Burbank, Calif. (September 23, 2013)—Walt Disney Pictures announced today that principal photography has begun at Pinewood Studios in London, on Cinderella, Disney’s first-ever live action feature inspired by the classic fairy tale.
Directed by Academy Award®-nominee Kenneth Branagh (Jack Ryan, Thor), the film stars Lily James (Downton Abbey, Wrath of the Titans) in the title role, Richard Madden (Game of Thrones, Birdsong) as the Prince, Oscar®-winner Cate Blanchett (The Aviator) as the infamous stepmother Lady Tremaine, and Academy Award-nominee Helena Bonham Carter (The King’s Speech, Alice in Wonderland) as the Fairy Godmother. Holliday Grainger (Great Expectations, Anna Karenina) and Sophie McShera (Downton Abbey, Waterloo Road) play Ella’s stepsisters Anastasia and Drisella, respectively. Stellan Skarsgård (The Avengers, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo) and Nonso Anozie (Game of Thrones, The Grey) play the Arch Grand Duke and the Prince’s loyal friend, the Captain. Tony® Award-winner Derek Jacobi portrays the King.
Cinderella is produced by Simon Kinberg (X-Men: First Class, Elysium), Allison Shearmur (The Hunger Games: Catching Fire), David Barron (Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Jack Ryan), from a screenplay by Chris Weitz (About a Boy, The Golden Compass).
The filmmaking team includes three-time Academy Award-winning production designer Dante Ferretti (The Aviator, Hugo, Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street), three-time Oscar-winning costume designer Sandy Powell (The Aviator, The Young Victoria, Shakespeare in Love), director of photography Haris Zambarloukos (Sleuth, Thor) and Academy Award-winning editor Martin Walsh (Chicago, Clash of the Titans).
The timeless story of Cinderella dates back to 1697 when first created by Charles Perrault, although it truly came to life for millions all over the world in 1950 with Walt Disney’s celebrated animated feature.
Director Kenneth Branagh says: “It is impossible to think of Cinderella without thinking of Disney and the timeless images we’ve all grown up watching. And those classic moments are irresistible to a filmmaker. With Lily James we have found our perfect Cinderella. She combines knockout beauty with intelligence, wit, fun and physical grace. Her Prince is being played by Richard Madden, a young actor with incredible power and charisma. He is funny, smart and sexy and a great match for Cinderella.”
The story of Cinderella follows the fortunes of young Ella whose merchant father remarries following the tragic death of her mother. Keen to support her loving father, Ella welcomes her new stepmother Lady Tremaine and her daughters Anastasia and Drisella into the family home. But, when Ella’s father suddenly and unexpectedly passes away, she finds herself at the mercy of a jealous and cruel new family. Finally relegated to nothing more than a servant girl covered in ashes, and spitefully renamed Cinderella, Ella could easily begin to lose hope. Yet, despite the cruelty inflicted upon her, Ella is determined to honor her mother’s dying words and to “have courage and be kind.” She will not give in to despair nor despise those who abuse her. And then there is the dashing stranger she meets in the woods. Unaware that he is really a prince, not merely an employee at the Palace, Ella finally feels she has met a kindred soul. It appears as if her fortunes may be about to change when the Palace sends out an open invitation for all maidens to attend a ball, raising Ella’s hopes of once again encountering the charming “Kit.” Alas, her stepmother forbids her to attend and callously rips apart her dress. But, as in all good fairy tales, help is at hand as a kindly beggar woman steps forward and, armed with a pumpkin and a few mice, changes Cinderella’s life forever.
Production on Cinderella will take place at Pinewood Studios and locations throughout England.
Cinderella will be released through Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures on March 13, 2015.
A few months before her birthday, Isabel asked me if I watched Doctor Who. “Oh, yeah,” I said. “Do you?” She hadn’t, but all her friends were raving about Matt Smith. “Tell you what,” I said. “I’ll get you the DVD set of Doctor Who.”
But I made a mistake. I only got her the 11th Doctor’s series. I figured that if she liked Matt, I would backtrack and get her the Chris Eccleston and David Tennant series.
But my brother thought it would be best to start at the beginning – plus I think he was curious about the whole Whovian phenomenon – so, using Netflix, Isabel and he have been binging on the Time Lord, starting with the 9th Doctor.
They’re both hooked.
And Isabel had a dream.
This – to cop a phrase from Law & Order – is her story.
•••••
You think you have had the best dreams about the Doctor and his TARDIS? You might want to think twice.
It started like this. I got on a bus to Hogwarts. I knew something was wrong because you take the train to Hogwarts, not a bus. I had just put my luggage away when I looked out the window of the bus and saw the Doctor standing there watching me. Before I could do or say anything the bus took off and then just as suddenly stopped. I got off the bus.
We were at Hogwarts, and…
…it was in the middle of town.
Again I knew something was wrong. And no way was I going to go into Hogwarts if it was so public.
Then I saw the Doctor walking right towards me, but something was wrong again, because right in front of my eyes he suddenly split into the 9th, 10th, and 11th Doctors!
“This is crazy!” I thought to myself, and started running.
And ran smack into two metal things.
I fell down and looked up.
I was staring at a Cyberman and a Dalek.
“Exterminate!” said the Dalek.
“Delete!” said the Cyberman.
Suddenly I had a sword in my hand.
I swung, striking the Dalek in its eye. I swung again, and exposed the Cyberman’s emotion-blocking chip. I reached in and pulled it out. Both the Dalek and Cyberman exploded into tiny bits of metal that rained down upon me.
I stood up, searching for somewhere to hide.
The TARDIS!
I ran to it, but I couldn’t open the door.
I saw the three Doctors coming towards me. I knew that I had to get away from them. I knew they couldn’t all be together at one time. That they were not my friends.
I ran into a darkened theater. I looked back. The three Doctors were still on my tail.
I kept running until I couldn’t run anymore. I collapsed. The three Doctors were almost upon me. I had lost my sword.
Then all of a sudden the three Doctors merged into one, and it was the 10th Doctor. He picked me up, brought me into the TARDIS, laid me down on a bed, and gave me a kiss on the forehead.
And I knew that I was safe.
• • • • •
Isabel Sofia Newell is a vivacious 13 year-old who I have known since she was born. A young woman of many talents, she is an accomplished blue-ribbon equestrienne on the show circuit, a cellist with PhilOrchKids – the Philadelphia Orchestra’s young musician program – and the Symphony in C Orchestra intensive summer camp based at the Gordon Theater at the Rutgers-Camden Center for the Arts in Camden, New Jersey. She is also a gifted singer, who has wowed audiences with her performance as everybody’s red-haired orphan, ANNIE, in junior summer stock.
Isabel is also a voracious reader, a fan of, among other things, Bone by Jeff Smith, the Archie family of comics, Percy Jackson, and, of course, Harry Potter.
By the time you read this, I’ll be winging my way out of Atlanta and back home; but as I write, I am still in the thick of the exciting events of Dragon Con! I’ve had some great fun this weekend, and it’s not even over yet!
So, what the heck have I done this weekend? Seriously, guys, what did I do? It’s all kind of a blur. A really fun blur, mind you! But…let me think…
Oh yes! I interviewed Michael Rooker, Maurice LaMarche, Raphael Sbarge, Charlie Schlatter, and Jim Butcher, and checked in with John DiMaggio for more news on his awesome voice actor documentary (which I now have!) so look for those interviews and a documentary review coming your way soon!
I also had some experiences you can only have at Dragon Con—like looking over a food table with Richard Hatch and then being asked if I wanted to be part of a documentary he’s doing about geek and nerd culture. To which I naturally said, “Sure, why not,” and went and got interviewed.
I then got to chat a bit with some of the other cool guests at the con. I asked James Cosmo (Game of Thrones) how they constructed the Wall for filming, and he told me that although some of it was CGI, they actually built a 400 to 500-foot wall in Northern Ireland with a working elevator—and then Kit Harrington (Jon Snow) got stuck in it halfway up.
I learned that Natalia Tena (Harry Potter, Game of Thrones) has known how to play the accordion for five years, that she picked it up “because I already knew piano and I just wanted to learn” – and that she’s in a band with the coolest name ever, “Molotov Jukebox.” How neat is that?
Seth Gabel shared that his character, the Count, was supposed to have a bigger story arc in Arrow, but Seth could only be on set for one day, so they couldn’t use the whole story. BUT he thinks he’ll be back, so maybe we’ll see that character arc yet…
Jamie Murray was delightful, and agreed that her character on Dexter was one that people loved to hate. She also shared that filming the crazy fire scene was “a bit dodgy,” but that she really loved that scene.
Kandyse McClure of Battlestar Galactica is very down-to-earth, and we had a great chat about all the cool things she’s learning to do during home renovations – like sand and stain furniture and weld things. Go, Kandyse!
Genelle Williams of Warehouse 13 told me she’s on a new show called Bitten that’s airing soon (but not picked up yet in the US), with Laura Vandervoort of Smallville, in which Laura plays the only female werewolf in a pack, and Genelle plays a werewolf’s girlfriend. Genelle reports that the show is really fun and that Laura’s werewolf is awesome because she’s a badass who hunts with the pack and doesn’t show vulnerability.
And from the Once Upon a Time panel, we learned from Jane Espenson that we will be seeing Ariel, Eric, and Ursula in the new season, and that Ariel may be somewhere other than Storybrooke (Neverland, perhaps?). So that’ll be fun to see.
That’s all the Dragon Con news for now, but stay tuned for all the great Dragon Con interviews, and until next time, Servo Lectio!
Psych is a warm and engaging and frequently hilarious show, and having spoken to the cast and crew at SDCC, I can attest that they are just as much of a blast to talk to as the show is to watch. I got to sit down with James Roday, Dulé Hill, Cary Elwes, Timothy Omundson, Maggie Lawson, Kirsten Nelson, Corbin Bernsen, Steve Franks, Chris Henze, and Kelly Kulchak and dish about the show. Here’s what I learned.
The Psych cast sings around the set a lot, and loved doing Psych: The Musical (which will air in December), and actually singing for the cameras.
Kirsten Nelson: “It was exciting to do! It was a whole lot of fun to go into a recording studio to record the songs and play it back for the crew, who were excited to hear us sing. They hear us singing, goofing around all the time, but now they’re like, ‘Oh my God, that’s an orchestra backing you, and you guys sound good.’”
Dulé Hill: “I liked the opening number, which really represented what our show is about, and all the things happening in the background there; and the Jamaican bit. Steve wrote that for me and it was a lot of fun.”
James Roday: “I was surprisingly moved by Mary Lightly as an angel sending off Yang’s number. Just because, like Despereaux, Yang is a character that we’ve kind of truly built into the fiber of our show; and without spoiling too much, I felt like it was the end of something, within the framework of our show. And I thought it was very well executed.”
The newly introduced Harris Trout (Anthony Michael Hall) is going to cause chaos in Season 8:
Kirsten: “He wreaks havoc on all of their lives, and the SBPD is turned upside-down. I’m not in those episodes; the guys aren’t hired for stuff; and Lassiter is demoted. He’s wearing his blue uniform – he’s a beat cop again!”
Cary Elwes returns in Season 8 for another Despereaux episode, and it’s going to be epic:
James: “It’s pretty rad, you guys. We go to London (and it looks a lot like Vancouver) and we get involved with some Guy Ritchie-like gangster hi-jinks; and right in the middle of it all is the return of Pierre Despereaux, throwing us yet another curveball.”
Dulé: “As always with Despereaux, you never know what to believe.”
James: “You never know what’s real and what’s not.”
Cary Elwes: “Vinnie Jones joined us for some fun, and man, we just laughed our way through this entire episode; it just was so much fun.”
James: “And it was a new kind of color and flavor for Cary to play as well.”
Cary: “A really funny episode; I can’t wait to see it. I had a lot of fun doing it. Every time I get the call to come and play with these guys, I’m ready to go. I have more fun working on this show than any other show I’ve ever done.”
Steve Franks is a Sherlock Holmes fan, and the London gangster episode is not only a little bit Guy Ritchie, but also a little bit Harry Potter:
Steve Franks: “Certainly, Psych was inspired by Sherlock Holmes, The Great Observer; and since then they’ve made a few of these Sherlock Holmes movies, that Guy Ritchie has done. I was really excited to see those, because in those they do a thing where Holmes sees things almost like a Shawn vision. It was very cool how similar that is. Then that gave me license to totally go and rip off Guy Ritchie, and we’re doing a London gangster episode – but that’s too straightforward for a Psych episode – so that’s where I took Harry Potter and mashed those two together. So we have an episode called, ‘Lock, Stock, Some Smoking Barrels, and Burton Guster’s Goblet of Fire.’”
Season 8 focuses on the core characters:
Maggie Lawson: “I don’t think in Season 8 so far we’re getting into our families as much as we are “this” family. I think we’re dealing less with the outside relationships; it’s a very core season. We’re really in it with each other, not so much family members. Although I would love to see another family member turn up, because I have the coolest family ever. Jeffrey Tambor, and William Shatner, and John Cena. Like, who’s next?”
Timothy Omundson: “It could only be topped by Sean Connery playing your grandfather.”
Maggie: “That would do it!”
Season 8 will be a season of changes and emotional rollercoasters:
James: “There’s definitely more emotional stuff coming; I think we’re just at that point in the run of the show. Last year kind of opened the gate for some more character-driven stuff to happen. It’s more of a character-focused season than we’ve had in the past.”
Dulé: “I also think the characters are realizing that it’s time to move forward. You can’t stay stagnant. So there are a lot of changes happening in the characters’ lives.”
Timothy: “Shit gets real in the SBPD in Season 8.”
Maggie: “It really does. I’ve heard Steve say that it’s a bit of a rollercoaster, Shawn and Juliet (dealing with the aftermath of Season 7’s episode ‘Deez Nups’) in Season 8; and I think that might be an understatement. It’s pretty intense.”
Timothy: “Season 7 cracked the door; Season 8 blows it off its hinges. It’s like a garage door blowing off its hinges – which actually happened to us in Season 3, by the way, by accident, and almost turned us into collateral damage! Season 8 is just so big and so intense and so emotional; it’s unlike anything we’ve done.”
Can Juliet forgive Shawn in Season 8?
Maggie: “I think as with any couple that truly loves each other, there come these times when it’s like, ‘Are we in this forever, and is forgiveness on the table?’ I think Juliet definitely has it in her to forgive him fully. I think there was part of her that was enchanted by the idea that he might really have been psychic, but there was probably a seed of doubt. Maybe why it hurt so bad is that they’d been together for so long, and it took that long for him to tell her.”
Timothy: “…And the fact that he’s a lying son-of-a-bitch?”
If Juliet had never met Shawn…
Maggie: “Juliet definitely would have married a Miami Dolphin.”
Dulé Hill really does have a super-sniffer, at least when it comes to finding nearby food.
Dulé: “I’m always snacking on something off-camera.”
Cary: “And he never puts on weight; it’s incredible.”
Dulé: “It’s my little secret.”
James Roday does not like being wet or hung upside-down:
Steve: “Who tells us no on set? Nobody tells us no; that’s why we get away with it!”
Chris Henze: “Sometimes James tells you no if you say, ‘We’re going to do an episode where you jump into this water; and then you’re going to be wet…”
Kelly Kulchak: “…and then you’re going to be on a horse.’“
Steve: “James doesn’t like to be wet or hung upside down. Those are the only things that he’ll say no to.”
Corbin Bernsen likes to think Shawn is actually (to use the term loosely) psychic:
Corbin Bernsen: “I [Henry] taught him observation, right? But I didn’t teach him the conclusion to the observation. So you might look at two clues, and she might look at two clues; and you both see them, but what do you conclude from them? I could argue that there is an ability, that’s somewhat psychic, to say ‘I know that connects him to the murder,’ when someone else doesn’t see it, though you’re both looking at the same thing. So I would say that he is a psychic, and he’s not fake.”
Steve Franks is Shawn and Gus:
Steve: “This is the weird thing – Shawn and Gus are equal parts of my personality. I am a person who is terrified to go open one of those doors over there to walk into somewhere; but at the same time I have all of Shawn’s quips and snotty remarks. So I’m constantly at war with myself at all times. So it was sort of born out of that idea. And my desire, and the way that we sort of run the show, is that our life is the constant search for fun. And how much is too much; and how much is getting in the way of becoming an actual self-realized human being. So for us when we break stories, it’s like, “Ooh, what roles do we get to play?” It was mostly born out of the two sides of my personality. It’s well-represented in the cartoon strip Calvin & Hobbes.”
Steve Franks would happily do Psych forever (or an approximation thereof):
Steve: “We’ll do it for as long as they’ll pay for our episodes. We love doing it; we’ve been around awhile; we’re going to do it in any incarnation we can. I’d like to ultimately do Psych movies every once in awhile.”
Man, I’d love to see that, and I’ll say this: as long as they keep doing awesome episodes of Psych, I’ll keep watching it!
Thanks to the cast and crew of Psych for sitting down with me for these interviews, and to USA Network for setting it all up.
There are certain films I’ve discovered just by channel surfing; likewise, there are films that I know and when I come across them (again, channel surfing), I may stay to watch a given scene and then find myself watching the film through to the end. Most of the OT Star Wars movies are like that; so is Casablanca. This morning my Mary and I came across another, Miss Pettgrew Lives For A Day. I found it first on TV, bought a copy, and today watched the movie through to the end anyway.
The 2008 film stars Amy Adams, Frances McDormand, Ciaran Hinds, Lee Pace, Mark Strong and Shirley Henderson, among others, and it was directed by Bharat Nalluri with a screenplay by David Magee and Simon Beaufoy adapting the 1937 novel by Winifred Watson.
I suspect you’ll already know Amy Adams’ and Frances McDormand’s work. Bharat Nalluri may be more known to ComicMix readers as the man who directed episodes of MI-5 and Torchwood: Miracle Day. Writer David Magee wrote Finding Neverland (another film I love) and Life of Pi. Simon Beaufoy won an Academy Award for Slumdog Millionaire and has also scripted the upcoming The Hunger Games: Catching Fire as well as The Full Monty.
Ciaran Hinds has a mixture of films to his credit. He played Dumbledore’s brother in the final Harry Potter film, was also in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy as well as John Carter and Game of Thrones. I thought he was very hammy in Political Animals, the Sigourney Weaver TV miniseries but he’s wonderful and understated in Miss Pettigrew.
Mark Strong was in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and John Carter as well and also played Sinestro in the Green Lantern film as well as Lord Blackwood in the Sherlock Holmes film with Robert Downey Jr. Lee Pace is in all three Hobbit movies and will be playing Ronan the Accuser in the upcoming Guardians of the Galaxy film.
Why do I tell you all this? To drive home that Miss Pettigrew has a really good pedigree and it lives up to it.
The story is gossamer light for all that it’s set in London in 1938 on the eve of World War II. That gives the film an underlying shadow; we know what’s waiting in the wings. So do some of the characters and it adds a poignancy to the story.
The story? Imdb does a nice job of summarizing the story so I’ll quote it: “War threatens London as Miss Pettigrew, a destitute governess, filches a client’s card from her agency and presents herself at the door. A singer named Delysia Lafosse wants a social secretary as she seeks a West End role by sleeping with a feckless producer in the bed of Nick, a smarmy nightclub owner with whom she also dallies. She ignores Michael, her piano player, who loves her and has tickets for New York on the Queen Mary. Miss Pettigrew’s job is to make sure Delysia gets the part. Over 24 hours, Miss Pettigrew is also called upon to help an ambitious and unfaithful fashion editor patch things up with her older fiancé, a lingerie designer. Has Miss Pettigrew found her calling?”
Amy Adams is Delysia and she’s perfection. She has superb comedic timing and shows real heart in a character that could otherwise be described as flighty and manipulative. The character is a fake but there are reasons why and a past that comes up at key moments. There’s an innocence to her. And it’s a brave performance. At the emotional climax, when she sings “If I Didn’t Care”, there are notes where Amy Adams shows us that Delysia is a good singer but not a great one. She’s not as good a singer as Amy Adams proved in Enchanted. You can hear that song on YouTube.
Listen to how the real character breaks through as she sings the song and discovers where her heart truly lies.
Frances McDomand’s performance as Miss Pettigrew is a lesson in underacting. The character starts very cold and distant, with a very set idea of what is right, and it all gets turned upside down as she encounters Delysia. Her heart, her warmth, opens up as she deals and helps the chaos that is the younger woman.
All the actors are wonderful and the movie itself could have been made in the 30s – all the period details seem so right. It’s a beautiful film to look at and the costumes and the cars and the sets all establish a reality – one that you know is soon to vanish. I never escape the underlying threat of war that runs through the film.
Just wanted to share a film that has become one of my favorites. Will you like it? Beats me. But if you’re a tad tired of superheroes right now and explosions and all that, you might want to give it a try.
My late wife Kim Yale had a very tender heart; if someone was critical of her or didn’t seem to like her, it would tear her up. She would take it very personally. I told her that not every opinion matters and sometimes it registered with her.
I think it was Steven Grant who I first heard say that opinions were like assholes; everyone has one. Opinions can also be a conduit for a whole lot of crap.
Not every opinion matters. Not to me. Do I listen to my fans? I should and I do but, as I’ve said to different people at different times, just because I’m not doing what you’re telling me doesn’t mean I’m not listening to you. Fans, as a rule, want the same thing again next time only different. If you try to give fans what you think they want, half of them will get angry because it wasn’t what they wanted. I once heard J.K. Rowling of Harry Potter fame say on a video interview (I’m paraphrasing but it’s close), “Should I listen to my readers? Absolutely. Should I allow what they say to change one word of what I do? Absolutely not.” QFT.
When I listen to readers, it’s because I’m looking to get an idea of what is effective in my work, what is not, what may be in it that I didn’t even realize, and – if they’re saying nice things – I like getting my ego stroked as well as the next narcissist. What I’m listening to is their impressions of what I’ve done. Often as not it will tell me more about the person giving that opinion than it will about the work itself.
If you’re a young writer or artist and you want someone to give you an opinion of what you’ve just done, be careful who you ask. Do you really want an opinion or do you just want them to tell you that the work is wonderful and so are you? Do they know anything about the work you’re doing? Is it an informed opinion or just a “gut feeling?” There are people that I trust, who I know, and their opinions matter to me. Others – not so much. I often have no context for the value of their opinions.
I was put in mind of all this by the recent death of Roger Ebert. Over the years, I read his reviews and I knew from experience that he could be a good guide for me. When it came down to Ebert and Siskel, I knew Roger Ebert’s opinion of a film would more likely be like mine than would Siskel’s. Ebert could alert me to films I might not have seen and warned me away from ones that would probably waste my money and my time.
The world is full of crap-filled opinions and the Internet overflows with them like the Deep Tunnel project in Chicago during this last week’s floods. A lot of times the opinions masquerade as “fact” but they really are just one person’s opinion and often a skewed one at that. Often, they are written by Anonymous or Pseudo-anonymous. How can I decide whether an individual’s opinion is worth anything to me if I know nothing about them?
It boils down to this – not everyone’s opinion matters whether be about work, about politics, about people, about art, about society – about anything. There’s wheat and there’s chaff out there – lots and lots of chaff. Discern which is which for yourself and you’ll be a happier person.
Announced just hours before the series premiere this evening, the BBC confirmed the first casting information for the Doctor Who 50th anniversary special, and they started big. David Tennant will make his return to the series, as will Billie Piper, reprising her role as Rose.
Tennant’s Doctor regenerated into Matt Smith on January 1, 2010; Billie was last seen in a cameo as Rose on the same adventure. Rose left the Doctor two years previous, on “Pete’s World” a parallel Earth, in the company of a human clone of The Doctor, created as a result of the fight with the Daleks in The Stolen Planet / Journey’s End. At this point, there’s no definite verification whether Tennant will return as The (original) Doctor or his Pete’s World clone.
Also announced as a member of the cast is John Hurt, British acting icon with quite a long resume in genre work, including Merlin, V For Vendetta, Elephant Man, Harry Potter, and 1984.
Tennant and Piper have spent much of the past months denying vehemently and whimsically their appearance in the series. David reported in a recent appearance on The Graham Norton Show that a representative arrived backstage to remind him not to talk about the special, “…and I don’t even know anything!”
Other actors associated with the show have been equally reticent about their appearance, and the few that have dropped tidbits have been rapped on the proverbial knuckles. John Barrowman (Captain Jack Harkness) announced that he was “talking” to the BBC to appear, only to have to retract that comment, followed by a tweet some weeks later stating definitively that he would not be appearing.
Filming for the new special begins this week, directed by Nick Hurran and written by Steven Moffat. Odds are that news of additional casting will filter out over the next weeks, either officially or via the hordes of fans which will certainly descend on each location shoot.
Hard to believe that it’s been 15 years since J.K. Rowling’s boy wizard first came to America. To celebrate, Scholastic announced this morning that a new covers will grace anniversary editions of the seven-book mega-best-selling series. In an interesting move, Kazu Kibuishi, the creator behind the over-hyped Amulet series, will be providing the new covers, replacing Mary GrandPré’s now classic images. Here’s the first cover for your viewing and personally, I think it’s an improvement. It’d be nice, as part of the celebration, they used the original title, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, but that’s not going to happen.
Here’s the formal release with all the anniversary details.
New York, NY (February 13, 2013) – Harry Potter fans and young readers just starting their journey through the world of Harry Potter will have something new and exciting to add to their bookshelves this September. Scholastic (NASDAQ: SCHL), the global children’s publishing, education and media company, today unveiled an all new cover for Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone – the first of seven new covers to appear on U.S. trade paperback editions coming in September 2013 to celebrate the 15th anniversary of the U.S. publication of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, the original book in J.K. Rowling’s best-selling Harry Potter series.
The stunning art for the new editions is by critically acclaimed artist Kazu Kibuishi, best known for his #1 New York Times bestselling graphic novel series, Amulet. Kibuishi is a longtime Harry Potter fan who called this opportunity, “more than a little surreal.” Each of the seven new covers will depict a distinctive and memorable moment from the respective book. The collection, which will also be released in September as a boxed set, will offer new readers just reaching the age to begin the series a glimpse of J.K. Rowling’s magical world and the epic story they are about to enter.
“The Harry Potter covers by Mary GrandPré are so fantastic and iconic,” said Kibuishi. “When I was asked to submit samples, I initially hesitated because I didn’t want to see them reinterpreted! However, I felt that if I were to handle the project, I could bring something to it that many other designers and illustrators probably couldn’t, and that was that I was also a writer of my own series of middle grade fiction. As an author myself, I tried to answer the question, ‘If I were the author of the books – and they were like my own children – how would I want them to be seen years from now?’ When illustrating the covers, I tried to think of classic perennial paperback editions of famous novels and how those illustrations tend to feel. In a way, the project became a tribute to both Harry Potter and the literary classics.”
The inspired original art for the series, created by the talented Mary GrandPré will continue to be featured on the U.S. hardcover and digest paperback editions.
According to Ellie Berger, President, Scholastic Trade Publishing, “The brilliant artist Kazu Kibuishi offers his unique vision of the world of Harry Potter, making each cover an incredible adventure that will transport new readers just discovering Harry Potter for the first time directly into the rich world of J.K. Rowling’s imagination.”
Scholastic also announced that in November 2013, the company will release the first boxed set of the complete Hogwarts Library in the U.S., including Quidditch Through the Ages, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, and The Tales of Beedle the Bard. Sales of the Hogwarts Library will support two charities selected by the author, J.K. Rowling: Lumos, a charity founded by J.K. Rowling which works to end the institutionalization of children, and Comic Relief, a UK-based charity that strives to create a just world free from poverty.
Fifteen years after the first U.S. publication of J.K. Rowling’s first book, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone in September 1998, there are more than 150 million Harry Potter books in print in the United States alone and the series still hits bestseller lists regularly. The seven Harry Potter books are published in over 200 territories in 73 languages and have sold more than 450 million copies worldwide.
Warwick Davis will be making a foray into a new camp of sci-fi fandom in 2013 when he appears on fifty-year-old juggernaut Doctor Who. In an episode for the second half of this season, Davis will appear in an episode written by fifty-one year-old juggernaut Neil Gaiman, returning to the series after his Hugo-winning episode, The Doctor’s Wife. The BBC has not released the title, but revealed yesterday the episode will feature the Cybermen. Also starring in the episode will be Jason Watkins (Being Human) and Tamzin Outhwaite (EastEnders).
Davis casts a long shadow over science fiction and fantasy. Starting with his role as Wicket W. Warrick in Return of the Jedi, he’s enjoyed a long and varied career in many franchises. He played the title character in George Lucas and Ron Howard’s Willow, and was similarly titular in the horror franchise Leprechaun. He played Marvin the Paranoid Android in the recent Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy film, appeared in the Harry Potter films as Professor Flitwick, and will be appearing in Bryan Singer’s Jack the Giant-Killer.
Davis’ most recent triumph is the Ricky Gervais comedy Life’s Too Short, which recently completed a run on HBO. In it he played an exaggerated version of himself, separated from his wife and straining under a massive tax bill, all while he produces and films a documentary about himself which chronicles these travails. Davis shows remarkable comedic timing and ability to do physical comedy in the series, playing the perfect balance of a hateful, selfish interpretation of himself who you still feel sorry for when horrible things happen to him.
Keeping with the whimsical self-deprecating tone of the series, he’s released an iPhone app, PocketWarwick, which turns him into a 21st century Tamagotchi. You are responsible for keeping him clean and fit as progressively more lucrative acting jobs are sent by his agent, as you attempt to bring you little thespian up from Z-lister to the A-list.
It’s rather safe to say that an appearance on the longest running science-fiction show his history will go a long way towards that goal. At this rate, he’ll have that tax-bill sorted in no time…
Your first thought at seeing this review is: “Why on earth is ComicMix reviewing this?” First of all, we’re a pop culture site; but more importantly, this is a film filled with marvelous British actors we have enjoyed in countless genre offerings. They deserve to be seen in just about anything they do and when you put them all together, it’s a British version of The Expendables, the geriatric edition. When you have Judi Dench (the current Bond films), Maggie Smith (Harry Potter, et. al.), Bill Nighy (the Pirates of the Caribbean series), and Tom Wilkinson (Batman Begins) acting together, you sit down and pay attention.
The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel is a charming, well-written, well-acted film that is actually about something. It was directed by John Madden (Shakespeare in Love) and based on Deborah Moggach’s novel These Foolish Things. The cast is fortunate to still be working, but many of their peers – and many of us – are not working as we age, and our future has come into question. The film follows these Brits as they decide to relocate from their homeland to a more affordable retirement community in India. They were suckered into believing the glossy brochure, without stopping to investigate. The reality, of course, is far worse than imagined and now they have to deal with the decisions they have come to make.
The film, now out on DVD from 20th Century Home Entertainment, plays things with a light touch while the subject matter is fairly heavy and resonates with our aging elders here, too. There’s Dench as a recently widowed woman who finds 21st Century technology baffling, and Wilkinson, who lived in India as a young man and has desired for a return. Nighy and Penelope Wilton (Shaun of Dead) blew their retirement savings on funding their daughter’s failed start-up so make this move out of desperation. And there’s Smith, playing a racist who only came to India for a quick and cheap hip replacement operation. It’s not all bleak as Ronald Pickup plays a retiree hoping to score with some of his compatriots, his ardor still running hot.
Sharp contrasts are drawn between the characters and their motivations for making such a major move so late in life. How they react to the decrepit hotel, run by the charming, enthusiastic and overwhelmed Dev Patel (Slumdog Millionaire) propels much of the story. Jaipur, where the story takes place, is beautiful and squalid, a composite of modern day India.
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The film follows the characters and over time we watch some adjust, some struggle, and many fight. It’s a school of fish out of water, prompting a lot of cultural miscues and comedy, but it overlays a poignancy that this stellar cast projects in a nice, subtle way. They learn things from the local people, and each other, while they also teach Sonny a thing or two, letting him finally take the belated steps towards a mature adulthood.
The film has its predictable moments but you’re smiling through most this and you want a happy ending for all concerned, which you (for the most part) get. It’s immensely satisfying and worth a look.
The transfer to Blu-ray is good, not great, and has fine audio. There are a handful of perfunctory extras that are too short for the subject matter, such as Behind the Story: Lights, Colors and Smiles (2:34) and Casting Legends (3:55). The exotic and picturesque locales get their due in Welcome to the “Real” Best Exotic Marigold Hotel (2:55) and Trekking to India: “Life is Never the Same” (2:45).
Burbank, Calif. (September 23, 2013)—Walt Disney Pictures announced today that principal photography has begun at Pinewood Studios in London, on Cinderella, Disney’s first-ever live action feature inspired by the classic fairy tale.
