You wouldn't know it to look at her, but Australian actress Melissa George —  sitting under the sun poolside in Cannes bejeweled in Chanel —  is sore from head to toe. “I can’t close my right fist,” she said, adding of her intense fight scenes: “I get really into it. I cant even remember the next day after a fight scene how violent it was, but I know from muscle spasms in my neck the next day.” As the lead in X-Files creator Frank Spotnitz’ latest small screen venture Hunted, George plays Sam, a spy who has just escaped an assassinati ... [Continua a leggere]

Dornan plays serial killer Paul Sector, who stalks his victims in and around Belfast. Anderson is talented Detective Superintendent Gibson on secondment from the Met, brought in to catch him. Produced by Artists Studio and written by Allan Cubitt (The Runaway, Murphy’s Law, Prime Suspect), the five episodes will follow the police investigation uncovering the intricate story of the lives entangled by a series of murders - both the killers’ and the victims’ families. Allan Cubitt says: “When I think of the great television drama from my formative years I think first and ... [Continua a leggere]

Photography by Roger Erickson Gillian Anderson remembers being struck by a magazine article in which a woman in her late forties escapes the constraints of marriage and motherhood for a solo vacation -- “to somewhere like Italy.” There, she finds herself at a dinner party among guests she does not know. “She decided that she wasn’t going to mention she had kids,” says Anderson in an accent that skitters pleasantly between British and American. “It was fascinating to read. It changes the energy of the conversation if people are talking about their kid ... [Continua a leggere]

Produced by Artists Studio and written by Allan Cubitt (The Runaway, Murphy’s Law, Prime Suspect), the five episodes will follow the police investigation uncovering the intricate story of the lives entangled by a series of murders – both the killer's and the victims’ families. Gillian Anderson stars as DSI Gibson, who arrives to conduct a 28 day review at a Belfast station where the police are getting nowhere on a high profile murder case. Further casting will be announced soon, with filming starting in Belfast next month. Allan Cubitt says: “When I think of the real ... [Continua a leggere]

It’s almost the bicentenary of Charles Dickens’s birth and while the literati are getting themselves in a lather over which of his novels merits being called the best, TV viewers have made it clear that the BBC’s lavish version of Bleak House is the ultimate small-screen Dickens dramatisation. The Bafta-winning all-star series emerged as the favourite adaptation according to a survey of over 600 RadioTimes.com users, beating other well-known dramatisations, including Martin Chuzzlewit, David Copperfield and Hard Times, into pole position. Lionel Bart’s 196 ... [Continua a leggere]

It was a Dickens-heavy Christmas and all the better for it. By that, I don't mean the rosy confected one of bantering ho-hos and seething subterranean hypocrisies which Charles essentially invented. It was a dark, bleak, clever one, with ghostly waving branches and awkward truths – possibly rather suitable to end the year we've just had. There was, of course, Great Expectations, over three grimly fabulous nights. You knew it was going to be good from the off, when a muddied Ray Winstone as Magwitch grabbed Pip's foot from under the bridge, those skies above the marshes a cloying gr ... [Continua a leggere]

I wanted to play Miss Havisham because she's an iconic character who pervades our world in various forms. So many people have written about her or based other characters on her over many decades. I was interested in what it was that was so appealing about her, what it is that seems to get under people's skin. We're talking about a woman who is deeply, almost psychotically manipulative and potentially really psychologically damaging to Pip and Estella, the two children that we see her have this direct impact on. There was a curiosity there for me. Also reading the scripts and appreciating ... [Continua a leggere]

The wealthy heiress, who was jilted on her wedding day and lived as a recluse for decades afterwards, haunts her tumbledown mansion clad in a dusty matrimonial gown. Miss Havisham - with her white matted hair and wedding feast table preserved in cobwebs - has been played by older actresses in previous major incarnations. Joan Hickson played her at the age of 75 in 1981, while Anne Bancroft was cast in a 1998 modern reworking of Dickens's story at the age of 67. But for the new take on Great Expectations she is portrayed by Gillian Anderson, who at 43 is the youngest screen star to pl ... [Continua a leggere]

'You've changed," I tell Gillian Anderson. In 1996, she was chosen as the world's sexiest woman by FHM magazine's readers; this Christmas she will be bald and on fire as Miss Havisham in the BBC's adaptation of Great Expectations. So what made her take this role? Anderson bristles: "That's not really a serious question, is it? The real question is, 'How the fuck did I end up as the world's sexiest woman in 1996?' – not why would I do Great Expectations. Any actor would want to do Great Expectations. I never set out to be the world's sexiest woman." No doubt. In any case, ... [Continua a leggere]

A mouldy wedding cake is perched upon a laid table and several dusty clocks are stopped in their tracks at twenty minutes to nine. Onto the scene appears a white-haired, spectral figure treading the wooden floor in a rotting wedding dress and one shoe. The cracked lips break into a smile and a deathly white hand is extended to greet us. Hello - it’s Hollywood actress Gillian Anderson, doing a fine impression of Miss Havisham, the spurned bride of Charles Dickens’s novel Great Expectations, on the set of BBC One’s forthcoming three-part adaptation. The classic tale of ... [Continua a leggere]

There are one or two questions I want to ask Gillian Anderson but, first of all, Gillian Anderson has a question for me. "What was my death like?" she asks -meaning her death as Miss Havisham in the BBC's new adaptation of Great Expectations, which she filmed earlier this year but hasn't seen yet. Having just watched all three episodes, I can tell Anderson that her death, in a massive tower of flame, is pretty spectacular: shocking, moving, but most of all intriguing because it signals a new take on one of literature's most famous characters. In Charles Dickens's original novel, ... [Continua a leggere]

Sarà una favola di Charles Dickens a liberare Gillian Anderson dal fantasma di Dana Scully? Nonostante un discreto curriculum lavorativo e due film in uscita nel 2012 (Mr. Morgan's Last Love e The Curse of The Buxom Strumpet), l'attrice americana non riesce a liberarsi dal personaggio della serie cult degli anni Novanta X-Files. Per questo, dopo aver ottenuto una nomination ai premi BAFTA per il ruolo di Lady Deadlock in Casa Desolata prodotta dalla BBC nel 2005, la star di Hollywood ha accettato con entusiasmo il ruolo dello spettro bianco di Miss Havisham nella nuova mini serietelevis ... [Continua a leggere]

Miss Havisham is such an iconic role — did you always want to play her?As much as I’m familiar with the book it’s not in my mind as one of my favourites as it is for a lot of people. But this was a time when I was as excited by the adaptation, if not more so, than the book. I felt I might have a way in to the character and I fell in love with the script. Miss Havisham had a real historical impact. In what way?There are various things that have come to my attention in terms of the Miss Havisham effect. Not just the potential addiction to loss and the pain of loss but ... [Continua a leggere]

Here Ray Winstone who stars as Magwitch and Gillian Anderson who stars as Miss Havisham talk about playing two of Dickens iconic characters and why Great Expectations is a must see for viewers who enjoy a bit of Dickens at Christmas. "Christmas without a BBC show or drama is not really Christmas is it. You have enough to drink and eat and then you sit down by the fire and watch a good drama, and there's nothing better than Dickens at Christmas," says Ray Winstone, the East-London born actor who follows in the footsteps of past luminaries such as Finlay Currie and James Mason in the ro ... [Continua a leggere]

Gillian Anderson, best known for playing Agent Scully in The X Files, has been unveiled as the new face of Charles Dickens' tormented Miss Havisham, in the BBC's festive adaptation of Great Expectations. The American actress looks every bit the jilted bride imagined in the Victorian classic, but her performance is sure to be measured against that of Helena Bonham Carter, who is playing the same character in a production to be released next year to coincide with Dickens' 200th anniversary. The 43-year-old may be best known for her dealings with the supernatural, but she's also previously p ... [Continua a leggere]