Stars on location in Warwickshire

[dutchman]

Hollywood stars Colin Firth, Cameron Diaz, Alan Rickman and Stanley Tucci have been making themselves at home in Warwickshire while filming a remake of the movie Gambit.


Colin Firth, Cameron Diaz and Alan Rickman

They headed to Compton Verney this month to film scenes in the gallery for the movie which will be released next year.

Oscar winner Colin Firth plays a British art curator who devises a finely-crafted scheme to con England’s richest man and avid art collector, played by Harry Potter actor Alan Rickman, into purchasing a fake Monet painting.

He recruits a Texas rodeo queen (Cameron Diaz) to cross the pond and pose as a woman whose grandfather liberated the painting at the end of World War II.

Compton Verney is an award-winning art gallery just nine miles from Stratford and it is home to six permanent collections and a changing exhibition programme. The summer exhibitions are Stanley Spencer And The English garden and Capability Brown And The Landscapes Of Middle England.

Compton Verney’s Director Dr Steven Parissien says: “We are delighted to have been chosen as a location for this film. It has been a great experience for us and a pleasure to work with such a prestigious and professional team.”

The new film is directed by Michael Hoffman, of The Last Station fame, and is based on a screenplay written by Oscar winners Joel and Ethan Coen, whose hits include True Grit and No Country For Old Men.

Joining the stars behind-the-scenes at Compton Verney were Florian Ballhaus. of Red, The Time Traveller’s Wife and The Devil Wears Prada, as director of photography Oscar-winning hair and make-up chief Christine Blundell and production designer Stuart Craig, a three-time Oscar winner for Gandhi, Dangerous Liaisons and The English Patient, who has multiple nominations for his work on the Harry Potter series.