MONTREAL/December 8, 2004—
Distinguished English actress Miriam Margolyes OBE (Harry Potter, Romeo and Juliet, Yentl, Magnolia, Age of Innocence) will be at Concordia University tomorrow, December 9, at 3 p.m. to film a segment for the BBC series Dickens in America, which re-creates Charles Dickens'
1842 odyssey through North America.
She will work with students in a Master Class in Victorian farce at Concordia's Cazelet Theatre (Loyola Campus, 7141 Sherbrooke St. West). The students will then stage a scene from Deaf as a Post, a play that was performed by Charles Dickens when he was here in the 1840s.
The series traces the largely unknown story of Charles Dickens' passionate and controversial relationship with America and Canada. Margolyes follows in the footsteps of his mid-nineteenth century tour from Boston to Montreal.
The series is based on his book American Notes, his account of his original trip with an eye for the comic, the critical and satirical recording of an emerging country's manners and morals, flaws and fashions and promises to offer an engaging insight into Charles Dickens.
>From The White House to West Point, Dickens visited and wrote about all
>of
American life, money and manners, press, prisons, slavery, corruption, greed, politics and religion in 1842. In 2004, Margolyes, a passionate Dickens enthusiast, takes a 4,000 mile odyssey following his trail to find out how much and how little has changed in North America in the intervening 160 years.
Miriam Margolyes OBE is one of England's finest and most loved actresses, her films this year include roles in Modigliani, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets, The Life and Death of Peter Sellars, Ladies in Lavender, Being Julia and The Water Warriors.
Information:
Rebecca Doll
Theatre Department
Concordia University
Tel: (514) 848-2424, ext. 4737
e-mail: rebeccad@alcor.concordia.ca
Suzie Samant
Lion Television Scotland, 14 Royal Crescent, Glasgow, Scotland G3 7SL. 0141 331 0450
Tel: +44-141-331-0450
Fax: +44-141-331-0451
e-mail: suzie.samant@liontv.co.uk
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