Prospero's Books
Encyclopedia
Prospero's Books written and directed by Peter Greenaway
Peter Greenaway
Peter Greenaway, CBE is a British film director. His films are noted for the distinct influence of Renaissance and Baroque painting, and Flemish painting in particular...

, is a cinematic adaptation of The Tempest
The Tempest
The Tempest is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1610–11, and thought by many critics to be the last play that Shakespeare wrote alone. It is set on a remote island, where Prospero, the exiled Duke of Milan, plots to restore his daughter Miranda to her rightful place,...

, by William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

. John Gielgud
John Gielgud
Sir Arthur John Gielgud, OM, CH was an English actor, director, and producer. A descendant of the renowned Terry acting family, he achieved early international acclaim for his youthful, emotionally expressive Hamlet which broke box office records on Broadway in 1937...

 is Prospero
Prospero
Prospero is the protagonist in The Tempest, a play by William Shakespeare.- The Tempest :Prospero is the rightful Duke of Milan, who was put to sea on "a rotten carcass of a butt [boat]" to die by his usurping brother, Antonio, twelve years before the play begins. Prospero and Miranda survived,...

, the protagonist who provides the off-screen narration and the voices to the other story characters. Stylistically, Prospero's Books is narratively and cinematically innovative in its techniques, combining mime
Mime artist
A mime artist is someone who uses mime as a theatrical medium or as a performance art, involving miming, or the acting out a story through body motions, without use of speech. In earlier times, in English, such a performer was referred to as a mummer...

, dance, opera, and animation
Animation
Animation is the rapid display of a sequence of images of 2-D or 3-D artwork or model positions in order to create an illusion of movement. The effect is an optical illusion of motion due to the phenomenon of persistence of vision, and can be created and demonstrated in several ways...

. Edited in Japan, the film makes extensive (and pioneering) use of digital image manipulation (using Hi-Vision video inserts and the Paintbox
Quantel Paintbox
The Quantel Paintbox was a dedicated computer graphics workstation for composition of broadcast television video and graphics. Its design emphasizes the studio workflow efficiency required for live news production...

 system), often overlaying multiple moving and still pictures with animations. Michael Nyman
Michael Nyman
Michael Laurence Nyman, CBE is an English composer of minimalist music, pianist, librettist and musicologist, known for the many film scores he wrote during his lengthy collaboration with the filmmaker Peter Greenaway, and his multi-platinum soundtrack album to Jane Campion's The Piano...

 composed the musical score and Karine Saporta
Karine Saporta
Karine Saporta is a French choreographer, dancer, photographer, and short film director. She is one of the most prominent figures in French dance....

 choreographed the dance. The film is also notable for its extensive use of nudity, displayed with a naturist ethos in keeping with the work's key themes. (i.e. The nude actors and extras represent a realistic cross-section of male and female humanity.)

Plot

The daughter of Prospero, an exiled magician, falls in love with the son of his enemy, while the sorcerer's sprite, Ariel, convinces him to abandon revenge against the traitors from his earlier life. In the film, Prospero stands in for Shakespeare, and is seen writing and speaking the story's action as it unfolds. Prospero's Books is a complex tale based upon William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

's The Tempest.

Ariel is played by three actors — a boy, an adolescent, and a youth. Each represents a classical elemental
Elemental
An elemental is a mythological being first appearing in the alchemical works of Paracelsus in the 16th century. Traditionally, there are four types:*gnomes, earth elementals*undines , water elementals*sylphs, air elementals...

. The boy represents water
Water
Water is a chemical substance with the chemical formula H2O. A water molecule contains one oxygen and two hydrogen atoms connected by covalent bonds. Water is a liquid at ambient conditions, but it often co-exists on Earth with its solid state, ice, and gaseous state . Water also exists in a...

, and is shown perpetually urinating.

Cast

  • John Gielgud
    John Gielgud
    Sir Arthur John Gielgud, OM, CH was an English actor, director, and producer. A descendant of the renowned Terry acting family, he achieved early international acclaim for his youthful, emotionally expressive Hamlet which broke box office records on Broadway in 1937...

     - Prospero
  • Michael Clark
    Michael Clark (dancer)
    Michael Clark is a Scottish dancer and choreographer.-Early life:Michael Clark was born in Aberdeen and began traditional Scottish dancing at the age of four. In 1975 he left home to study at the Royal Ballet School in London, and on his final day at the school he was presented with the Ursula...

     - Caliban
  • Michel Blanc
    Michel Blanc
    Michel Blanc is a French actor and director who is noted for his roles of losers and hypochondriacs...

     - Alonso
  • Erland Josephson
    Erland Josephson
    Erland Josephson is a Swedish actor and author. He is best known to international audiences for his work in films directed by Ingmar Bergman, Andrei Tarkovsky, and Theodoros Angelopoulos.-Biography:...

     - Gonzalo
  • Isabelle Pasco
    Isabelle Pasco
    Isabelle Pasco is a French actress and model.She was married to the actor Tchéky Karyo.-Films:*2006 - Intimità*2003 - Drôle de genre *2003 - Clandestino...

     - Miranda

  • Tom Bell
    Tom Bell (actor)
    Tom Bell was an English actor on stage, film and television. He was dark-haired, lean, and in his later years often played characters having a sinister side to their nature.-Biography:...

     - Antonio
  • Kenneth Cranham
    Kenneth Cranham
    Kenneth Cranham is a film, television and stage actor. He starred in the title role in the popular 1980s comedy drama Shine on Harvey Moon. He also appeared in Layer Cake, Gangster No. 1, Rome, Oliver! and many other films. He is probably best known to horror genre fans as the deranged Dr...

     - Sebastian
  • Mark Rylance
    Mark Rylance
    Mark Rylance is an English actor, theatre director and playwright.As an actor, Rylance found success on stage and screen. For his work in theatre he has won Olivier and Tony Awards among others, and a BAFTA TV Award...

     - Ferdinand
  • Gerard Thoolen - Adrian
  • Pierre Bokma
    Pierre Bokma
    Pierre Henri Martin Bokma is an award winning Dutch stage, television and film actor.In November 2007 he won an International Emmy Award for his roll in the movie De uitverkorene...

     - Francisco

  • Jim van der Woude - Trinculo
  • Michiel Romeyn - Stephano
  • Paul Russell
    Paul Russell
    Paul Russell may refer to:* Paul Russell , at the University of British Columbia* Rusty Russell , Australian Linux kernel hacker, whose real name is Paul Russell* Paul Russell , Major League Baseball player...

     - Ariel
  • James Thiérrée
    James Thiérrée
    James Thiérrée is the writer, director and star of The Junebug Symphony, La Veillée des Abysses and Au Revoir Parapluie ....

     - Ariel


Production and financing

John Gielgud
John Gielgud
Sir Arthur John Gielgud, OM, CH was an English actor, director, and producer. A descendant of the renowned Terry acting family, he achieved early international acclaim for his youthful, emotionally expressive Hamlet which broke box office records on Broadway in 1937...

 said a film of The Tempest
The Tempest
The Tempest is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1610–11, and thought by many critics to be the last play that Shakespeare wrote alone. It is set on a remote island, where Prospero, the exiled Duke of Milan, plots to restore his daughter Miranda to her rightful place,...

(as Prospero
Prospero
Prospero is the protagonist in The Tempest, a play by William Shakespeare.- The Tempest :Prospero is the rightful Duke of Milan, who was put to sea on "a rotten carcass of a butt [boat]" to die by his usurping brother, Antonio, twelve years before the play begins. Prospero and Miranda survived,...

, as he had been in four stage productions in 1931, 1940, 1957, and 1974) was his life's ambition. He had approached Alain Resnais
Alain Resnais
Alain Resnais is a French film director whose career has extended over more than six decades. After training as a film editor in the mid-1940s, he went on to direct a number of short films which included Nuit et Brouillard , an influential documentary about the Nazi concentration camps.He began...

, Ingmar Bergman
Ingmar Bergman
Ernst Ingmar Bergman was a Swedish director, writer and producer for film, stage and television. Described by Woody Allen as "probably the greatest film artist, all things considered, since the invention of the motion picture camera", he is recognized as one of the most accomplished and...

, Akira Kurosawa
Akira Kurosawa
was a Japanese film director, producer, screenwriter and editor. Regarded as one of the most important and influential filmmakers in the history of cinema, Kurosawa directed 30 filmsIn 1946, Kurosawa co-directed, with Hideo Sekigawa and Kajiro Yamamoto, the feature Those Who Make Tomorrow ;...

, and Orson Welles
Orson Welles
George Orson Welles , best known as Orson Welles, was an American film director, actor, theatre director, screenwriter, and producer, who worked extensively in film, theatre, television and radio...

 about directing him in it, Benjamin Britten
Benjamin Britten
Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten, OM CH was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He showed talent from an early age, and first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy Was Born in 1934. With the premiere of his opera Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to...

 to compose its score, and Albert Finney
Albert Finney
Albert Finney is an English actor. He achieved prominence in films in the early 1960s, and has maintained a successful career in theatre, film and television....

 to be Caliban
Caliban (character)
Caliban is one of the primary antagonists in William Shakespeare's play The Tempest.- Character :Caliban is forced into servitude on an island ruled by Prospero. While he is referred to as a calvaluna or mooncalf, a freckled monster, he is the only human inhabitant of the island that is otherwise...

, before Greenaway
Peter Greenaway
Peter Greenaway, CBE is a British film director. His films are noted for the distinct influence of Renaissance and Baroque painting, and Flemish painting in particular...

 agreed. The closest the earlier attempts came to being made was in 1967, with Welles
Orson Welles
George Orson Welles , best known as Orson Welles, was an American film director, actor, theatre director, screenwriter, and producer, who worked extensively in film, theatre, television and radio...

 as both director and as Caliban to Gielgud's
John Gielgud
Sir Arthur John Gielgud, OM, CH was an English actor, director, and producer. A descendant of the renowned Terry acting family, he achieved early international acclaim for his youthful, emotionally expressive Hamlet which broke box office records on Broadway in 1937...

 Prospero
Prospero
Prospero is the protagonist in The Tempest, a play by William Shakespeare.- The Tempest :Prospero is the rightful Duke of Milan, who was put to sea on "a rotten carcass of a butt [boat]" to die by his usurping brother, Antonio, twelve years before the play begins. Prospero and Miranda survived,...

, but after the commercial failure of Welles
Orson Welles
George Orson Welles , best known as Orson Welles, was an American film director, actor, theatre director, screenwriter, and producer, who worked extensively in film, theatre, television and radio...

 and Gielgud's
John Gielgud
Sir Arthur John Gielgud, OM, CH was an English actor, director, and producer. A descendant of the renowned Terry acting family, he achieved early international acclaim for his youthful, emotionally expressive Hamlet which broke box office records on Broadway in 1937...

 Shakespearean film collaboration, Chimes at Midnight
Chimes at Midnight
Chimes at Midnight, also known as Falstaff and Campanadas a medianoche , is a 1965 film directed by and starring Orson Welles. Focused on William Shakespeare's recurring character Sir John Falstaff, the film stars Welles himself as Falstaff, Keith Baxter plays Prince Hal , and John Gielgud plays...

,
financing for a cinematic The Tempest
The Tempest
The Tempest is a play by William Shakespeare, believed to have been written in 1610–11, and thought by many critics to be the last play that Shakespeare wrote alone. It is set on a remote island, where Prospero, the exiled Duke of Milan, plots to restore his daughter Miranda to her rightful place,...

collapsed.

The film was screened out of competition at the 1991 Cannes Film Festival
1991 Cannes Film Festival
- Jury :*Roman Polanski *Férid Boughedir *Whoopi Goldberg *Margaret Menegoz *Natalia Negoda *Alan Parker *Jean-Paul Rappeneau *Hans Dieter Seidel *Vittorio Storaro...

.

Soundtrack

Director Peter Greenaway
Peter Greenaway
Peter Greenaway, CBE is a British film director. His films are noted for the distinct influence of Renaissance and Baroque painting, and Flemish painting in particular...

 and composer Michael Nyman
Michael Nyman
Michael Laurence Nyman, CBE is an English composer of minimalist music, pianist, librettist and musicologist, known for the many film scores he wrote during his lengthy collaboration with the filmmaker Peter Greenaway, and his multi-platinum soundtrack album to Jane Campion's The Piano...

 acrimoniously ended their longstanding work relationship while making Prospero's Books. Most of the film's music cues, (excepting Ariel's songs and the Masque) are from an earlier concert, La Traversée de Paris
La Traversée de Paris (album)
La Traversée de Paris is an album by the Michael Nyman Band featuring music composed by Michael Nyman for an audio-visual exhibition of the same name which took place at the Grande Arche de la Défense from July to December 1989 to celebrate the bicentennial of the French Revolution.-Track...

and the score from A Zed & Two Noughts
A Zed & Two Noughts
Elements of Michael Nyman's score invoke the "Dies Irae" section from Heinrich Ignaz Biber's Requiem ex F con terza minore. The Angelfish Decay/Swan Rot/L'Escargot theme was originally written for Childs Play, a dance work commissioned by Lucinda Childs. Performance of the soundtrack is credited...

. The soundtrack album is Nyman's sixteenth release.

Track listing

  • 1. Full fathom five 1.58
  • 2. Prospero's curse 2.38
  • 3. While you here do snoring lie* 1.06
  • 4. Prospero's Magic 5.11
  • 5. Miranda 3.54

  • 6. Twelve years since 2.45
  • 7. Come unto these yellow sands* 3.44
  • 8. History of Sycorax 3.25
  • 9. Come and go* 1.16
  • 10.Cornfield 6.26

  • 11.Where the bee sucks* 4.48
  • 12.Caliban's pit 2.56
  • 13.Reconciliation 2.31
  • 14.THE MASQUE+ 12.12


Performers

  • Sarah Leonard, Ariel*

  • Marie Angel
    Marie Angel
    Marie Angel is an Australian-born opera singer. She sings both operas in the standard repertoire as well as contemporary operas by such composers as Mauricio Kagel, Bruno Maderna, Michael Tippett, Harrison Birtwistle, Philip Glass, Louis Andriessen, Michael Nyman, Bernd Alois Zimmermann, and John...

    , Iris
    Iris (mythology)
    In Greek mythology, Iris is the personification of the rainbow and messenger of the gods. As the sun unites Earth and heaven, Iris links the gods to humanity...

    +

  • Ute Lemper
    Ute Lemper
    Ute Lemper is a German chanteuse and actress renowned for her interpretation of the work of Kurt Weill.- Biography :Born in Münster, Germany, Ute Lemper was raised in a Roman Catholic family. She joined the punk music group known as the Panama Drive Band at the age of 16...

    , Ceres+

  • Deborah Conway
    Deborah Conway
    Deborah Ann Conway, is an Australian rock singer-songwriter and guitarist, and had a career as a model and actor. She was a founding member of the 1980s rock band Do-Ré-Mi with their surprise top 5 hit "Man Overboard"....

    , Juno
    Juno (mythology)
    Juno is an ancient Roman goddess, the protector and special counselor of the state. She is a daughter of Saturn and sister of the chief god Jupiter and the mother of Mars and Vulcan. Juno also looked after the women of Rome. Her Greek equivalent is Hera...

    +


Michael Nyman Band

  • Alexander Balanescu
    Alexander Balanescu
    Alexander Bălănescu is a violinist and founder of the Balanescu Quartet.He emigrated with his family to Israel in 1969....

    , violin
    Violin
    The violin is a string instrument, usually with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is the smallest, highest-pitched member of the violin family of string instruments, which includes the viola and cello....

  • Jonathan Carney
    Jonathan Carney
    Jonathan Carney is a violinist, violist, and conductor noted for his interpretations of Luciano Berio, Michael Nyman, Max Bruch, Johannes Brahms, Jean Sibelius, Felix Mendelssohn, John Cage, Bruno Maderna, Pablo Sarasate, Fritz Kreisler, Krzysztof Penderecki, Paul Hindemith, Philip Glass, Toru...

    , violin, viola
    Viola
    The viola is a bowed string instrument. It is the middle voice of the violin family, between the violin and the cello.- Form :The viola is similar in material and construction to the violin. A full-size viola's body is between and longer than the body of a full-size violin , with an average...

  • Elisabeth Perry, violin
  • Clare Connors, violin
  • Kate Musker, viola
  • Tony Hinnigan
    Tony Hinnigan
    Anthony "Tony" Hinnigan is a musician from Glasgow. He is best known for his work with Michael Nyman , Ennio Morricone, and James Horner. He plays cello as well as Irish whistle and various Andean woodwind instruments...

    , cello
    Cello
    The cello is a bowed string instrument with four strings tuned in perfect fifths. It is a member of the violin family of musical instruments, which also includes the violin, viola, and double bass. Old forms of the instrument in the Baroque era are baryton and viol .A person who plays a cello is...

  • Justin Pearson
    Justin Pearson
    Justin Pearson is a frontman or bassist for a number of San Diego noise rock and grindcore bands, starting off in the punk outfit Struggle in 1994. Ensuing projects included Swing Kids, The Locust, The Crimson Curse, Holy Molar, Head Wound City, Ground Unicorn Horn, Brain Tourniquet, All Leather,...

    , cello

  • Paul Morgan, double bass
    Double bass
    The double bass, also called the string bass, upright bass, standup bass or contrabass, is the largest and lowest-pitched bowed string instrument in the modern symphony orchestra, with strings usually tuned to E1, A1, D2 and G2...

  • Tim Amhurst, double bass
  • Lynda Houghton, double bass
  • Martin Elliott, bass guitar
    Bass guitar
    The bass guitar is a stringed instrument played primarily with the fingers or thumb , or by using a pick....

  • David Rix, clarinet
    Clarinet
    The clarinet is a musical instrument of woodwind type. The name derives from adding the suffix -et to the Italian word clarino , as the first clarinets had a strident tone similar to that of a trumpet. The instrument has an approximately cylindrical bore, and uses a single reed...

    , bass clarinet
    Bass clarinet
    The bass clarinet is a musical instrument of the clarinet family. Like the more common soprano B clarinet, it is usually pitched in B , but it plays notes an octave below the soprano B clarinet...

  • John Harle
    John Harle
    John Harle is an English saxophonist and composer.-Biography:John Harle - SaxophonistJohn Harle is one of the world’s leading saxophonists, and the most significant performer of the saxophone in the concert hall today...

    , soprano
    Soprano saxophone
    The soprano saxophone is a variety of the saxophone, a woodwind instrument, invented in 1840. The soprano is the third smallest member of the saxophone family, which consists of the soprillo, sopranino, soprano, alto, tenor, baritone, bass, contrabass and tubax.A transposing instrument pitched in...

     & alto saxophone
    Alto saxophone
    The alto saxophone is a member of the saxophone family of woodwind instruments invented by Belgian instrument designer Adolphe Sax in 1841. It is smaller than the tenor but larger than the soprano, and is the type most used in classical compositions...

  • David Roach, soprano & alto axophone

  • Jamie Talbot
    Jamie Talbot
    James Robert "Jamie" Talbot is an English jazz alto saxophonist.Talbot played with the London Schools Symphony Orchestra and then with the National Youth Jazz Orchestra while young.He attended the Royal College of Music in 1978-79, then recorded throughout the decades of the 1980s and 1990s with...

    , soprano & alto saxophone
  • Andrew Findon
    Andrew Findon
    Andrew Findon is an English flautist and saxophonist. Educated at Harrow County School for Boys, he trained as an orchestral flautist, and served as principal flute of the National Youth Orchestra in the early 1970s and three years at the Royal College of Music...

    , tenor
    Tenor saxophone
    The tenor saxophone is a medium-sized member of the saxophone family, a group of instruments invented by Adolphe Sax in the 1840s. The tenor, with the alto, are the two most common types of saxophones. The tenor is pitched in the key of B, and written as a transposing instrument in the treble...

     & baritone saxophone
    Baritone saxophone
    The baritone saxophone, often called "bari sax" , is one of the largest and lowest pitched members of the saxophone family. It was invented by Adolphe Sax. The baritone is distinguished from smaller sizes of saxophone by the extra loop near its mouthpiece...

    , piccolo
    Piccolo
    The piccolo is a half-size flute, and a member of the woodwind family of musical instruments. The piccolo has the same fingerings as its larger sibling, the standard transverse flute, but the sound it produces is an octave higher than written...

    , flute
    Flute
    The flute is a musical instrument of the woodwind family. Unlike woodwind instruments with reeds, a flute is an aerophone or reedless wind instrument that produces its sound from the flow of air across an opening...

  • Graham Ashton, trumpet
    Trumpet
    The trumpet is the musical instrument with the highest register in the brass family. Trumpets are among the oldest musical instruments, dating back to at least 1500 BCE. They are played by blowing air through closed lips, producing a "buzzing" sound which starts a standing wave vibration in the air...

  • Richard Clews, horn
    Horn (instrument)
    The horn is a brass instrument consisting of about of tubing wrapped into a coil with a flared bell. A musician who plays the horn is called a horn player ....

  • Marjorie Dunn, horn
  • Nigel Barr
    Nigel Barr
    Nigel Barr grew up as a member of the High Wycombe Salvation Army band. In 1980 he went to the Guildhall School of Music and studied trombone with Peter Gane and Denis Wick during that time he was also a member of International Staff Band playing bass trombone.Since then Nigel has had a varied...

    , bass trombone
  • Steve Saunders, bass trombone
  • Michael Nyman
    Michael Nyman
    Michael Laurence Nyman, CBE is an English composer of minimalist music, pianist, librettist and musicologist, known for the many film scores he wrote during his lengthy collaboration with the filmmaker Peter Greenaway, and his multi-platinum soundtrack album to Jane Campion's The Piano...

    , piano & musiical direction

Technical

  • Produced by David Cunningham
  • Engineer: Michael J. Dutton
  • Assistant engineer: Dillon Gallagher (PRT
    PRT
    -Politics:*Partido Revolucionario de los Trabajadores, name of political parties in Argentina, Nicaragua and Peru*Partido Revolucionário dos Trabalhadores, a political party in Portugal...

    ), Chris Brown (Abbey Road Studios
    Abbey Road Studios
    Abbey Road Studios is a recording studio located at 3 Abbey Road, St John's Wood, City of Westminster, London, England. It was established in November 1931 by the Gramophone Company, a predecessor of British music company EMI, its present owner...

    )
  • Mixed by Michael J. Dutton, Michael Nymam, and David Cunningham at PRT Studios and Abbey Road Studios
  • Edited at Abbey Road Studios by Peter Mew
    Peter Mew
    Peter Mew is a British music audio engineer at Abbey Road Studios where he is now senior mastering engineer. He came to Abbey Road in 1965 as a tape operator and has since worked with many artists at the studio...

  • Art Direction: Ann Bradbeer
  • Photography: Marc Guillamot
  • Design: Creative Partnership
  • Artist representative: Don Mousseau
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