Sunday News Snippet: Mary Burchell in the movies
Ida (aka Mary Burchell) and Louise Cook film in the works– I first read about Ida and Louise Cook years ago when I reviewed Ida’s book “Safe Passage” which detailed how they had fallen in love with opera and how it allowed them to help Jews trying to escape Europe before WWII. Now it looks like there might be a film made about the sisters and what they managed to do.
Now a major feature film, The Cooks, is being produced by Donald Rosenfeld, former president of Merchant Ivory Productions, who made period classics such as Howards End, starring Emma Thompson.
Having worked on four productions with Thompson – with a fifth project already under way – Rosenfeld would now like to cast her as one of the Cook sisters alongside fellow Oscar-winner Cate Blanchett.
He paid tribute to the Cook sisters’ bravery. They were mingling with high-ranking Nazis at the opera, while helping people flee. Recalling the musical about the Trapp family’s escape from the Nazis, he described the Cooks’ story as “the real Sound of Music”.
I hope any allusions to the sisters being spies or working for the government are verified and not over hyped for dramatic effect.
~Jayne
What exciting news! Any movie with Emma Thompson and Cate Blanchett starring would be of interest to me, but this romance genre connection puts it over the top.
ETA: Just read the article. It’s fascinating to think that they might have been spies. I hope the sealed files the CIA has are opened! And that more of the survivors they saved are found.