Gemma Arterton has proved she has pipes in films before, but she's about to take on a real singing challenge. She'll play Dusty Springfield in a new movie called So Much Love.
Carol screenwriter Phyllis Nagy is making her directorial debut with the film, working from her own script. It's set in 1968, at the peak of Springfield’s popularity and follows her journey to Memphis, Tennessee to record the career-defining record, Dusty In Memphis, which was inducted to the Grammy Hall of Fame in 2001.
As Dusty navigates her way through the politics of both the recording studio and the city, what she sees, hears and experiences there draws her back to key moments in her life and artistic development – including her destiny altering encounter with the music of Motown, her stand against apartheid policies during her aborted South African tour, and her thorny brushes with men in the music industry who were intimidated by both her talent and her insistence on moulding perfect performances rather than settling for good ones.
"Dusty Springfield has long been a hero of mine; an innovative, brilliant artist and a complex, contradictory woman and I can’t wait to bring her to life on screen," says Nagy, who also plans to have hits such as Son Of A Preacher Man and Just A Little Lovin' in the film.
Producers Elizabeth Karlsen and Stephen Woolley are backing this one via Number 9 films, with Nagy due to have the cameras rolling in the UK and US next spring.
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