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Frost/Nixon Character Card #3 Rebecca Hall as Caroline Cushing

By: Dec. 12, 2008
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The film opens in selected cities 12/5 and 12/12 with a nationwide release on Christmas Day. For more information visit, http://www.frostnixon.net/

British actress Rebecca Hall was cast as jetsetting Caroline Cushing, one of the few women who might tame notorious lothario David Frost.  Ex-wife of wealthy socialite Howard Cushing, she met Frost shortly before he met with Nixon to propose the interview series; Cushing remained his girlfriend for several years thereafter.  A former secretary to columnist Liz Smith, she later became successful Hollywood editor Caroline Graham. 

With an ex-boyfriend in Los Angeles and an ex-husband in Monte Carlo, Cushing was just the sort to tell Frost exactly what she thought.  Upon their first meeting, she recounts for Frost that she heard a journalist refer to him as "someone from humble origins who could reach the greatest heights without possessing any discernible quality beyond ambition."

Of her thoughts in preparing for the role, Hall offers: "It was important to me to know as much about Caroline as I could-to meet and talk with her.  But there also comes a point where you realize that Peter Morgan's written fiction, and I have to serve the story as best as possible.  I didn't want to get too carried away with the reality of this person and think: ‘That's not actually accurate, and I need to do this.  If we're going be true about this, then I need to do that.'  You end up losing sight of the story.  What was important was figuring out where she fits in and how to tell the story best."

Rebecca Hall (Caroline Cushing) most recently completed starring in Woody Allen's Vicky Cristina Barcelona, opposite Penelope Cruz, Javier Bardem and Patricia Clarkson.

Last year, Hall starred opposite Christian Bale, Michael Caine and Hugh Jackman in Christopher Nolan's The Prestige, a tale of two turn-of-the-century London magicians whose rivalry jeopardizes the lives of everyone around then. In Tom Vaughan's Starter for 10, a coming-of-age comedy about university students struggling to find themselves while learning the differences between knowledge and wisdom, Hall starred opposite James McAvoy.

Hall received wide acclaim for her performance as Rosalind, Shakespeare's love conflicted heroine in Peter Hall's production of As You Like It, which began at the Theatre Royal Bath in 2003 and continued with an international tour. It was revived in 2005 at the Rose Theatre in Kingston and subsequently ran at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, Los Angeles' Ahmanson Theatre and the Curran Theatre in San Francisco. In summer 2004, she starred in three productions at the Theatre Royal Bath: as the title role in Timberlake Wertenbaker's Galileo's Daughter, directed by Peter Hall; Elvira in Simon Nye's version of the Molire comedy Don Juan, directed by Thea Sharrock: and as Ann Whitfield in Shaw's epic Man and Superman, again under the direction of Peter Hall.

In summer 2003, she starred as Barbara in D.H. Lawrence's Fight for Barbara, directed again by Thea Sharrock at the Theatre Royal Bath. For her West End debut as Vivie, the tough-minded daughter in Mrs. Warren's Profession at the Strand Theatre in October 2002, Hall garnered an Ian Charleson Award. In 2003, she was again nominated for the Ian Charleson Award for As You Like It.

While studying English at Cambridge, she played Mirada in The Tempest, Martha in Edward Albee's Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolf? And directed productions of Cuckoo by Guiseppe Manfredi and Tom Stoppard's The Real Inspector Hound.

Hall's television credits include Brendan Maher's Wide Sargasso Sea on BBC 4. Einstein and Eddington and Joe's Palace for HBO/BBC Films, Peter Hall's acclaimed adaption of Mary Wesley's novel "The Camomile Lawn" for Channel 4 and Don't Leave Me This Way, directed by Stuart Orme.

 

 



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