Happy Xmas 2009!

MARGY KINMONTH and MAUREEN MURRAY wish you all a very Merry Xmas and a Happy New Year and would like to thank all Foxtrot’s friends, colleagues and supporters for their kind words, help, encouragement and enthusiasm throughout 2009.

Our office is closed from 23 December and will reopen again on 4 January 2010.
Until then, have a great holiday!

The Women In Film & Television Awards 2009

by Maureen Murray

Margy with Mariella Frostrup

Margy with Mariella Frostrup

Women In Film & Television UK is now twenty years old and it has blossomed from its beginnings in 1989 as a rather shy and awkward youngster of an organisation into a highly polished professional outfit, self-confident in its achievements and accepted by its peers. The organisation has come of age, and the WFTV 2009 Awards Ceremony really showed it! The London Park Lane Hilton Hotel ballroom was a positive feast of glitz and glamour. The list of invitees and awardees was stellar. Top comedienne Jo Brand got things going with a swing in her role as Awards Compere. John Hurt, sitting next to Lifetime Achievement Awardee Dame Helen Mirren at the next table to ours was corpsing with laughter throughout. The atmosphere in the room was celebratory and the role call of recognition was enjoyed by almost one thousand guests representing all sectors of the UK film and television industry.

It was one of the proudest professional moments of my life when Margy was called up on stage to receive the WFTV 2009 Creative Originality Award, which was presented to her by writer and broadcaster Mariella Frostrup. Margy is a heroine of independent arts film-making. In the last year alone she has talked thrills and spills with Placido Domingo in Los Angeles, raced around the Venice Bienale in a vaporetto, touched the musical heartbeat of Russia at St. Petersburg’s Mariinsky Theatre and spent dreamtime with aboriginal artists in Australia. Throughout her career she has made individual and beautiful films that make you you laugh, let you cry and – above all – encourage you to understand and celebrate the creative spirit. And it has been my very great privilege to be able to help her bring some of that work to life and now witness her very long overdue recognition. Well done, Margy!

The Awardees:

HANNAH McGILL: Winner of the Talkback-THAMES New Talent Award Presented by Claudia Winkleman

MOIRA ARMSTRONG: Winner of the Ascent Media Director Award Presented by Patricia Hodge and Miriam Margolyes

BECKY BENTHAM & KAREN ELLIOTT: Winners of the Eon Productions Business Award Presented by Sarah Harding

CAROLINE HEWITT: Winner of the Barclays Commercial Project Management Award Presented by Kerry Fox and Ben Wishaw

DINA EATON: Winner of the Panalux Craft Award Presented by Toby Stephens

NORMA PERCY: Winner of the BBC News and Factual Award

PAULA MILNE: Winner of the UK Film Council Writing Award Presented by Hayley Atwell

MARGY KINMONTH: Winner of the Skillset Creative Originality Award Presented by Mariella Frostrup

FRANNY ARMSTRONG: Winner of the ITV Achievement of the Year Award

KATIE JARVIS: Winner of the Pinewood Studios Best Performance Award Presented by Adrian Lester

CLARE BINNS: Winner of the Littlestar Services Contribution to the Medium Award Presented by Romola Garai

DAME HELEN MIRREN: Winner of the Working Title Films Lifetime Achievement Award Presented by John Hurt

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Women in Film & Television Awards 2009

Margy KinmonthProducer/Director MARGY KINMONTH has been chosen as the recipient of the prestigious 2009 Women in Film and Television Creative Originality Award, sponsored by Skillset. The Award recognises innovation, vision and originality in the creative areas of film, television and the digital media. This year’s de Lane Lea WFTV Awards are presented by Jo Brand and take place on 4 December 2009 at London’s Park Lane Hilton Hotel before 1,000 guests from the UK’s film & television industry, including Dame Helen Mirren, John Hurt, Sarah Harding, Paula Milne, Toby Stephens and Romola Garai.

Margy’s Foxtrot producing partner Maureen Murray paid this tribute: “I am absolutely delighted! Margy is the great unsung heroine of independent arts film-making. In the last year alone she has talked thrills and spills with Placido Domingo in Los Angeles, raced around the Venice Bienale in a vaporetto, touched the musical heartbeat of Russia at St. Petersburg’s Mariinsky Theatre and spent dreamtime with aboriginal artists in Australia. Throughout her career she has made individual and beautiful films that make you laugh, let you cry and – above all – encourage you to understand and celebrate the creative spirit.”

Photos and a report of the WFTV 2009 Awards Ceremony will be posted on Foxtrot Films’ website shortly.

Click here to see Margy’s Films.

Click here to read more about Margy.