THE DAILY TELEGIRAFFE
To celebrate, Kenneth Branagh as Richard III.
While on tour with Alanis Morissette in September of 1996, Radiohead was sent the last half-hour of Baz Luhrmann's film “William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet” and asked to write a song for the closing credits. Band members were impressed by the clip, and Thom wrote “Exit Music” for the movie. At first he attempted to use lines from Shakespeare's play as lyrics, but finally ditched the idea.
The moment in the film when Claire Danes (Juliet) holds a Colt 45 to her head was the actual inspiration for “Exit Music (For a Film).” Thom also had the 1968 version of the film in his head: "I saw the Zeffirelli version when I was 13 and I cried my eyes out, because I couldn't understand why, the morning after they shagged, they didn't just run away. The song is written for two people who should run away before all the bad stuff starts. A personal song." ---Background song info from Green Plastic.
“There's a special providence in the fall of a sparrow.
(Hamlet, 5.2.214), Hamlet to Horatio
~Birthday Flourishes for the Bard~
Red, Blue, Green
Exploring the interaction of art and music, Radiohead offer the painterly "Videotape".
If you look.
Not to mention the music.
After a hot gig at 93 Feet East in London, Radiohead bring nirvana via the BBC.
Radiohead tour the US this summer, reducing its carbon footprint by playing venues accessible by public transport.
And yes, there is good karma for those who never give up.
If you are lucky enough to be at "The Crick" in San Diego in August,
Anthony Minghella--A brief tribute.
Kenneth Branagh’s 48th Birthday Thank-You Message
"Calling all Ken-Friends!
It was particularly touching this year to have all the individual birthday cards from so many of you. The display in my house has been the envy of all my friends. They, like me, express astonishment at the extent of the kindess, the immensity of the sums raised over the years, and the enthusiasm of this remarkable group.
I am so glad that this year I have had the chance to repay a little of this remarkable support with three films of which I'm very proud. Let me add too, that in the rough and tumble of critical reaction, the immediate support of the Ken Friends to at least be part of an early audience and make up their own minds, has been invaluable.
So thank-you at the start of my 48th year for the magnificent sum you have contributed to Project Shakespeare, and for the excellent Tote Bag, which brought back so many happy memories for me.
Next year I will perhaps see some of your faces in the darkness of the theatre for Ivanov. I can also promise you a major television project as an actor. Needless to say, other adventures may emerge. I hope you enjoy them all.
Meantime thank-you again for the most wonderful birthday treat - the enthusiasm (and hard-earned cash) of some great folk, who I am proud and delighted to call my (Ken) Friends.
Have a happy and peaceful holiday season.
And once again.
THANK-YOU.
Ken Branagh"
In 2007, $3,200 was donated to Project Shakespeare.
About Project Shakespeare
Project Children, the parent organization for Project Shakespeare, was
founded in 1975 by Denis Mulcahy. Since 1975, Project Children has brought
nearly 25, 000 kids out for a peaceful break from the tensions and violence which has struck Protestant and Catholic communities. All of the Project Children
people, from host families to the coordinators, are volunteers. Our focus is on programs which get both sides together, and we are very grass roots, working in the communities in Belfast, Derry, Armagh, etc. Most of our volunteers are teachers, pediatricians, police, clergy and working class people who live right in the neighborhoods.
Project Shakespeare began with a letter to Kenneth Branagh, and has turned into a wonderful yearly event for children to experience Shakespeare on stage. Project Shakespeare provides transportation and tickets and housing for kids who get together to share the magic of live theatre and grow as friends together. Many,
many Project Shakespeare kids have kept in touch through the years. Live
theatre truly does work its magic and takes people away from the prejudices
and limitations of their daily lives.
In addition, $1,777 was donated to the William and Frances Branagh Memorial Fund of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art.
So far a grand total of $47,602 has been donated by Ken Friends to Kenneth Branagh's charities.
A huge array of performers, friends and family joined Kenneth Branagh for "A Night at the Movies",
Q: According to your biography, you left Belfast when you were 9 to
escape the Troubles. Do you think your experience of the conflict there
influences your battle scenes?
A: I think it makes me aware of how easy it is for people to hate,
rather than to love. I think it's a very exciting time in Northern
Ireland right now. Politically, a massive, massive shift has occurred,
and ancient hatreds have been put aside. I think an awareness of conflict
and the need to resolve, the need for peace was very much part of my
background. And this film [The Magic Flute, directed by Branagh] certainly
is about the need for peace.
Q: What is your motto in life?
A: A good question. A hard question. It sounds like a cliche, but there
is a line from Hamlet, at the end, where he says, "The readiness is all."
In that context, it's probably about being ready for death, but I think
it's a motto for me and it's about trying to be open in life, be open to
experience, be open to situations and to people. And be ready, be ready to
be surprised, sometimes be ready to be disappointed, be ready to be excited
and be ready for anything. But be ready for things to change. Be active and
positive. I suppose another way of saying the same thing would be: 'Anything
can happen, enjoy it.'"
Kenneth Branagh as Ivanov, and Directing Jude Law in Hamlet
Kenneth Branagh will star in Tom Stoppard's new version of
Chekhov's Ivanov to run from 12 Sept. through 29 Nov. 2008, directed by
Michael Grandage of London's Donmar Warehouse. Ivanov will kick off
the Donmar's West End season as it moves into Wyndham's Theatre.
Then, opening on June 3, Kenneth Branagh will direct Jude Law in Hamlet.
Kenneth's Branagh's Hamlet on DVD, complete with a commentary by the director and long-time consultant and Shakespeare scholar Russell Jackson. With a never better Kate Winslet, and oh, the flashbacks.
For more background on Branagh's film version of Hamlet, try The Readiness is All -- The Filming of Hamlet.
Sharing An Enthusiasm for Shakespeare:
Select scenes/speeches from RSC Shakespeare productions, as compiled by The British Library and the RSC.
Among the selections is Adrian Noble's 1986 "As You Like It" featuring Alan Rickman as Jacques. (Act 2; scene 7)
For more information visit the RSC website, which has clips from Romeo and Juliet (featuring Sir Ian McKellan) and Comedy of Errors (featuring Roger Rees [*the* Nicholas Nickleby] and Michael Williams, late husband of Dame Judi Dench). Check under ISBN_0712305246_359.
Warm Springs wins the 2005 Emmy Award for Best Made for Television Movie. Kenneth Branagh stars as President Franklin Delano Roosevelt in the HBO film.
Kenneth Branagh, Alan Rickman, Ralph Fiennes and others on the compact disc of Shakespeare's Sonnets
Offsite Offerings
Need Shakespeare? Check here for outside Shakespeare links.
Need a Shax monologue? Try the Monologue Archive.
Read Shakespeare here, at the Literature Network online.
Voices and Verses in Film: What are those poems and who wrote them?
Recent Theatre Highlights: Kenneth Branagh and Alan Rickman on Stage
California Shakespeare Theatre's 2003 season included Julius Caesar and The Winter's Tale.
Go to Page 2 of the Front Page
Go to Page 3 of the Front Page
Go to Page 4 of the Front Page
Features of the Daily Telegiraffe
What's Up: BOOKS Sarah Hatchuel, "Branagh and The Bard: A Companion to the
Shakespearean Films of Kenneth Branagh"
What's Up: FILM Waking Will Divinely: Shakespeare in Love
What's Up: STAGE Ralph Fiennes Finds Richard II and Coriolanus
Back Issues:
What's Up STAGE Rufus Sewell Takes on Macbeth
__________________________________________________________________________________
NEW YORK - "Hamlet" was chosen as the greatest poem
of the millenium in the New York Times Magazine millenium review!
LONDON (Reuters) - William Shakespeare was picked as Britain's "Man of the
Millennium" by a poll of BBC radio listeners!
ENJOY . . . Chosen as the greatest poem of the millenium, Hamlet endures.
ENJOY . . . Who is the "Greatest Fictional Character in World Literature and Legend" - - one guess.
ENJOY . . . Back issues of our features, indexed by subject on the front page, and on current feature pages.
ENJOY . . . Programme notes from the NFT's Branagh Retrospective, now added off of the Hamlet page.
ENJOY . . . Gertrude and Claudius,
a book by John Updike, explores the new King and Queen.
ENJOY . . .
Shakespeare in Less Than 10 Minutes Review of a video of restorations of the
earliest surviving silent Shakespeare films from 1899-1911. Also, can you
choose your five favourite Shakespeare films? Check your picks against Kenneth Branagh's
choices.
ENJOY . . . Director Michael Almereyda's film "collage" of a knit-hatted Ethan Hawke as a Gen-X slacker. Our review of his Hamlet is here.
Almereyda does Denmark as a corporate prison.
From the New York Times: Two Fortinbrases and the Ghosts of Hamlets Past. The last
stage Hamlet of 1999 in New York becomes a photo album of Hamlets past, including
Branagh, Olivier, and Gibson.
Added: The New York Post muses
on performing Hamlet.
ENJOY . . . Woody Allen, C'est Moi A
French interview with Kenneth Branagh about working with Woody Allen.
ENJOY . . . ABC: Woody Allen, Kenneth Branagh, and Celebrity
ENJOY . . . Behind Celebrity's Curtain:
An unabashedly editorial film review from the front office.
ENJOY . . . Glimpses of genius. In praise of HAMLET: Kenneth Branagh's film version captures the soul of Hamlet.
Also find on the Hamlet Page an interview with Kenneth Branagh (now with photograph)
and an account of the London benefit screening of Hamlet, at which Branagh appeared.
ENJOY . . . The New York Times review of "Discovering Hamlet" a short film which documents Branagh's
early take on the stage role under the direction of Sir Derek Jacobi.
ENJOY . . . Kenneth Branagh's interview at his NFT Retrospective, as conducted by the Guardian newspaper. Complete text, and complete
Questions and Answers now available.
ENJOY . . .
Billy Crystal does DeNiro working on Branagh's Hamlet, and
a bit of his version of the Woodman doing the Dane. All we need now is the audioclip!
ENJOY . . . Alan Rickman plays A. Dane in a science-fiction comedy/parody
of the Star Trek universe, in Galaxy Quest.
Click here for a transcription of Rickman's appearance on "Late Night
with Conan O'Brien" promoting the film.
ENJOY . . . The films "
Onegin" and
"The End of the Affair" open with reviews, interviews, and photographs. Fiennes has been
searching for Pushkin's anti-hero for some time now. His article, with a link to Empire Magazine's review
of Onegin
USING THE DAILY TELEGIRAFFE
Safari works best.
Bookmark us, or find us in .08 seconds under "Telegiraffe" using
Google
or just search the web.
© 1998--2008 Daily Telegiraffe
The Daily Telegiraffe is a non-daily non-dairy publication, where Mel Brooks meets Jane Austen,
WARNING!!!: Reading these articles has been known
This publication is for entertainment only. Pages which contain our Big Ben icon
All proprietary and legal rights reserved. On the other hand, you've read this far,
The Daily Telegiraffe also brings you "real deal" news and items, which can be found off of this front page.
Send e-mail, comments, additions
to reniept@hotmail.com or click here.
If it be now, 'tis not to come;
if it be not to come, it will be now; if it be not now,
yet it will come: the readiness is all:
Since no man knows aught of what he leaves,
what is't to leave betimes? Let be.” 
These captured stills are as captivating as canvas--and there are thousands of them. 
The live show was broadcast online, and Radiohead swept the world.
Our tickets include the Outside Lands Music & Arts Festival, a three-day festival
in San Francisco's Golden Gate Park from Aug. 22 through Aug. 24, 2008.
look for us in the pit in front of the stage! 
And again.
Kenneth Branagh, alongside Alan Rickman.
a musical tribute which honored Patrick Doyle, composer and longtime friend of Branagh's. 
Excerpt from an interview with Kenneth Branagh in the Mainichi Weekly Online
20 July 2007
For extensive links on Branagh's Hamlet, check Virginia's Hamlet (Kenneth Branagh) Movie Links site. 
An interview with Kenneth Branagh,
from Cineaste Magazine, December 1998.
%#*@^#($+& Hamlet
Kenneth Branagh in David Mamet's "Edmond". Reviews and photos of Branagh at the National Theatre. 
Young new actors thank Ken-Friends and their generous support. 
"When Love Speaks". Produced by the late Michael Kamen.
Escape 
Kenneth Branagh as Richard III was both revelation and reminder.
Alan Rickman as Elyot in a true-to-life Private Lives.
What's Up: BOOKS Harold Bloom, "Shakespeare: The Invention
of the Human"
With the Austen lover's link. 
FRONT PAGE
News/
The Good BitsSHAKESPEARE in PERFORMANCE
THE HAMLET PAGE
links/LINKS
What's Up: STAGE
What's Up: BOOKS
What's Up: MUSIC
What's Up: FILM
Fictional Characters
What's Up:
ARTToday's Special
Sure We
Thank You
Woody Allen meets Thomas Hardy,and everybody loves Shakespeare.
to induce mild amusement and may become habit-forming.
contain parody and fabrications intended as humourous commentary and witty jocularity.
Such page(s) may also include irreverent sarcasm, elements of irony, and assume a level
of intelligence on the part of the reader. We apologize for any inconvenience.
and the Daily Telegiraffe believes that tenacity should be rewarded. Accordingly,
permission is hereby given to reprint, reproduce, and otherwise distribute any original
articles which appear herein, as long as the name of this publication is cited.
The copyright for those items remain with the original creator(s) and no infringement is intended.
