ALAN MACDONALD

31 Aug

(23 June 1956 - 30 August 2017)

The British production designer Alan MacDonald, who has died aged 61, was responsible for the look of many high-profile and varied films in recent years. Early on in his career he designed record album sleeves and was part of a design collective. He worked on stage productions and, following some short films for John Maybury, his first TV job was on Maybury’s Man to Man (1992), with Tilda Swinton, for the BBC. He worked with Maybury again on Love Is the Devil, with Derek Jacobi as the painter Francis Bacon. Other films included Rogue Trader, Nora, The 51st State, Kinky Boots and then, for Maybury again, The Jacket and The Edge of Love. MacDonald also designed The Queen, Chéri, Tamara Drewe, Philomena, The Program, Florence Foster Jenkins and Victoria and Abdul, all for director Stephen Frears. He also worked on John Madden’s The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, Sing Street for John Carney, and designed Henry V for the BBC’s The Hollow Crown. He worked for Kylie Minogue on her 2002 tour and also collaborated with Boy George, Sinead O’Connor and Neneh Cherry on their music promos. In his time Alan MacDonald was nominated for several awards from the Art Directors’ Guild and the British Independent Film Awards. At the time of his death he was working on the Mamma Mia! film sequel, Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again.

MICHAEL DARVELL

Michael Darvell

Michael Darvell trained as a librarian at Watford and in Surrey before joining Ealing Libraries where he became Music Librarian for the borough. He edited Masthead, the magazine of the University of North London School of Librarianship, The Surrealist, the staff magazine of Surrey County Library, and contributed to the Assistant Librarian and London Librarian professional journals. A freelance film reviewer since 1970, he has written for Film, Films Illustrated, Film Review, Movie Maker and Radio Times, as well as editing Montage, the London film societies magazine, for ten years. A change of career saw him joining What’s On in London as Features Editor and he eventually stepped into the shoes of the late F. Maurice Speed (founding father of Film Review annual) as the magazine’s Editor. From 2007 to 2015, he was co-editor of the Film Review annual with Mansel Stimpson. As well as writing about films, Michael has reviewed theatre for The Stage newspaper, and has written about music theatre and cabaret for the Classical Source and Musical Theatre Review websites. He is also a former restaurant critic for the ViewLondon website. Michael has been a member of the London Film Critics’ Circle since 2005.

ALAN MACDONALD

SHELLEY BERMAN

KÁROLY MAKK