Blink and You'll Miss Him: Richard Armitage in Shakespeare Uncovered (Macbeth)

Was watching Shakespeare Uncovered last night on PBS, the Macbeth episode with host Ethan Hawke, when to my surprise I spot Richard Armitage

Watch about 35 minutes in, Macbeth RSC production 2001, the dinner scene. Several men around a table. He's wearing a uniform and has a beard. At end he exits with other actors. No lines, but you can clearly see him several times. (Wait a bit for video to load)

Watch Macbeth with Ethan Hawke on PBS. See more from Shakespeare Uncovered.

Go to PBS Videos to see more: http://www.pbs.org/wnet/shakespeare-uncovered/video/

 Photo thanks to Richard Armitage Central

King Richard Armitage Article and Interview Today in Leicester Mercury

Our Lovely Leicester Lad Richard Armitage and the Fabulous King Richard Armitage website and project is featured today in the Leicester Mercury.

King Richard Armitage  co-founder and leader Roswitha Gerhart was recently interviewed by the Leicester Mercury and you can read the interview and article by clicking on the link below. The article talks about Armitage fan efforts to support his interest in producing, and possibly starring, in a more historically accurate film or television series about Richard III. 

http://www.thisisleicestershire.co.uk/Fans-clamour-actor-king/story-17937749-detail/story.html

Please show your support for this project by signing the petition mentioned in the article (click on the link below to go to the petition):

 http://kingrichardarmitage.rgcwp.com/petition-for-richard-iii/

Black Sky: Video of Nathan Kress Talking about Working with Richard Armitage

I think he was asked what was it like to work on 

Black Sky:

 Nathan Kress plays one of Richard Armitage's sons in the yet to be released film, Black Sky. 

The Hobbit Dwarf Song and Russian Choral Music

In the interview below Richard Armitage talks about how he listened to a lot of Russian choral music to find the sound for Thorin's singing and for the sound he wanted for Misty Mountains Cold. 

I have no special knowledge of Russian choral music,  but Richard's answer reminded me of all the times in my childhood and youth that I went with my family to listen to the Russian Red Army Choir sing. Does the Russian Army still sing and have a choir?  

I was happy to find that YouTube had vids of the Russian Red Army Choir singing and below two songs that were my favorite and they always sang in their concerts. To me they fit what Richard was referring to in the interview.

While on YouTube I thought I would search for more Russian choral singing and here are two that I thought the dwarves would feel are kindred singers.

Update 1/27/13- Thanks to inspiration by my friend Dezmond's comments below, I looked for and found a video of 
Serbian Orthodox Church Music:

 Now for our own beautiful basso

 Thorin (Richard Armitage) and the Dwarves (the charming Hobbit cast) sing Far Over the Misty Mountains Cold 

New Richard Armitage News - Everything Old is New Again

 From Richard Armitage Online

 An early and up to now unseen trailer of Richard Armitage circa 1999 for the short film STAGED has surfaced on VIMEO thanks to the director.

Check it out at link below:

http://vimeo.com/56946099

 

 

"STAGED" (Trailer) - Starring Richard Armitage and Jennifer Taylor Lawrence (1999), UK

from Darren Denison

Part 2 - Lords of the North - More Fantasy Casting

FANTASY CAST:  Richard Armitage as Uhtred of Bebbanburg

So in my previous post I explained how I had set a goal, a game if you will, for myself to try and cast some of the characters in Bernard Cornwell's book the Lords of the North  (LOTN) with Scandinavian actors I know from TV series for the Danes/Vikings and UK or other actors for the Saxons.  Of course, Richard Armitage is Uhtred!

If you click on the names of the actors you don't know, you'll find out a bit about them, and maybe it will inspire you to look up some of their work. 

My inspiration is Richard Armitage's reading, or performance, of LOTN. Below a short excerpt:

To continue:

King Alfred - Benedict Cumberbatch

Ivar Ivarsson -  Ulf Friberg

Steapa - Graham McTavish

  

Kjartan the Cruel - Mikael Persbrandt

Father Hrothweard - Eddie Redmayne

 Suggested by a convo I had on Twitter

 I think I'll stop here for now. I must admit the casting of  Sven the One Eyed and Ragnar's sister Thyra has me stumped, and I'm still thinking about actors for other characters. 

Who would you cast if you were the casting director for this TV series?

 

http://www.englandandenglishhistory.com/anglo-saxon-history/alfred-the-great-the-first-english-king-871-ad-to-924-ad

Other pics from Google Images different sources, Richard Armitage pic from RichardArmitagenet.com

Fantasy Casting - Lords of the North by Bernard Cornwell

 

by Chels922 - DeviantArt

My favorite of all of Richard Armitage's audiobooks is The Lords of the North. I think the time has come to make this into a television series starring Mr. Armitage as Uhtred.  I'm sending out the call, not for the first time, to producers and directors out there.  It would be a great BBC/HBO series. Sharpe was a big hit, why not Cornwell's Saxon Stories.

For those unfamiliar with The Lords of the North or any of the other novels in the Saxon Stories series, below is the author setting the stage for Uhtred of Bebbanburg's life and times.

I tend to sometimes do some fantasy casting in my mind when reading a book, or in this case, listening to an audiobook. Richard Armitage is Uhtred. But who would I cast for some of the other characters since Richard can't play all the parts if it is a TV series?

As it happens I watch a fair amount of what's called Nordic Noir or Scandinavian Mystery TV series, so I'm familiar with some Swedish and Norwegian actors. I was thinking who would I cast for some of the roles, using UK actors for the Saxon characters and Scandinavian actors for the Danes/Vikings (click on the names to find out more about the actors)? See some of my choices below:

Richard Armitage - Uhtred

 

Peter Eggers -  Guthred

Trond Espen Seim  -   Ragnar

Jodhi May - Hild

Mikaela Knapp - Gisela

Aidan Turner - Finan

 Ewen Bremner - Father Beocca

I have more characters and actors in mind, but I will leave it here for this post for now. What do you think? Who would you cast for The Lords of the North?