Dreamscape – Toyah Willcox Fansite

As recently posted, and following this year’s Quadrophenia screening/Q&A + Gig, Toyah will return to Square Chapel Arts Centre in early 2020 for a Jubilee screening/Q&A and a new full-band electric concert.

As well as this, Square Chapel Arts Centre are also screening The Tempest, along with a Q&A with Christopher Biggins.

All of these events are taking place in February 2020 as part of LGBT History Month – We are delighted to be celebrating LGBT History Month with a series of live events and special film screenings.

• Browse details of the Jubilee and The Tempest screening events, as well as the full diary for LGBT History Month, at the Square Chapel Arts Centre website.

This New York City Playwright’s Music Video Puts a Fantastical Spin on the Tutu

When New York artist Leah Hennessey starts describing some of the influences of her band’s first official video, “Sleeping Beauty,” you can tell straight away that she’s a pop culture fanatic.

She references comic books like Grant Morrison’s The Invisibles, old fairy tales like Sleeping Beauty—unsurprising, given the song’s title—and deeper cuts like cult director Derek Jarman’s 1979 film The Tempest.

…The ballet look, on the other hand, was loosely based on Toyah Willcox’s costumes in Jarman’s The Tempest. “I was going for a feral balletic ethereality to evoke the fairy-tale aspect of the song,” she describes. Plus, she never before had an excuse to wear a tutu.

• Continue reading at Vogue.com. Browse our archive dedicated to The Tempest.

As previously posted, Toyah plays the Holt Festival 2019 on Friday 26th July – at the Theatre In The Woods.

An addition to the festival schedule that day is a screening of The Tempest, at the Britten Building.

New this year, we’re delighted to introduce Festival Extras – a series of events in addition to the main programme.

The Tempest: Friday 26 July, 4.00pm Britten Building
Tickets available on the door | Running time: 1h 35min
Derek Jarman’s magical 1979 film version of The Tempest starring Toyah Willcox. This screening will be introduced by the film’s producer Don Boyd and Toyah will make a guest appearance.

Each July the festival, whose media partners are the Eastern Daily Press and North Norfolk News, sets the Georgian country town alight with performers, musicians, art exhibitions and literary events. The early announcements include two music stars with many weeks in the charts between them.

• Visit the Holt Festival website. Browse all of our Holt Festival news.

Jarman brings sumptuous visual style and a measure of the punk spirit that informed Jubilee to this cinematic version of the Shakespeare text. Festival guest Toyah Willcox plays Miranda, who has been banished to a desolate island with her father Prospero (Heathcote Williams) by Alonso, King of Naples (Peter Bull). Prospero’s plans for revenge are complicated when Miranda falls in love with the king’s son Ferdinand (David Meyer). If you discount the very loose sci-fi adaptation Forbidden Planet this was the big screen’s first version of the play.

Screening as part of Derby Film Festival. Passes are available which allow entry to all events across the full ten days of the festival for just £80.

• Continue reading at Derby QUAD. View the full programme at the Derby Film Festival website. Full info on/Book tickets for Toyah Willcox in Conversation taking place on Saturday 5th May at DFF.

Following the news that Toyah will be a guest at the Derby Film Festival 2018 on Saturday 5th May – talking about her career in film and on screen – as part of Paracinema, the full programme of films and events has been announced, with Jubilee and The Tempest showing a number of times during the 10 day film fest.

Jubilee (15): UK, 1978: 106m. Dir: Derek Jarman
Saturday 5th May: 7pm, Tuesday 8th May: 12.10pm/8.35pm, Wednesday 9th May: 2.15pm/8.45pm

When Queen Elizabeth I (Jenny Runacre) asks her court alchemist John Dee (Richard O’Brien) to show her the future of England she is transported forward 400 years to 1978. She arrives to discover a post-apocalyptic society on the brink of collapse where girl gangs rove the streets indulging in casual murder, the police are openly fascistic, and public opinion is manipulated by all-powerful media moguls. Forty years on from its first release Derek Jarman’s Jubilee remains the quintessential punk film, a daring and unique vision, featuring many icons of the punk era including festival guest Toyah Willcox, Little Nell, Wayne Country, Jordan, Adam Ant and many more.

The Tempest (15): UK, 1979: 91m. Dir: Derek Jarman
Wednesday 9th May: 12pm/6pm, Thursday 10th May: 1.30pm/8.45pm

Jarman brings sumptuous visual style and a measure of the punk spirit that informed Jubilee to this cinematic version of the Shakespeare text. Festival guest Toyah Willcox plays Miranda, who has been banished to a desolate island with her father Prospero (Heathcote Williams) by Alonso, King of Naples (Peter Bull). Prospero’s plans for revenge are complicated when Miranda falls in love with the king’s son Ferdinand (David Meyer). If you discount the very loose sci-fi adaptation Forbidden Planet this was the big screen’s first version of the play.

• View the full programme at the Derby Film Festival website. Full info on/Book tickets for Toyah Willcox in Conversation.

Yet another special screening of Derek Jarman’s The Tempest in 2016. This time debuting in India, at the “Shakespeare on Film Collection”.

Screening of Shakespeare’s The Tempest
By British Council India
Wed, 21 Sep 2016: 6:30PM

As part of the Shakespeare on Film Collection, the British Film Institute and British Council present Derek Jarman’s “The Tempest” for the first time to audiences in New Delhi.

Starring Elizabeth Welch & Heathcote Williams, this depiction of Shakespeare’s play is a true representation of colonialism, revenge, retribution and reconciliation.

• Continue reading at Events High.

Derek Jarman’s The Tempest will be screened at New York’s Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) later this year, as part of their “Breaking Bard: Shakespeare on Film” festival.

MoMA Slates Fall Bardfest With 21 Shakespeare-Related Films

New York’s Museum of Modern Art will screen an eclectic assortment of films based on or inspired by William Shakespeare next month in “Breaking Bard: Shakespeare on Film, October 12–24 at the Roy and Niuta Titus Theaters.

The British-heavy, 21-film slate is certain to inspire debate over what’s in — a mix of classic performances including Olivier’s Hamlet and Paul Scofield’s King Lear, along with such Shakespeare riffs as Fred M. Wilcox’s 1956 sci-fi Tempest reboot Forbidden Planet and Tom Stoppard’s 1990 adaptation of his early Hamlet rumination, Rosencrantz And Guildenstern Are Dead — and what’s mmissing: No Chimes At Midnight (1965) from Orson Welles, for example, or Max Reinhardt and William Dieterle’s star-packed 1935 A Midsummer Night’s Dream (though Julie Taymor’s more recent version, a wonder, is included).

• Continue reading/See a full list of the films showing at Deadline. This is the fourth major film/Shakespeare event The Tempest has been screened at this year. It’s also been included at Athens Open Air Film Festival 2016, Irish Film Institute presents Shakespeare Lives, and the BFI presents Shakespeare on Film.

Derek Jarman’s The Tempest is showing at Athens Open Air Film Festival, taking place between 1st and 31st July 2016. The Tempest is screened on Wednesday 13th July at Peiraios 260, Garden D, and admission is free. See further information on the festival by clicking below.

The Tempest continues to be included in various events and festivals marking the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare’s death. Next month it is being screened as part of Shakespeare Lives at the Irish Film Institute.

#Season: IFI presents Shakespeare Lives, a season of Shakespearean film adaptations this June

The season continues with Derek Jarman’s interpretation of Shakespeare’s final play, The Tempest (June 19th), an evocative depiction of colonialism, revenge, retribution and reconciliation. Starring Heathcote Williams as Prospero, the former Duke of Milan, and Toyah Willcox as his daughter Miranda, Jarman brings a punk sensibility to this production, with wild visuals and rich designs which conceal the film’s modest budget.

Tickets are available now at www.ifi.ie/shakespeare or at the IFI Box Office on 01 679 3477.

• Continue reading at scannain.com. The Tempest is also part of the BFI presents Shakespeare on Film programme, being screened on 19th June.

Derek Jarman’s The Tempest is being screened next month at Watershed, Bristol as part of the BFI presents Shakespeare on Film programme.

Brooding and darkly laden with symbolic imagery, Derek Jarman’s terrific, homoerotic adaptation of Shakespeare’s final play is considered by some to be the most evocative Shakespeare adaptation ever to reach the screen.

A tale of colonialism, revenge, retribution and reconciliation, it focuses on an ageing magician named Prospero (Heathcote Williams) – who is imprisoned on an island with his beautiful daughter Miranda (Toyah Willcox) and a beast called Caliban (Jack Birkett) – and his plans to seek vengeance on his brother by conjuring up a wild tempest to shipwreck his ship. This is Jarman at his most playful and original – enjoy!

Shakespeare on Film: The Tempest
Sun 19 June 12:00 | Director: Derek Jarman
Cast: Heathcote Williams, Toyah Willcox, Karl Johnson
135 mins, 1979, UK

• Further info at the Watershed website. There’s also a short article on the screening at bristol247.com. Browse further details on BFI presents Shakespeare on Film here.

Toyah, at the BFI’s Derek Jarman Retrospective last month, discusses working with Jarman on The Tempest, in which she plays Miranda, and considers the director’s legacy. Click below to watch the video at the BFI website.

Toyah was also interviewed at the BFI about Jarman’s Jubilee. More info on that here.

Toyah is a special guest this evening at the British Film Institute (BFI Southbank), as part of their two-month Derek Jarman retrospective season, marking the 20th anniversary of the Director/Writer’s death. Toyah will discuss Jarman’s 1979 adaptation of The Tempest, in which she starred as Miranda and was subsequently nominated for Best Newcomer at the 1980 Evening Standard Awards for her performance in the role. The film has become another landmark in Toyah’s long and varied career. Click below for further info at www.toyahwillcox.com.

Rare photos from The Tempest. Toyah played Miranda in the 1979 film and her performance won her a nomination as Best Newcomer at the 1980 Evening Standard Awards. Click below to view these photos, and more, at Dreamscape’s Gallery. (A huge thanks to Andi for these)

TCM are airing a new documentary on Derek Jarman later this month, and have a new article on The Tempest in their “Weird World Of Late Night Cinema” strand.

“O brave new world, to have such people in it.”  — Miranda, The Tempest

Pioneering director Derek Jarman introduced a brave new world to filmgoers with this unconventional adaptation of William Shakespeare’s last solo dramatic effort. Prior to this 1979 release, no film director had attempted to put on screen the kind of experimental, deconstructed vision of the Bard that was starting to turn up in more experimental theatres around the globe.

• Continue reading at TCM Underground.

Three more new reviews of The Tempest on Blu-ray.

• Ioncinema: The Tempest | Blu-ray Review: Difficult as ever, Jarman’s take on Shakespeare’s final lone play is definitely a product of his own imagining. Laced with homoeroticisms, cabaret iconography, extravagant but dirty set design, and overall unsettling imagery… Like the original story, the film centers around the magician and ex-Duke of Milan, Prospero (Heathecote Williams), along with his beautiful daughter Miranda (Toyah Willcox) and their downright scary servant, Caliban (Jack Birkett), all of which now live alone in a decrepit mansion on an island.

• Blu-ray.com: The Tempest Blu-ray Review: Stormy weather ends in sunshine: Where Jarman’s The Tempest really differentiates itself is in its unsettling oddities, its ghostly atmosphere and decayed visual style… Karl Johnson makes for a hypnotic Ariel—weird and effete, dressed all in white—and Toyah Willcox is far from the usual, virginal Miranda. Here she’s sensual and erratic, a life-sized wind-up toy doll.

• Cultural Mente Incorrecto: “The Tempest” by Derek Jarman: A different and almost subversive Shakespeare classic: “The Tempest” by Derek Jarman is a different and almost subversive Shakespeare classic. Visually stunning, with that touch of indie with hints of neorealism but a literary question fabulesca, this is a historically important film in the film, required viewing for film fans Jarman, protesters and intellectuals.

• View links to numerous other reviews of The Tempest on Blu-ray here.

A few more reviews of The Tempest, released for the first time on Blu-ray (Region A/1) earlier this week.

• TCM: Movie News: The Tempest – Derek Jarman’s Acclaimed 1979 Adaptation of the William Shakespeare Play: The jump to Blu-Ray for The Tempest is a substantial improvement here, given that transfer technology has improved considerably in the several years since its last telecine pass and the obvious benefits of 1080p.

• DVD Direct: The Tempest: Like most of Derek Jarman’s work, The Tempest is strange and difficult to access, but remains one of my favorite Shakespeare adaptations in all of film.

• DVD Beaver: The Tempest (Blu-ray): Jarman’s The Tempest is certainly interesting as a unique take on The Bard’s work and still recognizable to the play on many fronts but there are notable omissions. I suspect that this Blu-ray can only find an audience for those who appreciate Jarman.

The Tempest was released on Region A/1 Blu-ray yesterday. View a comprehensive article on the film and Blu-ray remastered edition at DVD Talk.

How do you follow up an apocalyptic punk-rock satire that seemed to offend even more people than A Clockwork Orange, up to and including the purist punks whose energy it was inspired by and meant as a tribute to? If you were celebrated British underground auteur Derek Jarman in 1979, having just shocked and rocked the world with your prior year’s film, the scorched-earth, anti-royalist comic nightmare Jubilee, why, of course, your next step would (un)naturally be to take on Shakespeare!

…Prospero’s daughter, Miranda (Jubilee’s sinisterly lisping girl-woman Toyah Willcox, here sporting a no less punkish ‘do of straggly dreadlocks, along with a stripped skeleton of a period dress that looks like something out of vintage Vivienne Westwood).

• Continue reading at DVD Talk.

• The 1980 BBC version of Dr Jekyll & Mr Hyde has now been released on DVD in Sweden. This release has a slightly different cover to the UK version (released in 2007). The cast includes David Hemmings, Diana Dors and Toyah. View a larger version of the Swedish cover here.

• Derek Jarman’s 1979 version of The Tempest is just about to be released on Blu-ray (Region A/1) for the first time. There’s a new review of the film at the Criterion Cast website: A less easy choice however came in the casting of Miranda, which went to punk rock mega-star (and also star of Criterion-approved Jubilee also from Jarman and the soon to be released Quadrophenia) Toyah Willcox. Always seen as a virginal young woman, Willcox’s punk rock persona far from fit the character, but her performance was really quite entertaining, and the relationship between she and Williams’ Prospero is vital and engaging.

• A larger version of The Tempest Blu-ray cover is also now available. View here.

• Qudrophenia Region A/1 Blu-ray: Read more details on this forthcoming release at Modculture: As they say “You can get a UK Blu-ray already, but the Quadrophenia Criterion Collection Blu-ray release is a considerable step up from that.”

• Also at Modculture: View a limited edition Quadrophenia poster by Piper Gates Design, and read a new article on the movie by Eddie Piller.

The cover for the forthcoming Region A/1 Blu-ray release of Derek Jarman’s The Tempest has been made available. The Blu-ray edition, remastered by Kino International, will be released on 7th August.

The photo used, of Toyah as Miranda, is the same iconic shot used on the Region 1 DVD release from the early 2000s. A different photo is used on the Region 2 release. There’s no word on when, or if, there will be a European Blu-ray release of The Tempest.

SYNOPSIS: Shot on location at the ancient and ghostly Stoneleigh Abbey, The Tempest tells the story of Prospero the magician, who lives with his nubile daughter on an enchanted island and punishes his enemies when they are shipwrecked there. It’s a study of sexual and political power in the guise of a fairy tale. Jarman presents Shakespeare’s intricate comedy of magic and revenge in a form that is at once faithful to the spirit of the play and an original and dazzling spectacle mixing Hollywood pastiche, high camp, and gothic horror. His film recalls the innocent homoeroticism of Pasolini’s versions of classics, while its lush sense of decor and color is worthy of Minnelli. Remastered in HD and available for the first time on Blu-ray!

BONUS FEATURES: Three short films by Derek Jarman: ”A Journey To Avebury”, ”Garden Of Luxor” and ”Art Of Mirrors”, trailers and more.

“Full of magic and surprises…the most truly spectacular British film in years.” – The London Times

‘Second Sight’, classic film and tv on DVD, has great pages dedicated to the DVD releases of Jubilee and The Tempest. Both of these. now iconic, films were reissued on Region 2 DVD in the mid-2000s.

Both are also just about to be reissued again, as part of The Derek Jarman Collection: A 5DVD box set of Derek Jarman films released by Umbrella Entertainment, in Australia, on 2nd May 2012.

• View the Jubilee page here, and The Tempest here.

Strictly Come Dancing is back for the 20th year, once again bringing joy and sparkle to homes across the nation. The multi-award-winning entertainment show, produced by BBC Studios, returns to BBC One and BBC iPlayer from Saturday 14 September.

As the nation’s favourite dance show celebrates two spectacular decades of dance, this series promises to be extra special with even more glitz, glamour and unforgettable performances.

The celebrities quick stepping onto our screens this year are Chris McCausland, Jamie Borthwick, JB Gill, Montell Douglas, Nick Knowles, Tasha Ghouri, Tom Dean MBE, Toyah Willcox, Paul Merson, Pete Wicks, Punam Krishan, Sam Quek MBE, Sarah Hadland, Shayne Ward and Wynne Evans.

Toyah Willcox “It’s fabulous. Love it.”

When you got the call inviting you to take part in Strictly this year, what made you say yes?
I’ve always wanted to do it. I love the idea of dancing. I think dancing is one of the most extraordinary things about being a human being. I just love it. I think it’s the greatest way of expressing and getting in touch with your emotions. Music has always made me want to dance, so it feels very natural to have said yes to Strictly.

Describe Strictly in one word or phrase.
Uplifting.

How does it feel to be part of the momentous 20th Anniversary series?
It’s a heavy weight to carry. I want to be brilliant. I want to be my best. I’m not necessarily a dancer but I am definitely a mover. I just don’t want to ever let anyone down. It’s fabulous being part of the 20th anniversary, but also it has huge responsibility as well.

The series is 20 years old this year. What were you doing 20 years ago or what were you doing aged 20?
I was a punk rock singer. I was touring. I made the movie Jubilee, then the Tempest, then The Corn Is Green with Catherine Hepburn, then Quadrophenia. That was a huge year for me.

Do you have any stand out memories from watching the previous series?
Ann Widdecombe. I loved her strength of personality, her conviction, her self-confidence. I mean, that’s a real focus point for me. If I’m feeling I can’t do something, I just channel my inner Ann Widdecombe.

What aspects of Strictly are you most looking forward to?
I’m looking forward to the flowing movement of dance. There are certain dances that flow like water and I’m really looking forward to that. The more frenetic stuff is going to be quite challenging, just because of my age, but I know I can do it. I move on stage still now, but the stuff that flows, that has a kind of zen about it, I’m really looking forward to.

What dance are you most looking forward to trying?
The Foxtrot. I’m very tomboyish, I’m very boisterous, and I’ve never felt feminine so I’m looking forward to doing something that makes me feel feminine.

• Continue reading at BBC Media Centre. (Photos © BBC)