GB
1987
1hr 45mins
Dir: Stephen Frears
Starring: Gary Oldman and Vanessa Redgrave
The story of the spectacular life and violent death of British playwright Joe Orton
Based on the biography by John Lahr, this magnificent film tells the story of Orton and his friend Kenneth Halliwell in flashback, framed by sequences of Lahr researching the book upon which the film is based. There is a scene filmed in the lower lift lobby and surrounding passageways of Aldwych station, which shows to good effect the state of the station in an area that was not usually depicted by film crews, who tended to stick to the station platforms. The film was shot some seven years before the closure of the station, and the visibly poor state of the fabric in the passageway leading to the platform is self-evident even at this stage.
