Films So Good

Oscar-nominated The Shape of Water and Happy-Go-Lucky star Sally Hawkins has joined the cast of UK comedy-drama The Lost King, inspired by the remarkable 2012 true story of finding Brit monarch King Richard III’s remains under a Leicester car park. Steve Coogan has co-written the script with his Stan & Ollie and Philomena collaborator Jeff Pope. Philomena director, two-time Oscar nominee (The Grifters,The Queen) and Leicester-born Stephen Frears will direct the movie that will be produced by Baby Cow (Coogan’s production company). Coogan will co-star in the film as the husband of Philippa Langley, the woman who undertook the search for King Richard’s remains. Hawkins is expected to play Langley. Her casting was revealed in the press release announcing Sarah Monteith as Baby Cow’s new CEO. Shooting expected to begin begins in late April and casting director Leo Davis is attached.

Who is Philippa Langley?

Langley’s research for Richard III began in 1992 after she fell ill and gave up a successful career in advertising to try writing a film about the much-maligned king. The more research Langley did, the more she felt Richard’s actions had been misrepresented by Tudor propagandists. 

In 2004, as part of her research, Langley visited Leicester, where it was rumoured the king was buried on the site of the old Greyfriars monastery. Her trip proved fruitless but then, as she was about to leave, she noticed a car park with a private barrier across it and felt “an overwhelming urge” to go inside. She felt that she was walking in a grave.

A year later, she went back to test her hunchand the feeling returned. This time, someone had hand-painted the letter “R” over the parking bay to mark it as reserved. For Langley, it was a cosmic sign that “I needed to get on with it”.

She raised £34,000 and organise a two-week dig, leading to the eventual discovery of Richard III’s remains. Analysis of the bones revealed details about his brutal death at the age of 32. It also exploded the Shakespearean myth that he had a hunchback. Instead, he was shown to have suffered scoliosis of the spine which would have made one of his shoulders slightly higher than the other

After her discovery, she contributed to a documentary about the project, titled Richard III: The King in the Car Park based on her original Looking For Richard Project.