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Pattinson Premiere

Bong Joon Ho‘s upcoming science fiction film, “Mickey 17,” is scheduled to debut in South Korean theaters on Feb. 28, preceding its global release by a week, Warner Bros. Korea said on Friday. The $118 million production is Bong’s first directorial effort since the Oscar-winning “Parasite.”

Pattinson is set to join Bong in Seoul on Jan. 20 to kick off the movie’s promotional tour. The duo will participate in a press conference and showcase exclusive footage at Cgv Yongsan.

Based on the 2022 novel “Mickey7” by Edward Ashton, the sci-fi thriller stars Pattinson an “expendable” employee named Mickey Barnes. In the novel, Mickey is sent on dangerous missions to colonize an ice planet. When one version of Mickey dies, a duplicate is created to replace him that retains most of his memories. The cast also includes Steven Yeun, Naomi Ackie, Toni Collette and Mark Ruffalo.

Irish TV Appointment

Screen...

Our journey through Michael Caine’s 80s work reaches one of his best: Educating Rita, co-starring a powerhouse Julie Walters in the title role.

Michael Caine showed no sign of slowing down as he entered his third decade as a leading man. The 1980s would see him win his first Academy Award (Hannah And Her Sisters), tackle new genres such as horror (The Hand) and shark-based revenge movie (Jaws The Revenge) while continuing to work with interesting new auteurs like Brian De Palma (Dressed to Kill) as well as old friends from classic Hollywood such as John Huston (Escape To Victory).

Film by film, I’ll be taking a look at Caine’s 1980s filmography to see what hidden gems I can unearth alongside the more familiar classics…

Spoilers for Educating Rita ahead…

Directed by: Lewis Gilbert

Tagline: Frank Bryant is a professor of literature. And Rita is his newest student.

Louise Brealey plays Helen, a chicken factory worker who gets a second chance at love, in Janis Pugh’s uplifting crowdpleaser

There is a terrific warmth and emotional generosity to this romantic comedy-drama from the Welsh film-maker Janis Pugh, and if the storytelling in the end hits some familiar C-major chords, it’s not before a lot of inventive entertainment with quasi-musical sequences showing people singing along to the radio or the stereo morphing into full-on fantasy. I can imagine this being a stage musical crowdpleaser with serious ker-ching potential, packing the audiences in like something by Tim Firth or Willy Russell.

Louise Brealey and Annabel Scholey give seductive lead performances. Brealey plays Helen, a gentle soul living in a small town on the Welsh border with Merseyside, working at a local chicken factory. Her personal life is a deeply unhappy mess: her bullying and emotionally damaged husband has brought...

I have some sad news to report today. Actor Bernard Hill passed away at the age of 79. His death was confirmed by his agent, Lou Coulson.

Hill is known for playing Captain Edward Smith in James Cameron’s Titanic and notably for playing Theoden King of Rohan in Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings films. He also played Luther Plunkitt in Clint Eastwood’s True Crime.

He played many other roles, including Yosser Hughes in the BBC show Boys from the Blackstuff. Hill was due to return to TV on the second series of The Responder with Martin Freeman on BBC.

According to the BBC, Hill was supposed to appear at Comic Con Liverpool on Saturday but was canceled.

We’re heartbroken to hear the news of Bernard Hill’s passing. A great loss. Thinking of his family at this very sad time, and wishing them a lot of strength.

Bernard Hill has sadly passed away.

The actor best known for roles in Titanic and the Lord of the Rings trilogy, has died at the age of 79.

Keep reading to find out more…

His agent Lou Coulson confirmed to BBC News that he died in the early hours of Sunday (May 5). His family is expected to make a statement.

Singer and actress Barbara Dickson confirmed the news on social media: “It’s with great sadness that I note the death of Bernard Hill. We worked together in John Paul George Ringo and Bert, Willy Russell marvellous show 1974-1975. A really marvellous actor. It was a privilege to have crossed paths with him. Rip Benny x,” she wrote.

Bernard is best known for his roles as Théoden, King of Rohan, in the Lotr trilogy, and the part of Captain Edward Smith in Titanic.

He also played the character of Yosser Hughes...

Nicole Scherzinger, Succession star Sarah Snook, Game of Thrones and Sherlock actor Mark Gatiss, a revival of the musical Sunset Boulevard and the play Stranger Things: The First Shadow were among the winners at the 2024 Olivier Awards, which celebrate achievements in London theater. The ceremony at Royal Albert Hall in the British capital was hosted by Ted Lasso star Hannah Waddingham.

The revival of Andrew Lloyd Webber‘s Sunset Boulevard, which has starred Scherzinger as Norma Desmond and is set to come to Broadway this year, won the best musical revival award, the best actress honor for the former Pussycat Dolls singer and five other honors after also leading the nominations with 11.

Stranger Things: The First Shadow, a prequel to the Netflix hit series, which has hinted at its Broadway ambitions, won the best new entertainment or comedy play award, as well as the Olivier for best set design.

Dear England,...

Sarah Snook, Sarah Jessica Parker, Andrew Scott and David Tennant were among the nominees for the 2024 Olivier Awards, which celebrate achievements in London theater.

Parker was nominated for best actress for her role in Plaza Suite, opposite her husband, Matthew Broderick, while Snook was nominated in the same category for her one-woman take on The Picture of Dorian Gray. Tennant was nominated for best actor for his role in Macbeth, in the same category as Andrew Scott, in a one-man version of Vanya.

Sunset Boulevard, which starred Nicole Scherzinger, who is also nominated, and is set to come to Broadway next year, received 11 nominations, while Dear England, a play by James Graham about an English football manager, received nine nominations. Stranger Things: The First Shadow, a prequel to the television series, which has also hinted at its Broadway ambitions, is up for best new entertainment or comedy play.

The Olivier...

Stars including Sarah Jessica Parker, Sarah Snook, Andrew Scott and David Tennant will compete for Olivier Awards at the UK’s most prestigious theater ceremony next month.

The Sex and the City stars is up for Best Actress for her performance in Plaza Suite – her first Olivier – while Succession’s Snook has picked up a nod for her critically-acclaimed performance as 26 characters in The Picture of Dorian Gray.

In the Best Actor category, Scott’s performance in Vanya will come up against Tennant’s role in Macbeth, while the starry nominee list also includes Joseph Fiennes for Dear England, which is being made into a BBC series, Mark Gatiss for The Motive And The Cue and James Norton in A Little Life.

Other notable nominations include for singer Nicole Scherzinger in Sunset Boulevard, where she has picked up a nod for Best Actress in a Musical. Andrew Lloyd Webber’s...

Bill Kenwright, the prolific West End producer behind the hit musicals Blood Brothers, Whistle Down the Wind and Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat who would later go on to become an owner and chairman of his boyhood soccer club Everton, has died. He was 78.

In a statement, Everton said Kenwright died peacefully, “surrounded by his family and loved ones.” This month, the Premier League club revealed that Kenwright had recently undergone surgery to remove a cancerous tumor from his liver.

“The world of British theatre without Bill Kenwright seems impossible,” said fellow theater impresario Cameron Mackintosh in a statement on X. “In my lifetime, there has never been anyone like Bill. He’s totally irreplaceable, and we will miss him so.”

“Dearest Bill, Somewhere you’ll be singing Let It Be Me and challenging heavenly choirs to look into your Ebony Eyes,” Andrew Lloyd Webber tweeted. “The theatre will...

Actors and theater industry notables are submitting tributes to celebrate the life of longtime theater and film producer William “Bill” Kenwright, who died Monday following surgery to remove a cancerous tumor from his liver back in August.

Kenwright is best known as one of the longest standing theater, TV and film producers, including being the force behind long-running West End musical “Blood Brothers.” He began as an actor, appearing in British soap opera “Coronation Street.” On top of his work in theater, he also served as a BBC Radio 2 presenter and as chairman of the Everton Football Club for nearly two decades.

“Like many grateful actors I am in debt to Bill Kenwright for employment,” “Lord of the Rings” star and theater legend Sir Ian McKellen shared on X (formerly Twitter). “We were young together, when he was in ‘Coronation Street’ and I was dipping a toe into Shaftesbury Avenue.

According to our current combined predictions, Jodie Comer (“Prima Facie”) is the frontrunner to win Best Actress in a Play at this year’s Tony Awards with 12/5 odds. She already won an Olivier a couple of months ago for her work in the West End production. She would be the fifth Tony winner in this category for a one-woman performance.

In Suzie Miller‘s one-woman show, Comer plays Tessa, a barrister from working-class origins who must deal with an unexpected event that forces her to confront the patriarchal power and morality of the law.

When it comes to solo performances at the Tonys, four have prevailed in this category before. In 1977 Julie Harris won her fifth and final competitive accolade for her portrayal of Emily Dickinson in William Luce‘s “The Belle of Amherst.” In 1986 Lily Tomlin won for playing multiple characters in Jane Wagner‘s “The Search for Signs...

Exclusive: Sheridan Smith and Céline Buckens have been cast as sisters in The Castaways, a Paramount+ drama series based on Lucy Clarke’s novel.

Smith will play Lori and Buckens is her sibling Erin in the thriller, which marks Clarke’s second series adaptation for Paramount+’s UK service.

After they have a huge flight, Lori boards a plane to Fiji, while Erin does not. The flight never arrives at its tropical destination and months later no wreckage has been located. Erin suddenly hears Lori’s credit card has been used on a remote Fijian island and she later recognizes the pilot on CCTV. She boards a plane to Fiji to track down the truth.

The show jumps between the perspectives of the two sisters, with Erin undertaking an investigation in the modern day and Lori struggling to survive after surviving a crash on a remote island. The truth about...

Exclusive: Oscar winner Dustin Hoffman (Rain Man), Emmy nominee Sam Neill (Jurassic Park), BAFTA winner Eileen Atkins (The Crown), BAFTA winner Derek Jacobi (Gladiator), IFTA nominee Aidan Turner (The Hobbit), Endeavour star Roger Allam and Pitch Perfect star Brittany Snow are set to lead cast in feature comedy Mr. Shaw Goes To Hollywood, which is being launched for the TIFF market.

Set in 1933, the movie will chart how celebrated playwright, George Bernard Shaw (Jacobi), visited Hollywood with his formidable wife, Charlotte (Atkins). The idea of turning Shaw’s most successful play, Pygmalion, into a film was a hot topic of conversation as the great and the good of Hollywood vied for his attention, desperate to be part of the next big motion picture. How would the Irish-born writer and social reformer rub along with the Hollywood elite and, perhaps more importantly, did he have any intention of selling the rights...

Author: Cai Ross

Bond fans are mourning the loss at the fine old age of 97, of director Lewis Gilbert. Gilbert was responsible for three of the biggest James Bond films of the 60s and 70s, You Only Live Twice, The Spy Who Loved Me and Moonraker.

His Bond movies took everything up to eleven. They all featured immense lairs for larger than life villains. In You Only Live Twice, Donald Pleasance’s HQ was housed inside a Japanese volcano. Moonraker’s climax was set on board a gargantuan space station, and The Spy Who Loved Me’s goliath supertanker set was so huge that thee producers had to build an entire sound stage at Pinewood to accommodate it.

The Spy Who Loved Me was an enormous gamble, an expensive doubling-down after the disappointing returns of The Man With The Golden Gun. The producers were rewarded with one of the biggest...

The BFI’s Missing Believed Wiped returns to BFI Southbank this December to present British television rediscoveries, not seen by audiences for decades, most since their original transmission dates…. The bespoke line-up of TV gems feature some of the countries most-loved television celebrities and iconic characters including Alf Garnett in Till Death Us Do Part: Sex Before Marriage, Cilla Black in her eponymous BBC show featuring Dudley Moore , Jimmy Edwards in Whack-o!, a rare interview with Peter Davison about playing Doctor Who, an appearance by future Doctor Who Patrick Troughton from ITV’s early police drama, No Hiding Place plus a significant screen debut from a young Pete Postlethwaite.

However for Nerdly readers, one of the real highlights of this edition of Missing Believed Wiped is the uncovering of TV horror Late Night Horror: The Corpse Can’t Play. Originally broadcast on 3 May, 1968 on BBC2 this is the only...

From tragedy to triumph. Screenwriter Jemma Kennedy writes about recallibrating Captain Webb.

In his play Educating Rita, Willy Russell famously articulates the difference between the tragedy and the merely tragic. Any event, such as a tree falling and killing a man, may be called tragic, but a real tragedy is one in which the hero is doomed by his fatal flaw. Character, not just circumstance, drives him inexorably to his doom.

I thought about this a lot when writing Captain Webb – the titular character was the first man to swim the English Channel in 1875.

Julie Walters is one of those people who really does seem like a national treasure. She's done it all, from comedy to drama, over an amazing career that earned her a BAFTA Fellowship earlier this year.

We were lucky enough to pop along to a Q&A with Julie last night - launching BAFTA's new live strand A Life in Television - and she was funny, interesting and always entertaining. We've collected together just 18 amazing things we learned - from why Educating Rita made her cry to her crush on Hugh Bonneville to why dancing and Julie do not mix. Read on for all that and much more...

1. She cried when she first saw Educating Rita because she thought she was "terrible".

"I'd done Educating Rita on stage, Willy Russell's play, and then Lewis Gilbert came along and said, 'Do you want to be in a film, darling?'...

Julie Walters is one of those people who really does seem like a national treasure. She's done it all, from comedy to drama, over an amazing career that earned her a BAFTA Fellowship earlier this year.

We were lucky enough to pop along to a Q&A with Julie last night - launching BAFTA's new live strand A Life in Television - and she was funny, interesting and always entertaining. We've collected together just 18 amazing things we learned - from why Educating Rita made her cry to her crush on Hugh Bonneville to why dancing and Julie do not mix. Read on for all that and much more...

1. She cried when she first saw Educating Rita because she thought she was "terrible".

"I'd done Educating Rita on stage, Willy Russell's play, and then Lewis Gilbert came along and said, 'Do you want to be in a film, darling?'...

More than 100 prominent people from literature, the arts, science, academia, human rights and the law have signed a declaration urging newspaper and magazine publishers to embrace the royal charter system of press regulation.

They join people who have been victims of press misbehaviour in arguing that charter will give "vital protection to the vulnerable" from abuse of power by the press.

The signatories include broadcasters Stephen Fry, Clare Balding, Gary Lineker and Rory Bremner. Actor Emma Thompson has signed, as have Professor Richard Dawkins and Sir Jonathan Miller.

Several film directors are on the list, such as Stephen Frears, Alan Parker, Mike Leigh, Beeban Kidron, Guy Ritchie, Stephen Daldry, Bill Forsyth, Peter Kosminsky, Terry Gilliam and Michael Apted.

Among the writers and playwrights are Alan Bennett, William Boyd, Alan Ayckbourn, Tom Stoppard, Monica Ali, Helen Fielding, Michael Frayn, Ian McEwan, A C Grayling, David Hare, Alan Hollinghurst, Jk Rowling, Salman Rushdie,...

Screenwriters just love the classroom – so pay attention at the back for the best clips from films focusing on those emotionally turbulent high school years

This week's Clip joint is by James Rawson, a TV and web producer specialising in film journalism and based in Doha, Qatar. Follow him on Twitter at @jrawson.

Think you can do better than James? If you've got an idea for a future Clip joint, drop an email to [email protected]

Cast your mind back to your teens, if it doesn't pain you too much. Those emotionally turbulent years when everything was changing physically, socially and psychologically; when every other thought was about sex; when you were struggling to learn life lessons but still look cool at the same time.

As an institution, high school has been the vehicle for almost every cinematic genre*, and it's easy to see why screenwriters are...

This November, a series of events are planned to celebrate its 100 year history

The Liverpool Playhouse Theatre, home to one of the oldest repertory companies, will celebrate its centenary later this year with a special gala performance of The Ladykillers.

A new book on the Williamson Square landmark and a series of events will also mark the 100th anniversary on November 11.

The gala evening will include a pre-show champagne reception and a chance to join the cast – which includes Peter Capaldi, James Fleet and Ben Miller – after the show to toast the theatre as a special birthday cake is cut.

The Ladykillers adapted for stage by Graham Linehan is on from November 3-19, but is sold out already.

Meanwhile, the cast of Roger McGough's adaptation of Moliere's play, Tartuffe, have been entertaining audiences at the Playhouse. Tartuffe runs until Saturday.

The Playhouse is also launching a book to...

The autobiography of Pete Postlethwaite, once called 'the best actor in the world' by Steven Spielberg

In the year or so leading up to his death from cancer this year, Pete Postlethwaite had been working on an autobiography, and this has now appeared, sympathetically ghostwritten by Andy Richardson. It is an extrovert, tender, charming and unselfconscious book, with some extraordinary, hell-raising and hair-raising anecdotes. Reading it revived the sadness I had on hearing about his death, particularly the last, remarkable chapter about his final illness, recounted as it was happening, like a sort of liveblog.

I hadn't quite grasped that before he became a screen icon, Postlethwaite was basically the rock'n'roll wild man of 1970s/80s subsidised theatre: a cheerfully uncaged party animal who made Dennis Hopper look like Margaret Rutherford, yet always showed up on time for rehearsals, where a succession of thin-lipped Oxbridgey directors would find every line of their interpretation,...

Obituaries of the character actor Peter Postlethwaite reveal the role played by the Everyman Theatre in his success

Talent can look like a fluke. An actor with eyes that draw you in, a voice that rings in the memory – these things seem to be good luck, a gift. But this is only part of the story, as obituaries of Pete Postlethwaite prove.

The Warrington-born actor became one of our most successful character stars after appearing, fairly late in his career, in The Usual Suspects and Brassed Off, before being adopted as a favourite Hollywood turn, gracing films such as the Jurassic Park sequel and last year's Inception. It was back in the 1970s, though, that Postlethwaite's acting had really got going, as one of a gang of performers and writers working at Liverpool's Everyman Theatre.

The venue in Hope Street on the site of a former chapel was the seedbed...

In 1997, Simon Hattenstone went to the pub with Pete Postlethwaite while the actor, who died earlier this week, was starring in Macbeth. Read the interview again

Act One: lunchtime, a pub in Bristol. Three men, actor Pete Postlethwaite, Dennis, a publicist, and Dick, a producer, sit supping pints of Guinness. Enter a Journalist, who has never met the actor before.

Postlethwaite: "Simon, Simon. What can we do about this?"

Dennis: "You're late, and Pete has a full dress rehearsal in 20 minutes."

Exit Dick to get a round of drinks.

Postlethwaite: "Any chance of hanging around for three hours or so? Then we'll have a proper chat. A proper drink, a good time."

However often you've watched Pete Postlethwaite on stage or screen, it's hard to prepare for the close-up: the compact body, dainty feet dressed in Kickers, the skin – cross-hatched with thin red contours – resembling a faintly exotic cheese,...

Oscar-nominated British actor with a vast range who could move between comedy and tragedy with ease

The actor Pete Postlethwaite had a face that elicited many similes, among them "a stone archway" and "a bag of spanners". These unflattering descriptions, plus his tongue-twisting surname, would suggest an actor with a career limited to minor supporting roles. But Postlethwaite, who has died of cancer aged 64, played a vast range of characters, often leading roles, on stage, television and film.

He was at ease in switching the masks of tragedy and comedy. The working-class martinet father he played in Terence Davies's film Distant Voices, Still Lives (1988), which Postlethwaite credited as his big break, can be seen as paradigmatic of his career. Postlethwaite powerfully conveyed the father's double-sided nature: at one moment he is tenderly kissing his children goodnight, the next he is ripping the tablecloth off in a rage.

Postlethwaite was...

Gold has announced that it has commissioned a drama about The Royle Family. The BBC comedy ran from 1998-2000 and has also aired a number of special episodes. Creators Craig Cash and Caroline Aherne, who starred as Dave and Denise, have now agreed to discuss the show in The Royle Family: Behind The Sofa. The one-off programme, with a voiceover from Mark Radcliffe, will feature interviews with cast members Liz Smith, Sue Johnston, Ricky Tomlinson, Ralf Little, Jessica Hynes, Sheridan Smith and Geoffrey Hughes. Writer Phil Mealey will also contribute to the show along with celebrity fans Catherine Tate, Paul Whitehouse, Willy Russell, Jimmy McGovern and Henry Normal. Meanwhile, the soundtrack will be provided by a brass (more)...

For the Sex and the City star, it's a return to her first love and her roots – playing Shakespeare's greatest erotic heroine Cleopatra at the Liverpool Playhouse

The room was full of spray-varnished stars of the stage that day, all looking their best for the prize-giving ceremony ahead. Many were talented and some were good looking too, but there was only one actress that guests at the Laurence Olivier awards were queuing up to meet.

Regal in a long, strappy dress, her hair worn up, Kim Cattrall was belle of the ball, serenely gliding past Kevin Spacey and Patrick Stewart in the manner of Cleopatra, the Egyptian queen she has just announced she is to play later this year. Then, in 2005, the star of Sex and the City was fresh to the West End scene and so was still imbued with a kind of transatlantic glow. One might mention her...

From Crosby beach to a big match at Anfield, actor David Morrissey takes Amy Raphael on a tour of his hometown – and explains why it has inspired him to direct a new film

Past the Hillsborough memorial and beneath the legend "You'll Never Walk Alone" atop the Shankly Gates, through the creaking turnstile and into the main stand. A subdued Liverpool team warm up on the pitch. Freezing fog swirls in the floodlights. David Morrissey warms his hands on a cup of hot chocolate and wishes he hadn't left his gloves back home in north London. Two officials stare and nudge each other, but no one else even glances at him.

We are sitting five rows from the pitch and, for the first half of this Premiership game against Birmingham City, all the action is at the other end as Liverpool attack the Kop. Morrissey – 6ft 3in, broad of shoulder,...

Former EastEnders star Larry Lamb has landed a part in a new stage production of Educating Rita. The actor, who recently bowed out from his role as Walford villain Archie Mitchell, will appear in the play at the Menier Chocolate Factory theatre from March 27. Actress Laura Dos Santos, who took part in a Radio 4 adaptation of Educating Rita which was broadcast at Christmas, has also been cast in the show. Written by Willy Russell and originally premiering in 1980, Educating Rita tells the story of a young, brash hairdresser named Rita (Dos Santos) who enrols with the Open University to study (more)...

Mel C says starring her first theatre role is the most challenging thing she's ever had to do. The former Spice Girls star - who performed to packed out audiences around the globe during her time with the group - admits taking on the role of Mrs. Johnson in hit show 'Blood Brothers' on London's West End has presented her with a very daunting task. She said: "Doing 'Blood Brothers' is my biggest challenge. I've never had a serious acting role before, so I'm daunted. But I'm in good hands - and coming from Liverpool, I feel very comfortable with Willy Russell's script." Merseyside-based musical 'Blood Brothers' tells the story of twins who have been separated at birth, with one...

Mel C says starring her first theater role is the most challenging thing she's ever had to do. The former Spice Girls star - who performed to packed out audiences around the globe during her time with the group - admits taking on the role of Mrs. Johnson in hit show "Blood Brothers" on London's West End has presented her with a very daunting task.

She said: "Doing 'Blood Brothers' is my biggest challenge. I've never had a serious acting role before, so I'm daunted. But I'm in good hands - and coming from Liverpool, I feel very comfortable with Willy Russell's script."

Merseyside-based musical 'Blood Brothers' tells the story of twins who have been separated at birth, with one staying with his birth mother Mrs. Johnson and the other going to rich family, and the different paths their lives take.

Despite her string of successes with the Spice Girls,...

Sex And The City star Kim Cattrall was turned down for a role in award-winning play Educating Rita because she was too old.

The 51-year-old was so desperate to land a part in the famous stage production - set in her native Liverpool, England - she personally contacted playwright Willy Russell to talk him into hiring her.

Cattrall was turned down over her age, with Russell insisting he would prefer a young actress in the title role.

But Cattrall is not bitter about the snub.

She says, "I contacted Willy Russell a few years ago because I wanted to do a version (of Educating Rita). The idea was to make it about a working-class woman in her 40s, a woman's realisation of herself and the different possibilities for her.

"But he said it had been written for an actress in her 20s, which I respected."...