Part I. Anger, Suez and Archie Rice
“There they are,” George Devine told John Osborne, surveying The Entertainer‘s opening night audience. “All waiting for you…Same old pack of c***s, fashionable assholes. Just more of them than usual.” The Royal Court had arrived: no longer outcasts, they were London’s main attraction.
Look Back in Anger vindicated Devine’s model of a writer’s-based theater. Osborne’s success attracted a host of dramatists to Sloane Square. There’s Shelagh Delaney, whose A Taste of Honey featured a working-class girl pregnant from an interracial dalliance; Harold Pinter’s The Room, a bizarre “comedy of menace”; and John Arden’s Serjeant Musgrave’s Dance, which aimed a Gatling gun at its audience. Devine encouraged them, however bold or experimental. “You always knew he was on the writer’s side,” Osborne said.
Peter O’Toole called the Royal Court actors “an...
“There they are,” George Devine told John Osborne, surveying The Entertainer‘s opening night audience. “All waiting for you…Same old pack of c***s, fashionable assholes. Just more of them than usual.” The Royal Court had arrived: no longer outcasts, they were London’s main attraction.
Look Back in Anger vindicated Devine’s model of a writer’s-based theater. Osborne’s success attracted a host of dramatists to Sloane Square. There’s Shelagh Delaney, whose A Taste of Honey featured a working-class girl pregnant from an interracial dalliance; Harold Pinter’s The Room, a bizarre “comedy of menace”; and John Arden’s Serjeant Musgrave’s Dance, which aimed a Gatling gun at its audience. Devine encouraged them, however bold or experimental. “You always knew he was on the writer’s side,” Osborne said.
Peter O’Toole called the Royal Court actors “an...
- 3/13/2015
- by Christopher Saunders
- SoundOnSight
Two especially noteworthy reviews of Susan L. Mizruchi's new book on Marlon Brando have appeared this weekend, both of them somewhat conflicted. The Financial Times' Antonia Quirke asks, "Can’t we leave him as he was: a beautiful maelstrom of dissembling? And yet this always interesting, addictive book (I didn’t move for two days) does repeatedly demonstrate how brilliantly Brando dreamt himself up." More book reviews: In the New York Times Book Review, Charles Isherwood recommends a "highly readable" collection of letters by Elia Kazan and John Simon argues that Philip Ziegler’s new biography of Laurence Olivier "may well be the best yet—perhaps even definitive." » - David Hudson...
- 7/26/2014
- Fandor: Keyframe
Two especially noteworthy reviews of Susan L. Mizruchi's new book on Marlon Brando have appeared this weekend, both of them somewhat conflicted. The Financial Times' Antonia Quirke asks, "Can’t we leave him as he was: a beautiful maelstrom of dissembling? And yet this always interesting, addictive book (I didn’t move for two days) does repeatedly demonstrate how brilliantly Brando dreamt himself up." More book reviews: In the New York Times Book Review, Charles Isherwood recommends a "highly readable" collection of letters by Elia Kazan and John Simon argues that Philip Ziegler’s new biography of Laurence Olivier "may well be the best yet—perhaps even definitive." » - David Hudson...
- 7/26/2014
- Keyframe
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
Philip Ziegler's biography of Laurence Olivier captures the man in his contradictory essence
Laurence Olivier was the greatest British actor of his time, primus inter pares of the trio who dominated our theatre from the early 1930s to the 1980s. His superiority to his chief rivals, Ralph Richardson and John Gielgud, resides in the role he played in the creation of the National Theatre and in the way he came to embody for the public at large a sense of national greatness. His most magnificent and emblematic performances were as Henry V and as Archie Rice in John Osborne's The Entertainer. The former was the warrior king in the patriotic second world war movie that captured the Churchillian spirit of Britain at her finest hour. The latter was the second-rate music hall comedian, full of imperial bluster and bad faith, who symbolised in the aftermath of the Suez debacle a nation that had,...
Laurence Olivier was the greatest British actor of his time, primus inter pares of the trio who dominated our theatre from the early 1930s to the 1980s. His superiority to his chief rivals, Ralph Richardson and John Gielgud, resides in the role he played in the creation of the National Theatre and in the way he came to embody for the public at large a sense of national greatness. His most magnificent and emblematic performances were as Henry V and as Archie Rice in John Osborne's The Entertainer. The former was the warrior king in the patriotic second world war movie that captured the Churchillian spirit of Britain at her finest hour. The latter was the second-rate music hall comedian, full of imperial bluster and bad faith, who symbolised in the aftermath of the Suez debacle a nation that had,...
- 9/22/2013
- by Philip French
- The Guardian - Film News
London, August 12: A new biography on Oscar-winning actor Sir Laurence Olivier has revealed that he hated Marilyn Monroe and didn't bother being taught acting by Burt Lancaster and Kirk Douglas.
According to the extracts seen by The Sunday Times, Oliver thought of Joan Fontaine, his co-star in Rebecca, as 'loathsome' and Merle Oberon as a 'silly little amateur', the Independent reported.
Historian Philip Ziegler listened to taped interviews with Olivier before penning the book which has him talking condescendingly about some of old Hollywood's brightest stars.
The biography reveals the 'Hamlet' actor's deep.
According to the extracts seen by The Sunday Times, Oliver thought of Joan Fontaine, his co-star in Rebecca, as 'loathsome' and Merle Oberon as a 'silly little amateur', the Independent reported.
Historian Philip Ziegler listened to taped interviews with Olivier before penning the book which has him talking condescendingly about some of old Hollywood's brightest stars.
The biography reveals the 'Hamlet' actor's deep.
- 8/12/2013
- by Anita Agarwal
- RealBollywood.com
As The King’s Speech arrives in cinemas, we met with director Tom Hooper and star Colin Firth to chat about the film…
Anticipation for The King's Speech has been steadily building since its premiere back in September at the Toronto International Film Festival. There, it won the coveted Audience Award and later in the year it swept the British Independent Film Awards, and now, at the start of the new year, it is tipped for Golden Globe, Oscar and BAFTA success.
We're not surprised, what with the film filling many awards fodder prerequisites, being a period-set character drama that brings together themes of monarchy, disability and even a hint of World War 2 under the yoke of a brilliant cast, as Colin Firth's Prince Albert (and soon-to-be King George VI) consults unconventional speech therapist Lionel Logue (Geoffrey Rush) for help with his stammer.
Thankfully, the film is also terrific,...
Anticipation for The King's Speech has been steadily building since its premiere back in September at the Toronto International Film Festival. There, it won the coveted Audience Award and later in the year it swept the British Independent Film Awards, and now, at the start of the new year, it is tipped for Golden Globe, Oscar and BAFTA success.
We're not surprised, what with the film filling many awards fodder prerequisites, being a period-set character drama that brings together themes of monarchy, disability and even a hint of World War 2 under the yoke of a brilliant cast, as Colin Firth's Prince Albert (and soon-to-be King George VI) consults unconventional speech therapist Lionel Logue (Geoffrey Rush) for help with his stammer.
Thankfully, the film is also terrific,...
- 1/7/2011
- Den of Geek
She was known for much of her life as the queen mother. And according to her official biography, she detested it."Horrible name," she wrote in a 1953 letter to her daughter, Queen Elizabeth II.Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother, died in 2002 at the advanced age of 101. The official account of her life by royal biographer William Shawcross runs past 1,000 pages and divulges the queen mother's opinions on topics ranging from feminism to homeopathy.In the preface of the book, which will be released Friday, Shawcross said he quoted extensively from the queen mother's private correspondence, "because few of them had been seen before and because I found them remarkable . from childhood to old age she wrote with clarity and verve. Her letters illuminate sides of her character which were not always clear to people beyond her immediate family."According to publishers MacMillan, it is the first...
- 9/16/2009
- Filmicafe
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