“The greatest living playwright in the English-speaking world” (TIME)

Friday 8^th June at 8pm, Sky Arts 1 and live and on-demand on Sky Go

This June, Sky Arts will broadcast a truly extraordinary new film by multi-award-winning director Tony Palmer on the life and times of Athol Fugard, in honour of the playwright’s 80^th birthday.

Athol Fugard is considered to be the world’s greatest living playwright. Falls the Shadow: The Life and Times of Athol Fugard is a new film by the award-winning director Tony Palmer. It is the first ever full-length profile of Fugard which explores his past, his influences, his artistic development and his continuing themes. At the centre of the film is an extensive interview with Fugard. 

The film features unprecedented access to some of the world’s most remarkable performers and associates who are most familiar with his craft including ex-Presidents Nelson Mandela and F.W de Klerk, Alan Rickman, James Earl Jones, Dame Janet Suzman, Nadine Gordimer, Sir Ben Kingsley, Sir Antony Sher, and Pieter-Dirk Uys. 

The film also features extracts from some of his best known plays and performances by award-winning actors including Danny Glover, Angela Bassett and Matthew Broderick. 

Fugard has become best known for the Oscar-winning film adaptation of his novel Tsotsi but it was the success of his political plays, which brought him to prominence and into considerable conflict with the national government of the time.

Since the 1950s, his plays have fought with the political and personal demons of his native South Africa. Keenly aware of the injustices of the apartheid from his time working as a court clerk in Johannesburg from 1958, in 1962 he supported an international boycott against the practice of segregation of theatre audiences.

A one-time student of philosophy, Fugard’s works are marked by a drive for truth, a rallying cry against injustice and a celebration of humanity, no matter how impossible the individual’s conditions. Fugard has charted the lives of a nation that has struggled to reconcile the terrible scars of its past with its indefatigable hope for the future. 

He has been the recipient of countless awards from around the world, including a Tony Award for Sizwe Banzi is Dead/The Island and an Evening Standard Award for Master Harold…and The Boys. His plays include Statements after an Arrest under the Immorality Act (1972) The Road to Mecca (1984) and Bushman and Lena In 2011, Fugard received a Special Tony Lifetime Achievement Award. He has also received honorary degrees from Yale, Brown and Princeton.  

Tony Palmer specialises in profiling exceptional figures, and Athol Fugard is no exception. His work includes over 100 films, ranging from early works with The Beatles, Cream, Jimi Hendrix and Frank Zappa (200 Motels), to his classical portraits which include profiles of Maria Callas, Richard Wagner, Yehudi Menuhin, and Ralph Vaughan Williams. Among over 40 international prizes for his work are 12 Gold Medals from the New York Film Festival as well as numerous BAFTAs and Emmy Awards. Last year Tony Palmer won a Grierson Award for his astonishing film on Leonard Cohen, Bird on a Wire.  

“This fascinating film is a testament to Athol Fugard’s extraordinary life, and we’re delighted to be able to screen it in honour of his birthday,” comments Siobhan Mulholland, Commissioning Editor, Factual and Features at Sky. “There are very few living playwrights who have captured so completely the essence of a country both unified and divided by its fascinating history, its guilt and its triumphs.”

“We are delighted to be able to bring this remarkable film to Sky Arts and our customers, who I know will be fascinated by the life and times of one of the world’s greatest playwrights. The list of contributors alone highlights perfectly how central and necessary Fugard’s plays are to the history of South Africa,” comments James Hunt, Channel Director of Sky Arts. “From Presidents to actors, authors to commentators, Fugard has inspired and mobilised an entire generation to transcend political limitations and strive for freedom.”

Tony Palmer has been commissioned by Portobello Films, and commissioned for Sky by Siobhan Mulholland. The 100 minute documentary is produced by David Elstein and Eric Abraham.

Following the addition of Sky Arts to Sky Go, customers will also be able to watch Falls the Shadow: The Life and Times of Athol Fugard on the move on iPad, selected smartphones and laptops at no extra cost.

**Select interviews are available with Athol Fugard and key contributors**

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION PLEASE CONTACT

Katherine Solomon PR Manager, Sky Press Office

T: 0207 032 0599

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NOTES TO EDITOR

Sky Arts

Sky Arts offers an eclectic mix of the best music, arts, biographies, chat shows, film, drama and comedy. 2012 will see Sky Arts turn the spotlight on the best amateur dramatics companies in the UK in BRITAIN’S BEST AM-DRAM, exclusive productions from The Globe Theatre and Simon Callow’s one man play as part of a SHAKESPEARE SEASON and Ronnie Wood’s new show for Sky Arts.  Popular series such as THE ONION NEWS NETWORK and ROMANZO CRIMINALE will sit alongside the premieres of Israeli dramas BE TIPUL and PRISONERS OF WAR.  Sky Arts also encourages new formats and methods for accessing opera; beaming the world’s first live opera in 3D to cinemas across the UK and Ireland from ENO.

Sky Arts seeks to connect with culture on the ground; creating and collaborating with the best of the arts in the UK and Ireland to bring new experiences to life. The flagship show, The Book Show, now goes to four literary festivals including Hay and Cheltenham. The Sky Arts Ignition Series launched in in 2011 to invest in the arts landscape of the UK, following long term partnerships with English National Opera, English National Ballet and Artichoke. The Series will seek to collaborate with six arts organisations over the next three years in the creation of brand new works; Sky Arts Ignition Series: Futures Fund will support five young artists with a bursary of £30,000 each, enabling Sky Arts to back the creation of new works of art as well as nurture emerging talent.

See sky.com/arts

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