Sir Tom Stoppard is returning to the BBC after more than 30 years with a lavish adaptation of Parade's End, the quartet of novels by Ford Madox Ford.
Beginning in the years before the First World War, it stars Benedict Cumberbatch as Christopher Tietjens, a cuckolded husband, and Rebecca Hall as his adulterous wife Sylvia.
Adelaide Clemens, an Australian actress, plays Valentine, a spirited suffragette who falls in love with Cumberbatch’s buttoned-up civil servant.
The five-part costume drama is a BBC/HBO co-production to be shown on both sides of the Atlantic, and is believed to be the most expensive production ever broadcast on BBC Two with a budget of around £12 million part-funded by the US network.
Benedict Cumberbatch, star of Sherlock, is now an international name with forthcoming roles in Hollywood blockbusters The Hobbit and the new Star Trek film.star.
However, Parade’s End director Susanna White had to convince HBO bosses to cast him when he was a relative unknown.
She said: “Christopher was probably the hardest character to cast because he’s such a buttoned-up Englishman who doesn't show his emotions, and yet you have to fall in love with him and want to follow his journey over five hours.
“There was really only a tiny amount of people we felt could play him. Benedict seemed so right for the part but he was less well-known when we started out.
“There was a famous breakfast at The Ivy when HBO said, ‘Who is this Benedict Cumberbatch?’ And we said, ‘Trust us, he’s a truly great actor and by the time Parade’s End has come out everyone will have heard of him’.
“And of course, now everyone in America has heard of him.”
READ MORE: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/9432700/Parades-End-Who-is-this-Benedict-Cumberbatch.html
No comments:
Post a Comment