Richard with “The Royals” stars William Moseley and Alexandra Park. They discuss how and why they are trying to humanize the royals through their roles on the show.
Watch the whole thing HERE!
https://youtu.be/t1XvUYvdr3s
Richard “Canada AM” interview with actors Elvis Nolasco and Benito Martinez to get the scoop on the new CTV drama ‘American Crime.’
Watch the whole thing HERE!
By Richard Crouse – Metro Canada
The glass slipper fitting on Cinderella’s foot is at the core of the magic of the fairy tale. It is a plot point that cannot be removed. If you do the whole story falls apart.
Real life is different.
Lily James, star of the new Disney live action remake of the Brothers Grimm tale, says the Swarovski slipper she “wears” in the film didn’t fit.
“That is my English humour,” she says. “It didn’t fit anyone. It wasn’t that they just got the size wrong. It’s Swarovski Crystal so it would have broken. They had to CGI it onto my foot, which was a bit of a shame.”
The Downton Abbey star—she plays the rebellious Lady Rose on the hit show—is about to have her name intrinsically connected with the Disney princess, but at the audition she had her eye on another role.
“When you get the casting call for something they pick what part you’re going to go for and they wanted me for [step-sister] Anastasia,” she says. “I remember I wore this pink tie-dyed jumper that the casting director told me to burn. But I had blonde hair because of Downton and they said I should read for Ella.
“I was kind of up for playing the off centre part; the quirkier, funnier part. I paced the corridor for about twenty minutes and the breakdown of the part that Ken [Branagh] had given me kind of struck me. It said she had a generous spirit and a generous nature and an open heart and I think because I didn’t have time to over think I just went in and just read it. I think I was much better for it.”
Her first day on set she shot one of the film’s key scenes, the “love-at-first-sight” meeting between Cinderella and Prince Charming, played by Game of Thrones actor Richard Madden.
“Ken said, ‘How do you feel about shooting that scene first?’ Richard and I didn’t really know each other and Ken caught that nervous energy, that getting-to-know-you, butterflies-in-your-stomach thing. He caught it on camera and I think that was smart. It kind of sets up the whole movie. It feels in that moment that Ella is very strong.”
So how will Downton Abbey fans react to seeing her familiar face as Cinderella?
“I hope lovingly,” she laughs. “I didn’t think there were many similarities but some people have said they think are. I watched the film and in the first scene I thought, ‘Oh no! I’m playing Rose.’ Then thankfully I shed it.”
By Richard Crouse – Metro In Focus
“How do you do a glass shoe?”
It sounds like a question from an age-old nursery rhyme, but was actually a real problem for Sandy Powell, the Academy Award-winning costume designer of the new live-action version of Cinderella.
Powell, whose Oscars for Shakespeare in Love, The Aviator and The Young Victoria decorate her mantle, gave me a sneak peek at the unique shoes given to Cinderella (played by Downton Abbey’s Lily James) by her Fairy Godmother months in advance of this weekend’s opening.
“The glass slipper had nothing to do with any shoemakers because it is made of crystal,” Powell explained.
Working with Swarovski, she designed the shoe, complete with a six-inch heel and 221 facets with their light-reflecting Crystal Blue Aurora Borealis coating, out of solid crystal.
“No one can actually put their foot in that,” she says.
“It’s a prop. In effect I was designing a prop that gets held and gets tried on but for her (to walk in) we made another shoe that was the same shape, in leather, that she could wear and then the visual effects (transformed it to) the glass on her foot.
“The glass shoe was the biggest challenge to do.
“How do you do a glass shoe that doesn’t look ugly and huge?
“Hopefully I have done it. It had to sparkle. And rather than it be made up of lots of little crystals, I thought it would be brilliant if we could make it out of one piece of crystal. We didn’t know if that would be possible.
“We spoke to Swarovski very early on and I thought it should be like a faceted, cut piece of crystal and that’s what we worked on, which took several months.
“They didn’t even know if they could do it.
“We didn’t know if it was going to be possible until the first one came hot off the press.”
Eight crystal shoes were made, but in order to save time and money, there was no left or right foot, just neutral, according to Powell.
“No one is going to notice,” she says. “Doing a pair would have taken twice as long and we never see two at the same time.”
Working with Disney to bring Cinderella to life brings Powell full circle back to the movie that set her on her career path.
She cites the Mouse House’s Mary Poppins as an early influence, adding,
“I’ve always been inspired by clothes and I have always loved films.”
These days, 40 movies and three Oscars later, Powell is still finding plenty of passion in her work.
“I love it.
“It gives me great satisfaction,” she says.
The names Cinderella and Disney go together like bread and butter, peanut butter and jam, or I guess, in this case, Fairy Godmothers and Wannabe Princesses.
Kenneth Branagh and Disney have teamed to breathe new life into an old story but instead of giving it an edgy twenty-first century sheen—no step-sisters toes are amputated in this version—the new “Cinderella” is coated in shimmering fairy dust.
Young Ella (Eloise Webb) has the perfect life. Her loving parents (Hayley Atwell and Ben Chaplin) treat her like a princess, the farm animals talk to her—and she can talk back to them—and all is sunshine and light. Darkness comes as Ella’s mother falls ill, leaving her with the words, “Always have courage and be kind.”
Ella (played as a teenager by “Downton Abbey’s” Lily James) tries to keep those virtues top of mind, but her resilience is severely tested when her father marries Lady Tremaine (Cate Blanchett) and she suddenly finds herself with two self-centered and mean stepsisters (Holliday Grainger and Sophie McShera). After the death of her father Ella’s new family see her as less a sister and more a servant, even dubbing her Cinderella because her house chores leave her covered in soot.
A chance meeting with Kit (Richard Madden)—known to everyone except Ella in the village as the Prince—leads her and a magical pair of glass slippers to the palace of the king and possibly into the arms of the prince.
The newest “Cinderella” takes some liberties with the 1950 animated Disney film, the most famous version of the story. In Branagh’s world Cinderella and the Prince meet before the ball, his royal highness is nicknamed Kit and the Fairy Godmother (Helena Bonham Carter) has an expanded role.
What Branagh hasn’t changed is the idea that physical beauty and marriage are the keys to having a happy and fulfilled life. It’s the kind of retrograde thinking Disney has been moving away from in their recent movies, and yet, here it is at the heart and soul of “Cinderella.” It doesn’t feel particularly progressive, but I’m not sure you can change the story and still honestly call it “Cinderella.”
On the upside, there is strong messaging regarding being comfortable in one’s skin—“The greatest risk anyone can take is to be seen as they really are.”—and the merits of courage and kindness. “They treat me as well as they are able,” Cinderella charitably says about her step-family.
Sexual and familial politics aside, “Cinderella” is a classic and beautiful movie that feels like old-fashioned Disney. There’s an emphasis on the storytelling and fantasy, on good and evil—Blanchett scales new heights in wickedness and looks remarkable while doing so—all supported by sumptuous costumes and set decoration.
“Run All Night” plays like an alternate universe “Taken” set in a world where a killer played by Liam Neeson actually feels remorse for all the havoc he has created.
Once again Neeson is a father who will do almost anything to protect his family, including using his very special set of skills, but the situation is very different from the ones that saw him traverse the globe as kick-ass dad Bryan Mills.
In “Run All Night” he plays Jimmy Conlon, a hitman for the Irish mob. His boss is his childhood friend—his only friend, in fact—kingpin Shawn Maguire (Ed Harris). They have a bond forged by decades of having one another’s backs. The pair are like brothers, until a disagreement between their sons (Boyd Holbrook and Joel Kinnaman) spirals out of control the two best friends become mortal enemies.
Action man du jour Neeson goes mano a mano with Ed Harris and faster than you can say, “Tell everyone to get ready, Jimmy’s coming,” he goes then mano a mano a mano a mano a mano a mano against everyone else in an exhibition of extreme, grunting manliness. Jimmy is a man who has done some very bad things, and continues to, using a very particular set of skills to nullify anyone who gets between him and the safety of his son.
Unlike the “Taken” series, which is content with straight-ahead action, “Run All Night” attempts to deepen the story by examining Jimmy’s conscious, delving into themes of atonement and guilt, topped off with a “I wanted to save you from having the same kind of life I had” subplot. Neeson really wants us to know that Jimmy is a killer but not a bad dad and the emphasis on adding psychological layers to the character drags the movie down in the last forty minutes.
It’s great fun to see Harris and Neeson ooze testosterone and the movie does have some very stylish action scenes plus a relentless hitman (Common) but its efforts to examine Neeson’s Irish guilt aren’t nearly as interesting or well done as the action story.
There’s something missing in the new Adam Sandler movie. Notable in their absence in this story of a cobbler with the uncanny ability to change into other people, are jokes of, how to put this delicately… a gastrointestinal nature, one of the hallmarks of the Sandleronian oeuvre.
In “The Cobbler” he plays Max Simkin, a shoe repairman from a long line of cobblers. Like his father and grandfather before him, he runs the family business on New York City’s Lower East Side. He’s dissatisfied with his work, with his non-existent love life and living with his elderly mom. When he repairs Leon Ludlow’s (Method Man) shoes on an old stitching machine, unused since his father left the business years ago, Max discovers the machine imbues the shoes with the magical power of transformation. With that discover Max steps into a world of wonder where he can be anyone he wants… as long as he has their shoes and they are size 10 ½.
This is a slight movie; a one-joke idea stretched to feature length with the addition of a crime subplot. There will be no spoilers here, but let it be known that by the end of the movie he becomes known as The Cobbler, a guardian of souls.
There are jokes to be made about walking a mile in a man’s shoes before you can presume to know them, but this movie doesn’t make them. In fact, it makes very few actual jokes. There are laughs but this isn’t one of those Adam Sandler movies that strains to make you giggle several times per minute.
It’s one of his kinder, gentler fantasies, like “Click” or “Bedtime Stories.” Sandler is the likeable center of the story, and he carries it through the first half until the plot starts to become cluttered with characters and later, sentiment. The amazing transformation shoes could have been used to deepen the story by showing Max learn about himself as he learns how the other half lives. Instead he goes undercover to get money to buy his mother a headstone which leads him to help an old man keep his apartment and possibly even get a date with a pretty activist (“Fruitvale Station’s” Melonie Diaz). Deep it ain’t.
Then it flies off into a wild flight of fancy that I still can’t decide if it is the greatest or stupidest plot twist ever in a movie. There’ll be no spoilers here, but let’s just say the film is set up to be the first in a series.
“The Cobbler” has more sole than soul, and is a bit flatfooted in its approach to the story, but it is a nice change to see an Adam Sandler movie and not be bombarded with bathroom humor.
August Strindberg’s play 1888 “Miss Julie” comes with a preface stressing several key points in the staging of the work. Liv Ullmann, director of the newest film adaptation of the show—the first appeared in 1912—changes the location of the story from the tradition Swedish setting to Ireland, but other than that, for better and for worse, has adhered to Strindberg’s instructions to keep the text natural, the conflict significant and the staging simple.
The action takes place on Midsummer Night 1890 in a mansion owned by Miss Julie’s (Jessica Chastain) aristocratic father. The rambling place is empty save for maid Cathleen (Samantha Morton), John the valet (Colin Farrell) and the count’s daughter.
The films follows a fiery and complex cat-and-mouse as Miss Julie attempts to seduce the handsome and intelligent John despite the presence of his fiancée Cathleen. It’s a power struggle between the well-born Julie and servant John—who reveals he’s been infatuated with her since childhood—that examines, challenges and upends the traditional notions of 19th century class and gender.
Ullmann’s take on “Miss Julie” is conventional. With the exception of a handful of scenes she remains “stage-bound,” presenting most of the action in kitchen of the manse. It is here the fireworks fly, but they come from the feisty performances and not the filmmaking. For the most part the camera stays out of the way, capturing the action as discreetly as possible. It’s a voyeuristic approach that captures the naturalism and simplicity Strindberg hoped for, even though much of the dialogue and situations (a “kiss the boot” scene feels like it might not have been out of place in “50 Shades of Grey”) are hopelessly theatrical.
By the end you’re left with the feeling that watching the latest “Miss Julie” is less a cinematic experience than it is a heightened theatrical one. I’m not sure it is exactly what Strindberg had in mind.
From Touchwood PR: We work with a charity called POV 3rd Street that helps young adults in at-risk communities who have a desire and drive for media by giving them their first shot in the industry. We are holding a fundraiser on April 9th emcee’d by the awesome Richard Crouse with a musical performance by the emerging sensation Tash Lorayne. There will be lots of goodies available in our silent auction along with food and free booze. Tickets are $150 and all proceeds go to making a difference in a young person’s life. https://pov3rdstreet.com for more info on the organization.
