Original Coverage & Source Attribution: www.hollywoodreporter.com
In her latest incarnation, Diane Morgan as Philomena Cunk returns as the worst-informed person on Hollywood in Charlie Brooker’s latest mockumentary for Netflix and the BBC, Cunk on Cinema.
The droll actor is entirely out of her depth sitting across from director Michael Bay, actor Benedict Cumberbatch, composer Daniel Pemberton and, in all, 23 Hollywood experts as Cunk comedically probes the origins of the silver screen.
“When you’re trying to get inside a character, which hole do you enter by, north or south?” Cunk asks a flustered Cumberbatch at one point in a trailer for Cunk on Cinema. “These, er … are odd questions,” an equally bewildered Bay responds during another interview conducted by Morgan’s clueless interviewer/commentator character.
That’s apparently the point, as the six-part Cunk on Cinema to debut Nov. 15, also puts on the hot seat filmmakers like Mark Cousins and cinematographer Seamus McGarvey, along with a host of highly decorated film critics and academics.
“Cunk will attempt to demystify it all while sitting in lumpy seats with stale popcorn, asking herself where did cinema come from? And why? What does it want? And why can’t it tell us?” a synopsis from Netflix states, as the documentary-style series promises to cover the whole of cinema from the invention of the movie camera to the introduction of AI tools in filmmaking.
Jim Al-Khalili and Ashley Jackson also return after their collaborations on Cunk on Life and Cunk on Earth. Cunk on Cinema, directed by Al Campbell, is a Pacesetter Production for the BBC, with Netflix to stream the series outside the U.K. and Ireland.
Brooker is joined in the writers room by Ben Caudell, Erika Ehler, Eli Goldstone, Jason Hazeley, Dan Maier, Morgan, Joel Morris, Michael Odewale, Kali Varghese and Sam Ward. Brooker also shares the executive producer credits with Jessica Rhoades, Morgan and Ward.
