Tag Archives: Steven Knight

Netflix to Launch Season 6 of “Peaky Blinders,” Featuring Anya Taylor-Joy’s Return to the Cast, in June

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Anya Taylor-Joy is ready for the Peaky of summer on Netflix…

Netflix has set the premiere date for the sixth and final season of period gangster epic Peaky Blinders, which sees the return of the 25-year-old Argentine American actress to the cast, for early June around the world.

Anya Taylor-Joy, Peaky BlindersAll six episodes of Season 6 will launch on the streaming service on June 10 in the U.S. and all markets where Netflix has the show’s rights.

Peaky Blinders is currently enjoying a strong run in the UK.

The Cillian Murphy-led series debuted its sixth season in late February on BBC One in the UK, setting a new record for a season launch at 3.8 million overnight viewers. That was the best score for the Shelby clan in a debut episode ever and also tied the series’ overall record, which was previously set by the Season 5 finale in September 2019.

Season 6 is the last run of the drama in series form. However, creator Steven Knight recently confirmed to us that a movie is definitely going to happen with the same players.

In Season 6, Murphy’s Tommy Shelby will square off with various foes, but the most formidable enemy he has is himself. Also returning are Tom Hardy, Paul Anderson, Finn Cole, Taylor-Joy, Natasha O’Keeffe and Sophie Rundle, among others.

Stephen Graham and James Frecheville also appear. Co-star Helen McCrory (Polly Gray) passed away last year and the first episode of Season 6 is dedicated to her.

Peaky Blinders began airing on BBC Two in 2013 and went on to win the BAFTA for Best Drama in its fourth season. It then moved to BBC One in 2019 and has continued to grow its rabid fanbase.

 

Neon Offers First Look at Pablo Larrain’s Princess Diana-Biopic “Spencer” Starring Kristen Stewart

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Pablo Larraín’s latest project is earning royal raves…

Neon has released the first trailer and extended clip for the 45-year-old Chilean Oscar-nominated filmmaker’s latest film Spencer, the biopic about Princess Diana that stars Kristen Stewart.

Kristen Stewart, Princess Diana, Spencer

The film will have its world premiere at the Venice Film Festival on September 3, then move on to the Toronto International Film Festival (TIFF).

There’s been a lot of attention on the prospect of Stewart’s portrayal of the iconic Lady Di (she was last in Venice playing another real-life woman in 2019’s Seberg).

The trailer footage begins with the arrival at Sandringham for the Christmas weekend and takes us through preparations for dinner while Diana is clearly stressed in a bathroom as she’s called to the table. Other images show her strutting down a long hallway dressed to the nines in a silver gown, sitting for a family portrait, paparazzi snapping cameras, and Diana also in moments of letting loose dancing and running across the estate grounds.

In the extended footage clip, Diana and Prince Charles discuss the scrutiny that’s placed on them by the media. She says, “If they’re circling, it seems they’re circling just me.” To which Charles retorts, “Perhaps that’s because I always take care to close my curtains.”

In the tense exchange, he adds, “There has to be two of you. There’s two of me… The real one and the one they take pictures of… We are given a task… But you have to be able to make your body do things you hate.” Diana: “That you hate?” Charles: “Yes… For the country, the people. They don’t want us to be people. That’s how it is. I’m sorry, I thought you knew.”

They have their tiff across a distanced snooker table and also nip about the son’s taking up shooting outside, and her wardrobe. The scene culminates in Stewart’s Diana having a measured display of irritation at her husband who is railing on her, but with such a placid tone.

Directed by Larrain and written by Peaky Blinders creator Steven Knight, the film takes place during the Christmas holidays with the royal family at the Sandringham estate in Norfolk, England, when Diana decides to leave the marriage.

Jack Farthing is playing Charles, with further cast including Timothy Spall, Sally Hawkins, Sean Harris, Olga Hellsing and Thomas Douglas.

Prior to filming, Stewart admitted to nerves and excitement ahead of taking on the biopic. “The accent is intimidating as all hell because people know that voice, and it’s so, so distinct and particular,” she told InStyle. She continued, “It’s one of the saddest stories to exist ever, and I don’t want to just play Diana — I want to know her implicitly. I haven’t been this excited about playing a part, by the way, in so long.”

Neon and Topic Studios recently set a November 5 domestic release.

Pablo Larraín to Direct Kirsten Stewart in Princess Diana Film “Spencer”

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Pablo Larraín is taking on the portray of another legend…

The 43-year-old Oscar-nominated Chilean filmmaker will direct Kristen Stewart in the drama Spencer about Princess Diana. 

Pablo Larraín

The Steven Knight-scripted film covers a critical weekend in the early ‘90s, when Diana decided her marriage to Prince Charles wasn’t working, and that she needed to veer from a path that put her in line to one day be queen. The drama takes place over three days, in one of her final Christmas holidays in the House of Windsor in their Sandringham estate in Norfolk, England. 

“I’ve always been intrigued and fascinated by the Royal Family and how things are in that culture, which we don’t have where I come from,” Larraín said. “Diana is such a powerful icon, where millions and millions of people, not just women, but many people around the world felt empathy toward her in her life. We decided to get into a story about identity, and around how a woman decides somehow, not to be the queen. She’s a woman who, in the journey of the movie, decides and realizes that she wants to be the woman she was before she met Charles.

The film won’t deal with Diana’s tragic death after she left that palace life, but will examine the fraying of the relationship with her husband, and her ferocious love for her sons Prince William and Prince Harry.

“It’s about finding herself, about understanding that possibly the most important thing for her is to be well, and to be with herself and by herself,” Larraín explained. “That’s why the movie is called Spencer, which is the family name she had before she met Charles. It’s very contained, set over a few days in Sandringham. They spent Christmas there for many years and that’s where we set the movie in the early ‘90s, around 1992, we’re not specific. It’s Christmas Eve, Christmas and Boxing Day, three days, very contained. We get to understand what it is she wants and what she will do.”

“How and why do you decide to do that? It’s a great universal story that can reach millions and millions of people, and that’s what we want to do. We want to make a movie that goes wide, connects with a worldwide audience that is interested in such a fascinating life,” he adds.

Production is expected to begin in early 2021 on the film, which Larraín will also produce.

Larraín previously directed Natalie Portman in Jackie. The film follows Jackie Kennedy in the days when she was First Lady in the White House and her life immediately following the assassination of her husband, U.S. President John F. Kennedy in 1963. The film earned Portman an Academy Award nomination for Best Actress.

Larraín’s other credits include Neruda, about poet Pablo Neruda, as well as the Spanish-language film No, Oscar-nominated for Best Foreign Language Film, and The Club.