Post by Hannah Lee on Jan 5, 2022 2:31:38 GMT
Benedict’s co-star in Parade’s End, Rebecca Hall, has come to the forefront as an actress and now as a director, for her debut film, Passing.
She and the film and its stars have all gotten mention in this awards season. Passing is definitely on my watch-list.
I remember during the roll out of Parade’s End being very impressed with Hall and the character Sylvia. But at the time it seemed to me that Stoddard had become so enamored with Sylvia the character and/or Hall that it IMO put the narrative of PE as a mini-series off balance a bit. Because it was a story of Tietjens, and a love triangles over time, that imbalance set the piece on edge, with the respected playwright’s preference overriding Suzanna White’s or even FMF’s narrative about Tietjens and the world, culture, society he inhabited.
Rebecca Hall is featured in the current season of Finding Your Roots*, a well-made US Public Broadcasting take on the Uk’s who Do You Think You Are, with ancestry research and DNA analysis used to shed light on family histories. RH has deep UK theatre roots, but her mum was an American opera singer on the worldwide stage. There had been rumors or hints her maternal background had some twists, and the FYR episode explores rumored Native American heritage to reveal a family history which includes prominent African Americans.
The hint of those secrets in her family’s past is one of the things which brought the novel Passing to RH’s attention and made it resonate for her as a project.
It was a lovely watch, to see RH coming to terms with what had been a family history shrouded in mystery and recognizing that so much of the opportunity afforded her in her life and career had been made possible by her grandfather’s choice to hide his family background and heritage.
*The host is Harvard Professor and historian Henry Louis Gates Jr who some may remember from his time in the news, when returning from an academic conference, he was arrested for “breaking in” to his own home, when a neighbor in Cambridge MA called to report a black man entering a home. Eventually President Obama invited Prof Gates and the arresting officer to have a beer together as his guests at the US White House. Sad to say, way too many people offered their opinions about how Gates had gone into his OWN home wrong, trying to justify the neighbor calling the police.
She and the film and its stars have all gotten mention in this awards season. Passing is definitely on my watch-list.
I remember during the roll out of Parade’s End being very impressed with Hall and the character Sylvia. But at the time it seemed to me that Stoddard had become so enamored with Sylvia the character and/or Hall that it IMO put the narrative of PE as a mini-series off balance a bit. Because it was a story of Tietjens, and a love triangles over time, that imbalance set the piece on edge, with the respected playwright’s preference overriding Suzanna White’s or even FMF’s narrative about Tietjens and the world, culture, society he inhabited.
Rebecca Hall is featured in the current season of Finding Your Roots*, a well-made US Public Broadcasting take on the Uk’s who Do You Think You Are, with ancestry research and DNA analysis used to shed light on family histories. RH has deep UK theatre roots, but her mum was an American opera singer on the worldwide stage. There had been rumors or hints her maternal background had some twists, and the FYR episode explores rumored Native American heritage to reveal a family history which includes prominent African Americans.
The hint of those secrets in her family’s past is one of the things which brought the novel Passing to RH’s attention and made it resonate for her as a project.
It was a lovely watch, to see RH coming to terms with what had been a family history shrouded in mystery and recognizing that so much of the opportunity afforded her in her life and career had been made possible by her grandfather’s choice to hide his family background and heritage.
*The host is Harvard Professor and historian Henry Louis Gates Jr who some may remember from his time in the news, when returning from an academic conference, he was arrested for “breaking in” to his own home, when a neighbor in Cambridge MA called to report a black man entering a home. Eventually President Obama invited Prof Gates and the arresting officer to have a beer together as his guests at the US White House. Sad to say, way too many people offered their opinions about how Gates had gone into his OWN home wrong, trying to justify the neighbor calling the police.