Screen Yorkshire Backs Piper's Passionate Woman

A feature production of Kay Mellor's play A Passionate Woman is being backed by Screen Yorkshire.
It will star Billie Piper, Sue Johnston, Alun Armstrong and Frances Barber in a film that tells the story of a young wife and mother - to be played by Piper - who falls in love with her Polish neighbour in 1950s Britain, only for her affair to implode 30 years later on her son's wedding day.
The production will shoot throughout Leeds with Screen Yorkshire investing £250,000 and executive producing. It will be co-directed by Mellor and Antonia Bird and Carey Fitzgerald's High Point Films, the theatrical sales arm of High Point Media Group, will handle sales.
Hugo Heppell, Executive Producer of A Passionate Woman and Head of Production at Screen Yorkshire, said: "We are thrilled to be able to help Kay Mellor bring her much cherished, worldwide smash hit play, A Passionate Woman, to the big screen.
"We believe the film, co-directed by Antonia Bird and Kay Mellor, will have huge appeal for international audiences and festivals and brilliantly evokes the time 'Room At The Top' put Yorkshire on the world cinema map.
"With a longer version being made for the BBC, and featuring stellar British talent including Billie Piper, Sue Johnston, Alun Armstrong and newcomer Theo James, A Passionate Woman will be one of the stand-out productions of 2010, just as Red Riding was of 2009."
Fitzgerald added: "Kay Mellor has a deservedly robust reputation as one of the top dramatists working in the UK today and we are proud to be taking A Passionate Woman to the international market."
(KMcA/BMcc)