15 Surprising Facts About Tom Hardy

Mental Floss
Jennifer M Wood

You don't have to be a Hollywood insider to know that Tom Hardy is widely considered to be one of the most talented actors of his generation … and that he has a reputation for not always being willing to play by Hollywood’s rules.

Since making his onscreen debut in 2001, the London native has gone on to collaborate with some of the world’s most talented filmmakers, including Ridley Scott, George Miller, Alejandro González Iñárritu, Sofia Coppola, and Christopher Nolan (on three occasions, and counting). He also created, produced, and starred in the FX hit Taboo and earned an Oscar nomination for his role in The Revenant—and all of this before hitting the big 4-0.

1. HE WON A TELEVISION MODELING CONTEST.

Technically, Tom Hardy’s onscreen debut came in 1998, when he took part in a modeling contest on the British morning show The Big Breakfast. Among the facts we learned about the then-21-year-old: He was a drama student who idolized Gary Oldman, liked Eddie Izzard, wanted to write and direct his own short films, and didn’t like football. And yes, he won.

2. HE MADE HIS ONSCREEN DEBUT IN BAND OF BROTHERS.
In September of 1998, shortly after he began attending the Drama Centre London, Hardy dropped out when he was offered a role in the Steven Spielberg-produced WWII miniseries Band of Brothers (2001). When asked about the experience by IGN in 2002, Hardy said that, “Band of Brothers was my first job so I was virtually out of the frying pan and into the fire, really. I'd not had previous experience with working in front of the camera, so there was dealing with that. Also, I had the research material—not that I'd need it. I mean, I was in two episodes and had 12 lines. That was the sum total of work [I] had to do.”

Hardy made his big-screen debut in 2001 as well, playing Twombly in Ridley Scott’s Black Hawk Down. “I was the Ranger who got left behind,” he told IGN. “He was sort of, if you could call it, comic relief to [a] very precarious situation.”

3. HE WENT TO SCHOOL WITH MICHAEL FASSBENDER.
While attending the Drama Centre London, Hardy looked up to a fellow student who was two years older than him: Michael Fassbender. “He was a really serious method actor and we used to watch him and think, ‘F**k, man! He’s the sh*t!,’” Hardy told The Daily Beast. “He was in an Irish play about this guy who came back from the First World War who was a great athlete but ended up in a wheelchair, but at lunchtime he wouldn’t come out of character and was always in his wheelchair and we’d be like, ‘Dude! Just order your lunch and come along! We’ve got an hour before we have to go back to class! But he was the best actor in the school.” (Fassbender, too, landed a role in Band of Brothers.)

4. HARDY REPLACED FASSBENDER IN TINKER TAILOR SOLDIER SPY.
Though their careers have taken different paths, Hardy and Fassbender overlapped a bit in 2010, when Hardy replaced Fassbender as British operative “Tricky” Ricky Tarr in Tomas Alfredson’s 2011 adaptation of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, a Cold War thriller based on the John le Carré novel.

5. HE IDOLIZES GARY OLDMAN.
That aforementioned modeling contest wouldn’t be the only time Hardy expressed his admiration of Gary Oldman. In 2011, he told ShortList that, “Gary Oldman is my absolute complete and utter hero. He’s the f**king man. I look at him and I want to be like that for my generation—I want to have that same quality. He’s incredible.”

That same year, Hardy got the chance to star alongside Oldman in the Oscar-nominated Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. “There is a definite ‘hang on a minute’ [moment], but I’ve got past the star-struck part now,” Hardy said of getting the chance to act opposite Oldman. They have since worked together on three more films: Lawless (2012), The Dark Knight Rises (2012), and Child 44 (2015).


READ MORE; http://mentalfloss.com/article/504331/15-surprising-facts-about-tom-hardy

Tom Hiddleston, Hugh Laurie interview for The Night Manager

Further cast announced for Hamlet starring Benedict Cumberbatch

WHAT'S ON STAGE
Rosie Bannister • London, Off-West End • 2 Apr 2015



Ciarán Hinds and Anastasia Hille will join Benedict Cumberbatch in Hamlet at the Barbican Theatre later this year.

Hinds, whose recent theatre credits include The Night Alive and Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, will play Claudius in Lyndsey Turner's production, with Hille (The Effect, The Master Builder) as Gertrude.

They are joined by Sian Brooke as Ophelia, Kobna Holdbrook-Smith as Laertes, Jim Norton as Polonius and Leo Bill as Horatio.

READ MORE HERE: http://www.whatsonstage.com/london-theatre/news/benedict-cumberbatch-hamlet-cast_37524.html

Benedict Cumberbatch: Breaking the code to stardom

EXPRESS
By: Robert Paisley
Published: Sun, November 16, 2014



The rise and rise of Benedict Cumberbatch has taken him from Harrow School via a Tibetan monastery to Baker Street and Hollywood. Now the next stop may be the Oscars thanks to his role in new movie The Imitation Game.

"It's been a lovely sort of slow build and this is just a great time," says the newly-engaged star, who says what surprises him most about his ascent is his sex symbol status.

"I am not a typical beauty," says Benedict, 38. "Mine is a weird face; a cross between that of an otter and something people find vaguely attractive. I've got a long face and a long neck which, for an actor, is useful in period roles. So my approach has been to wear high collars in period dramas and to turn my collar up in 21st-century dramas, like Sherlock."

His acting abilities are far more extensive and first bloomed 25 years ago when he played Titania, Queen of the Fairies, at his all-boys boarding school production of A Midsummer Night's Dream.

Benedict was a leading light of Harrow's Rattigan Society, the drama club named after old Harrovian and playwright Terence Rattigan, but before continuing his acting studies at Manchester University he spent a gap year in Darjeeling, India, teaching English in a Tibetan-run monastery.



"It was such a different environment from what I had left and I learnt far more than I taught during that year," he says.

Benedict emerged with a Zen-like calm that has served him well in showbusiness, and having actors as parents has helped him cope with career fluctuations.

"I had two parents who had lived with all the perils. I knew what the negatives were so when they hit I was prepared for them and just grafted on," says Benedict of Wanda Ventham and Timothy Carlton. They also played his parents in Sherlock.

Benedict made his mark playing classic roles in small theatres before graduating to leading parts at the prestigious Royal Court, Almeida and National Theatre.

He returns to the London stage for 12 weeks next summer, in what he describes as "a little play called Hamlet at the Barbican". Tickets for his return to Shakespeare sold even faster than concerts by One Direction and Beyonce.

His television career began with guest spots in Heartbeat and Spooks and then leading roles as Stephen Hawking, Guy Burgess and Vincent Van Gogh before his mercurial magic as Sherlock in 2010, but Benedict almost turned down the role.

"It was such an iconic character, the most filmed one in all of fiction, so I knew it would be a very exposing role with a lot of focus on it and I wondered if I really wanted to take that step into the limelight.

"It was such good material, though, that I took it and I'm glad I did as it is great fun to play the number one consulting detective and high functioning sociopath.

"I was amazed at how vocal and immediate the response was from the TV audience. All that tweeting and blogging was a new experience for me and overwhelming."

With Sherlock an instant hit, suddenly Benedict was in demand for movies. After smaller roles in British films Starter For Ten and Atonement he suddenly had Steven Spielberg casting him in War Horse, joined the all star cast of Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and then Danny Boyle recruited him for the National Theatre's Frankenstein.

"It might seem like that whole momentum came from one particular role but Steven Spielberg had not actually seen me in Sherlock at that time, neither had Danny Boyle nor Tinker Tailor director Tomas Alfredson. What these people do with their spare time I don't know!" Playing Peter Guillam in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy was a special thrill for Benedict because he had long wanted to be a spy, on screen or in reality.



READ MORE HERE:http://www.express.co.uk/news/showbiz/535985/Rise-of-actor-Benedict-Cumberbatch

Benedict Cumberbatch secret BBC project revealed: Actor to front Best of BBC Drama trailer

MIRROR
Oct 28, 2014 13:15
By Carl Greenwood



Benedict Cumberbatch is to front a new trailer showcasing the best of BBC drama.

The Sherlock actor - who has reportedly been cast as Doctor Strange in Marvel's new superhero film of the same name - will front the trailer which will celebrate the best of British drama.

Cumberbatch will read the All the World’s a Stage monologue from William Shakespeare’s As You Like It as the supercut trailer celebrates BBC drama with moments from seminal productions past, present and future.

The BBC previously teased the actor's involvement in the secret project on Twitter, leading fans to suspect all kind of things were going on.

New shows given their first airing as part of the celebration include the adaptation of JK Rowling's novel The Casual Vacancy, Dame Judi Dench and Dustin Hoffman's drama Esio Trot and One Child from BAFTA-winning writer Guy Hibbert.

The highly-anticipated adaptation of Hilary Mantel's Man Booker Prize winning historical novel Wolf Hall will also feature, alongside the remake of Poldark and Jimmy McGovern's new eight part series Strange and Norrell.

Doctor Who, Luther, Last Tango in Halifax and Sherlock will also feature as will Call The Midwife, Happy Valley and EastEnders.

The Fall, Line of Duty, Death in Paradise and Peaky Blinders will also be shown, adding to the roster of impressive contemporary drama the BBC producers.

The trailer will also look back at some of the most successful and beloved dramas of the past including The Singing Detective, House of Cards, Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, This Life, Pride and Prejudice, Criminal Justice, Small Island, Spooks and Life on Mars.


READ MORE HERE: http://www.mirror.co.uk/tv/tv-news/benedict-cumberbatch-secret-bbc-project-4522664

Tom Hardy 'secretly married' fiancée Charlotte in France TWO months ago - they kept that quiet

THE DAILY MIRROR
21 SEPTEMBER, 2014
By Katy Forrester



Tom Hardy and Charlotte Riley have secretly married.

Peaky Blinders star Tom Hardy has reportedly tied the knot with his actress fiancée. Hearts. Break. Everywhere.

The 37-year-old hunk, who has been dating Charlotte Riley since 2009, married in the South of France and managed to keep it a secret for more than two months. How they managed to keep that quiet, we're not too sure.

Tom and Charlotte, 32, decided it would be an intimate affair and were joined by a small group of friends and family at the 18th-century castle Chateau de Roussan in Provence on July 4.

The actor has a six-year-old son, Louis, by ex-girlfriend Rachael Speed, who was also at the wedding.

A family source told The Sun on Sunday newspaper: "It was a beautiful, low-key day made even more special because they just had their closest friends and family around them.



http://www.mirror.co.uk/3am/celebrity-news/tom-hardy-secretly-married-fiance-4297447#ixzz3EApNzOny
Follow us: @DailyMirror on Twitter | DailyMirror on Facebook

Colin Firth would love to return to television, if a show would have him (ATTENTION JULIAN FELLOWES)

MIRROR
Sep 03, 2014 16:14 By Carl Greenwood



Colin Firth would love to return to his television roots - if only a show would have him.

The 53-year-old Oscar-winning actor - who made his name on TV almost 20 years ago as the wet Mr Darcy in period drama Pride And Prejudice - has since been enjoying success on the big screen.

On Tuesday night, Firth was lauded with a GQ Men Of The Year gong for leading man, to add to his already-bulging trophy cabinet.

Speaking at the awards party in the Royal Opera House, the Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and King's Speech star said he was tempted to make the move back to TV if he was offered a meaty enough role.

"I would definitely do TV, at the drop of a hat, if I was offered a good role," he said.

A string of established Hollywood stars, including Kevin Spacey in Netflix drama House of Cards and Halle Berry in sci-fi adventure Extant, have made the switch recently to TV, where drama is enjoying a golden age.

But Firth said: "I haven't really been offered anything."


http://www.mirror.co.uk/tv/tv-news/colin-firth-would-love-return-4158523#ixzz3CHUs3U00 
Follow us: @DailyMirror on Twitter | DailyMirror on Facebook

Benedict Cumberbatch & Tom Hardy Shortlisted for 'Doctor Strange'

FIRST SHOWING NET
by Ethan Anderton
June 9, 2014
Source: Deadline



The weekend finally brought news that Marvel had locked down a director for the troubled production of Ant-Man with Yes Man and The Break-Up director Peyton Reed getting behind the camera and Anchorman and Step Brothers writer/director Adam McKay contributing to the script before cameras roll next month. Now Marvel is looking ahead to their next developing Phase Three title, Doctor Strange. The comic book studio has already lined up Deliver Us from Evil and Sinister director Scott Derrickson to be at the helm, and now Deadline reports Benedict Cumberbatch and Tom Hardy are candidates to star.

Read on here!

In "Locke," Tom Hardy Only Needs a Car and a Camera to Prove He's the Best Actor Alive

COMPLEX POP CULTURE
BY MATT BARONE | APR 25, 2014 | 9:42 AM



Directed by British screenwriter turned shotcaller Steven Knight, Locke is the epitome of cinematic minimalism. Hardy plays Ivan Locke, a construction manager who gets into the driver's seat of his BMW the night before he's supposed to oversee the biggest concrete pour in Europe's history. But that's the last thing on Locke's mind. As his wife and teenage son call him on the BMW's dashboard phone system, Locke heads down the M5 motorway en route to London, where an older woman he had a one-night stand with is about to give birth to their out-of-wedlock baby. And for nearly 85 minutes straight, Knight's cameras remain inside the car and focus on Locke as he battles through a whirlwind of emotions and comes to terms with the awful way he's about to rip his family apart, not to mention put his successful career in jeopardy.

Indeed, Locke is simply Tom Hardy in a car for a little less than 90 minutes, and it's amazingly captivating and intense. Behind the camera, Knight does a fine job adding unforeseen dimensions and raw energy to his single, claustrophobic location. But let's not get it twisted—Tom Hardy is the film's undeniable MVP.

Nearly matching the beguiling brilliance of his strange Bane voice, Hardy gives Ivan Locke a somewhat exaggerated but consistently pitch-perfect Welsh accent. Why? Hell if I know, but it's an inspired choice, one that exemplifies Hardy's singular risk-taking decisions as an actor. He sports a scruffy beard that undercuts his natural-born handsomeness, lending the character a jovial-neighbor-next-door appeal that's absent in every role he's played before Ivan Locke. He owns all of Knight the screenwriter's dialogue, transmitting an array of feeling, from overwhelming sadness to on-edge anger and manufactured calmness, through little more than facial expressions.

There's a point in Locke where the film nearly jumps the shark, or, for a more appropriate metaphor, crashes the figurative car. Knight mixes pieces of Locke's back-story into his phone conversations, hinting at a painful relationship with his now-deceased father. In the beginning of his trip, Locke swigs medicine to fight a head cold, and after one swallow too many, he begins to imagine that his dad is riding in the BMW's backseat. Fortunately, there isn't an actor playing Locke's own Dexter-like "dark passenger"—Hardy just talks to himself in the rear-view mirror.

It's a potentially silly move on Knight's part, and had he cast a lesser actor to pull off such inherently goofy scenes, Knight could have derailed the entire production. Hardy, however, taps back into the skill he employed to turn Charles Bronson's straight-to-the-camera monologues into towering moments of sheer force, though that specific talent is downplayed in Locke. In Knight's vehicle, he makes his character's fiery but overcooked talk of joining his pops in heaven sound beautifully wrenching.

READ MORE HERE: http://www.complex.com/pop-culture/2014/04/locke-tom-hardy-movie-review

Benedict Cumberbatch By Colin Firth

TIME MAGAZINE
BY COLIN FIRTH
APRIL 23, 2014

When I was about 25 years old, I worked with two very good actors. The encounters were brief, but I’ve remembered them both with great admiration. Wanda Ventham and Timothy Carlton both embodied qualities which one is fogyishly tempted to look at with nostalgia. Along with very considerable talent, they had elegance, glamor, wit, kindness and decency.

I didn’t know at the time that they were married or that they had a son of about 10 who was quietly gestating all the same attributes. And now, 30 years later, the boy has been let loose. He has taken the form of Benedict Cumberbatch.

His parents’ qualities are on rampant display. It’s rare to the point of outlandish to find so many variables in one actor, including features which ought to be incompatible: vulnerability, a sense of danger, a clear intellect, honesty, courage — and a rather alarming energy. I take no pleasure in feeling humbled, but there’s no getting around it.

READ MORE HERE: http://time.com/70781/benedict-cumberbatch-2014-time-100/

Colin Firth on stardom: 'You're a bit part in a farce'

Donna Freydkin,
USA TODAY
10:07 p.m. EDT April 13, 2014


(Photo: Stan Godlewski for USA TODAY)

"You're a bit part in a farce. You're not the star of some big tragedy. If you lose your sense of the absurd, you're likely to become miserable. Don't take this lofty position that the fruit baskets and first-class travel are vulgar. Laugh it off. You're not winning a Nobel Prize for science. We're not that important. Treat it as a rather enjoyable farce," says Firth. "All we do is what we like. We put on costumes and pretend, which is very similar to what I was doing when I was 5."

And yet, says Firth, treat your work, and those who do it with you, with respect. "Every so often, you get brought up short that you had a brush with something important. This story is important and you're entrusted with that," he says of his and Irvine's film, about a tortured World War II prisoner who forgives his tormentors.

Firth and Irvine have a pretty solid connection.

"If I have half the career Colin has had and could be half as decent…" muses Irvine.

Firth still makes ladies swoon for his portrayal of dreamy Mr. Darcy in the 1995 British TV adaptation of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice, and won a best-actor Oscar for playing a stuttering monarch in 2010's The King's Speech. And Irvine carried Steven Spielberg's 2011 epic War Horse before being hand-picked by Firth to play the youthful version of train engineer turned POW Eric Lomax in The Railway Man.

Seeing someone so chiseled and fresh-faced playing him is, admits Firth, "a little humbling, I'm afraid. Particularly as I'm being told that he does a better Colin Firth than I do. I think it might be time to retire."

But not before he and Irvine discuss and dissect all the perks and perils of their chosen careers.

On choosing their roles wisely: For Firth, who has starred in musicals (Mamma Mia!), romantic romps (Bridget Jones's Diary) and shadowy capers (Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy), it comes down to what feels right in the moment. Sometimes, he's up for a lark. Other times, he craves something more serious. "I find the criteria change every time. This one, heavily weighing in the scales was the importance of the story and why the hell wasn't it told," says Firth. And for Irvine, a World War II buff, it came down to the importance of telling this particular story. "It's also a movie about the very best in people. I can't relate to what Eric went through but I can't imagine forgiving someone. That's one of the most extraordinary things," says Irvine, who vacillates between big studio films and smaller fare like Railway Man.

On being a public figure: Firth, dapper and debonair as he is, is someone who lives his life behind closed doors, by choice. He's married to Italian environmental activist Livia Giuggioli, and has two sons with her, Luca, 13 and Matteo, 10 (and an older son from a relationship with actress Meg Tilly). "It's not my life plan to be private but I've never intended otherwise. I've never had an instinct to do it any other way. When I was Jeremy's age, I never imagined my work would put me in front of a camera. I liked doing plays. I didn't bargain for any level of recognition, really," says Firth. "My instinct to retreat when I'm not on is a driving force. I wear the same things most of the time when I show up now. It's a single body armor for that duty. And the rest is simply nobody's business." For Irvine, it's still a learning process when he's recognized. "When someone catches you off-guard, when you're out shopping, I often think I'm more nervous than them," he says.

 READ MORE HERE: http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/people/2014/04/13/colin-firth-jeremy-irvine-railway-man/7509177/

Tom Hardy To Star In BBC Miniseries Taboo From Steven Knight And Ridley Scott

BLEEDING COOL
Posted on April 3, 2014 by Linda Ge



Tom Hardy and Steven Knight must have really, really loved working together on Locke, because not only is Hardy going to play a role in season 2 of Knight’s Peaky Blinders series, now they’re doing another TV project together.

Taboo is the name, and it’s a historical thriller, which also has Ridley Scott on board as an executive producer. Filming on the 8-episode series will begin in early 2015. Hardy’s a busy man, after all.

Here’s the official synopsis:

Set in 1813, TABOO follows James Keziah Delaney (Hardy), a rogue adventurer who returns from Africa with 14 ill-gotten diamonds to seek vengeance after the death of his father. Refusing to sell the family business to the East India Company, he sets out to build his own trade and shipping empire and finds himself playing a dangerous game with two warring nations, Britain and America.

READ MORE HERE: http://www.bleedingcool.com/2014/04/03/tom-hardy-to-star-in-bbc-miniseries-taboo-from-steven-knight-and-ridley-scott/

Benedict Cumberbatch: ice driving in Finland (High Life Article)

HIGH LIFE
Benedict Cumberbatch wraps up in snowy Finland
Joe Windsor-Williams for High Life magazine
April 2014



Benedict Cumberbatch ditches his trademark detective's coat for thermals as he dares to cheat death driving on ice in central Finland. Gavin Green joins him

 The frozen lake we're standing on is speaking to us. It's a groaning, creaking voice, almost of pain, from way down deep in the icy abyss. 'Listen to that,' says Benedict Cumberbatch, dressed in a thick fur-collared jacket, black salopettes, chunky blue scarf, big snow boots, thick gloves and woolly hat. He looks more Scott of the Antarctic than Sherlock Holmes of Baker Street. 'It sounds absolutely magical,' he says, concentrating hard on the sound of the ice moaning beneath us, around us. There is no other sound. It's too cold for birds or people or animals, too isolated for traffic.

'The ice is quite solid, I assume?' asks Benedict, articulating what we're all thinking. We're about to power around this frozen lake in a range of Jaguar sports cars and nobody wants their F-Type to turn submarine. 'Quite solid,' says our Finnish instructor, Tomi. He shows us a contraption that measures ice thickness. 'It's 35cm,' he says reassuringly. (That's just over a foot.) 'Although maybe less thick in places.' (An unhelpful postscript.)

We're in southern central Finland taking part in a Jaguar winter-driving course. Alongside me is probably the biggest British TV or film star since Anthony Hopkins made Hannibal a cannibal or Colin Firth performed his royal stammer. In excess of 16 million Brits watched Benedict reappear as Sherlock Holmes for his third series on BBC1, making it the most-watched — and certainly best-loved — British TV drama in over a decade.

He's tall (6ft), ramrod straight, just 37, slim (though trying to bulk up for his next part as a mercenary in Blood Mountain), has a blemish-free and stubble-free complexion, ice-blue eyes and swept-back auburn brown hair — which was dyed black for Sherlock, blond for Julian Assange in The Fifth Estate.

It was Sherlock, of course, that made him a star. Since that first series in 2010, it's been nonstop. 'I've played so many characters so fast,' he tells me. 'I had a bank holiday weekend to transfer from Sherlock Holmes into Christopher Tietjens [in Parade's End].'

On the frozen lake, driving a fast car, Benedict applies himself with the customary concentration of Sherlock solving a murder mystery. 'I do take challenges seriously,' he admits. Tomi and a former Finnish female rally champion, Minna ('She's the fastest driver here,' says Tomi) show him how to steer, how to brake and how to accelerate, to get the Jaguar to dance on ice.

His enthusiasm and determination are as clear as the bright Arctic light. At first, he spins (we all do). Later, after some practice, he's powering and pirouetting around the Finnish ice lake, more Senna than Sherlock.

Cumberbatch's intensity comes as no surprise. You have to be committed and laser-focused, I guess, if you're going to morph convincingly from Sherlock Holmes to Stephen Hawking, from Vincent van Gogh to Julian Assange, from Frankenstein and the monster to Smaug the Dragon. He's been an aristocratic WWI army officer (in Parade's End and War Horse — he says he has the face for it), a secret agent (in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy), a slave owner (12 Years a Slave) and a Star Trek arch-villain. He's been Pitt the Younger and Young Rumpole. He's even been on Sesame Street — 'one of the best fun things I've ever done'.

READ MORE HERE  :http://highlife.ba.com/Destinations/Benedict-Cumberbatch-ice-driving-in-Finland.html

EastEnders' Danny Dyer: 'I get stereotyped unlike posh boy Cumberbatch'

DIGITAL SPY
By Tom Eames
Wednesday, Mar 26 2014, 5:52am EDT

Danny Dyer has hit out at "snobbery" within showbiz circles and said that he struggles with "playing the game".

The EastEnders actor revealed that he feels stars such as Benedict Cumberbatch are taken more seriously than him, despite his acting background.

He told Woman magazine: "You've got actors like Benedict Cumberbatch - a great actor, but he's a posh boy playing posh boys. He does it well, and he doesn't get mocked for that.

"I play working class people, and I get mocked for it. I'm stereotyped, he's not. I've done plays at the National Theatre, come off stage and gone into the bar and I ain't got nothing in common with those people.

"When it comes to playing the game, I'm rubbish. The middle-class actors are better prepped at working the system, because they've got more in common with the decision makers."

Dyer, who plays Queen Vic landlord Mick Carter in EastEnders, also revealed that the show's bosses have asked him to tone down his remarks on Twitter now that he is working for the BBC.

Read more: http://www.digitalspy.com/celebrity/s2/eastenders/news/a560229/eastenders-danny-dyer-i-get-stereotyped-unlike-posh-boy-cumberbatch.html#ixzz2x7HTju8B 

Follow us: @digitalspy on Twitter | digitalspyuk on Facebook

Tom Hardy and his father, Edward 'Chips' Hardy, to write and star in Bluebell

XPOSE ENTERTAINMENT
Monday, March 10, 2014

Tom Hardy has teamed up with his father to write and star in new series 'Bluebell'.

The 36-year-old actor and his writer father Edward - who is known as Chips - have been working together on a new detective series in which he will take on the lead role of Detective Bluebell.

A source said: ''It's a lovely project for the pair of them.

''Tom has been wanting to do more writing and directing with his dad being a novelist, it means they can tap into each other's expertise. They have been working on it for a while as they initially submitted the pilot over a year ago.''

'The Dark Knight Rises' star - who is also set to appear on the small screen in the second series of BBC Two gangster drama 'Peaky Blinders' - is expected to see his first writing project come to life as early as next year, as 'Bluebell' has now been commissioned by Sky Atlantic.

read more here: http://www.tv3.ie/entertainment_article.php?locID=1.803.813&article=128515

Are Benedict Cumberbatch & Gary Oldman Locked In For STAR WARS: EPISODE VII?

COMIC BOOK MOVIE.COM
By Mark "RorMachine" Cassidy - 2/24/2014



At this stage I know we're all fed up with constant rumors and would like some solid news - but, MarketSaw have been on the ball when it comes to Star Wars related scoops in the past, so their latest casting updates might be worth paying attention to..

MarketSaw (who actually broke the news that Lucasfilm had plans for the new Star Wars trilogy in the first place) are reporting on some casting updates for the J.J. Abrams directed flick, as well as providing some possible plot information. According to them not only are Ford, Hamill and Fisher locked in, but Billy Dee Williams (Lando), Ian McDiarmid (Emperor Palpatine) Anthony Daniels (C3PO) and Warwick Davies (Wicket) too. As for the new faces, they reckon that long rumored cast addition Benedict Cumberbatch is in, and so is Gary Oldman - who recently confirmed that he'd had some "conversations", but never really indicated if he would take them up on the offer or not. Here's the most interesting part:

"I believe Cumberbatch and Oldman were pursued for the same role. I don't know how that will work out with the script changes, but I'm told they are both involved."

Read more at http://www.comicbookmovie.com/fansites/notyetamovie/news/?a=95083#6sss8K2DWsbh1tIp.99
 

Benedict Cumberbatch Reading R. Kelly Lyrics Is One Of The Best Things We've Seen

MARIE CLAIRE
by Suzannah Ramsdale
06:07 | 20 Jan 2014

 

Maybe we're a bit late to the party, but this weekend we came across this video of Benedict Cumberbatch reading the lyrics to a particularly raunchy R. Kelly song. And, it's all kinds of awesome.

Read more at http://www.marieclaire.co.uk/blogs/suzannah-ramsdale/545395/benedict-cumberbatch-
reading-r-kelly-is-one-of-the-best-things-we-ve-seen-in-a-long-time.html#7flQrhTU7mexdvlp.99

Tom Hardy Drives a Car For 85 Minutes, And It's Mesmerizing

VANITY FAIR
BY JULIE MILLER
JANUARY 17, 2014 2:49 PM

\

There are worse places to spend 85 minutes than inside a car with Tom Hardy, even he ignores you the entire time to make calls on speakerphone. This lesson comes courtesy of Steven Knight’s experimental Sundance entry Locke, during which Hardy does just that in real time without ever exiting his vehicle or speaking to another person face-to-face.

And despite those somewhat extreme constraints, the drama is compelling, genuinely moving, and suspenseful. It's a singular achievement for Knight, who also wrote the drama’s measured script, and Hardy, who manages to propel the story forward even though his butt is planted in the same position for an hour and a half.

The film opens on Hardy, a construction manager named Ivan Locke, as he steps into his BMW S.U.V. and leaves a work site. During each phone call Locke makes, the audience slowly discovers more about Hardy and his late-night excursion via trickles of exposition. Knight carefully unfurls more stakes about why Hardy’s car ride is so urgent, why his family is so disappointed in him, and why the timing of his trip is so damning for his construction company.

As the pressure on Hardy’s character mounts, the actor never resorts to showing his stress by going Nic Cage on us—raising his voice, banging on a steering wheel, or flipping off speeding passersby. Instead, he speaks in a Welsh accent so lilting and soothing that we would personally request it for our iOS if we lived in a future Her-type universe that allowed us to make these kinds of decisions. Even though he maintains composure (for the most part), and his position at the wheel for the entirety of the movie, Hardy, with Knight's direction, is able to summon legitimate suspense thanks to the script’s snaking personal revelations, which are masterfully laid out.


READ MORE HERE: http://www.vanityfair.com/vf-hollywood/tom-hardy-locke-sundance