Antonia Bird: From EastEnders to Hollywood (2016)

• 72%
• 2016
• Documentary
• Susan Kemp
• Antonia Bird
• Kate Hardie
• Robert Carlyle

Antonia Bird, who died in 2013 aged just 62, was one of the most important British directors of her generation, a powerful political voice who learned her trade in radical theatre and TV soaps, and went on to become the first British woman ever to direct a Hollywood movie. Yet in part because of her gender, her work remains under-recognized and under-valued. This documentary by Scottish director Susan Kemp, executive produced by Mark Cousins, is the first major attempt to put that right. It explores her fight to get her voice heard, to break through the barriers against her gender and her politics, and to bring a radical edge to popular drama. It reveals the secrets behind Antonia's greatest films - Safe, Priest, Face, Ravenous, Care, Rehab, The Hamburg Cell - and her ground-breaking work on TV series such as EastEnders and Casualty, through intimate interviews with her closest collaborators, including Robert Carlyle, Kate Hardie, Steven Mackintosh, Irvine Welsh and Cousins himself.