A Short Stay in Switzerland

Last updated

A Short Stay in Switzerland
Directed by Simon Curtis
Music by John Harle
Country of originUnited Kingdom
Original languageEnglish
Production
Running time90 minutes
Release
Original release
  • 25 January 2009 (2009-01-25)

A Short Stay in Switzerland is a 2009 British television film directed by Simon Curtis and written by Frank McGuinness. It stars Julie Walters, who won the International Emmy Award for Best Actress for her performance as Dr Anne Turner. [1] [2] It was produced by the BBC and was later released on DVD in regions 1 and 2. [3] [4]

Contents

It was also nominated for other numerous awards including the BAFTA TV Award for Best Single Drama and Best Actress. [5]

Plot

Having recently witnessed the death of her husband from a neurological disease, Dr Anne Turner is diagnosed with a near-identical illness and determines to end her life once her condition has reached a critical point. As her health deteriorates, Anne's son, Edward, and two daughters, Sophie and Jessica, struggle to reach a consensus over their mother's intentions to end her life in an assisted dying facility (Dignitas) in Switzerland (where this is legal) and while they search for alternative options, silent recriminations and stubborn practicality threaten to tear the family apart. With her family at loggerheads, Anne must also face the fury of her best friend, whose opposing views bring them into direct conflict. [6]

Cast

Background

The film was inspired by the true story of Dr Anne Turner (25 January 1939 - 24 January 2006), who took her own life in a Zurich clinic, having developed the incurable neurodegenerative disease progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP). Before being diagnosed with PSP, Dr Turner had nursed her husband until he died from a similar disease, multiple system atrophy (MSA). [8] Her brother also was victim of a progressive condition, motor neurone disease. [9]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Julie Walters</span> English actress (b. 1950)

Dame Julia Mary Walters, known professionally as Julie Walters, is an English actress. She is the recipient of four British Academy Television Awards, two British Academy Film Awards, two International Emmy Awards, a Golden Globe Award, and a Laurence Olivier Award.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jeffrey Tambor</span> American actor

Jeffrey Michael Tambor is an American actor. He is known for his television roles such as Jeffrey Brookes, the uptight neighbor of Stanley and Helen Roper in the television sitcom The Ropers (1979–1980), as Hank Kingsley on The Larry Sanders Show (1992–1998), George Bluth Sr. and Oscar Bluth on Arrested Development and Maura Pfefferman on Transparent (2014–2017). For his role in the latter, Tambor earned two Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series out of three nominations. In 2015, he was also awarded a Golden Globe for his portrayal of Pfefferman.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Patricia Richardson</span> American actress

Patricia Castle Richardson is an American actress best known for her portrayal of Jill Taylor on the ABC sitcom Home Improvement, for which she was nominated four times for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Comedy Series and twice for the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Television Series – Comedy or Musical. She also received an Independent Spirit Award nomination for her performance in Ulee's Gold (1997).

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jessica Walter</span> American actress (1941–2021)

Jessica Walter was an American actress who appeared in over 170 films, stage and television productions. In film, she was best known for her role as a psychotic and obsessed fan of a local disc jockey in the 1971 Clint Eastwood film, Play Misty for Me. On television, she was most recently known for her role of Lucille Bluth on the sitcom Arrested Development, and providing the voice of Malory Archer on the FX animated series Archer (2009–21). Walter received various awards over the course of her television career including a Primetime Emmy Award for Amy Prentiss (1975). She also received two Golden Globe Award nominations and three Screen Actors Guild Award nominations. For her starring role opposite Eastwood in Play Misty for Me, Walter received a Golden Globe nomination for Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ron Leibman</span> American actor (1937–2019)

Ron Leibman was an American actor. He won both the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play and the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actor in a Play in 1993 for his performance as Roy Cohn in Angels in America. Leibman also won a Primetime Emmy Award in 1979 for his role as Martin 'Kaz' Kazinsky in his short-lived crime drama series Kaz.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Harriet Walter</span> British actress (born 1950)

Dame Harriet Mary Walter is a British actress. Known for her extensive work in numerous Royal Shakespeare Company productions, Walter has received an Olivier Award as well as nominations for a Tony Award, five Emmy Awards, and a Screen Actors Guild Award. In 2011, she was appointed Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) for services to drama.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Luisa Bradshaw-White</span> British actress (b. circa 1974)

Luisa Bradshaw-White is an English actress. Her roles on television include playing Tina Carter in EastEnders, Bad Girls, Holby City and This Life. She has also made appearances in Grange Hill, Birds of a Feather, The Bill and Doctors.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Lyndsey Marshal</span> English actress

Lyndsey Marshal is an English actress best known for her performance in The Hours, and as the recurring character Cleopatra on HBO's Rome, and as Lady Sarah Hill in BBC period drama Garrow's Law.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jessica Chastain</span> American actress and producer (born 1977)

Jessica Michelle Chastain is an American actress and producer. Known for primarily starring in projects with feminist themes, she has received various accolades, including an Academy Award and a Golden Globe, in addition to nominations for two Tony Awards and a Primetime Emmy Award. Time magazine named her one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2012.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Claire Foy</span> British actress (born 1984)

Claire Elizabeth Foy is a British actress. She is best known for her portrayal of the young Queen Elizabeth II in the first two seasons of the Netflix series The Crown (2016–2017) for which she won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series.

Suicide tourism, or euthanasia tourism, is the practice of potential suicide candidates travelling to a jurisdiction to die by suicide or assisted suicide which is legal in some jurisdictions, or the practice of travelling to a jurisdiction in order to obtain drugs that can aid in the process of ending one's own life.

The 2010 British Academy Television Awards were held on 6 June 2010. The nominations were announced on 10 May. This year new awards were added including the award for Best Actor/Actress in a Supporting Role. Graham Norton hosted the ceremony. Winners are in bold.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Suicide in Switzerland</span>

Switzerland had a standardised suicide rate of 10.7 per 100,000 as of 2015. The actual (non-standardised) rate was 12.5 in 2014.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Sophie Turner</span> English actress (born 1996)

Sophie Belinda Turner is an English actress. She made her acting debut as Sansa Stark in the HBO epic fantasy television series Game of Thrones (2011–2019), for which she received an Emmy Award nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series in 2019.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Simon Curtis (filmmaker)</span> British film director and producer

Simon Curtis is an English director and producer. He has directed theatre productions and the television dramas David Copperfield (1999) and Cranford. His feature films include the biographical dramas My Week with Marilyn (2011), Woman in Gold (2015), and Downton Abbey: A New Era (2022).

<i>Life According to Sam</i> 2013 film

Life According to Sam is an HBO original documentary film directed by Sean Fine and Andrea Nix Fine. Premiering in January 2013 at the Sundance Film Festival, the documentary discloses the impact that progeria had on the lives of Sam Berns and his parents, Dr. Leslie Gordon and Dr. Scott Berns. It was broadcast on HBO in October 2013, and since then it has won a 2013 Peabody Award and an Emmy Award for Exceptional Merit in Documentary Filmmaking. It was also one of the 15 titles considered for nomination in the Documentary Feature category for the 86th Oscars.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">International Emmy Award for Best Actress</span>

The International Emmy Award for Best Performance by an Actress is an award presented annually by the International Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (IATAS). The award honors the best performance by an actress in a made for-television fiction program.

The Triple Crown of Acting is a term used in the American entertainment industry to describe actors who have won a competitive Academy Award, Emmy Award, and Tony Award in the acting categories, the highest awards recognized in American film, television, and theater, respectively. The term is related to other competitive areas, such as the Triple Crown of horse racing.

<i>Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again</i> 2018 film by Ol Parker

Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again is a 2018 jukebox musical romantic comedy film written and directed by Ol Parker, from a story by Parker, Catherine Johnson, and Richard Curtis. It is the sequel to the 2008 film Mamma Mia!, which in turn is based on the 1999 musical of the same name using the music of ABBA. The film features an ensemble cast, including Christine Baranski, Pierce Brosnan, Dominic Cooper, Colin Firth, Andy García, Lily James, Amanda Seyfried, Stellan Skarsgård, Julie Walters, Cher, Meryl Streep, Alexa Davies, Jessica Keenan Wynn, Josh Dylan, Jeremy Irvine, and Hugh Skinner. Both a prequel and a sequel, the plot is set after the events of the previous film, and is intersected with flashbacks to Donna's youth in 1979, with some scenes from the two time periods mirroring each other.

<i>A Million Happy Nows</i> 2017 American film

A Million Happy Nows is a 2017 American independent drama film written by Marisa Calin and directed by Albert Alarr. The film stars Crystal Chappell and Jessica Leccia as a lesbian couple dealing with the diagnosis of early onset Alzheimer's.

References

  1. ↑ "A Short Stay in Switzerland - Trailers, Reviews, Synopsis, Showtimes …". Archive.is. 19 July 2012. Archived from the original on 19 July 2012. Retrieved 13 January 2018.
  2. ↑ "Julie Walters stars as Britons dominate International Emmys". The Daily Telegraph . 24 November 2009. Retrieved 2 March 2015.
  3. ↑ "A Short Stay in Switzerland". Amazon. 26 April 2011.
  4. ↑ "A Short Stay in Switzerland". Amazon UK. 27 July 2009.
  5. ↑ "A Short Stay in Switzerland (2009 TV Movie) : Awards". IMDb.com. Retrieved 2 March 2015.
  6. ↑ "A Short Stay in Switzerland - BBC One". BBC. Retrieved 13 January 2018.
  7. ↑ "YouTube". YouTube . Retrieved 13 January 2018.
  8. ↑ Boseley, Sarah; Dyer, Clare (25 January 2006). "I believe I must end my life while I am still able". The Guardian. Retrieved 13 January 2018.
  9. ↑ "Clinic assists doctor's suicide". News.bbc.co.uk. 13 January 2018. Retrieved 13 January 2018.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.