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A naked ambition
REG LITTLE talks to 22-year-old Oxford film-maker Vicky Jewson about her new film and attempt to get Richard Branson to ride naked through the city on a horse
THE challenge is in the post, with the gauntlet well and truly thrown down to Sir Richard Branson.
Tastefully set out on a medieval scroll, yet straight to the point, Vicky Jewson wants to know if the Virgin millionaire is man enough to ride naked on horseback through the centre of Oxford, before arriving at the Odeon cinema in Magdalen Street to be greeted by fellow celebrities.
It would all be in aid of charity, while happily promoting Vicky's eagerly-awaited film Lady Godiva.
Whether or not he is up for the challenge, as a past master at headline-grabbing stunts, Sir Richard will no doubt smile at this 22-year-old's bare-faced cheek.
How could he not relish her determination to succeed as a film-maker?
For within minutes of meeting Vicky, you quickly realise that there is not a lot she would not do - or get someone else to do - in order to persuade people to go to see her film.
She has been living with Lady Godiva for three years now, starting the script within minutes of finishing her English A-level.
And as well as producing the script and persuading independent backers to invest £1.4m, she also put together the cast, directed the film and took charge of its distribution.
At one stage she blew a £20,000 bank loan in one night on a dinner for 50 potential investors, who she had managed to lock in a room with a 12ft cinema screen.
So pulling off a bit of grassroots marketing is posing no worries.
The £3m the film cost to make may be peanuts compared with other British-made romantic comedies, never mind Hollywood blockbusters.
But there is no doubting that this Oxford businessman's daughter is a young girl in a hurry, who has much riding on a naked woman on a horse blazing a trail in UK cinemas.
There are rumours that those sending Lady Godiva on her way at the film's premiere in Oxford on January 19 will include Liz Hurley, Orlando Bloom and Sharon Osbourne.
When we met at her parents' home on Boars Hill she was already busily plotting to close down Magdalen Street so her VIP guests could arrive in horse-drawn carriages - and presumably, just in case a disrobed man with a beard shows up from Kidlington.
But then, this is a woman who brought Magdalen Bridge to a halt, grabbing headlines across the world when she filmed a naked Phoebe Thomas riding into Oxford astride a steed in the film's most memorable scene.
It was actually shot at 4.30am in three takes, with the actress passing 100 extras wearing nothing but a flesh-coloured thong and tights.
"Without that scene, we wouldn't have a film," laughed Vicky, "so I had no choice but to get everyone up long before dawn, stop the traffic every few minutes and do it in as few takes as possible. All credit to the cast, crew and extras who made this happen quickly and with little fuss."
Her father first put the rich potential of the Godiva story in her mind after listening to a programme on Radio 4.
Vicky said: "It struck me as a great tale to adapt. And it's a tale that's never been told before - a kind of undiscovered Robin Hood. I didn't want to make a film about medieval taxes. But the whole concept of a woman, ahead of her time, who stood against adversity, was something I wanted to write about."
Those with only a cursory knowledge of the medieval tale of the proud woman who defies her husband and rides through the streets to protest against high taxes, will know the action is set in Coventry.
But Vicky's Lady Godiva is a contemporary love story set in Oxford, involving Jemima, a quirky young school teacher, struggling to come to terms with the death of her brother, who dreams of rebuilding a local arts centre that he created.
She falls for a handsome playboy (played by Matthew Chambers), who owns the world-famous horse Lady Godiva. Various romantic disappointments follow before she discovers that the cad has made a £100,000 bet that she would not ride naked through Oxford.
"It simply couldn't be filmed anywhere else. There is no body double for the dreaming spires," said Vicky, who during the seven-week shoot used more than 37 locations across the county, including the Said Business School, Jericho and the Kirtlington Park polo grounds. The crew later went out to Carcassone in France, where the film's opening sequence was shot.
She initially approached the supermodel Kate Moss, and the James Bond actress Denise Richards, who both turned down the chance to star in a film that promises you "the ride of your life".
But she was delighted when Phoebe Thomas, a star of BBC1's Holby City, agreed to play the main character.
But it seems that Vicky was not worried about directing a cast with such established actors as Simon Williams, of Upstairs Downstairs fame and Petra Markham, who starred opposite Michael Caine in Get Carter.
Being a young woman in her early twenties was never a big deal for her.
"On set you can make an issue or not - it depends on how you look at it. My youth was a bit of an issue that people had to overcome, But when you are raising finance, you get more success with the men because you can appeal to them with female charm, which I probably did in order to help raise the finance for the film."
Most of the film's editing was undertaken in a former blacksmith's forge on the outskirts of Radley, where she was faced with the prospect of cutting 22 hours of footage down to a 90-minute film.
But then, she will tell you, it was a task she has been quietly preparing for since the age of seven, when she made her first film, heavily reliant on the gymnastic talents of her sister.
At school she founded her own film and drama clubs.
But she insists: "I was never what you would call a film buff. I still don't go watching and gauging loads off other films. I prefer making them."
She attended a film-makers' course at Modern Art Oxford while still in her teens and directed a Second World War film, Lilly's White, which was screened at The Old Fire Station.
It was introduced by Radio 4's veteran quizmaster Nicholas Parsons, who makes a cameo appearance in the new film.
But the event was to end in tears of frustration, when a technical problem resulted in her film having to be shown in black and white.
Vicky began the Lady Godiva script while still at Wychwood School in Oxford and despite winning a place at Birmingham University, she decided to ditch plans for university in order to concentrate on film-making
It is doubtful whether academic life could have presented her with as many tough lessons as the British film industry was to do.
Her doomed attempts to persuade the likes of Universal and Fox to back her film, despite organising special showings, attending film festivals and wining and dining film distributers, have left a mark on her.
"The film was a labour of love. But it was a steep learning curve. It's all very well making a film, but it's a product at the end of the day. Getting it out to the market place is what investors are interested in."
Remarkably, she found that making a feel-good romantic comedy with obvious appeal to women actually counted against her.
"The British film industry fails to encourage commercial films," she said. "It's almost not now the thing to make commercial films. That's what I've come up against. My film is to entertain the masses. Because of that I've met this wall of criticism. There were times when we had to consider that the film would not come out."
Fortunately, throughout the rejections she had at her side her close friend and now business partner Rupert Whitaker, who co-produced Lady Godiva.
Rupert had previously worked on films with director Dominik Moll. His father, David Sinclair Whitaker, is one of Britain's leading composers, who wrote an impressive score for the film.
"In a way the fact that we did not get a distributor was fortuitous. It meant that we have had to do it ourselves," said Vicky. "It was nice to follow everything through and we learnt a great deal about how this end of the market works."
She could also enlist as producer Adam Kempton, who made The Ninth Gate with Johnny Depp.
Vicky describes her film as being more of "a romantic fairytale" than another example of British tongue-in-cheek humour in the Four Weddings and a Funeral mould.
"It is very uncynical, mainly because I wrote it when I was 18 and fresh from a very nice childhood."
But her steely determination won her plaudits along the way. A year ago she was named one of the top seven women of the future in the arts, media and culture category of the Woman of the Future Awards, with the judging panel chaired by Baroness Greenfield, of Oxford University.
She has already completed a new film script, The Other Place, which she describes as an espionage thriller, once more set among the dreaming spires of Oxford. Not content with founding Jewson Film Productions, in March Vicky and Rupert will launch The Oxford Film Investment Group to "pioneer film-making in Oxford".
It will, she hopes, offer a new approach to film-making, injecting life back into an industry that proved so reluctant to embrace her.
The plan is to put out two films a year, with the company organising everything from raising finance to finding locations for film-makers. It will also be the vehicle for Vicky's own future releases.
But her own journey with Lady Godiva has shown that naked ambition has never been a problem for Vicky.
All she needs now is for British cinema goers to become Peeping Toms in their thousands.
6:18am Friday 11th January 2008
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