Rupert Everett follows in Byron’s footsteps
Monday, November 17th, 2008
Rupert Everett is to present a two-part documentary about Lord Byron for Channel 4.
The programme, called Rupert Everett – In Search of Byron, will retrace the steps of the romantic poet during his travels through Portugal, Greece, Albania, Turkey, Switzerland and Italy, exploring Byron’s personal life and examining his relationship with the countries he visited.
Considered by many to be the first modern celebrity, from 1809 to 1811 Byron embarked on the grand tour of Europe customary for a young nobleman of the era. Avoiding the Napoleonic Wars, Byron headed for the Mediterranean, the birthplace of the Classical antiquity, hoping to follow in the footsteps of his Homeric heroes. The documentary will mark the 200th anniversary of his travels.
This will not be the first time that Everett has presented a history programme on Channel 4. Earlier this year the actor fronted a Channel 4 documentary examining the life of the infamous Victorian explorer Sir Richard Burton, called the Victorian Sex Explorer.
Everett said: “I love anti-heroes, and Byron is one of the 19th century’s great misfits. His story has everything: incest, sodomy, drugs, scandal, madness and war. But would we have found Byron as electrifying and seductive as his contemporaries did? Is his genius still relevant? Are his poems fresh or are they dried flowers?”
Infamously described as being “mad, bad, and dangerous to know”, Byron was a libertine of Herculean proportions, and his name is as synonymous with promiscuity as it is with poetry. Production assistant Auron Tare said that the Everett developed an understanding of the role after spending five days travelling by mule in Albania.
“Everett understood why Lord Byron had come to Albania, where he said he found ‘a Scotland with mosques’ because of the similarity of nature, steep mountains, folk costumes and people’s character.”
The documentary is being made by independent production company Blast! and will be produced by Ed Coulthard and Grant McKee and directed by Michael Waldman.
