1 March 1999: The Dutch release date for Little Voice has been postponed to 18 March. Other dates that are still in the future are: Finland 5 March, Denmark 16 April and Iceland 23 April 1999.
1 March 1999: Forget the Oscars, the BAFTAs make a lot more sense. Jane is nominated for best actress, Michael Caine for best actor, Brenda Blethyn for best supporting actress, Mark Herman for best adaptation and the film Little Voice itself for 'most outstanding British film' and for best sound. Award ceremony 11 April on the BBC.
10 February 1999: What?! No Oscar nomination? Reading the nomination list gives me the impression that the collective Hollywood actors and filmmakers have now really lost it. Michael Caine not nominated while he won the Golden Globe? Jane not nominated? Little Voice as film not nominated? And it's not that they only go for the big commercial films: American History X did get the nomination (Edward Norton for best actor) I was hoping for, but wasn't expecting. But then that's an american film... Anyway, since Jane's second baby is expected around the time of the award ceremony, it's probably best that she doesn't have to show up.
25 January 1999: Jane didn't win the Golden Globe. Instead, Gwyneth Paltrow did. Also in other categories the ones I really wanted to win lost to the ones I really didn't want to win (the exception being Michael Caine who did get the award for his role in Little Voice). It was a bad day.
7 January 1999: Release date summary for Little Voice: UK 8 January, Australia 14 January, US 22 January (wider release), Netherlands 25 February. If you know any others, please tell me.
7 January 1999: I didn't mention this yet I guess, but Jane's second baby is expected around March.
18 December 1998: Me being busy at work, computers breaking down and me working on a new lay-out for this site (which will be at the new address) have got in the way of very necessary updates to these pages. Sorry.
18 December 1998: Jane is nominated for a Golden Globe! As are Michael Caine and Brenda Blethyn, all for their performances in Little Voice.
18 December 1998: The release dates for Little Voice are in the Netherlands on 25 February 1999, in the UK on 8 January 1999 and in the US (depending on where you live) it's either already on release, or will be released on 25 December 1998 or 22 January 1999.
22 April 1998: The film version of The rise and fall of Little Voice with Jane Horrocks, and Ewan McGregor, has been filmed and will be released in the UK in the autumn and in the Netherlands in December. Many prepublicity is done for the film, suggesting that it's going to be a major release.
8 January 1998: The UK release of Bring me the head of Mavis Davis will be on 16 January 1998. The Australian is now set for somewhere in January 1998.
24 November 1997: It appears that a new series of Crapston Villas has started on Channel 4. Jane provides at least one of the voices. The series started 7 November, but since I can't receive Channel 4, it's not easy to keep up to date on this...
24 November 1997: Wednesday 3 December 1997 the Raspberry Ripple Awards will be broadcast on Channel 4 (23.50 UK time). These awards go to the best and worst portrayals of disabled people in the media. It's organised by the 1 in 8 Group, of which Jane Horrocks is mentioned as one of its high profile supporters.
10 November 1997: Jane is currently filming The rise and fall of Little Voice, together with Michael Caine, Brenda Blethyn, Jim Broadbent and Annette Badland. It seems that Ewan McGregor has dropped out, probably due to having too much to do.
10 November 1997: I've just found out that Helena Bonham Carter's Dancing queen was actually written for Jane Horrocks.
10 November 1997: It seems likely that Jane will play the lead in Alice through the looking glass, a Channel 4 project. Nothing is certain about that yet, though.
10 November 1997: Some new videos have been released in the UK over the last couple of months. If you like Jane's voice, you can buy The blobs, Crapston Villas and Wyrd sisters. There's also an out-takes video available for Absolutely fabulous, called Absolutely not.
18 September 1997: According to the Internet movie database, Bring me the head of Mavis Davis will be released in Australia on 20 November 1997.
16 September 1997: The date of birth of Jane's son, Dylan, is actually 28 April 1997.
16 September 1997: Bring me the head of Mavis Davis, see below, is/was going to be released in the UK in September.
16 September 1997: The filming on The rise and fall of Little Voice will actually start in October.
16 September 1997: The recent broadcast of Some kind of life on Dutch tv had a different soundtrack than the original ITV broadcast, which featured the REM song Drive prominently. But now it was replaced by The whole of the moon by the Waterboys. Also the song playing on the jukebox in the bar is replaced by Seal's Crazy. Most annoying was the piano music over the end credits, which really changed the atmosphere. Did the bands object to the usage of their songs and if so, why? If anybody knows I would like it if you could tell me. I also like to know whether this was also the case in broadcasts in other countries.
10 September 1997: Old news, but it seems that Sam Mendes decided not to direct The rise and fall of Little Voice after all. His reasons are personal and very understandable. The film should now be shooting in London, but I don't know who directs it.
3 June 1997: According to the Radio Times Jane will be doing a new film called Girls will be girls.
22 May 1997: At the award ceremony of the Royal Television Society Jane was nominated with her Never mind the Horrocks in the category of best television performance. Though Paul Whitehouse of The fast show won.
12 May 1997: One day, there's going to be a puppet animation series or film called Combination skin including Jane's vocal talents. I don't know anything about the story line, format, etc., but I've seen a small clip and I know it's going to be on Channel 4. Unless of course this is something from a long time ago and I had not heard of it yet.
18 April 1997: The film The rise and fall of little voice will be recorded this September in London. Ewan McGregor (Trainspotting and also with Jane in Tales from the crypt) is also confirmed.
The next items were not yet included with a date:
There will be a film version of one of Jane's earliest theatre works, The rise and fall of little voice. This play was written especially for her, around her impersonations and the film will be directed by famous director Sam Mendes. There were some doubts initially whether Jane would play in the film: she wanted to, badly, but the producers were thinking of letting the role of the Lancastrian mimic be played by an American actress. They've seen sense now and our Lancastrian mimic will play the role.
Another film in the making is Bring me the head of Mavis Davis with Rik Mayall, who is known from The young ones, Bottom and of course Rik Mayall presents... (and I'm sure much more). In this film, Mavis' agent (RM) tries to get rid of his star (JH, I guess) by trying to kill her in lots of original ways and failing to do so with worrying inevitability. I think this film is produced for the BBC, so we might expect to see it there.
Another Sam Mendes production, the musical Cabaret, will transfer/is transferred from the Donmar Warehouse to Broadway. The setting is as much as possible the same as the acclaimed UK version, but Jane's role will be taken over by Natasha Richardson (known from Nell).
A new Absolutely fabulous episode! It's currently doing the tour around all the world's TV stations with taste, after it was broadcast on the BBC. Jennifer Saunders had written this new one and a half hour long episode as the absolutely last, final, etc., ever. The original BBC press release announced that it would be an one hour long show starring the full AbFab cast (all J's), but it appeared that Jane Horrocks herself wasn't in it. Anyway, AbFab is still something you're not allowed to miss.
Read up-to-the-minute UK entertainment news in the Spotlight section of the PA newscentre.