The Picture Journal

Andrea Riseborough

You’ll be appearing soon as Svetlana Stalin – Joseph Stalin’s only daughter – in Armando Ianucci’s The Death of Stalin. This will be one of Ianucci’s first projects not only using a real contextual setting but also ‘real’ historical figures. What can you share about the way this project (and you through your character) approached the balance of reality and creative license? I watched the moving images of Svetlana available, read one book in particular, Rosemary Sullivan’s Stalin’s Daughter, which was comprehensive. And used all the stills of her available. Then made an effort to forget it all and embrace…

0 Comments

Ronan Raftery

What do you think would be the most inconvenient phobia for you to develop at this stage of your life? A fear of interviews. Which cinematic villain or antagonist have you always felt the most empathy for? Beetlejuice, he just wants the house to himself! I usually empathize with the bad guy. Good movies rarely have a villain with no redeemable characteristics or moments where they question everything, however briefly. I’m thinking of Charlize Theron in Monster or Jack Nicholson in The Shining, Darth Vader etc. Moments when the armour cracks and we catch a glimpse of the person that…

0 Comments

Jenn Murray

What is a fear that you have willingly faced? I am not sure I would call this a real fear, but when I was a teenager I always thought having very short hair would be awful. Then shooting my first film I was required to bleach it every week. My hair disintegrated and after filming I had to cut it all off to a very short pixie crop hairstyle. This is a look I had feared but then when I had it, I liked it. I would never have voluntarily cut it all off and because I had no choice,…

0 Comments

Jim Sturgess

If you could somehow give the 12 year old version of yourself a book to read, a film to watch, and an album to listen to – presumably to make yourself cooler or more knowledgeable at an earlier age – what would you gift? That’s a hard question as I feel that whatever you are reading, listening to, or discovering at the time is the right thing for you at that moment. The discovery of these things as you go through life are what make you who you are… so I’d be nervous to interfere with that. I didn’t really…

2 Comments

Tom Riley

If you could pick one piece of technology or art to have come out 10 years earlier in your life or 10 years later, what would you pick? The iPhone. And a decade later. I just would have liked ten more years to actually take in the world around me. Eggplant emoji, winky face. What is the most interesting conversation you’ve had with someone whom you never talked to again? I’m not sure about the most interesting, but the conversation that stayed with me the most was when I was shooting a neurosurgery show called Monroe a few years ago.…

0 Comments

Inside Look: Chanya Button

We spoke to director Chanya Button about Burn Burn Burn, her first feature length film. Much of Burn Burn Burn is comprised of a road trip – if you could pick three people to share the road with who you do not know, who would you pick? My next film is about Virginia Woolf and her relationship with the poet Vita Sackville-West. They had an intense friendship, they creatively inspired each other, and they had a passionate romance for a time. I’d like to take a road trip with them and bear witness to the fireworks! They sounded like a…

0 Comments

Finlay MacMillan

What capability would you rather have, a photographic memory or the ability to impersonate anyone without practice? Photographic memory sounds cool. But only if when I blink (to take the photograph) I can hear a small internal shutter noise sound effect. You’ll soon be appearing in the psychological thriller The Dark Mile, concerning two holidaying women seeking R&R but finding anything but… Inverting the central premise, have you ever been in a situation that you utterly dreaded only for it to turn out to be just the opposite? I was home alone and absolutely shaking with terror once. It was…

1 Comments

Where to next?