The legend of ILIYA MUROMETS lives to this day, but, like
any legend, a living person is hiding behind it. A peasant son who could
not walk until the age of thirty-three, but became a great warrior.
This is a mighty warrior who faithfully served Prince Monomakh and won
the glory of a hero in the war against the Polovtsy and in the
unification of Russian lands. A hero who, after so many feats, left
military affairs and devoted the rest of his life to serving God.
BEHIND THE PRODUCTION
The idea of the film belongs to Yegor Pazenko, who also plays the title role and acts as the general producer. For several months, Yegor, together with the historian Alexander Golovkov, worked on the future script, and later Karen Oganesyan also joined them. The story of legendary ILIYA MUROMETS has come down to our days in the format of epic poems, fairy tales, comics, and has become for everyone a kind of a comic story, divorced from reality. Therefore the creators of this picture had a very important task: to tell people about the real ILIYA MUROMETS, a real person who lived in the times of Ancient Russia. The budget of the film is 900 million rubles (about $7 million), which is not surprising - this is an incredibly large-scale and ambitious project, which involves famous actors, an impressive number of extras, work has also been done to restore life in Russia in the 11th century, costumes, armor, and weapons have been created. The film uses computer graphics, there are spectacular, meticulously staged fight scenes in order to recreate significant battles of ancient Russia from the time of price Monomakh.
Sad news, people, instead of Michelle Williams who was supposed to play the queen, FIREBRAND historical movie with Jude Law as Henry VIII has added Alicia Vikander as his last queen Catherine Parr, who was the only one to avoid banishment or death.
By the time young Catherine Parr married the deteriorating, increasingly despotic King Henry VIII, she had no assurances of a happy marriage; in fact, she had no assurances of surviving this marriage at all. Of her predecessors, two were thrown out, one died in childbirth and two were beheaded. While Catherine tried to keep her head about her to navigate the politics of her position, she brought a secret agenda. She was Protestant, believed it her duty to marry Henry, for it would be the only position in which she could convert him, and the kingdom, from his pro-Catholic position. That faith was tested when the church resisted granting his divorce from his first wife so he could marry Anne Boleyn, who would later be beheaded. With arrests, torture, and executions of Protestants on the rise, Catherine invited a dangerous game that would leave
Jude Law will play king Henry VIII in his later years
one of them dead before long. The thriller is told through Catherine’s singular point-of-view of the psychological horror of living with a monster, and the remarkable will to not only survive, but thrive. Karim Ainouz is directing.
Earlier this winter I informed you that Epix has greenlit the second season of their DOMINA epic TV series and now we have a confirmation that it will start shooting this spring in Rome and will, beside Epix, also again air on Sky in Europe next year. The series that sees Kasia Smutniak playing Livia Drusilla, Caesar's (Matthew McNulty) wife, chronicles the struggle for control of the Roman Empire, and of Rome’s Imperial Family from a rare female perspective. In its first season, Livia Drusilla, the golden girl of the prominent Claudii family returned to Rome after ten years in exile, determined to regain everything that was stolen
The first season had great ratings both for Epix and Sky
from her. Now, atop a fractious empire, and a dysfunctional dynasty, she must fight to preserve her marriage to Gaius and find a way to seat one of her sons
Kasia Smutniak will again lead the series as Livia Drusilla
on the throne as new and old rivals jockey for position in a world where it’s impossible to know who to trust. The first season was the most watched in 2021 among the new shows at Epix. Hopefully we will have new casting addition announcements soon.
MIDNIGHT AT THE PERA PALACE
NOW STREAMING ON NETFLIX
I kept forgetting to inform you about this one and now it is already streaming over at Netflix. MIDNIGHT AT THE PERA PALACE is a new eight episode historical comedy adventure series based on a Charles King
The Midnight at the Pera Palace is already streaming at Netflix
novel, focusing on the rise of modern-day Turkey! Esra (Hazal Kaya) is a journalist looking for her next big story. She sets off to visit the Pera Palace, an esteemed hotel in Istanbul known for both its intriguing history and its
Hazal Kaya takes the female lead in the series
mysterious supernatural happenings. One fateful night, Esra is suddenly sent back to the past, finding herself in 1919. There, she meets all sorts of key figures from the past, including Mr. Halit (Selahattin Pasali), who isn’t just
The series airs in eight hourlong episodes
the key to Esra returning to the present but is also the key to ensuring the election of Turkey’s first president, Mustafa Kemal, comes to pass.
How will Esra keep the past the same to prevent the future from changing?
New STAR TREK series STRANGE NEW WORLDS has got a launch date of May 5th over at Paramount +
and the first ultra spectacular teaser as well and that is just one of our today's sf delights! It is interesting that the series has already
been renewed for a second season. It will follow episodic adventures of
the Enterprise’s original crew long before James T. Kirk was captain. Anson Mount, Rebecca Romjin, and Ethan Peck will be returning as Captain Pike, Number One, and Spock Celia Rose Gooding will play Uhura, Babs Olasanmokun will play Dr. M’Benga, and Jess Bush will play Christine Chapel; new characters on the bridge include Christina Chong as La'an Noonien-Singh, Melissa
Anson Mount takes the lead role of captain Pike
Navia as Erica Ortegas, and Bruce Horak as Hemmer. With other series in the franchise, Discovery and Picard proving
a disappointment with the fans,
New series will be episodic in nature
the audience is having high hopes for
this one which will have episodic stories rather than having a seasonal
plot. That is something that we haven't seen in 17 years ever since Enterprise finished.
OBI WAN KENOBI SERIES
GETS A BOMBASTIC TRAILER
Obi Wan Kenobi launches May 25th
Disney Plus has announced the air date for their new Star Wars series OBI WAN KENOBI with first rather bombastic trailer: Ewan McGregor starring
space saga will arrive May 25th and the story will begin 10 years after
the dramatic events of Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith where Obi Wan
Kenobi faced his greatest defeat — the downfall and corruption of his
best friend and Jedi apprentice, Anakin Skywalker, who turned to the
dark side as evil Sith Lord Darth Vader! Hayden Christiansen will be back as Darth, with Joel Edgerton, Simone Kessell, Indira Varma and Kumail Nanjiani in the cast as well. There are rumours that Rupert Friendwill play Grand Inquisitor in the new series. Check out the trailer below and tell us what you think, will you give this one a go even if you are not a fan of science fiction and Star Wars franchise?
