Skip to content

Projects

What Was She Thinking?: Notes on a Scandal

In the recent Charlie Rose Interview …
Dame Judi mentioned that one of her next projects will be a film based on the novel … directed by Richard Eyre and also starring Cate Blanchett …

Fox Searchlight has set Judi Dench and Cate Blanchett to star in “Notes From a Scandal,” a Patrick Marber-scripted adaptation of the Zoe Heller novel. Richard Eyre will direct the film, with shooting to begin August 13th. Scott Rudin and Robert Fox will produce according to Variety.

Blanchett will play Sheba Hart, a free-spirited and charismatic art teacher brought down by scandal when she is arrested for engaging in sexual relations with a 15-year-old student. Dench will play Barbara Covett, a fellow teacher who befriends the younger woman and observes her fall from grace.

Book was published under the title “What Was She Thinking?” Rudin and Searchlight bought Heller’s novel in late 2003, hoping to fashion it as an acting vehicle for Dench.

Thanks to Ellen for bringing this to my attention

The Cranford Chronicles

Tara on TV” : “Hey, oop, our Judi”

Dame Judi Dench is set to take a role in new BBC adaptations of Victorian novelist Elizabeth Gaskell’s waspish and witty novels. The Beeb has just made a version of Gaskell’s North and South. The story about privileged Southerner Margaret Hale who moves to the North and falls in love with a factory owner, stars former East Ender’s actress Daniela Denby-Ashe and Richard Armitage. Now the BBC wants to adapt more of Gaskell’s masterpieces in a series dubbed The Cranford Chronicles – and it seems Dame Judi is interested. It’s not yet known which role she would take but securing her for the series will undoubtedly be a feather in the Corporation’s cap. There’s certainly a wealth of wonderful roles for women in Gaskell’s works. The classic chronicles were based on stories of her childhood, about the women who ruled the fictional town of Cranford where men were “not much in evidence.” One source said” “we’ve been trying to get Judi Dench for a theatrical show net year but have been told she’s doing an Elizabeth Gaskell drama for the BBC. Dame Judi’s last BBC starring role was in the world war II drama The Last of the Blonde Bombshells in 2000. A BBC spokesman said: “we are in development to do more Elizabeth Gaskell novels. Dame Judi’s agent says she’s looking at lots of different projects for next year but she’s not decided on anything yet.

Gnomes: Dench and Winslet

Forgetting any other gnome than this …
Romance blooms between indoor and outdoor garden gnomes.

Darlings of the British acting scene, Dame Judi Dench and Kate Winslet are to provide the voices for a new film about garden gnomes. The film, an animated Disney-backed venture called Gnomeo and Juliet, is being made by Rocket Pictures, the production company of Elton John and partner David Furnish. As might be expected, the film will be an adaptation of Shakespeare’s light-hearted romantic comedy Romeo and Juliet. Winslet will play Juliet and Dame Judi her nurse, their gnome characters computer-generated against an English garden background. Sir Elton will write the score for the film in collaboration with fellow musical aristo Sir Tim Rice, but reportedly turned down the honour of having one of the gnome characters modelled on him because he did not like its hair, rotund curves or its habit of spending a fortune on flowers.