Author Topic: London Spy: Ben Whishaw, dreamy lover/genius Ed Holcroft and sage Jim Broadbent  (Read 571574 times)

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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London Spy
Episode 3
"Blue"




[youtube=425,350]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g26ZXL2PxFg[/youtube]
"You fail to grasp what has been done to you."
Published on Nov 24, 2015.

Oh my.

I never before noticed the flash/streak of red
in the opening credits--at the 0.23 second
mark--under the submerged and drowning
figure (obviously Alex)--or the sudden hail
of red splotches on the London skyline as
Danny emerges, a failed Orpheus--so sad.

 :( :( :(


« Last Edit: February 16, 2016, 12:54:59 am by Aloysius J. Gleek »
"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
(and you know who I am...)


Cowboy Curtis (Laurence Fishburne)
and Pee-wee in the 1990 episode
"Camping Out"

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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London Spy
Episode 2
"Strangers"


Hammershøi by another name....






Although, of course, Jack--or rather, in this alternate universe, Ennis--didn't have a slew of post-graduate degrees like poor, murdered Alex.
As this is London Spy, Danny discovers that the first of Alex's two boyhood bedrooms is a 'fake', but the props--his diplomas (to 'Alistair Turner')
and his VERY precocious model of a Ferris wheel--are 'real'.)









« Last Edit: February 17, 2016, 08:14:57 am by Aloysius J. Gleek »
"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
(and you know who I am...)


Cowboy Curtis (Laurence Fishburne)
and Pee-wee in the 1990 episode
"Camping Out"

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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Déjà vu all over again Dep't





"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
(and you know who I am...)


Cowboy Curtis (Laurence Fishburne)
and Pee-wee in the 1990 episode
"Camping Out"

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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Poor Danny/Orpheus and
his beloved Alex/Eurydice--







"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
(and you know who I am...)


Cowboy Curtis (Laurence Fishburne)
and Pee-wee in the 1990 episode
"Camping Out"

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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There is a brief stand-off between Ben Whishaw’s character and Charlotte Rampling’s mysterious character that discusses sexual intricacies while outing a lie that might be the most honest and fantastic five minutes you’ll see on screen all season.






http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/review/london-spy-tv-review-857785


London Spy
TV Review
Great acting, wonderful cinematography shape a love story
at the center of a spy story in BBC America's languid miniseries


The Bottom Line:
Acting, writing, visuals flourish in this spy in the house of love story


by Tim Goodman
Email: [email protected]
Twitter: @BastardMachine

3:34 PM PST 1/20/2016




BBC America’s London Spy is one of those miniseries that only remotely relates to what you initially think it might be. For starters, yes, it’s a spy story – but almost reluctantly. It’s a kind of love story, really, or many kinds of love stories – including ones where love has either been snatched away or botched entirely. Ultimately, if there’s a pressing need to know about intent, London Spy has a moral or seven to be had about secrets and lies. You will be left thinking, which a good spy story achieves. Almost every spy story has that, but few have what comes before it.

This five-part BBC America series is filled with excellent performances – Ben Whishaw, Jim Broadbent and Charlotte Rampling are standouts – and it wallows in that genre almost completely missing from American television these days save for Sundance Channel’s Rectify, and that’s the meditative Slow TV movement.

Beautifully and seductively shot by director Jakob Verbruggen (The Fall, The Bridge), London Spy is one of those rare series (like Rectify) that is perfectly willing to sit still while two people talk – or rather, don’t – about difficult topics. The emotion comes from what’s not said, pictures of how they’re thinking about replying or how they drift off in sadness or fritter around the edges of some painful memory for a while before they actually answer. It should come as no surprise then that Verbruggen also likes to shoot lengthy scenes – swimming underwater, smoking pensively at a window sill, overhead shots of two lovers walking lengthy expanses of countryside.

But here’s the thing – it all works, as counterintuitive to a spy story as it might seem. Mostly because novelist Tom Rob Smith (Child 44) came up with a dandy-enough spy-level hook revealed in the latter episodes that allows him to focus on the relationship between Danny (Whishaw) and Alex (Edward Holcroft) first and foremost. The two are polar opposites. They meet by accident when scraggy Danny, up all night at a club, dehydrated and strung out – as he’s been most of his adult life – is barely functioning one cold morning after dancing and/or sedating himself from the world all night. Alex, fit and Adonis-like, is out running before most others are awake.

Credit Smith for making this essential meeting both a perfect chance encounter that strikes within Danny some long forgotten notion of love at first sight, and the perfect dubious – in retrospect – “set up” encounter that fuel many spy stories. Much of London Spy makes you wonder which version is correct – in fact, hinges on that rarest and most foreign of rainbows and unicorns moment Danny has ever felt in his life (thus always imploring his more natural and cynical side to doubt it) and the heart crushing other option that what he experiences with Alex is, in fact, amazingly true and real.

London Spy is a love story, then, between Danny and Alex first and foremost – one of the most intimate and nuanced of gay love stories put on TV in some time.

Smith’s precision in this arena is at the heart of what makes London Spy so good. There is a brief stand-off between Whishaw’s character and Rampling’s mysterious character that discusses sexual intricacies while outing a lie that might be the most honest and fantastic five minutes you’ll see on screen all season.

Danny’s sexual history is long and sometimes sordid – the latter part one he deeply regrets, but was pulled from it and helped by his much older former partner and now confidant Scottie (Broadbent).

Alex, on the other hand, was a genius savant growing up (especially with numbers) but has no ability to navigate intimacy – he’s not out when he meets Danny and has dubious sexual experience. All of this gets muddied – and not in the unclear sense, but in the dirty sense – as London Spy shifts dramatically in the early going and Danny’s more sordid past acts as a list of morally perceived crimes against his personal character. Smith’s ability to make London Spy both about sexuality/sexual choice and also a broader spy story keeps it working on two fronts.

It’s even deeper than that, as secrets mix with shame throughout. As mentioned above, the getting there is more contemplative than traditionally conspiratorial in a spy story sense. It’s a languid, beautiful contemplation of lies before it’s any kind of pulse-pounder about spies.

Not all of it works, however. There are constructs that strain belief. There is convenience in how fast damage (and damage control) happens.

That said and even though it can be (purposefully) slow going, London Spy is particularly effective at making each hour-long installment be different from the next. When it feels like a love story it then because an oddly structured hour where you’re sure something weird will happen, then morphs the next hour into a traditional spy story and in the next hour into something about wealth and family secrets and so on. Even in its slowness, there are impressive feints and dodges.

Whatever your ultimate take-away becomes when all is revealed, like Rectify and other Slow TV stalwarts of the recent American television past, this British import proves that the real joy of the journey is in getting there, not what’s revealed when you arrive.

"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
(and you know who I am...)


Cowboy Curtis (Laurence Fishburne)
and Pee-wee in the 1990 episode
"Camping Out"

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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http://www.interviewmagazine.com/culture/edward-holcroft



CULTURE
SPY GAMES
EDWARD HOLCROFT
IN LONDON JANUARY 2016
By HALEY WEISS
Photography HANS NEUMANN

Published 02/04/16














Actor Edward Holcroft isn't interested in typical tales and happy endings. This is apparent in his choice of roles to date: as failed intelligence recruit Charlie Hesketh in Kingsman: The Secret Service he was a posh bully-turned-villain; in the Golden Globe-winning miniseries Wolf Hall he was George Boleyn, accused of incest with his sister, Queen Anne Boleyn, resulting in him going toe-to-toe with Thomas Cromwell (Mark Rylance). Holcroft's disinterest in the standard is equally apparent in his demeanor. When we caught up with the 28-year-old London native over the phone, he transitioned seamlessly between sarcasm and sincerity, his wry, British humor taking hold before giving in to thoughtful, conversational tangents on acting and what he's looking for in it.

"Ideally, you want to be doing something that you really want to do," he tells us. "And that always comes down to the writing and the role. For me, something has got to really draw you to the character. You've got to really want to play it otherwise there's a better person out there to play it. I always think that there's no point in doing something unless you're going to give it everything," he continues. "There is still a lot to learn on camera that I haven't learned yet. I would like to keep exploring."

Currently, Holcroft is a spy once more in the BBC America mini-series London Spy. As Alex, he's a mathematical prodigy with an unclear lineage and allegiances to MI6. He falls for Danny (Ben Whishaw), his first true love and relationship, after a chance meeting—and a second, orchestrated one on Danny's part—on London's Lambeth Bridge. The pair's story, one of two young men unsuited for each other in lifestyle but fitting against the odds, proceeds quickly. At the end of the first episode, which aired two weeks ago, the untimely death of Holcroft's character was revealed. The circumstances surrounding it, however, remain foggy until the show's finale—for both the viewer and Danny alike.

As London Spy airs in the United States, Holcroft is performing onstage at London's Donmar Warehouse in Les Liaisons Dangereuses, a play based on Choderlos de Laclos' 18th century epistolary novel. He recently wrapped The Sense of an Ending, a feature film based on the eponymous Julian Barnes novel, earlier in 2015, and is also preparing to film the Kingsman sequel.




HALEY WEISS: Alex, your character in London Spy, is frequently described as enigmatic. How would you characterize him?

EDWARD HOLCROFT: I think he's lonely. For me, that was the biggest part of his character. What is it like for somebody to be really alone in the world? To have no friends, to have never had a relationship, never really talked to anyone outside your work? And [to have] this want to find something, but not have the social ability to because he's never practiced it? He's never been in social situations and he doesn't know how to socialize. It was more about being lonely, rather than enigmatic. I just think he doesn't know how to show emotions or how to convey it.

WEISS: While the story isn't based on the life of Gareth Williams, [an MI6 agent whose suspicious death has been surrounded with speculation], the circumstances of Alex's death do echo his. Did that inform your role at all?

HOLCROFT: Not really. When I read it, I thought of Gareth Williams pretty quickly but I didn't go any farther than just the thought. I didn't research him because they're different people and although the idea may have some connection to it, the individual of Alex is a fictitious character, and a very different character. I didn't want to get sidetracked by someone real.

WEISS: Would you consider the show a love story, a spy thriller, or both?

HOLCROFT: I think it's both; it's a spy thriller that is motivated by a love story. At the crux of the story is the relationship between Danny and Alex, and without that, there wouldn't be the story.

WEISS: Most of your scenes are one-on-one with Ben Whishaw. Had you worked with him prior to this show?

HOLCROFT: No, I had never met him.

WEISS: What was that experience like?

HOLCROFT: Terrible. [laughs] It was awful. He was one of the worst people to work with in the world. I mean, he's a real diva, such a bad actor. [laughs] No, it was great. He, as I'm sure you know, is a very talented individual and also a very decent, kind, fun person. We got on really well and as a consequence we're now very good friends.

WEISS: I know you're also in a play right now, Les Liaisons Dangereuses. How has that been for you?

HOLCROFT: It has been a brilliant experience. I've never done theater so it's new ground. It's scary; there is nowhere to hide on a stage. On camera, you can hide, you can cut, you can shoot again and do it until it's good, whereas in theater you can't hide. Once you walk on you have to be believable the whole time otherwise you get found out. It's a great skill to learn as an actor. It's very important and I've now seen that. So it's been a very good thing.

WEISS: Have you enjoyed being able to return to the same lines and scenes night after night?

HOLCROFT: It's hard. It provides challenges, there's no doubt. You've got to find ways of keeping it fresh, but it's a good discipline. And it's always different because every audience is different. Some audiences are half asleep, some are shouting, and your performance changes in accordance to what you're getting back. The great thing about theater is that it's a two-way thing, you get energy from the audience and the audience gets energy from you.

WEISS: You were able to work with Charlotte Rampling and Jim Broadbent again in The Sense of an Ending. Was filming more comfortable having known them from London Spy?

HOLCROFT: No, it was terrible.

WEISS: Everything is terrible.

HOLCROFT: Everything is terrible! [laughs] I didn't actually have much to do with them in The Sense of an Ending. I know that they're in it, but my scenes weren't with them. But I did see Jim. Charlotte and Jim are kind of brilliant examples of not only very talented actors, but just such nice people. I can't begin to tell you. They're so unfazed by the industry side of it, they don't really have time for it, which is such an admirable quality when people are really talented. They don't buy in to some of the bullshit that comes with it. They have very quiet lives and they're great.

WEISS: I read that you think it's important to maintain a certain air of mystery as an actor. Can you tell me a little bit about that?

HOLCROFT: I don't think it's a new concept. I should think most actors probably think this, but I know that when I watch actors, the actors who I know least about I buy into more because I can imagine them as the character. It's as simple as that. If you lead a very high profile life—and of course, it's easy to say this, and if you become incredibly famous because of your work some of that is unavoidable—but if you can do as much as you can to keep away from some of that limelight then you just help yourself when it comes to your work. You have a blank canvas, as it were, to work with, rather than people knowing a whole bunch about your life or what you get up to, what you had for breakfast. Everyone is different, and each to their own, as they say, but for me that's what I would like to try and establish.

WEISS: You live in London now, but did you grow up there as well?

HOLCROFT: I did, I grew up here. I was sent off to boarding school when I was eight until 18. That was outside of London in the countryside, so I sort of took a break and came back. I am a Londoner but boarding school makes you feel a bit [pauses] I don't know what the word is, but you're sort of a traveler, as it were. Boarding school is a very... It's not a harsh environment, but you have to be quite tough and that probably put me in quite good stead for this profession. You need to have a thick skin.

WEISS: Were you acting at all when you were in boarding school?

HOLCROFT: No, no. God no. I did a tiny, tiny bit. I used to play girls because I had killer legs. [both laugh] No, I didn't. I was terrible but I looked the youngest so I played the odd woman, but in short, I never had the dream of being an actor until I was at least 22.

WEISS: What was your first role then?

HOLCROFT: In my whole life? I was at school when I was 12 and I played Curley's wife in John Steinbeck's Of Mice and Men, who gets killed by the lead character, Lenny. She gets murdered. So I was a girl who got murdered! [laughs] They obviously saw me doing big, big things.

WEISS: What made you decide to pursue acting seriously later on in life?

HOLCROFT: Lack of options? No, I don't know, I was just sort of drawn to it, I think. It was not a life-long ambition. I saw Mark Rylance] in a play called Jerusalem, which was seven or eight years ago now, and it was the first time that I had been really moved by something on stage. I had loved theater but I had never really fully bought into it. I always knew I was sitting in a theater and I was next to people and it never had quite the same impact that film did. But then I watched him. It was so electric and I could feel it. I had never had that before and I remember thinking, "I've got to do that. I've got to try that." I was just drawn to it and I don't really know how to put my finger on it, but anyway after that I sort of thought, "Right, there's that and a lack of options." [laughs]

WEISS: So it must have been exciting to be George Boleyn and play across [Mark Rylance] in scenes [while filming Wolf Hall].

HOLCROFT: Yeah, it was great. I like those moments in life, where life completes little mini stories. It started when I saw him on stage and life thought it would tie the knot in a circle and finish it when I met him on set for Wolf Hall. It was wonderful.

WEISS: You attended drama school at the Drama Centre. What made you choose that program in particular?

HOLCROFT: Michael Fassbender and Tom Hardy had just been there. Literally, that was the reason. I didn't know much about acting, I didn't know much about the drama schools. I knew that there were sort of four or five really good schools, like RADA and LAMDA, and Drama Centre was one of them, and I didn't know how to pick because I didn't know what I wanted from each school and I didn't know what I was doing. So I just picked actors who I had seen around that time who I thought had been brilliant. I remember I had seen Fassbender in Hunger and I thought, "Where did he go to school?" I looked it up and it said Drama Centre so I said, "Right, I'm going to go there." And that was that. I turned up and then I got in.

It's probably the most unromantic reason to go to a school, most people wanted to go to RADA since they were three. But all I knew was what I liked. I knew that I didn't know anything else about acting; I just knew that I had liked Mark Rylance and I had liked what I saw in Hunger with Michael Fassbender. That's all I had, really, was an instinct. So I thought I'd just tread in their footsteps and do what I can.


LONDON SPY AIRS THURSDAYS ON BBC AMERICA AT 10PM ET.


« Last Edit: March 06, 2016, 07:54:07 am by Aloysius J. Gleek »
"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
(and you know who I am...)


Cowboy Curtis (Laurence Fishburne)
and Pee-wee in the 1990 episode
"Camping Out"

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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LONDONSPYFANART









« Last Edit: February 27, 2016, 09:55:14 am by Aloysius J. Gleek »
"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
(and you know who I am...)


Cowboy Curtis (Laurence Fishburne)
and Pee-wee in the 1990 episode
"Camping Out"

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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London Spy
Episode 1
"Lullaby"




Alex: This is us.
(This is what Alex habitually says when pointing at their location on the numbered ordnance map, and "this is us" makes London city boy Danny feel very, very happy.)















































« Last Edit: February 18, 2016, 02:18:32 am by Aloysius J. Gleek »
"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
(and you know who I am...)


Cowboy Curtis (Laurence Fishburne)
and Pee-wee in the 1990 episode
"Camping Out"

Offline Aloysius J. Gleek

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"Tu doives entendre je t'aime."
(and you know who I am...)


Cowboy Curtis (Laurence Fishburne)
and Pee-wee in the 1990 episode
"Camping Out"

Offline CellarDweller

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  • A city boy's mentality, with a cowboy's soul.
really loving the images being posted here!


Tell him when l come up to him and ask to play the record, l'm gonna say: ''Voulez-vous jouer ce disque?''
'Voulez-vous, will you kiss my dick?'
Will you play my record? One-track mind!