Laura Linney, Samuel West In Talks To Star Opposite Bill Murray's F.D.R. In 'Hyde Park On Hudson'

Laura Linney, Samuel West In Talks To Star Opposite Bill Murray's F.D.R. In 'Hyde Park On Hudson'

Olivia Colman To Play Queen Elizabeth

May 6, 2011

Depressingly for those of us in the U.K. who would like to throw off the yoke of our apparently-appointed-by-god inbred oppressors, royalty is big business at the moment. Between the enormous, Oscar-winning success of "The King's Speech," and the royal wedding last week, the Windsors are back, and there's more than one film project in the works at present. For instance, Dakota Fanning is attached to play the young Princess Margaret in the romantic-comedy "Girl's Night Out," although that won't move forward until after director Michael Hoffman is done with "Gambit."

And George VI and his wife Elizabeth (played by Colin Firth and Helena Bonham-Carter in "The King's Speech") are heading back to the big-screen for the Roger Michell-helmed drama "Hyde Park On Hudson," which will examine the, ahem, "close friendship" between President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and his distant cousin Margaret Suckley, against the background of King George's visit to New York, the first time a British monarch had ever set foot on American soil. Yesterday, Variety confirmed that, as rumored, Bill Murray would be playing the president, something that, typical for the actor, has taken over a year of courtship, and now we've got some news of who will likely be joining him.
Baz Bamigboye reports that Laura Linney is in the advanced stages of talks to play Margaret in the project, while British actors Samuel West and Olivia Colman are stepping into their compatriots' awards-laden shoes as King George and Queen Elizabeth. Linney is, of course, bloody marvellous, and seems to be an excellent fit for the part.
Their British counterparts are less familiar to U.S. audiences, but they're equally well-matched. West is a theater veteran, son of legendary British actors Timothy West and Prunella Scales, who's probably most familiar abroad for small roles in "Van Helsing" and "Iris." He's worked with Michell a number of times before, both on screen ("Notting Hill," "Persuasion"), and on stage, in an excellent 2007 production of Harold Pinter's "Betrayal," and he's been more prominent in recent years, thanks to the lead role in the hit play "Enron," as well as becoming a leading opponent to the current British government's program of cuts.
Meanwhile, Colman's also on the rise. A veteran of TV comedies like "Peep Show" and "Green Wing," she had a scene-stealing role in "Hot Fuzz," but she's taken a big step towards big-screen dramatic work this year, with a widely acclaimed lead performance in Paddy Considine's Sundance hit "Tyrannosaur" opposite Peter Mullan, and she's just wrapped up a role as Margaret Thatcher's daughter Carol in the Meryl Streep-toplining biopic "The Iron Lady." We're sure her role and West's will be far less prominent than in "The King's Speech," but they're certainly two performers who won't be afraid of being overshadowed by that film.
All in all, things are looking very promising here -- director Michell sometimes gets lumped in with the likes of John Madden and Mike Newell, but for the most part his films are terrific, particularly his low-key British pictures like "The Mother" and "Venus." He's assembled quite a cast for the project, and, although it's a while off, we'd put money on the 2013 Best Actor race being a presidential face-off between the long-overdue Murray and Daniel Day-Lewis in Spielberg's "Lincoln." Film4 and Focus are backing the project, which will be shopped at Cannes next week, with filming planned to get underway in July.

Indiewire - Laura Linney, Samuel West In Talks To Star Opposite Bill Murray's F.D.R. In 'Hyde Park On Hudson'

HighTide Festival 2010

published August 11 2010

HighTide are delighted to announce that award-winning actor and director Samuel West will be performing at the HighTide Arts Club. The Arts Club is an exclusive evening of short creative responses to oppression by emerging international artists and headlined by Samuel West.
Samuel West’s most recent stage appearance was as Jeffrey Skilling in Lucy Prebble’s Enron. Extensive stage credits include Betrayal and The Family Reunion for the Donmar Warehouse, A Number and Much Ado About Nothing for Sheffield Theatres, Doctor Faustus and The Master and Margarita for Chichester Festival Theatre, the title roles in Hamlet and Richard II for the Royal Shakespeare Company (both directed by Steven Pimlott) and The Sea and Arcadia for the National Theatre. His film credits include Howards End, Notting Hill, Van Helsing, Persuasion and Iris and on television he has been seen in Foyles War, Cambridge Spies and as Ted Heath in Margaret Thatcher: The Long Walk to Finchley, . Forthcoming television includes Murder on the Orient Express and Any Human Heart. His directing work includes Waste for the Almeida and The Romans In Britain, Insignificance and As You Like It for Sheffield Theatres, where he was Artistic Director. He also directed Cosi Fan Tutte for English National Opera.
Samuel West will read from Generation Jeans by Nikolai Khlezin of the Belarus Free Theatre.

Two decades after the collapse of the Soviet Union, in White Russia (Belarus) Western gramophone records and jeans are still highly-desired ‘pieces of the free world’.

In 1994 Alexander Lukashenko took office as president of Belarus. In the protest against this ‘last dictator in Europe’ a special part was played by jeans: a denim shirt was raised as a protest flag during a demonstration on 16th September 2005. This signalled the start of the ‘Jeans Revolution’.

At the end of March 2005, Natalia Koliada and Nikolai Khalezin founded the Belarus Free Theatre. However, they have often clashed with the authorities and have been repeatedly jailed. In the meantime the company is enjoying increasing renown in the West and can count the late Harold Pinter and Vaclav Havel and Mick Jagger among their fans.

In Generation Jeans, Nikolai Khalezin tells his semi-autobiographical story of the Jeans Revolution in Minsk. He approaches it seriously, but with some self-mockery. Theatre of great urgency, directness and wit.

Top trio in Betrayal

Top trio in Betrayal

first published Fri 30 Mar 2007 13:25

Dervla Kirwan, Toby Stephens and Samuel West have been cast in Harold Pinter’s Betrayal at the Donmar Warehouse (31 May-21 July).
Betrayal is the story of a love triangle between a woman, her husband and his best friend, and relates the seven-year affair in reverse, from its poignant end to the illicit first kiss. One of Pinter’s most popular plays, Betrayal premiered at the National in 1978, directed by Peter Hall. In 2003 Hall mounted a new production at Theatre Royal Bath which came to the West End’s Duchess theatre and starred Janie Dee, Hugo Speer and Aden Gillett.
Kirwan is best known for her television roles in Goodnight Sweetheart, Hearts And Bones, Ballykissangel, 55 Degrees North and Casanova. Her London stage credits include Dangerous Corner at the Garrick in 2001, The Aristocrats at the National in 2005 and most recently Exiles, also at the National, last year.
Actor and director Samuel West has frequently performed on the London stage where his credits include A Life In The Theatre, Arcadia, The Sea, Richard II and Hamlet. He has directed several plays and an opera, Cosi Fan Tutte for ENO. On screen he has appeared in many television series such as Waking The Dead, Midsomer Murders and Cambridge Spies, alongside Betrayal co-star Stephens. His film credits include Van Helsing, Iris, Notting Hill and Howard’s End, in which he starred alongside his mother Prunella Scales. Since June 2005 he has been Artistic Director at Sheffield Theatres, where last November he appeared with his father Timothy West in A Number. He is due to step down from his post this year.
Stephens’s face is familiar on screen from his roles in the films Possession, Onegin and Die Another Day, plus television series Jane Eyre, Sharpe’s Challenge and Waking The Dead. On stage he has worked for the RSC in productions of A Midsummer Night’s Dream and Hamlet, which came to the West End in 2004, while other London appearances include A Streetcar Named Desire and The Royal Family.
Betrayal is directed by Roger Michell, who previously directed Pinter’s Old Times at the Donmar. His film work includes the recent Venus, Enduring Love and Notting Hill, while in London he has directed My Night With Reg for the Royal Court, plus The Homecoming, Honour and Joe Penhall’s Blue/Orange for the National. He returns to the National next month with another Penhall play, Landscape With Weapon.