Keira Knightley's
2010 - KeiraWeb's Review of the Year
SUMMARY
This year has been called by some fans
'a Keira drought' due to the lack of personal appearances for the promotions
of Never Let Me Go at Toronto and London Boulevard in the UK, but this
is clearly not the case as you will read below. Although she only recorded
one full-length movie, A Dangerous Method, she was frequently on the public
stage at both London and Rome Film Festivals, the Paris Fashion Show, plus
Chanel, Elle and Vogue photo and video shoots. More smaller projects were
recorded, including Maze and Steve, and more charity contributions than
ever received Keira's participation this year: Amnesty's childbirth campaign,
The People Speak, MySafePlace, Healed With A Kiss, The Starlight Foundation,
and she became a patron of the spinal muscular atrophy charity The SMA
Trust. She continued to receive nominations for her performances (The Misanthrope
and Never Let Me Go) and continues to be one of the most in-demand and
A-List consideration actresses of our time. One of the world's most respected
directors David Cronenberg said of her this year: "Keira is a brilliant
actress. She blew everyone away. I’m telling you, she’s as good as anyone
I’ve worked with, including Miranda Richardson and Lynn Redgrave..." The
whirlwind years of 2003-2008 are behind her and she is now finding a balance
of choosing projects that fascinate her and challenge her as an actress.
While that may not result in a Hollywood blockbuster (and consequently
may not be seen by all her fans, although there's always the DVD), it shows
that she continues to be driven to prove herself as an actress and continue
to learn and better herself.
JANUARY
- The short film The Suicide Brothers screens
at the London Short Film Festival on the 9th.
- Keira attends the opening night of Rupert
Friend's play The Little Dog Laughed in London.
- The first public evidence of a one-to-one
fan meeting appears, as Keira visits a cerebral palsy sufferer as an ambassador
of The Starlight Foundation.
- On the 28th, the release of Last Night
is put in doubt as Disney announce they will close Miramax Pictures, leaving
the movie and five others in limbo.
FEBRUARY
- A fan was arrested for harrassment after
a complaint by Keira when arriving and leaving The Comedy Theatre in London
for her Misanthrope performances over several days.
- Keira gets a Best Supporting Actress
nomination for her role in The Misanthrope at the Laurence Olivier Awards.
It also gets a Best Production Revival and Best Costume nomination.
- Keira lends her lips to a glass plaque
for charity auction on behalf of Healed With A Kiss, and lends her voice
to a phone app Valentine's Day recording of a love poem. She is also third
in a poll to find the perfect celebrity date.
MARCH
- Keira attends the Olivier Awards Nominees'
Luncheon in London.
- She is cover girl for the March issue
of Elle US.
- Among celebrities including Annie Lennox,
Jonathan Pryce and Beverley Knight, Keira is part of a film made by Amnesty
International to highlight the number of women still dying in childbirth
in the Third World.
- Movie rumours continue unabated, with
Tender Is The Night, The Emperor's Children and Captain America the latest
three.
APRIL
- Keira has recorded a short film for her
artist friend Stuart Pearson Wright called Maze. It will form part of an
installation at his forthcoming art exhibition at London's Riflemaker Gallery.
It features the two of them in Elizabethan costumes trying to find each
other through a hedge maze, with each person being shown separately on
two screens at opposite ends of the gallery.
- The Sunday Times' Under-30s Rich List
places Keira at joint seventh place alongside Kiera Chaplin and Princes
William and Harry!
MAY
- Max Factor cosmetics buyers vote Keira
sixth in a poll to find the world's most glamorous woman.
- Keira starts filming A Dangerous Method
(formerly titled The Talking Cure) in Germany. Directed by David Cronenberg,
it becomes her only movie recording project of the year.
JUNE
- Stories and rumours continue to circulate
about the fate of Last Night, while Oscar buzz starts early for Never Let
Me Go.
- On the 27th, German filming of A Dangerous
Method wraps, and the production moves on to Austria.
JULY
- In an interview, Keira's Last Night co-star
Eva Mendes says the film will screen at the Rome Film Festival in October,
the first definite proof that a distribution deal might yet result in a
release. The Miramax sale had only recently been completed, but no news
emerged on the fate of the unreleased movies.
- On the 23rd, A Dangerous Method wraps
filming on Lake Constance.
- Promotional material for Never Let Me
Go appears online, including the official site, suggesting a festival screening
may be in the pipeline. This is confirmed on the 27th when it is announced
it will be the Gala Screening presentation at Toronto.
- Last Night co-star Sam Worthington says
in an interview that Last Night will also screen at the Toronto Film Festival.
- A press release on the 31st reveals
another charity contribution by Keira, namely a photoshoot by Nick Haddow
for the Emma Thompson-inspired project MySafePlace, which aims to highlight
survivors of human rights violations.
AUGUST
- Never Let Me Go will get its European
premiere at the London Film Festival in October, it is announced on the
5th, with it being chosen as the Gala Screening.
- On the 26th, the Rome Film Festival
confirm that Last Night will not just screen at the festival, but will
be the opening night movie.
- Keira's agent tells KeiraWeb that she
will not be promoting either of her two screening movies at Toronto, but
will be at the London screening.
SEPTEMBER
- In the first week of the month Keira
was in Paris, France, filming a new commercial for Chanel, being the face
of their fragrance Coco Mademoiselle. Directed once again by Joe Wright,
it features Keira in a very different set up from the first ad - in a catsuit
on a Ducatti motorbike!
- A new project for Rupert Friend's production
company is announced. Called 'Steve', it stars Keira, Tom Mison and Colin
Firth in a 16-minute film about a visit from a neighbour who lives downstairs.
It has secured a release at the London Film Festival.
- Many print and video interviews for
Never Let Me Go appear online as part of its Toronto Film Festival screening.
- Keira appears on the West End stage
as part of Colin Firth's project about speeches from history called The
People Speak, a British version of the project recorded in the US last
year for The History Channel. Juliet Stevenson, Rachel Weisz, Sir Ben Kingsley,
Sir Ian McKellen and Sir Patrick Stewart are among the other readers.
- Never Let Me Go's North American release
opens strongly, taking over $165,000 on just four screens in five days.
- Keira comes in at No.38 on The Guardian
newspaper's Power List of Film, the third highest actress on the list after
Angelina Jolie and Kate Winslet. Keira is also No.3 on Glamour magazine's
Best Dressed Woman survey.
OCTOBER
- Keira makes up for her red carpet absence
by conducting a string of video interviews promoting Never Let Me Go, including
chats with CBS' Early Show, ET Canada, Fox News, Parade Magazine and many
more.
- The 'Keira cut' is the talk of the fashion
world on the 5th, as Keira appears at the Paris Fashion Show sporting a
new cropped bob.
- On the 13th, Keira makes her first red
carpet movie premiere appearance of the year, as Never Let Me Go opens
the London Film Festival. At an afternoon press conference, Keira wore
a Rodarte outfit, changing to Chanel for the premiere.
- The Daily Mail reignites the three-year-old
rumours about Keira about to play Princess Diana in a biopic for Pathe.
The film company later dismisses the rumours as 'pure gossip'.
- Evidence appears that the F Scott Fitzgerald
biopic The Beautiful & Damned is no longer happening. Following a financial
restructuring of the production company The Film Department earlier in
the year, it was looking doubtful the movie would ever get made.
- On the 22nd it was announced that Keira
will be returning to the London stage in a rare West End revival of Lillian
Hellman's play The Children's Hour. Keira will play Karen Wright who, along
with her partner (to be played by Elisabeth Moss), run a girls school and
are accused of lesbianism. The play will open in January and if successful
may transfer to Broadway at the end of 2011.
- Keira attends the Rome Film Festival
to promote Last Night, which opened the festival. The red carpet arrivals
were marred, however, by striking Italian movie workers, demostrating against
funding cuts to the industry.
NOVEMBER
- Keira is nominated for Best Supporting
Actress at the BIFAs (British Independent Film Awards) for her role as
Ruth in Never let Me Go. Carey Mulligan gets a Best Actress nomination
and Andrew Garfield Best Supporting Actor.
- Slow promotion trickles out for London
Boulevard, due out in the UK on the 24th. Colin Farrell takes on most of
the TV interviews, with Ray Winstone doing a few. There is no premiere
for the movie, and a TV spot spells Keira's name wrong. The movie does
debut at No.3, however, taking £577,000 acorss 345 screens in its
first weekend.
- Keira is second in an online movie fan
survey to find Britain's Sexiest Actress Under 30.
- Keira conducts a photoshoot in Cornwall
for an early 2011 issue of Vogue.
- Another casting rumour emerges at the
end of the month - Anna Karenina. The only substance to this is that Joe
Wright is rumoured to be helming it (although the same was erroneously
said about My Fair Lady when Keira was still supposedly attached).
- It is announced that Keira has become
a patron of the SMA Trust, a charity raising funds and awareness for spinal
muscular atrophy.
DECEMBER
- Never Let Me Go's European release slips
to mid-February while the North American DVD gets a February 1st release.
- Keira does not attend the BIFAs in London,
although she lost out in her category. Carey Mulligan won Best Actress.
- Along with her Children's Hour co-star
Elisabeth Moss, Keira visits Brentwood School in Essex for research as
rehearsals officially get under way on the 6th.
- In an interview published mid-month
for Vogue UK's January issue, Keira gives her most frank interview to date,
stating that she actually considered retiring from acting during the hectic
years in which she shot to fame, from Pirates to Atonement.
