Sally Hawkins to make Broadway debut in George Bernard Shaw’s “Mrs. Warren’s Profession”

Sally Hawkins will be making her Broadway debut in October 2010!  With thanks to hisakot for the news, she will play the role of Vivie Warren, daughter to Cherry Jones’ Kitty Warren, in George Bernard Shaw‘s Mrs Warren’s Profession.

Mrs. Warren's Profession - Official Poster
Mrs. Warren's Profession - Official Poster

Other members of the cast include: Mark Herilik as Sir George Crofts, Edward Hibbert as Mr. Praed, Australian actor Michael Siberry as Reverend Samuel Gardner, and newcomer Adam Driver – a recent Julliard graduate – as Frank Gardner.

The play, set in 1894, “tells the story of Kitty Warren, a mother who makes a terrible sacrifice for her daughter Vivie’s independence” (official website) and was considered controversial at the time it was written in 1893-1894, due to its subject matter of prostitution; a full script is available courtesy of EServer Drama.

This new Broadway production will open officially on 3rd October 2010 at the American Airlines Theatre and is produced by the Roundabout Theatre Company. It will be directed by Tony Award-winning director Doug Hughes.

Tickets went on sale last week – I wish I lived in the US now.

p/s:  You can find the official blurb for Sally below:
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Interview with Sally Hawkins by Liz Hoggard, Evening Standard

I picked up my usual daily copy of the Evening Standard on Thursday evening, and to my great surprise, there was a photo of Sally Hawkins featured on the topright of the front page!

Sally Hawkins - Evening Standard (July 29th 2010)
It turned out to be an interview with Sally Hawkins by Liz Hoggard -  a 3 page spread starting from Pg 27 – to promote Sally’s forthcoming new film ‘Made in Dagenham‘.

I’m very glad that a major London newspaper has given this much space (it’s the middle spread!) for the interview as Sally really deserves as much air-time as possible, particularly for a film that narrates such a poignant tale, which – as I found out from the article – actually led to the Equal Pay Act of 1970.

Titled ‘From SE3 to USA‘, factually the interview didn’t really add much more to what we fans may have gleaned from previous interviews, but I think it was very thorough in introducing her again to the general public after her success as Poppy in Happy-Go-Lucky with plenty of quotes by Sally including:

It taps into something quite profound…You don’t realise how much you keep suppressed, because you’d be fighting every single day.

You can read the interview online at The Evening Standard, or below:

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New Trailer for “Never Let Me Go” with Sally Hawkins

A new trailer for “Never Let Me Go” with Sally Hawkins has been released! You can watch it below courtesy of Fox Searchlight:

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Sally Hawkins’ new film “Made in Dagenham”: New Trailer, Poster and Photos

New promotional material for Made in Dagenham has just been released! Formerly known as We Want Sex, the film is a brand new British comedy starring Sally Hawkins as the leading lady, Rita O’Grady.

Made in Dagenham - Poster 1
Poster courtesy of Empire Online

Set in 1960s Britain and based on a true story, Sally becomes the figurehead in the fight for equal pay by a group of women working in the Ford production factory in Dagenham.

The film is directed by Nigel Cole (of Calendar Girls fame) and features a very fine cast list alongside Sally, including the likes of Miranda Richardson, Rosamund Pike,  and Bob Hoskins amongst others;  I can hardly wait for the release date of October 1st 2010!

So with thanks to David Sztypuljak of HeyUGuys, you can see a selection of the first available photos from the film:

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Sally Hawkins in BBC Radio 4 Friday Play ‘Greed All About It’

It’s been a while since Sally Hawkins has been part of a radio comedy or drama, so I am very happy to share the news that she recently played the lead, Alice, in the BBC Radio 4 Friday Play Greed All About It!

Greed All About It
Greed All About It

Set in 1986, the play – written by the wonderful Ian Hislop and Nick Newman – is ‘a sharp, satirical look at the Wapping dispute‘. The official BBC press release has this introductory blurb:

In the hard drinking, straight talking, misogynistic inner workings of a daily newspaper office on Fleet Street, it is the inkies in their overmanned, union protected print room who hold all the power.

Written by Ian Hislop and Nick Newman, this satirical look at the lead up to the Wapping dispute in the Eighties sees journalists with their copy as just an interruption to the inkies’ daily routine of smoking endless cigarettes, playing cards and throwing the occasional sandwich into the machine – after all they are only there in case it breaks down.

Alice longs to be taken seriously as a proper journalist, and when Greg “from management” takes a shine to her and mentions that he is involved in setting up a new newspaper in a high tech office in Wapping, she senses an opportunity.

But Alice soon finds out that Greg has bent the truth a bit and this high-fangled Wapping office with its computer-powered printers and journalist-driven printworks is not for a new newspaper at all, but for the existing one. For her it is an opportunity, but for her father Ted, a senior inkie on the paper and a very active and vocal member of the printer’s union, it means something quite different.

Ted will not take this lying down. He hits on a direct plan of action – a strike, although it is soon clear that nothing, not even the force of a strong union, can stop the progress of technology.

The hour long drama is both funny and poignant, and is interspersed with classic Eighties music, such as “You Spin Me Around” playing in the background, and even iconic Eighties techie terms, notably the Sinclair C5.

Sally Hawkins plays her role of Alice to perfection, and is supported by a (mostly) delightful family: Eileen (Marion Bailey) as her Eastenders-loving ‘mum’; Ted (Ron Cook) as her straight talking union-man ‘dad’; Harry (Clive Russell) as her geeky Amstrad-loving brother who shows her how to use the new computers.

The Eighties was a time of massive change with the advent of new technology and the shift of power away from the unions, and Alice is somewhat caught between the old and the new. There is a wonderful moment in the middle of the play, where Alice immerses herself in her utopian world: where she can be a true journalist and have the liberty to write articles that matter to her that will be printed. The reality, however, is the broom cupboard and as we find out later, editorial management.

By the end of the play, it’s really quite difficult to like Alice’s slimy beau Greg (Richard Dillane) anymore, yet as the play fast-forwards to modern day Britain, Alice is surprisingly insightful as she recounts the events that followed the Wapping dispute.

I think it was definitely an hour well spent and as Greed All About It is sadly no longer available on the BBC iPlayer (it was originally broadcast on 14th May 2010), with thanks to Douglas103 for the source file, we have decided to make the mp3 available as a download below:

Download ‘Greed All About It’ (53 MB zip file)

p/s: Other credits include: Charles (Nigel Hastings), Andy (Freddie White), Graham (John Biggins), and the Reporter (Keely Beresford). The producer was Gary Brown.

Let us know if you enjoy listening to it too!