7/25/2013 by Stuart Kemp

They join Stephen Fry in the voice cast of the movie to be directed by Alexander Williams and touted in Toronto and then AFM.

LONDON — Nicholas Hoult, Gemma Arterton and Stephen Fry have been tapped to lend their voices to the family animation feature Once Upon a Time in the Kitchen.

Alexander Williams, whose animation résumé boasts stints on The Lion King, Pocahontas and Robots, will direct from a script by Chris Brown, one of the original writers of sitcom Friends.

Production is due to get underway in September on a story that revolves around what happens in a kitchen when the humans leave. It features a feud between everyday utensils and the best silver and cutlery from opposite sides of the table.

U.K. independent sales and distribution banner Kaleidoscope (KFD) has boarded the project and taken sales duties and British distribution rights. KFD inked a deal for the movie with production banner A Polished Productions, whose producer Bob Thompson is a veteran of the BBC and LEGO and whose credits most recently include the CGI feature Ultramarines with John Hurt and Terence Stamp.

Williams described Once Upon a Time in the Kitchen as “a fantasy adventure aimed squarely at a family audience, but with enough sophisticated wit to keep the grown-ups happy.”

KFD CEO Spencer Pollard said: “We expect a lot of interest from the market, and it should be a busy time in Toronto and the upcoming AFM. The film has all the right ingredients to be a potential global theatrical family smash with excellent animation, a very fun script and A-list voice talent both for the U.K. and international market.”

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08/08/2013
by Nia Daniels

Gemma Arterton is one busy lady – having just finished filming a new comedy series, she is heading for France to use her newly-acquired language skills in her first French film.

Filming recently wrapped on Inside No.9, a new BBC Two comedy from Steve Pemberton and Reece Shearsmith (Psychoville etc). The 6 x 30 series examines the extraordinary, macabre and sometimes just mundane, goings on behind the door of several very different ‘No. 9s’.

The anthology is a BBC in-house production, from seasoned comedy honcho and exec producer Jon Plowman.

Arterton will soon head for France, where she is due to being shooting Gemma Bovery, a film based on Posy Simmonds’ graphic novel – first published in The Guardian – which is in turn based on Flaubert’s classic Madame Bovary. It sees our heroine moving to Normandy to start a new life. Ruby Film & Television is the UK company involved in this international co-production. This is the second time Arterton will have starred in a Posy Simmonds film adaptation, having previously played the title role in Tamara Drewe for director Stephen Frears.

Arterton is also due to join the cast of Ned Rifle, the third in Hal Hartley’s tragi-comic trilogy about the Grim family. The feature follows on from Henry Fool (1998) and Fay Grim (2007).

She will also have to find time to voice the newly-announced family animation Once Upon a Time in the Kitchen, along with Nicholas Hoult and Stephen Fry, who will also lend their voices to the fantasy adventure about the rivalry between various kitchen utensils.

In the meantime, you can always head to the cinema, where, from 27 September, you can see Arterton in the crime thriller Runner, Runner with Ben Affleck and Justin Timberlake. Or there’s always the forthcoming DVD release of the fantasy thriller Byzantium, directed by Neil Jordan and co-starring Saoirse Ronan.

Bonne chance with your French film Gemma, and come back to Blighty soon.

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