Latest news with #TobiasMenzies
Daily Mail
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- Daily Mail
The endearing nickname Prince Philip gave Princess Anne, who turns 75 today, and how he supported her during a 'rocky patch' in her marriage
Today Princess Anne celebrates her 75th birthday - but one royal who sadly will not be able to attend is her beloved father Prince Philip. Anne and Philip were known to share a very close bond, with many friends of the family going as far as to claim the Princess Royal was the late Duke of Edinburgh 's favourite child. This close bond between the two royals was endearingly exemplified in season three of the hit Netflix series The Crown when an adorable nickname Philip had for Anne was revealed. In the scene, from the fourth episode of the season, Philip is seen sitting at his desk speaking into a tannoy asking for a member of the Royal Family. Philip, played by Tobias Menzies, can be heard calling out 'sweetie' into the intercom. One of Queen Elizabeth II's advisors assumes it is her he is trying to reach and so goes into her office to let her know. 'I'm not sweetie, I'm darling or cabbage. Someone else is sweetie,' Elizabeth replies. It is then revealed that it is in fact Anne that the doting father is trying to reach as Erin Doherty makes her debut in the show as the Princess Royal. 'Sweetie' was reportedly a real nickname that Prince Philip had for Anne and an unsurprising one considering their special father-daughter relationship. Mike Parker told the Daily Mail in 2017 that their close bond was because 'Anne is very much like Philip' while 'Charles is more like Elizabeth'. Indeed, the pair were remarkably similar, with both sharing a love of sport and being among the hardest-working members of the family. Anne is also known to have leaned on her father for support during the breakdown of her marriage to Mark Phillips. Writing in his biography of the late prince - titled Philip: The Final Portrait - broadcaster Gyles Brandreth said: 'When Princess Anne 's first marriage foundered, the Queen and Prince Philip were saddened, of course, but as the Duke put it to me, "What can you do? It isn't easy. She tried to make it work. She really did."' Anne then married her second husband, Tim Laurence, in 1992 but then went on to confide in her father about a 'rocky patch' the couple were enduring. Brandreth wrote: 'A few years later, when Anne had remarried, the Duke told me that she and her new husband were having a "Rocky patch - you're married, you know how it is?" "I do," I said. '"I don't know what to do to help," he said. He shook his head.' The surprisingly candid admissions came while Philip was attending a meal at the Cabinet War Rooms. 'He made no attempt to hide his distress and concern. It clearly weighed on him quite heavily. It must have done because this conversation was taking place in public: at a charity fundraising lunch in the Cabinet War Rooms,' Brandreth recalled. 'We had only just taken our places: food was being served. I was seated one place away from the Duke. He turned to the middle-aged woman who was seated between us. '"As a rule, I try to keep out of these things," he explained,' Brandreth continued. '"But you want to help," said the woman, who had married children of her own. '"Yes," said the Duke, contemplating his starters, "but I don't know what to say except, keep it going, it will work out. With good will on both side, it usually does." 'He sighed: "Children."' Following Philip's death in April 2021, the Princess Royal paid tribute to her father describing him as her 'teacher, supporter and critic '. Anne and Philip together in 1980. Upon his death, the Princess Royal paid tribute to her father describing him as her 'teacher, supporter and critic' The statement read: 'You know it's going to happen but you are never really ready. 'My father has been my teacher, my supporter and my critic, but mostly it is his example of a life well lived and service freely given that I most wanted to emulate. 'His ability to treat every person as an individual in their own right with their own skills comes through all the organisations with which he was involved. 'I regard it as an honour and a privilege to have been asked to follow in his footsteps and it has been a pleasure to have kept him in touch with their activities. 'I know how much he meant to them, in the UK, across the Commonwealth and in the wider world. 'I would like to emphasise how much the family appreciate the messages and memories of so many people whose lives he also touched. We will miss him but he leaves a legacy which can inspire us all.' The notoriously private Anne is known for her rather unconventional approach to royal life, having decided when her children were born they would not receive titles. That attitude also extends into other aspects of Anne's life. On the Royals with Roya and Kate podcast, expert Roya Nikkhah revealed Anne follows a strict policy when it comes to birthday celebrations. Roya claims that the Princess Royal has a 'no-frills' approach to her birthdays which means she only celebrates major milestones. 'Anne's policy is: "I will do things for my birthdays that have a zero, but I won't do things for my birthdays that have a five,"' Roya said. She added Anne has reportedly cancelled meetings in the run up to the big day to avoid discussions about how she might mark her 75th. So for Anne's next big birthday celebration, partygoers will have to wait till her 80th.
Yahoo
06-08-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Tobias Menzies and Sophia Di Martino Among Eight Joining Ayo Edebiri-Will Sharpe Rom-Com Series ‘Prodigies' at Apple
Apple TV+ has added eight new cast members to 'Prodigies,' the streamer's upcoming romantic comedy series created by Will Sharpe and starring Sharpe opposite Ayo Edebiri. Newly joining 'Prodigies' are Tobias Menzies ('F1: The Movie,' 'You Hurt My Feelings,' 'The Crown'), Sophia Di Martino ('Loki,' 'Flowers'), Andrene Ward-Hammond ('Your Honor,' 'English Teacher'), Yumi Asō ('Perfect Days,' 'Angel Flight: Kokusai Reikyu Sokanshi'), Reece Shearsmith ('Inside No. 9,' 'The League of Gentlemen'), Nabhaan Rizwan ('Kaos,' 'In Camera'), Meera Syal ('Roar,' 'The Wheel of Time') and Lolly Adefope ('The Franchise,' 'Ghosts'). More from Variety Dua Lipa, Tobias Menzies, David Jonsson to Star in Short Films Reading Excerpts From International Booker Prize Contenders 'Manhunt' Finale Breakdown: Tobias Menzies on How They Pulled Off [Spoiler]'s Death and Building a Bromance With Abe Lincoln 'Loki' Star Sophia Di Martino on Potential Season 3 and Wanting a Sylvie-Thor Crossover: 'It Would Be Fun to See Them Get Wound Up' 'Prodigies' follows a couple named Didi (Edebiri) and Ren (Sharpe), who are described in the official logline as 'two ex-child prodigies who have been together since they were children. Now in their early 30s, they are starting to question whether their very ordinary existence is living up to the extraordinary promise of their childhood. Inevitably, they find themselves asking the same questions of their relationship. As individual hopes and needs feed into and conflict with their shared lives, the series challenges the fallacy at the heart of romantic storytelling — that the tale is over when the heroes get together. In life, surely, that is just the beginning?' Along with Sharpe and Edebiri, the new cast members join Rina Sawayama, the pop singer previously announced to be recurring in the role of Hana, Ren's sister. Sharpe writes the seven-episode series and executive produces alongside Edebiri. Also executive producing are Jane Featherstone, Naomi de Pear and Katie Carpenter via Featherstone and Elisabeth Murdoch's Sister production banner. Best of Variety New Movies Out Now in Theaters: What to See This Week What's Coming to Disney+ in August 2025 What's Coming to Netflix in August 2025
Wall Street Journal
01-07-2025
- Entertainment
- Wall Street Journal
Tobias Menzies Was Born to Play the Villain
Tobias Menzies, 51, is an Emmy-winning English actor best known for 'Outlander' and 'The Crown.' He co-stars in 'F1: The Movie.' He spoke with Marc Myers. When my mother was in her 20s, she took acting classes in London. Then she met my father and started a family. She never discussed her acting plans nor did she nudge me to perform when I was a child.
Times
23-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Times
Tobias Menzies on F1: I don't find racing very gripping. I prefer tennis
Every American alpha in an action flick needs an unmacho British foil, someone who, just through their awkward presence, can make the star look even cooler. In the Indiana Jones films Harrison Ford had Denholm Elliott, in Mission: Impossible Tom Cruise had Simon Pegg, and now, in F1: The Movie, Brad Pitt has Tobias Menzies. While Pitt's Formula 1 driver, Sonny Hayes, is a laconic straight-shooter steeped in racing nous, Menzies's money man, Peter Banning, is a jittery obfuscator who has binge-watched Drive to Survive to get up to speed. Swaggering he is not. It's a role deftly played in unfamiliar conditions by Menzies, 51, who is known around the world as Edmure Tully in Game of Thrones and for his Emmy-winning portrayal of Prince Philip opposite Olivia Colman's Elizabeth in The Crown. 'I haven't really done these sorts of films before,' he says, talking in a café near his home in northwest London. In a $300 million juggernaut such as F1, seizing the moment is all. 'You've got these tiny little pirouettes of character and story, and then drive, drive, action, action.' • Inside F1: The Movie – how Brad Pitt hit 180mph (with Lewis Hamilton's help) Physicality, Menzies decided, could convey more than words, so he gave his character a Tim Henman-style fist-pump celebration. Banning, a board member on Hayes's team, was pitched to him as 'a sort of classic English gent, suited and booted, and I was like, that feels in danger of being a cliché'. He left the suits to Javier Bardem, who plays the team boss, and suggested that his character be more of a tech bro, clad in a casual 'but unbelievably expensive' wardrobe à la Succession. Pitt he found to be 'delightfully straight' and 'very unstatusy — when he's on set, he just likes to play the scene'. Except that some scenes involved him driving an F1 car at 180mph. 'What I love about the film is just how fast it looks,' Menzies says. 'Brad said he found it unbelievably rewarding and my sense was that he'd gotten very good at it.' Over the period of filming Pitt's lap times got a second faster, an eternity in the sport. Menzies didn't get to drive an F1 machine — how fast has he gone in a reasonably priced car? 'I probably haven't even broken 100.' 'The challenge of the movie star is a different thing — he's got to carry the story,' he says of Pitt. 'Clooney, Brad, these guys are bringing something suffused with their own natural charisma and attractiveness.' Like his character, Menzies wasn't familiar with F1. 'There's a crazy circus quality to it — these teams just land for three days in this place and then move on. It's like theatre on steroids.' They filmed guerrilla-style at real grands prix in the UK, Abu Dhabi, Hungary and Italy. He remembers shooting on the grid at Silverstone ten minutes before the start of a real race. 'All the real drivers were there, the real crowd. We had to run out of there because the cars had to take off for the warm-up lap. That was my first day and I'm like, this is nuts.' The film was endorsed by the sport's governing body and its authenticity extends to rampant product placement. 'It's an expensive film to make,' he says. 'And the product placement doesn't pop so much because you're used to seeing it in Formula 1.' The movie is full of plugs for Ninja air fryers but he didn't get a free one. 'I obviously wasn't in on those days.' So is Menzies now an F1 convert or was it just a work thing? 'It might, whisper it, be the latter,' he says. 'It's a very strange world and, if I'm totally honest, as a spectator I didn't find it very gripping. When you're watching the track, sometimes you wouldn't know who had gone past.' He is more of a tennis guy and an all-year swimmer in the Hampstead Heath ponds. • Read more film reviews, guides about what to watch and interviews Born in London to a radio producer father and a teacher mother, Menzies went to a Steiner school in Canterbury and trained at Rada, where his peers included Sally Hawkins and Maxine Peake. 'Maxine was already a bit of a star — when we were there she had a TV documentary made about her,' he says. He politely avoids talking about his private life, having graced gossip columns in the Noughties while dating Kristin Scott Thomas, 14 years his senior. After breaking through in 2005 as an anguished Brutus in HBO's Rome, these days he generally gets recognised for Game of Thrones, the time-travelling historical fantasy Outlander and The Crown, although fans of the last of those are as restrained as the royals. 'They don't tend to come up to you,' he says. Many of Menzies's characters are quite buttoned up. 'That's a bit who I am, but not completely. I'm more of a mess than Philip — he's a lot more alpha. I find life a lot more challenging.' Contained acting is also 'what I'm drawn to, where it doesn't show me everything straight away'. Seeing Stephen Dillane in Tom Stoppard's The Real Thing at the Donmar Warehouse in 1999 was formative. 'There was an ambivalence about his relationship with the audience — it wasn't necessarily kind or appealing. The inside is bigger than the outside.' For Menzies that interiority comes with fierce self-criticism. At the F1 premiere he talked to Hans Zimmer, the film's composer. 'He was like, 'I hardly like anything I've written — I ask directors to tell me whether it's shit or not shit.' I'm similar.' So what's the least bad thing he's done? 'The episode in The Crown that juxtaposed Philip's midlife crisis with the moon landings,' he says. Philip would never admit to having a crisis 'so he needs this other thing to communicate it through. My internal critic wasn't too savage on that one.' Menzies can play lighter, from his deadpan gynaecologist in Catastrophe to Edmure, his hapless nobleman in Game of Thrones, who was the groom at the infamous Red Wedding ('I left the room and everyone died') and had a hilarious scene in the very last episode of the show, where he made a pitch for being king before his niece, Sansa Stark, told him, 'Uncle — sit down.' 'There was a happy little accident there,' Menzies says. 'I turn and my scabbard bangs against the tent pole. That wasn't in the script, it happened in rehearsal.' His next film, The Entertainment System Is Down, is about as far from F1 as you could get. Co-starring Keanu Reeves and Kirsten Dunst, and directed by Ruben Ostlund, the Swede who made The Square and Triangle of Sadness, it's about a plane en route from London to Sydney whose in-flight entertainment goes kaput. 'It becomes, in a very Ruben Ostlund way, a dark social commentary about what happens when you remove the screens from our society,' Menzies says. 'It's a huge opiate, maybe the biggest drug that we're all consuming. 'I can be obsessive about work but I found my match in Ruben. He's highly demanding — you do a minimum of 25 takes. Often his films have a comedic element but anything that feels acted he can't bear. Which is absolutely my taste as well.' Like Triangle of Sadness, the film shows a spectrum of society: pilots and stewardesses, upper class and economy. Menzies plays one of a group of Australian cricket fans who have just seen their team beat England in the Ashes. 'We're a source of chaos and entertainment,' he says. 'It came out of Ruben meeting a group of Australian guys at a barbecue and being really taken by a particular kind of Australian masculinity — unapologetic, front-footed, a lot of jokes.' Ostlund, like many directors, knows that Menzies can be a whole lot more than the token weedy Brit.F1: The Movie is in cinemas from June 25
