A week ahead of its theatrical release in the United States, Helen Mirren has joined Lionsgate’s press tour for “White Bird”. Besides yesterday’s screening at the DGA Theater in New York (see update below), she and director Marc Forster were interviewed on a press junket. Clips from both events have been added to the video archive, alongside a making of featurette for the film.

Dame Helen Mirren will host the D-Day 80 national commemorative event in Portsmouth. The Ministry of Defence, Royal British Legion, the Commonwealth War Graves Commission and the Normandy Memorial Trust will celebrate the work of UK and other forces at the port city, where the Allies left for the beaches of Normandy during the Second World War. Dame Helen will present the event, which takes place on the eve of the 80th anniversary. It is broadcast through the BBC One programme D-Day 80: The Allies Prepare, which is presented by Woman’s Hour host Anita Rani and John-James Chalmers, a veteran and sports presenter. The event in June will feature “spoken word testimony” by well-known faces and military personnel as well as performances from musical stars and the tri-service orchestra. BBC chief content officer Charlotte Moore said: “The 80th anniversary of D-Day is an important moment to reflect and pay tribute to those who were involved in 1944. “We have a wide range of distinctive programming that will bring people together to commemorate across the BBC, including full live coverage of events from both sides of the Channel as well as special documentaries and editions of some of our most popular programmes on television and radio.” BBC One will also have the programme D-Day 80: Tribute To The Fallen, which will be presented by former Desert Island Discs host Kirsty Young at the Bayeux War Cemetery in Normandy, France.

“Golda” is still making its rounds internationally with a theatrical release in Australia this week. On Tuesday, Helen Mirren zoomed into Australia’s “The Today Show” to promote the film. The complete video can be found in the video archive. Screencaptures have been added to the photo gallery.

On Thursday, Helen Mirren stopped by “The Talk” on CBS to promote the Audible premiere of “Moriarty: The Silent Order”. She talked about voicing Lady Milverton and joked about the possibility of joining the EGOT ranks in case of a Grammy win for her performance. A clip of her appearance can be found in the video archive with screencaptures being added to the photo gallery.

“I play sort of an arch villainous [Lady Milverton] really. I’ve always wanted to play an arch villainous. I was rather cross that I was never asked in any of the Bond movies to be like the big villain…so it was a wonderful opportunity.” Host Jerry O’Connell asks, “You have Emmy, an Oscar and a Tony – is this our Grammy? Are we getting that EGOT?” “Wouldn’t that be lovely. There are so many brilliant actresses who can also sing, and I want to kill them because I can’t sing at all.” Mirren adds, “I’m never going to win my Grammy from singing…They often win a Grammy for writing a book, then reading it, a sort of tell all book.” She jokes, “My Sex Life by Helen Mirren.” (Helen Mirren, The Talk, November 09, 2023)

In an interview aired by Israel’s Channel 12 on Sunday, Mirren spoke about her leading role in “Golda” depicting Israel’s first and only female prime minister, Golda Meir, during the period of the fateful 1973 Yom Kippur War. The interview was recorded in July when Mirren was in Israel for the premiere of the movie at the Jerusalem Film Festival. “I believe in Israel, in the existence of Israel, and I believe Israel has to go forward into the future, for the rest of eternity,” Mirren said. “I believe in Israel because of the Holocaust.” She revealed there were those who had tried to talk her out of making the film due to Israel’s controversial position on the world stage, but, she said, “I’ve met such extraordinary people in Israel.” “I know there is a base, a foundation of deep, intelligence, thoughtfulness, commitment, poetry even in Israel that is very, very special, I think,” said Mirren. Mirren admitted that before making the film, “I didn’t know a lot about Golda” but said she clearly recalled “the feeling of triumph and satisfaction and of awe actually that a woman had been elected to lead a country. It was a very exciting moment for women in general. Understanding her physical suffering… as well as the mental suffering of dealing with this enormous burden of the war, that was a revelation for me.” The complete article accompanying the interview can be read here, while the full interview can be found in the video archive.

This August, we’re in for a treat. The French/German television channel Arte will be celebrating Helen Mirren with a weeklong retrospective, as well as a brand new documentary, directed by Nicolas Maupied, which will share insights on Helen’s varied career. Arte’s retrospective starts on Monday, August 14 with “The Long Good Friday” (also available on-demand). The following Monday, August 28, “Excalibur” and “Eye in the Sky” will be shown. And on Wednesday, August 30, “Hitchcock”s broadcast will be followed by the new documentary “A Sassy Royal Actress” (alternatively “Une Femme Puissante” in French or “Eine königliche Schauspielerin” in German). The documentary, which will be available on Arte’s streaming platform starting August 23, runs for a full hour and will feature lots of scenes from her films and from archive interviews. To my knowledge, no interaction or new interview has been conducted for this – but I’m looking forward to see if they dug up some old treasures.

Not only a theater icon, but also a television and a movie star, the English Helen Mirren and her brilliant career have been impressing the world since the 1960s. She is the only winner of the “Triple Crown of Acting”. She’s an uncategorizable, multi-talented actress, but also a powerful and very feminist woman. She is considered by many to be the greatest living actress. Often associated with the roles of powerful figures in films such as “The Queen”, she is a strong feminist activist. Indeed, for almost 60 years, through the characters she chose to play and her attitude behind the scenes, she’s an advocate for women’s emancipation, relentlessly fighting against sexism.

Helen Mirren will lead the Queen’s commendation at the 76th annual film awards ceremony at London’s Southbank Centre’s Royal Festival Hall on Sunday. The Queen had a close association with the Academy that spanned 50 years and saw her donate and support initiatives, as well as attend many events over the years. In 1972, the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh donated the profits from the documentary film Royal Family to the Society of Film and Television Arts (SFTA), which later became the British Academy of Film and Television Arts (Bafta), for a new headquarters. The renaming of the organisation occurred during the official opening of the headquarters in 1976, which was conducted by the Queen, and remains the London home of Bafta five decades on. During her lifetime, the Queen was a patron of the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts, the Royal Variety Charity and the Cinema and Television Benevolent Fund. William and Kate will be attending the ceremony for the first time in three years before meeting the winners and Rising Star Award nominees. Bafta’s chief executive Jane Millichip said: “It is an absolute pleasure to welcome so many nominees and film industry guests to the EE Bafta Film Awards on Sunday. “This year’s Awards are shaping up to be one of our most well attended on record, which is a ringing endorsement of the importance of British audiences to the global film industry, and Bafta’s role in bringing these incredible films and filmmakers to public attention. The EE Bafta Film Awards will be broadcast on 19 February at 7pm on BBC One and iPlayer.

IFC today announced “Documentary Now… and Forever!”, a week-long cinematic celebration pairing classic documentaries and the landmark series. The in-person, retrospective screening series will play at The IFC Center located in New York, NY, from Wednesday, September 14 through Tuesday, September 20. For fans who cannot make it to the in-person screenings, a curated selection of documentaries will also be available on AMC+, AMC Networks’ premium streaming destination, beginning the same day. Hosted again by Helen Mirren, the two-part season premiere episode, “Soldier of Illusion,” written by John Mulaney and starring Alexander Skarsgård, Nicholas Braun, and August Diehl, was inspired by the Werner Herzog-focused documentary Burden of Dreams. In the early 1980s, a visionary German filmmaker (Skarsgård) tries to will his magnum opus into existence while working in the remote, punishing conditions of the Russian Ular mountains. Screencaptures from the trailer have been added to the photo gallery.

According to this Sky press release, The South Bank Show, one of the UK’s most loved and longest standing arts and culture programmes, returns on Wednesday 20th July on Sky Arts, Freeview channel 11, and NOW with three brand new episodes. Edited and presented by Melvyn Bragg, the new three-part series of The South Bank Show showcases talent from the worlds of acting, comedy, and dance with films about Helen Mirren, Frank Skinner and Carlos Acosta. Helen Mirren is one of the best-known and most respected actresses in the world, with a career that spans over 30 years. In the first episode of the series, she joins Melvyn to discuss her diverse and prolific career across theatre, film, and television, exploring a range of work including her early days at the Royal Shakespeare Company to her extraordinary Oscar winning performance in The Queen. Longer-form 90-minute episodes of The South Bank Show will also air in late-August, giving audiences the opportunity to learn more about the incredible careers of Helen, Frank and Carlos through extended interviews with host Melvyn Bragg.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, U.K. network ITV has lined up a host of big names to celebrate Queen Elizabeth’s Platinum Jubilee next month. Among those leading the festivities for the monarch’s 70 years on the throne will be Tom Cruise, Helen Mirren and Damian Lewis, who will take part in a grand theatrical event, including 1,300 performers and 500 horses taking viewers through various moments in history, from the reign of Queen Elizabeth I through to the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II. Mirren is set to play Queen Elizabeth I (a role she has performed before in a 2005 TV series), while a cast of “Queen’s Players” will be introduced by a character called The Herald, played by actor and comic Omid Djalili. Each act will reflect on key moments in history, including Elizabeth I’s Tilbury Speech and James I and the Gunpowder Plot. The Commonwealth will also be celebrated, as well as the four nations within the United Kingdom. All of this will be interspersed with a number of military and equestrian displays from around the world, including Azerbaijan, India, Oman, France, Norway, Switzerland and Trinidad & Tobago. Music will be provided by a 75-piece orchestra comprising Tri-Service personnel and augmented with members of The National Symphony Orchestra, with special performances from Keala Settle, Gregory Porter and Katherine Jenkins. The musical director will be the multi-award winning composer, Debbie Wiseman, whilst the principal director for music will be Lieutenant Colonel Jason Burcham RM. The Queen’s Platinum Jubilee will be broadcast live from the private grounds of Windsor Castle on Sunday, May 15.