Exclusive: Judy Craymer would just love it if Barbie filmmaker Greta Gerwig could just make herself available to complete the Mamma Mia! movie trilogy.
“Hey, Greta, if you’re free to do anymore projects…” jokes Craymer, the driving force that has kept the “Money, Money, Money” pouring into the box office for musical Mamma Mia!, featuring the songs of Swedish pop stars Abba, for a quarter of a century.
Saturday night will mark an incredible milestone for a show that has taken over $5.685 billion at the box-office worldwide in ticket sales and is responsible for a further $17 billion in supplementary expenditure from spending on hotels, restaurants, transport and merchandising globally in the 25 years since opening night at the Cameron Macintosh-owned Prince Edward Theatre on April 6, 1999.
Those figures do not include the hundreds of millions of dollars that movie offshoots Mamma Mia! and Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again have amassed.
“Hey, Greta, if you’re free to do anymore projects…” jokes Craymer, the driving force that has kept the “Money, Money, Money” pouring into the box office for musical Mamma Mia!, featuring the songs of Swedish pop stars Abba, for a quarter of a century.
Saturday night will mark an incredible milestone for a show that has taken over $5.685 billion at the box-office worldwide in ticket sales and is responsible for a further $17 billion in supplementary expenditure from spending on hotels, restaurants, transport and merchandising globally in the 25 years since opening night at the Cameron Macintosh-owned Prince Edward Theatre on April 6, 1999.
Those figures do not include the hundreds of millions of dollars that movie offshoots Mamma Mia! and Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again have amassed.
- 4/5/2024
- by Baz Bamigboye
- Deadline Film + TV
Tilda Swinton famously cut her acting teeth on the experimental films of late director Derek Jarman such as Caravaggio and The Garden as well as life-long friend Joanna Hogg’s debut short Caprice and Sally Potter’s Orlando.
Nearly 50 years later, she has continued to work with Hogg as well as in the experimental cinema arena, finding a new Jarman-esque kindred spirit in Thai artist and filmmaker Apichatpong Weerasethakul.
Speaking in an in-conversation event at the Marrakech Film Festival on Monday, the actress revealed how some of the big commercial studio pictures she has worked on across her career have felt personally more experimental to her than her avant-garde work.
“I’ve been really fortunate to have some adventures in worlds of filmmaking that I never thought I would be able to go into,” she said.
“When Derek died [in 1994], I was a bit high and dry… slowly… invitations came...
Nearly 50 years later, she has continued to work with Hogg as well as in the experimental cinema arena, finding a new Jarman-esque kindred spirit in Thai artist and filmmaker Apichatpong Weerasethakul.
Speaking in an in-conversation event at the Marrakech Film Festival on Monday, the actress revealed how some of the big commercial studio pictures she has worked on across her career have felt personally more experimental to her than her avant-garde work.
“I’ve been really fortunate to have some adventures in worlds of filmmaking that I never thought I would be able to go into,” she said.
“When Derek died [in 1994], I was a bit high and dry… slowly… invitations came...
- 11/27/2023
- by Melanie Goodfellow
- Deadline Film + TV
David Cronenberg’s new film “Crimes Of The Future” asks its audience to go on quite a journey to the dystopian future. The film’s most quotable line, “surgery is the new sex,” only scratches the surface. Amidst the detritus of Grecian ruins, the human body is not only generating strange new organs but removing and tattooing them becomes a form of art in its own right with an erotic dimension. This is the specialty of Viggo Mortensen’s Saul Tanser, who grows the new flesh, and his performance partner who handles it, Léa Seydoux’s Caprice.
Continue reading ‘Crimes Of The Future’: Viggo Mortensen Initially Wanted A Smaller Part, Léa Seydoux On Cronenberg’s World [Interview] at The Playlist.
Continue reading ‘Crimes Of The Future’: Viggo Mortensen Initially Wanted A Smaller Part, Léa Seydoux On Cronenberg’s World [Interview] at The Playlist.
- 6/5/2022
- by Marshall Shaffer
- The Playlist
Although one might expect David Cronenberg’s Crimes of the Future to deliver several cringe-inducing scenes given the festival press swirling around it, the film is actually rather subdued in terms of its adherence to the “body horror” genre generally connected with the filmmaker’s other works. That being said, while it may not be the finest example of the Cronenberg ethos, it is easily one of the more thought-provoking and interesting films of his career.
In the auteur’s latest exploration of the body politic, Cronenberg surmises that human evolution has adapted to encompass life in a synthetic environment. This has allowed some human bodies to transform and mutate (though not necessarily for identifiable or specific evolutionary purposes). Harnessing this new genetic oddity, performance artist Saul Tenser (Viggo Mortensen), presents the metamorphosis his body undergoes as a series of “avant-garde” performances along with his partner Caprice (Léa Seydoux). However,...
In the auteur’s latest exploration of the body politic, Cronenberg surmises that human evolution has adapted to encompass life in a synthetic environment. This has allowed some human bodies to transform and mutate (though not necessarily for identifiable or specific evolutionary purposes). Harnessing this new genetic oddity, performance artist Saul Tenser (Viggo Mortensen), presents the metamorphosis his body undergoes as a series of “avant-garde” performances along with his partner Caprice (Léa Seydoux). However,...
- 6/3/2022
- by Mike Tyrkus
- CinemaNerdz
There’s a lot of weird fetishes in this world, which we won’t go into, but for David Cronenberg’s Crimes of the Future, surgery is the new sex.
The dystopian-future hipster pic starring Viggo Mortensen and Léa Seydoux as a performance art couple obsessed with being operated on, and the former getting his organs tattooed to club-crowd spectacle, scored a six-minute standing ovation after the credits rolled here at its Cannes Film Festival premiere.
Kristen Stewart plays an investigator for the National Organ Registry. However, she’s so bedazzled by Viggo’s Saul Tenser and crushes on him, yearning to be the new muse in his life and taking over for Seydoux’s Caprice. See, it’s Caprice who gets to suck Saul’s open wounds, and she’s the chief architect of his innards (the loose argument is that all this anarchistic surgery enables him to survive...
The dystopian-future hipster pic starring Viggo Mortensen and Léa Seydoux as a performance art couple obsessed with being operated on, and the former getting his organs tattooed to club-crowd spectacle, scored a six-minute standing ovation after the credits rolled here at its Cannes Film Festival premiere.
Kristen Stewart plays an investigator for the National Organ Registry. However, she’s so bedazzled by Viggo’s Saul Tenser and crushes on him, yearning to be the new muse in his life and taking over for Seydoux’s Caprice. See, it’s Caprice who gets to suck Saul’s open wounds, and she’s the chief architect of his innards (the loose argument is that all this anarchistic surgery enables him to survive...
- 5/23/2022
- by Anthony D'Alessandro
- Deadline Film + TV
Enrique Buleo’s “Still Life With Ghost,” Ana Asensio’s “The Goat Girl,” Gala Gracia’s “The Remnants of You” and Esteban Alenda Bros.’ “There Is Evil” are some of the film projects pitched at the spotlight event on Spanish cinema at Cannes’ Producers Network on Friday May 20.
Five Spanish production companies– Un Capricho de Producciones, Quatre Films Audiovisuales, Potenza Producciones, Aquí y Allí Films and Solita Films – were selected by Spain’s trade promotion board Icex and the Icaa film institute to pitch their production slates at the Marché du Film event.
As part of the Production Day, which kicked off with the Producers Network, the five Spanish producers made a video pitch with their projects – the main part of them at development stage – to encourage international partnerships with co-producers and sales agents.
Comedy is the predominant genre among the feature projects selected.
In the evening, 25 Spanish producers will...
Five Spanish production companies– Un Capricho de Producciones, Quatre Films Audiovisuales, Potenza Producciones, Aquí y Allí Films and Solita Films – were selected by Spain’s trade promotion board Icex and the Icaa film institute to pitch their production slates at the Marché du Film event.
As part of the Production Day, which kicked off with the Producers Network, the five Spanish producers made a video pitch with their projects – the main part of them at development stage – to encourage international partnerships with co-producers and sales agents.
Comedy is the predominant genre among the feature projects selected.
In the evening, 25 Spanish producers will...
- 5/20/2022
- by Emiliano De Pablos
- Variety Film + TV
Get in touch to send in cinephile news and discoveries. For daily updates follow us @NotebookMUBI.NEWSAbove: Dean Stockwell in David Lynch's Blue Velvet (1986)The actor Dean Stockwell, remembered for his performances in films like The Boy with the Green Hair (1948), Paris, Texas (1984), Blue Velvet (1986), and many more, has died at the age of 85. As Sheila O'Malley mentions in her tribute, Stockwell's career was marked by numerous disappearances. He didn't always love acting, but "he lived long enough to be able to not just appreciate but feel the love that people had for him, the way audiences fell in love with him for 70 years." A newly discovered memoir by Paul Newman will be published next year by Knopf. Based on Newman's conversations with screenwriter Stewart Stern, the book aims to tell the legendary actor's story in his own words. Following the exit of Robert Pattinson and Taron Egerton, Joe Alwyn...
- 11/10/2021
- MUBI
Each week we highlight the noteworthy titles that have recently hit streaming platforms in the United States. Check out this week’s selections below and past round-ups here.
A Cop Movie (Alonso Ruizpalacios)
There has never been a less auspicious time to make a “cop movie.” As scrutiny abounds from both within (content warnings on streaming services) and externally (social media) towards the past output of media producers, also suspect are the bevy of films and series that glamorize law enforcement, or see the police as uncomplicated arbiters of justice. Of course, last summer’s Black Lives Matter protests initiated all kinds of brave new thinking about a potential world devoid of cops. Like the Western genre, perhaps all police thrillers in future will be revisionist ones. Mexican director Alonso Ruizpalacios’ new Netflix-produced quasi-documentary, A Cop Movie, has thus arrived right on cue. – David K. (full review)
Where to...
A Cop Movie (Alonso Ruizpalacios)
There has never been a less auspicious time to make a “cop movie.” As scrutiny abounds from both within (content warnings on streaming services) and externally (social media) towards the past output of media producers, also suspect are the bevy of films and series that glamorize law enforcement, or see the police as uncomplicated arbiters of justice. Of course, last summer’s Black Lives Matter protests initiated all kinds of brave new thinking about a potential world devoid of cops. Like the Western genre, perhaps all police thrillers in future will be revisionist ones. Mexican director Alonso Ruizpalacios’ new Netflix-produced quasi-documentary, A Cop Movie, has thus arrived right on cue. – David K. (full review)
Where to...
- 11/5/2021
- by Jordan Raup
- The Film Stage
The Cannes Film Festival isn’t known for launching sequels. But on Thursday morning, Joanna Hogg’s “The Souvenir Part II” held its first screening as part of the Directors’ Fortnight lineup. The semi-autobiographical film is a continuation of the 2019 Sundance darling that follows Julie (Honor Swinton Byrne) in the days after the tragic outcome of a relationship, as she takes comfort from her mother Rosalind and directs a student film — called “The Souvenir” — based on her grief.
“It was always intended to be one piece of work in two films,” Hogg said in a Q&a after the screening.
Hogg revealed that she’d wanted to tell this story for years, based on a real romance from her youth, but she struggled because she’d never fully understood her ex-boyfriend. “I began to realize very slowly, I could do it from my point of view,” Hogg said. “The two parts have to coexist.
“It was always intended to be one piece of work in two films,” Hogg said in a Q&a after the screening.
Hogg revealed that she’d wanted to tell this story for years, based on a real romance from her youth, but she struggled because she’d never fully understood her ex-boyfriend. “I began to realize very slowly, I could do it from my point of view,” Hogg said. “The two parts have to coexist.
- 7/8/2021
- by Ramin Setoodeh
- Variety Film + TV
The long-term collaborators shot the film in secret late last year; it is being produced by Ireland’s Element Pictures, BBC Film and Martin Scorsese’s Sikelia Productions. After shooting, finishing and premiering The Human Voice with Pedro Almodóvar late last year, Tilda Swinton is clearly setting an example for staying productive during the Covid-19 era. The Eternal Daughter, her latest collaboration with British great Joanna Hogg, has just been announced, with A24 taking world rights in advance of next month’s EFM. With filming having wrapped in December last year in Wales, under Covid-secure guidelines, the project gives Swinton a headlining role for Hogg, after her supporting turns in The Souvenir and the upcoming The Souvenir: Part II. They began their film careers together when Swinton starred in Hogg’s school graduation film, Caprice, in 1986. Suggesting a turn towards the gothic for Hogg, the film, billed as a “ghost story” and a.
As Disney quietly disappears huge swathes of film history into its vaults, I'm going to spend 2020 celebrating Twentieth Century Fox and the Fox Film Corporation's films, what one might call their output if only someone were putting it out.***Twentieth Century Fox didn't weather the 60s terribly well, but what American studio did? At least they hit the 70s running with M*A*S*H, which was more or less through luck (they execs were too busy having heart failure over the cost of Patton (1970) and Tora! Tora! Tora! (1970) to bother Robert Altman, who then became a semi-regular director for them during the next decade).George Axelrod's The Secret Life of an American Wife (1968) pops out as an endearing oddity in an output mostly divided between the last gasps of formerly reliable or even inspired filmmakers (try Frank Tashlin's Doris Day spy caper Caprice [1967]), weird experiments and cheap...
- 11/24/2020
- MUBI
‘The Souvenir’: Joanna Hogg Reunites With Tilda Swinton After 33 Years and Makes Her Daughter a Star
When British auteur Joanna Hogg finally set about crafting what would become “The Souvenir” — a breakout hit for the filmmaker decades in the making — it seemed only natural that she would turn to her very first star, Tilda Swinton, to help tell a story loosely based on Hogg’s own experiences in film school. What came next, however, was a surprise to both of them. “The Souvenir” stars Honor Swinton Byrne as a Hogg proxy: starry-eyed young film student Julie, whose life is thrown into turmoil when she falls in love with the secretive Anthony (Tom Burke).
For Hogg, it’s a personal (and occasionally painful) look back at a fraught time in her life. It’s also one that Swinton herself remembered clearly, having previously starred in Hogg’s first short, “Caprice,” which served as Hogg’s graduation film from the National Film and Television School in 1986. Casting Swinton...
For Hogg, it’s a personal (and occasionally painful) look back at a fraught time in her life. It’s also one that Swinton herself remembered clearly, having previously starred in Hogg’s first short, “Caprice,” which served as Hogg’s graduation film from the National Film and Television School in 1986. Casting Swinton...
- 5/15/2019
- by Kate Erbland
- Indiewire
For fans of Hollywood’s Golden Age, the news from California this Monday morning hit hard, like the sudden loss of a treasured longtime friend (or for many that “girlfriend next door”).
Here’s how E! Online reported her passing:
Hollywood has lost a beloved legend.
Doris Day, the actress and singer who personified classic Hollywood in the ’50s and ’60s, has died, the Doris Day Animal Foundation announced on Monday. According to the foundation, Day died at her Carmel Valley, Calif. home early Monday while surrounded by a few close friends.
“Day had been in excellent physical health for her age, until recently contracting a serious case of pneumonia, resulting in her death,” the foundation said in a public statement. Day was 97 years old, recently celebrating her birthday on April 3.
For 20 years, 1948 to 1968, Ms. Day was a staple of movie theatres. A few years ago I included her in...
Here’s how E! Online reported her passing:
Hollywood has lost a beloved legend.
Doris Day, the actress and singer who personified classic Hollywood in the ’50s and ’60s, has died, the Doris Day Animal Foundation announced on Monday. According to the foundation, Day died at her Carmel Valley, Calif. home early Monday while surrounded by a few close friends.
“Day had been in excellent physical health for her age, until recently contracting a serious case of pneumonia, resulting in her death,” the foundation said in a public statement. Day was 97 years old, recently celebrating her birthday on April 3.
For 20 years, 1948 to 1968, Ms. Day was a staple of movie theatres. A few years ago I included her in...
- 5/14/2019
- by Jim Batts
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
When teenager Doris Mary Ann Kappelhoff sang along to Ella Fitzgerald on the radio, the Cincinnati native could never have predicted that, as Doris Day, she would go on to become one of the 20th century’s most beloved performers, first as a vocalist, then as an actress and then finally as an outspoken champion for the rights of animals.
But it was those radio sing-alongs that inspired Alma Welz Kappelhoff to send her daughter to a vocal coach, and by the time Doris was 17, she was singing for bandleader Barney Rapp, who convinced her to change her name to a more marquee-friendly length.
Day would go on to sing for the likes of Jimmy James and Bob Crosby, but it was her collaboration with Les Brown and His Band of Renown in the late 1940s that would rocket her to national stardom with hits like “Sentimental Journey” and “‘Till the End of Time.
But it was those radio sing-alongs that inspired Alma Welz Kappelhoff to send her daughter to a vocal coach, and by the time Doris was 17, she was singing for bandleader Barney Rapp, who convinced her to change her name to a more marquee-friendly length.
Day would go on to sing for the likes of Jimmy James and Bob Crosby, but it was her collaboration with Les Brown and His Band of Renown in the late 1940s that would rocket her to national stardom with hits like “Sentimental Journey” and “‘Till the End of Time.
- 5/13/2019
- by Alonso Duralde
- The Wrap
From Parker Posey to Timothée Chalamet, the Sundance breakout is a tradition. Young talent is trotted up and down Park City’s Main Street to face an onslaught of interviews and offers for major new projects. But one of the most exciting new performers at the 2019 festival has stayed out of the spotlight: Honor Swinton-Byrne, daughter of Tilda and Scottish playwright John Byrne, has been generating a steady stream of raves for her extraordinary performance in “The Souvenir,” British Joanna Hogg’s intimate drama about a young love turned sour.
Conceived as the first installment in a two-part saga, “The Souvenir” stars Swinton-Byrne as Julie, a film student who falls for heroin user Anthony (Tom Burke) and faces devastating consequences as she comes to terms with his addiction. Appearing in nearly every scene, Swinton-Byrne is a quiet revelation, commanding many of the movie’s understated scenes with a combination of intellectual curiosity and wide-eyed naiveté.
Conceived as the first installment in a two-part saga, “The Souvenir” stars Swinton-Byrne as Julie, a film student who falls for heroin user Anthony (Tom Burke) and faces devastating consequences as she comes to terms with his addiction. Appearing in nearly every scene, Swinton-Byrne is a quiet revelation, commanding many of the movie’s understated scenes with a combination of intellectual curiosity and wide-eyed naiveté.
- 1/30/2019
- by Eric Kohn
- Indiewire
Netflix has acquired Emmanuel Mouret’s critically acclaimed French period drama “Mademoiselle de Joncquières,” which world-premiered at Toronto. The deal for most rights worldwide excludes France, Switzerland, Canada and the Benelux countries.
Represented in international markets by Indie Sales, “Mademoiselle de Joncquières” competed in Toronto’s Platform section. The 18th-century love-triangle drama is inspired by Didier Diderot’s classic work “Jacques the Fatalist and His Master,” and stars Cecile de France, Edouard Baer and Alice Isaaz.
De France plays Madame de la Pommeraye, a young and reclusive widow who falls in love with the seductive libertine Marquis des Arcis (Baer) against her better judgment. Feeling betrayed by his fading love, she orchestrates an intricate plan for revenge involving the seemingly pious Mademoiselle de Joncquières. Variety’s review called it “a shrewdly choreographed roundelay of scheming, seduction and revenge in the spirit of ‘Les Liaisons Dangereuses.'”
Frédéric Niedermeyer at Paris-based...
Represented in international markets by Indie Sales, “Mademoiselle de Joncquières” competed in Toronto’s Platform section. The 18th-century love-triangle drama is inspired by Didier Diderot’s classic work “Jacques the Fatalist and His Master,” and stars Cecile de France, Edouard Baer and Alice Isaaz.
De France plays Madame de la Pommeraye, a young and reclusive widow who falls in love with the seductive libertine Marquis des Arcis (Baer) against her better judgment. Feeling betrayed by his fading love, she orchestrates an intricate plan for revenge involving the seemingly pious Mademoiselle de Joncquières. Variety’s review called it “a shrewdly choreographed roundelay of scheming, seduction and revenge in the spirit of ‘Les Liaisons Dangereuses.'”
Frédéric Niedermeyer at Paris-based...
- 11/9/2018
- by Elsa Keslassy and Brent Lang
- Variety Film + TV
Murphy Brown is calling in some celebrity reinforcements: The CBS revival has lined up a number of bold-faced names to guest-star later this season, including Bette Midler in a reprise of her Emmy-nominated role on the original series.
Our sister site Deadline reports that Midler will appear in the Nov. 8 episode as Caprice, Murphy’s former secretary who “has a surprising new connection to Murphy” which makes her “even more entitled and unbearable.” Midler earned an Emmy nod in 1998 for her Murphy guest spot as Caprice.
Also, Brooke Shields (Suddenly Susan) will appear in the Nov. 15 episode as Holly Mackin Lynne,...
Our sister site Deadline reports that Midler will appear in the Nov. 8 episode as Caprice, Murphy’s former secretary who “has a surprising new connection to Murphy” which makes her “even more entitled and unbearable.” Midler earned an Emmy nod in 1998 for her Murphy guest spot as Caprice.
Also, Brooke Shields (Suddenly Susan) will appear in the Nov. 15 episode as Holly Mackin Lynne,...
- 10/19/2018
- TVLine.com
The eight previous features from French director Emmanuel Mouret (Shall We Kiss?, Caprice) have often been funny and quite talky contemporary dramedies that explored relationships and morality, so it is no surprise that he has occasionally been dubbed the “French Woody Allen.” But it is unlikely that Allen would ever direct something like Mademoiselle de Joncquieres, Mouret’s first historical film which is set in 18th-century France and which suggests Les liaisons dangereuses by way of Denis Diderot. A rarely-better Cecile de France stars as a young widow who, against her better judgment, falls head-over-heels in love with a ...
- 9/10/2018
- The Hollywood Reporter - Film + TV
The eight previous features from French director Emmanuel Mouret (Shall We Kiss?, Caprice) have often been funny and quite talky contemporary dramedies that explored relationships and morality, so it is no surprise that he has occasionally been dubbed the “French Woody Allen.” But it is unlikely that Allen would ever direct something like Mademoiselle de Joncquieres, Mouret’s first historical film which is set in 18th-century France and which suggests Les liaisons dangereuses by way of Denis Diderot. A rarely-better Cecile de France stars as a young widow who, against her better judgment, falls head-over-heels in love with a ...
- 9/10/2018
- The Hollywood Reporter - Movie News
Plus first image of project starring Edouard Baer, Cécile de France and Alice Isaaz released.
Source: Indie Sales
Mademoiselle De Joncquières
Paris-based Indie Sales has boarded French director Emmanuel Mouret’s upcoming 18th century, love triangle costume drama Mademoiselle de Joncquières, starring Edouard Baer, Cécile de France and Alice Isaaz.
The sales company, which will kick-off sales on the film at Unifrance’s Rendez-vous with French Cinema in Paris this week (Jan 18-22), has released an exclusive first image of Baer and Isaaz in the costume drama.
The film is inspired by a tale in French Enlightenment writer and philosopher Didier Diderot’s classic picaresque work Jacques The Fatalist exploring ideas of fate and free will.
Baer plays the libertine figure of the Marquis des Arcis opposite de France in the role of Madame de la Pommeraye, an attractive, reclusive widow he seduces.
When their relationship comes to a messy end the spurned Madame de la Pommeraye...
Source: Indie Sales
Mademoiselle De Joncquières
Paris-based Indie Sales has boarded French director Emmanuel Mouret’s upcoming 18th century, love triangle costume drama Mademoiselle de Joncquières, starring Edouard Baer, Cécile de France and Alice Isaaz.
The sales company, which will kick-off sales on the film at Unifrance’s Rendez-vous with French Cinema in Paris this week (Jan 18-22), has released an exclusive first image of Baer and Isaaz in the costume drama.
The film is inspired by a tale in French Enlightenment writer and philosopher Didier Diderot’s classic picaresque work Jacques The Fatalist exploring ideas of fate and free will.
Baer plays the libertine figure of the Marquis des Arcis opposite de France in the role of Madame de la Pommeraye, an attractive, reclusive widow he seduces.
When their relationship comes to a messy end the spurned Madame de la Pommeraye...
- 1/16/2018
- by Melanie Goodfellow
- ScreenDaily
The recent box office success of The Boss firmly establishes Melissa McCarthy as the current queen of movie comedies (Amy Schumer could be a new contender after an impressive debut last Summer with Trainwreck), but let us think back about those other funny ladies of filmdom. So while we’re enjoying the female reboot/re-imagining of Ghostbusters and those Bad Moms, here’s a top ten list that will hopefully inspire lots of laughter and cause you to search out some classic comedies. It’s tough to narrow them down to ten, but we’ll do our best, beginning with… 10. Eve Arden The droll Ms. Arden represents the comic sidekicks who will attempt to puncture the pomposity of the leading ladies with a well-placed wisecrack (see also the great Thelma Ritter in Rear Window). Her career began in the early 1930’s with great bit roles in Stage Door and Dancing Lady.
- 8/8/2016
- by Jim Batts
- WeAreMovieGeeks.com
Oscar-nominated costume designer who dressed Diana Ross and Barbra Streisand
Now that television talent contests are gussied up to Vegas standards, it's less easy to appreciate the discreet glamour that was the speciality of Ray Aghayan, who has died aged 83. But for 60 years, he guaranteed that difficult divas would arrive on screens and stages projecting perfection. Glamour was so much his habitat that he supervised over a dozen Oscar shows.
His initial diva, he remembered, was even more terrifying than Barbra Streisand: Princess Fawzia of Egypt, first wife of the last Shah of Iran, a woman of movie appearance and wilfulness. Aghayan came from an Armenian family in Tehran, and his widowed mother, Yasmine, designed clothes for the ruling Pahlavi family; the boy, starstruck by Hollywood, was certain he, too, could create, and the amused Fawzia summoned him via her ladies in waiting. She explained to him that she had to wear mourning dress,...
Now that television talent contests are gussied up to Vegas standards, it's less easy to appreciate the discreet glamour that was the speciality of Ray Aghayan, who has died aged 83. But for 60 years, he guaranteed that difficult divas would arrive on screens and stages projecting perfection. Glamour was so much his habitat that he supervised over a dozen Oscar shows.
His initial diva, he remembered, was even more terrifying than Barbra Streisand: Princess Fawzia of Egypt, first wife of the last Shah of Iran, a woman of movie appearance and wilfulness. Aghayan came from an Armenian family in Tehran, and his widowed mother, Yasmine, designed clothes for the ruling Pahlavi family; the boy, starstruck by Hollywood, was certain he, too, could create, and the amused Fawzia summoned him via her ladies in waiting. She explained to him that she had to wear mourning dress,...
- 10/18/2011
- by Veronica Horwell
- The Guardian - Film News
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