Keira Knightley thrilled Love Actually is part of Christmas

Shameless plug for my first book.  So sorry.  Couldn't feel worse.

The 2003 movie was a collaborative film starring Knightley, Liam Neeson, Bill Nighy and Emma Thompson, and is regularly shown on U.K. TV in the lead-up to Christmas Day.

And Knightley loves having a film which has become a must-see for families at this time of year.

She tells the Huffington Post, "It's amazing that it turned that kind of Christmas movie, isn't it? I don't think anyone realized it was going to do that.

"It's an extraordinary thing when people come up and go, 'Oh, you know, that's the thing I watch every Christmas'. It's a lovely thing. That's why you make them."


Read more: http://www.wxyz.com/dpp/entertainment/celebrity/Keira-Knightley-thrilled-Love-Actually-is-part-of-Christmas_38116758#ixzz2GB61fxui

SPOILER SPOILER Dan Stevens Has Something to Say About ‘Downton Abbey’ By DAVE ITZKOFF (NEW YORK TIMES)

Dan Stevens as Matthew Crawley on “Downton Abbey.”

WITH Michelle Dockery

Be forewarned that this post deals with developments on “Downton Abbey” that British viewers are now aware of, but which have not yet occurred in the American broadcast of that series. In other words, major spoilers ahead.

Just when things were going swimmingly for Matthew Crawley at “Downton Abbey” — that aristocratic character, played by Dan Stevens, was enjoying his long-delayed wedding to Lady Mary (Michelle Dockery); his wife had given birth to their first child, a son; he was delighted by his fancy new motorcar — an automobile accident he sustained in the show’s Christmas special resulted in his demise, and ended Mr. Stevens’s tenure on the popular period drama.

Speaking with The Telegraph of London, Mr. Stevens said that his departure from “Downton Abbey” felt strange but inevitable, and that his decision to leave the series was made before he started filming its most recent season (which begins in the United States on Jan. 6).


READ MORE: http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/12/26/dan-stevens-has-something-to-say-about-downton-abbey/

Kenneth Branagh recalls the opening ceremony of London 2012 27 July: the actor relives working with Danny Boyle to help create the dazzling opening ceremony of the 2012 Olympics (GUARDIAN)

"I have never learned a part more thoroughly": Kenneth Branagh performs at the opening ceremony. Photograph: Mike Segar/Reuters

I was in Liverpool on a location scout for the film Jack Ryan when I got the call. Danny Boyle rang me and explained that they'd had a great tragedy – Mark Rylance's daughter had passed away and he was pulling out of his role in the opening ceremony. He asked if I would take over. I was standing on a street corner and I was so shocked at Mark's news that I didn't really take in the second part.

A couple of days later I went to see Danny at the Olympic Stadium. It was three weeks before the ceremony and the place was packed with thousands of people all doing things impressively. Danny seemed to know everybody's first name – it was like taking a walk with the Pied Piper. We climbed on to the hill that I'd eventually be doing my piece from. It was quite a lot to take in. Danny said, "You'll be here in the person of Isambard Kingdom Brunel performing Shakespeare to the accompaniment of Elgar," and I said, "God, that's a lot of Great Britons all at once." I asked him where the prompter or autocue would be and he said, "Oh, no we won't have one of those." I have never learned a part more thoroughly in my entire professional career. The notion of screwing up in front of a billion people concentrated the mind very strongly.

On the opening night the energy was incredible and hard to resist. There was a temporary structure built as our dressing rooms and all the children involved were on the top floor. They were so wild with excitement the building was shaking. I remember being in my dressing room with the Arctic Monkeys rehearsing "Come Together" for the 5,000th time next door, and on the other side of the partition, Rowan Atkinson and Simon Rattle were discussing, in minute detail, how to be funny in two minutes and 11 seconds. Across the way Danny Boyle was talking JK Rowling off the ledge because it was her first time performing in public. As for me, I was just trying to keep my head straight and going through my lines: "Be not afeard. The isle is full of noises…"


READ MORE: http://www.guardian.co.uk/theobserver/2012/dec/23/kenneth-branagh-danny-boyle-olympics

Henry Cavill Career Montage - I Was Here

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hcz_m8wkIVk&feature=youtu.be


Henry Cavill Fanpage Videos

Richard Armitage Dishes on Battle of Five Armies in 'Hobbit: There and Back Again' ACES SHOW BIZ

The Thorin Oakenshield depicter predicts the epic battle will be a manic fight in the air, while another cast member Andy Serkis claims, 'It's going to be intense beyond belief.'

"The Hobbit" has just released the first installment of the trilogy, but one of its actors, Richard Armitage, is already raving about the epic Battle of Five Armies in the third film, "The Hobbit: There and Back Again". While the intense sequence hasn't been shot just yet, he envisioned what it would be like.

"It's been put aside until next year, thankfully," Armitage jokingly said of the filming. "It's this big thing looming over us. I'm predicting about ten weeks for the shoot because it's an extensive battle and each character is going to have their 'hero' moment on the battlefield. It's a manic fight in the air - the eagles are fighting bats - and on the ground, and I can't wait to see what Pete does with that."

Actor and second-unit director Andy Serkis, who will handle the big fight sequence, hints that "it's going to be intense beyond belief. It's going to be extraordinary - that's all I can say." The epic battle sequence will see the Men, the Elves, the Dwarves and the Eagles, all fighting for the future of Middle-earth.

Read more: http://www.aceshowbiz.com/news/view/00056650.html#ixzz2GAZI25HR

Henry Cavill: All I Want for Christmas is You from your Christian Grey fans

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6xoffUqqkgU&feature=youtu.be

Melissa Davideit

SPOILER - KING OF SPOILERS - DOWNTON ABBEY CHRISTMAS EPISODE **BEWARE** (MAIL ON LINE)

By CHRISTOPHER STEVENS

The fatal twist was so unforeseen that it took the breath away. In Downton Abbey, after two hours of premonitions that Lord Grantham’s oldest daughter, Mary, would suffer the fate of her sister Sybil and die in childbirth, an entirely different tragedy occurred.

It happened off-screen: an open-topped roadster on a country lane, a looming lorry, and then a cut to Maggie Smith in the Abbey drawing room, reflecting that ‘we don’t always get our just deserts’.

That was, for her, an uncharacteristic understatement. Mary’s husband, cousin Matthew, was bowling home from the maternity hospital, where he had just kissed hello to his baby son, born a few weeks premature. 

He told his wife that he felt as if he’d swallowed a box of fireworks. She told him to remember the feeling, so that he’d forgive her more easily next time she did something silly... like crashing his precious car.

Downton Abbey has never been Matthew’s story: it’s a family saga. And yet he has been the pivot, the axle for the free-wheeling plot.

READ MORE: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2253255/Downton-Abbey-A-baby-Matthew-dead-road-A-true-Downton-jaw-dropper.html