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.

On Tuesday, Helen Mirren was a guest on “The Today Show” to promote the limited theatrical release of “The Duke” in New York and Los Angeles on April 22.

Dame Helen Mirren joins Hoda Kotb and Jenna Bush Hager to talk about her new movie “The Duke,” where she plays the wife of a working class man accused of stealing Britain’s most famous painting. The Oscar winner reflects on her legendary career, sharing how she deals with acting anxieties. “I always have had profound insecurities, I think it’s one of the reasons I became an actor,” she says.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Kate Winslet has been tapped to present Helen Mirren with the 2021 SAG Life Achievement Award at the Screen Actors Guild Awards later this month. As previously announced, Mirren was chosen to receive the guild’s top honor at the Feb. 27 ceremony in recognition of her body of work, including her Oscar-, Emmy- and Tony-winning roles. The award is presented annually to “an actor who fosters the finest ideals of the acting profession.” The event will reunite Winslet and Mirren, who starred together in the 2016 film Collateral Beauty. Winslet, who received an Emmy last year for her starring role in Mare of Easttown and is nominated for a SAG Award for the same role, next stars in James Cameron’s Avatar sequel and in Ellen Kuras’ Lee, on which she also serves as a producer. The 28th annual SAG Awards will air live at 8 p.m. ET/5 p.m. PT on Feb. 27 on TNT and TBS. It also will be available to stream the following day on HBO Max.

Today IFC announced the return of Documentary Now! for its 53rd season, quite the feat for such an artful and obscure series that’s actually in its 4th season. As Collider reports, the series, hosted by Dame Helen Mirren, pays homage to the art of documentaries through farcical short films. The new season will consist of six new episodes, which are currently in production. The new episodes include Two Hairdressers in Bagglyport, an homage to fashion documentaries such as 3 Salons at the Seaside and The September Issue. The short will be a fly-on-the-wall look at a salon owner and her staff as they prepare their annual stylebook, How They Threw Rocks, a take on the sports documentary When We Were Kings, which will follow Craig Maes, a Welsh sportsman known as the “Field Rock” who competes in a 1974 bout titled “The Melon vs. The Felon,” and My Monkey Grifter, which draws inspiration from My Octopus Teacher, and follows a filmmaker who develops and intensely personal relationship with a monkey with devious motives. Documentary Now! has been nominated for six Emmys over the course of its run. The series debuted with rave reviews from critics both critics and audiences. The series soon became a fan favorite thanks to the series’ loving treatment of such beloved documentaries as Grey Gardens. Season 53 is currently in production and further casting announcements will be made soon. No premiere date has yet been set.

Harry Potter is commemorating 20 years since the debut of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone with its own series competition, Dame Helen Mirren, celebrity guests, and even a few of Hogwarts own esteemed alumni — and a new trailer is showing us just how cool Harry Potter: Hogwarts Tournament of Houses is going to be. Fans competing against one another in hard-hitting trivia complete with their house regalia on full display? Check. Special guest stars of the Potter world like Harry Potter film alums Tom Felton (Draco Malfoy), Dan Folger (Fantastic Beasts’ Jacob Kowalski) and Matthew Lewis (Neville Longbottom)? Check. Even some cameos from Potter superfans Pete Davidson and Jay Leno? Check. As the trailer indicates, Harry Potter: Hogwarts Tournament of Houses will celebrate the fans — one of which will take home the ultimate championship trophy, as well as bragging rights for all wizarding eternity. And with Mirren at the helm, we can expect it to be as full of magic as the Goblet of Fire… though hopefully with less dangerous tasks. Harry Potter: Hogwarts Tournament of Houses will kick off Nov. 28 at 8 p.m. ET/PT on TBS and Cartoon Network with “Gryffindor vs. Hufflepuff” and continue with Ravenclaw and Slytherin going head to head before the two winning houses compete in a wildcard episode and finally, the grand finale. The interactive competition also invites Harry Potter fans from around the world to join in via digital quiz events that will launch on WizardingWorld.com starting Nov. 26 through Dec. 10.

Yesterday, Helen Mirren was a special guest of “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” – special, because she did the interview right out of her baththub. Besides promoting “Fast & Furious 9”, they talked about Helen confronting a black bear that was trying to sneak onto her porch and the rather familiar story of The Who’s Keith Moon crashing her dressing room during an intermission of 1975’s “Teeth ‘n’ Smiles”. The full segment can be watched below and in the video archive, screencaptures have been added to the photo gallery.

In the new Amazon science-fiction series “Solos,” Helen Mirren plays a senior citizen who decides to take a one-way ticket to the farthest reaches of the universe. Joining TODAY live, the actress also talks about finally achieving a longtime career goal – being in a car chase in the upcoming film “F9” – and reflects on a 1975 interview when she was critical of a “boring” question. The video can be watched above and in the video archive, HD screencaptures have been added to the photo gallery.