HARRY Potter star Rupert Grint has helped conjure up the £150,000 needed from fans to get a "dark" version of Shakespeare's 'Scottish Play' Macbeth off the ground.
The deadline ran out on Saturday night by which time 2,500 backers had pledged the cash. Games of Thrones actor Sean Bean, who also starred as Boromir in the Lord of the Rings trilogy and in Golden Eye, will take on the role of Macbeth with Grint - who rose to prominence as Ron Weasley in the Harry Potter film series - playing Macbeth's cousin Ross. Vincent Regan's directorial debut - called Enemy of Man - will also star Charles Dance, Jason Flemyng, James D'Arcy and Neil Maskell. A proof of concept trailer has been unveiled and the film also launched a Kickstarter campaign for £150,000 in order to take the film into pre-production. People backing the project will be promised a range of benefits, from signed scripts to the opportunity to be named on the credits as a funding producer, depending on the level pledged.
Grint added: "I'm always waiting for that one that really grabs you - and a challenge as well I think - and that's what I felt about this. It's something quite out of my comfort zone just with the nature of the Shakespeare language." Bean, who previously performed in a stage version of the Scottish Play in London, said the idea was to have a Macbeth that was "not very word heavy kind of Shakespeare".
"Something that is new and that is dark and gives a completely new take on the play. I am just hoping we can get it together and make it work," he said. The dramatic landscape of Skye recently provided the stage for the latest big screen version of Shakespeare's Scottish Play. That new cinematic version of Macbeth stars Michael Fassbender in the title role.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article