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Daily Mail
27-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
EastEnders star is worlds away from his Walford days as he is nominated at Raindance Film Festival for unique independent horror movie role
EastEnders star John Altman has been nominated for a top award at the Raindance Film Festival. The soap opera legend, famed for playing 'Nasty' Nick Cotton for 30 years, has taken on a very different role from his Walford days in horror movie The Last Grail Hunter. In a unique plot, the release follows failed grail hunter and alcoholic Johnny Calvi as he makes one last ditch attempt to find the Holy Grail - the cup that Jesus drank from at the Last Supper. Set in the 2031, society has been rebuilt and is controlled by a secret organisation called the Priory of Sion, with life being run in Arcadia 'as a mystical game'. It prompts the question about whether Johnny's life is controlled by a gamer and if his epic mission is simply a quest in the video game, titled The Last Grail Hunter. From A-list scandals and red carpet mishaps to exclusive pictures and viral moments, subscribe to the Daily Mail's showbiz newsletter to stay in the loop. The 70-minute independent movie was shot across just four days in London and directed by Mark Christopher Lee. And John's work has been recognised as he has been nominated for Best Performance in a UK Feature at the 33rd Raindance Film Festival. In the category, he is up against Daniel McNamee for Breakwater, Mickey Angelov's Dali, Graham McTavish for Dirty Boy, and Jordan Bolger for Heavyweight. Also among the independent nominees are Charlie Robb for Loney, Row's Bella Dayne, White Guilt's Temica Thompson and Edward Hogg for The Lonely Musketeer. Speaking about his nomination at the largest independent film festival in the UK, John said: 'I'm extremely happy to have been nominated for Best Performance. 'I've worked with Mark before on music but he called me one day and said he had an idea for a film and I like things that are different. 'It was an enjoyable four days filming the entire movie on location in London and St Albans.' Set to ominous music, the trailer follows Johnny as he parades around London to find the Holy Grail, before shots show him screaming on a table while a gamer appears to control his every move. The horror flick, which is available to stream, will premiere on June 19, 2025, at the Vue in Piccadilly, London, as part of the film festival. John agreed to take on the unique role after learning about the plot, while he is also a huge fan of horror as a franchise. Though it is worlds away from his Walford days, John is a horror aficionado having nabbed roles in Demons At Dawn, Repentance and 1981's An American Werewolf In London. He told BANG Showbiz: 'I love horror films. I like to be made to jump out of my skin, which a good horror should be able to do. 'I like it when the film controls you so that you're totally relaxed and not expecting anything and that's when you jump. I like that, the power of film.' John rose to fame among the original cast of long-running BBC soap opera EastEnders, entering the scene as 'Nasty' Nick Cotton. He was an integral part of the show's first big storyline - murdering elderly resident Reg Cox (Johnnie Clayton) and became the soap's biggest villain. But he left the soap in 1991 after refusing to accept a gay storyline for his character, with John claiming he was written out. John later returned to the soap, appearing in 1993, 1998 and between 2000 and 2001, 2008 and 2009 and finally from 2014 to 2015 - when he was killed off. He died in his on-screen mother's arms after a fatal reaction to heroin for which Dot (June Brown) did not seek medical help. Earlier this year, John made headlines once again for saying a racial slur live on air during an appearance on BBC Radio 4. The broadcaster was forced to apologise for his language after he had uttered an offensive term during a conversation about whether he had ever improvised any lines. 'We knew our characters so well. We wouldn't change it drastically. We'd put in words or a line here and there to make it comical. Just to liven it up a bit,' he shared. John then recalled an incident in the late 00s when show bosses changed a racial slur in the script to 'illegal immigrant', repeating the offensive term on air himself. He said: 'I suppose I can say it on air, if you don't mind, but Nick referred to someone who was living with Dot as a ****. They start filming and they said, ''Oh I don't think we can say that''. Interjecting, Sarah stated: 'No, I don't think we can [say that].' John then claimed that 'people do unfortunately still say it these days', to which Sarah insisted: 'They don't.' Later on, Sarah apologised for the language used, saying: 'Can I apologise. It wasn't appropriate in the old days, and it wasn't appropriate now, for what John Altman said.'
Daily Mail
24-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
VERONICA LEE reviews The Great Gatsby: Dazzling, but not the greatest Gatsby
The Great Gatsby (London Coliseum) Verdict: A spectacle old sport Marc Bruni's dazzling production of The Great Gatsby opened on Broadway last year and now – with a mostly British cast – bursts into life in the West End. But while the musical adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's great American novel about money and class looks like a million dollars, the creators still struggle to overcome the essential problem of the work: none of the leading characters are likeable, not even narrator Nick Carraway (Corbin Bleu), who may not be nasty or vapid but is still (whisper it) a bit of a sap. Paul Tate dePoo III's scenic and projection design and Cory Pattak's lighting create a dazzling array of scenes, conjuring up the 1922 Long Island mansions of old-money socialites Tom and Daisy Buchanan (Jon Robyns and Frances Mayli McCann) and their party-loving new neighbour Jay Gatsby (Jamie Muscato), who has made his fortune from bootlegging and is determined to win Daisy's heart. Gatsby in famous film incarnations by Robert Redford and Leonardo DiCaprio is enigmatic. Muscato captures the character's cool detachment, and has a beautiful singing voice in a production that sounds terrific (even if the songs are as ephemeral as the green lamp at the end of Daisy's dock). McCann and Rachel Tucker, as Tom's mistress Myrtle, also impress in their solo numbers. The creators (script by Kait Kerrigan, Jazz Age-infused music by Jason Howland and lyrics by Nathan Tysen) have taken a few liberties with the novel, so it may not be an evening for hardcore Fitzgerald purists. Instead, the show focuses on the Gatsby-Daisy love story, with mere nods to the novel's more nuanced examination of the dark side of the American Dream. But while it may not fully engage one's emotions, this is a Show with a capital S. It looks fabulous. It has a talented ensemble for the big set pieces – and it offers a lot of bang for its (and your) buck. The Great Gatsby runs until September 7. Tickets on sale at The Da Vinci Code (Salisbury Playhouse) Verdict: 24 carat hokum Can anyone take Dan Brown seriously? Well, not I… after seeing this re-heated stage adaptation of his religious conspiracy novel, The Da Vinci Code – provocatively timed to open during Easter's Holy Week (imagine The Satanic Verses timed for Eid). The story is sometimes denounced as blasphemous, which greatly overstates its importance. In reality, it's a work of 24-carat hokum that earned the best-selling author much more than 30 pieces of silver. Catholics like me could easily take exception to its prurient claim that Jesus had children with Mary Magdalene – and that his 'bloodline' still walks the Earth, safeguarded by a shady organisation called the Priory of Sion. But it's better understood as a comic caper in which a hot French cop ambushes a Harvard 'Professor of Symbology' in the Louvre, so he can help her investigate the murder of her grandfather, who was mixed up in a pagan sex cult. Brown's ludicrous plot provides some fun as a nerdish sudoku thriller, supplemented by anagrams, cryptic clues and the notorious Fibonacci sequence – imagine TV's The Crystal Maze meets Countdown, in top tourist destinations across France and the UK. Poor old Leonardo da Vinci is revealed to be a crackpot cryptographer and proto Steve Bannon conspiracy theorist who encoded civilization-shattering messages in his art. None of these delusions compress easily into stage action, any more than they did on film. Rachel Wagstaff and Duncan Abel's script is sustained by seemingly AI-generated dialogue including every duff crime-writer's go-to exclamation: 'No, wait, I can explain!' And yet, in its frenzy to rip through Brown's codswallop, Chelsea Walker's production fizzes amusingly in a setting of a concrete bunker with churchy acoustics, haunted by cowled monks. And yet, in its frenzy to rip through Brown's codswallop, Chelsea Walker's production fizzes amusingly in a setting of a concrete bunker with churchy acoustics, haunted by cowled monks Helping us decipher the labyrinthine conspiracy fostered by the Vatican's answer to the CIA – 'Opus Dei' – Joe Bannister, as our geeky hero Robert Langdon, breathlessly explains Brown's esoterica like a high-end tour guide. Georgia-Mae Myers does an 'Allo 'Allo! French accent as sassy cop Sophie Neveu, who is impressively au fait with mathematical formulae. And Philip Bretherton is an over-educated English billionaire/Bond villain, Leigh Teabing, desperate to add the Holy Grail – Jesus's chalice from the Last Supper – to his private collection. With a self-flagellating Opus Dei flunky (Joe Pitts) in hot pursuit, like Mr Bean with a cat-o'-nine-tails, it's too silly to be sacrilegious, but can just about be enjoyed as pseudo-intellectual larks. Until May 3; then Mercury Theatre, Colchester May 7-24 How To Fight Loneliness (Park Theatre, Finsbury Park, London) Verdict: Assisted dying: murder or mercy? By Georgina Brown 'MAYBE he's not coming?' says Jodie in the opening scene of the UK premiere of Neil LaBute's play, in one of many echoes of Beckett's Waiting Godot. The set is another, with a touch of Dali, too: a scorched apocalyptic landscape, bare but for leafless trees and withered plants, with drinks appearing surreally from a rusting sculpture and painted steps referred to as a 'couch'. Justina Kehinde's beautiful, blooming Jodie seems gripped by pain, her hair a giveaway post-chemo shadow — and very striking. Both LaBute and director Lisa Spirling steer well shy of the shocking, ugly deterioration that can come with stage four brain cancer. Jodie is not just sick, she is 'sick and tired'. She has tried and failed to jump off a building or in front of a van and, for some unexplained reason, she and her devoted husband, Brad (Archie Backhouse), haven't moved to an American state where assisted dying is legal. Instead, and in spite of the fact that he wants Jodie to live to the inevitably bitter end, Brad has invited a man rumoured to have 'helped' his stepbrother to die to come to their house — and decided to ask him to kill her. Morgan Watkins's gauche, lunkheaded hulk Tate, capable of snapping someone's neck accidentally, seems an unlikely angel of death. He has no time for Brad, but every sympathy with Jodie, whom he remembers from schooldays, and accepts the task. Jodie and Brad's looping, repetitive exchanges about her wanting to end the pain and him wanting her to fight it may be realistic but dramatically paralysing. The best scene is the last, charged with violence and tenderness, when an antagonised Tate (Brad has been calling and hanging round his workplace) first confronts and finally cradles the grieving Brad. Too late, the play becomes as complicated and conflicted as this life and death issue demands and deserves. Until May 24. Midnight Cowboy (Southwark Playhouse, Elephant) Verdict: Not much to sing about By Georgina Brown Think of the grimy, gritty 1969 movie Midnight Cowboy and you think of Harry Nilsson's haunting hit Everybody's Talkin' (and Jon Voigt's cowboy boots, and Dustin Hoffman's limp). Only a composer and lyricist as confident as Francis 'Eg' White (geddit?), who has written hits for Adele, Amy Winehouse, Celine Dion and Kylie, would dare to create a new score for this brutal bromance. Strikingly, however, the musical opens in silence as Joe Buck washes off his bloodstained body and, with it, the horror of what just happened, and slips into a moody rearrangement of Everybody's Talkin'. An homage, at least. From there, Bryony Lavery's book goes back to before, when the provincial young Texan (Paul Jacob French, an underwhelming, oddly vacant beefcake), dressed as an ersatz cowboy, takes a bus to New York city, determined to shrug off his haunted, hopeless past and reinvent himself as a gigolo. Like the movie, it's a series of flashback fragments as Joe is effortlessly swindled and his Great American dream becomes a living nightmare. Unlike the movie, it fails to get under the skins of the characters. At least a potential sugar mommy enjoys the ride (a show-stopping Tori Allen-Martin writhes ecstatically while singing Whatever It Is You're Doing) before fleecing him. A religious pervert shamelessly exploits him. Sickly, lowlife conman Ricko 'Ratso' Rizzo (a clammy, vulnerable Max Bowden) fails to become his pimp but manages to become his partner in grime. Lost souls, clinging together, they survive on the rats infesting their squalid tenement, clobbered then baked by Ratso. Darkly atmospheric as Nick Winston's production is, it's a pale shadow of John Schlesinger's movie. The talkin' ain't great and, but for a couple of moving numbers (Trying To Reach The River and Blue Is The Colour), and a soulful Good Morning Joe (Tori Allen-Martin, fabulous once again), the songs neither push the story forward nor amplify the emotion. Stick to the film. Until May 17.
Chicago Tribune
21-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Chicago Tribune
Review: 'The Da Vinci Code' at Drury Lane puts the complicated screenplay of the story on stage
On Good Friday at the Drury Lane Theatre in Oakbrook Terrace, Easter bunnies cheered up the lobby as the venue prepared for its famed holiday weekend brunch. Meanwhile, the theater was staging a show that (spoilers ahead) posited that Jesus of Nazareth may have borne a child with Mary Magdalene. Quite the disconnect. A trip from your seat to the concession stand was to pass through two entirely different worlds. In all seriousness, it's unlikely that 'The Da Vinci Code' will undermine anyone's faith. You'll likely recall the Dan Brown novel, imagining a vast conspiracy theory involving Leonardo Da Vinci, the Priory of Sion cabal and the Catholic organization known as Opus Dei, all in service of covering up the existence of an ongoing bloodline emanating from Jesus. Brown's mystery, which has sold some 80 million copies over the last 22 years, became a hit 2006 film with Tom Hanks and Audrey Tautou and sparked much interest in its, ahem, alternative religious history. It begins with a murder in the Louvre Museum where Robert Langdon, a Harvard professor of religious symbolism and iconography (played at Drury Lane by Jeff Parker) has run into a young cryptologist named Sophie Neveu (Vaneh Assadourian). Together, the pursued pair set out on a fantastical quest, which leads them to an eccentric Englishman named Sir Leigh Teabing, played by Bradley Armacost. Will he lead our heroes to the Holy Grail? How much will we care? Drury Lane's production is directed by Elizabeth Margolius, a genuinely talented visual stylist who can achieve wonders when paired with the right material. And, indeed, there are a lot of cool digital design elements here from set designer Scott Penner and projections maestro Joshua Schmidt. But this script is not a great match for Margolius' skills. It contains so much cascading plot that you can barely keep track of things, even without all of the additional visual accoutrements that mostly confuse, especially in the early stages, when surely unnecessary heavy French accents get in the way of comprehensibility. Things do get better as the show goes on and I admire the aims here, but this chilly show just doesn't gel. I suspect that Margolius wanted to genuinely theatricalize a script that basically just sticks the screenplay of the movie onto a stage and hopes audiences will follow along as the characters flit from place to place. But this uninspired text just cannot support what she is trying to achieve here. It's too pedestrian an adaptation from Rachel Wagstaff and Duncan Abel. Margolius would have better going back to the novel and creating her own, had that been allowed. That said, if you are a fan of the novel or the film and want to be reminded of your experience, you'll likely enjoy at least some of this show, staged with an experienced cast. I'm something of a Da Vinci obsessive myself and I remember reading Brown's novel back in the day and being fascinated anew by this polyglot genius — an artist, futurist, tinkerer and thinker whose depths have yet to be fully plumbed. So there's that. The show does make you want to head to Milan to look again at Da Vinci's mysterious masterpiece. I did ask the Easter Bunny what he thought of these ritualistic nightly goings on, presumably within his earshot, but alas I got no response. Chris Jones is a Tribune critic. cjones5@ Review: 'The Da Vinci Code' (2.5 stars) When: Through June 1 Where: Dury Lane Theatre, 100 Drury Lane, Oakbrook Terrace Running time: 2 hours, 25 minutes Originally Published: April 21, 2025 at 10:45 AM CDT
