Big names from the film industry, including acclaimed Kenyan actor Oliver Litondo, are working in an unusual partnership with charities, including The Big Issue Foundation, to open people"s eyes to homelessness through the power of film.
The Truth About Stanley, a heartfelt drama set on the streets of London, currently in post-production, will raise money for The Big Issue Foundation and homeless charity Anchor House. Its executive producers are Oscar-winning Trademark Films.
The Truth about Stanley stars Oliver Litondo, the lead from the international feature film The First Grader, 12-year-old Raif Clarke and Andrew Lee Potts, lead role in ITV"s Primeval. It was shot in five days in locations in and around central London in early December 2011.
Lucy Tcherniak, who won the 2008 Smoke and Mirrors 48 Hour Film Challenge for her film I Stood Up, has directed the 20-minute film. Lucy wrote the script for The Truth About Stanley with Neil Westley, who was runner-up in the 2011 Director"s Circle Scriptwriting Selection.
It’s only February but the 2012 diary invitations are already stacking up! Forgive the (weak) pun – but the Big Issue Foundation just penned another date in the calendar... and you’re invited.
Samantha Scuffham, music promoter and musician, is hosting “The BIG Secret Pancake Party” on 21 February at the Macbeth pub in Shoreditch, London. http://www.themacbeth.co.uk/.
For just £2 entry, there will be pancakes galore, a choice line-up of hotly tipped performers (tba) and since the evening’s profits will be donated to the Big Issue Foundation, there’s a good sprinkling of the feel-good factor too.
The BIG Secret Pancake Party will also be filmed for a forthcoming BBC3 documentary on Hidden Homelessness, which explores the difficulties faced by young people who have nowhere permanent to live but do not qualify as statutorily homeless. Samantha, who has been sofa surfing with friends and relatives since graduating with a music degree last year, features in the documentary - which is likely to broadcast in Spring.
‘A year before The Big Issue, Gordon Roddick and I published Dickens The Socially Mobile Cat, a story I had written that cheekily describes a cat who is ‘transmogrified. The cat, and this is the cheeky bit, is called Dickens, and goes through some of the conditions that Dickens went through when his father was put in gaol for debt. It seems timely to raise Dickens the Socially Mobile Cat from the backlist and put it before you’.
John Bird - Founder of The Big Issue and author of Dickens the socially mobile cat.
Simon Callow and Big Issue founder, John Bird MBE, share a heart felt passion for Dickens that goes back many years. Simon generously put in a strenuous day reading the work and making it dance into life.
It’s a tale of poverty and transformation and one that has played to a packed out theatre in London’s West End over Christmas. But now, Simon Callow’s moving one-man rendition of Charles Dicken’s classic tale A Christmas Carol has helped raise funds for a vital service for Big Issue vendors.
Last week, a crowd of around 300 Big Issue supporters, vendors, and members of the public descended on London’s Arts Theatre where Callow masterfully brought to life the Victorian novella at a special show in aid of the Big Issue.
Following the event, Callow, who is Honorary Patron of the Big Issue Foundation, said, “There’s a logical link between the Big Issue and Dickens. A Christmas Carol is all about inequity in society. In these times of economic woe the story reminds us that disadvantage is not just something we should think about at Christmas, but the whole year through.”
The Big Issue Foundation launches The Big Brum Night Walk!
The Big Issue Foundation's first ever Birmingham Night Walk will take place on Friday 30th March 2012 and will see over 150 walkers join together to raise money to support vital services in Birmingham.
This years Christmas appeal focus on our Off the Streets Initiative.
The Off the Streets Initiative is the broad name we are applying to a wide range of our activities – it encompasses everything we do to give homeless people the practical help they need to move from a life on the streets to a life with employment, shelter and independence.
The Big Issue Foundation is looking for venues to host our outstanding exhibition ‘Hard Times’ in 2012.
The show comprises a specially commissioned series of images by renowned photographer Paul Wenham-Clarke. The exhibition has already received the photography world’s highest accolade – a Gold Award from the Association of Photographers.