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[from conventrytelegraph.net]

THE agony of everyexploding blister and every aching muscle was written across Eddie Izzard’s face in Marathon Man … and still he kept running.

His challenge was to run an incredible 43 marathons in 51 days for Sport Relief notching up more than 1,000 miles along the way.

The popular comedian had never done a marathon before, but undeterred he took the road and began running.

Eddie soon discovered the pain of the long distance runner as blisters began popping up and his legs started to struggle with the challenge of clocking up miles every day.
The experts told him to walk up the hills, to take a rest when necessary, but Eddie wasn’t having any of it. He was relentless even when it was plain to see he was
totally exhausted at times.

“The positive thing about today,” he said lying wearily in the back of the support van, “is ….? There’s nothing positive about today.”

Eddie Izzard: Marathon Man on BBC 3 captured Eddie as he kept going and
going in all weathers and conditions.

It was hard to watch as he struggled in the early stages, but then Eddie seemed to find the physical and mental energy to push ahead with his challenge.

He put up messages on Twitter along the way, was welcomed by passers-by …
and never stopped.

It seemed an impossible challenge, but steady Eddie got the job done.

[from dvdtalk.com]

Comedy may be subjective, but I know at least one thing to be true. Eddie Izzard is a comic genius. He is also an Action Transvestite. If you are familiar with his work, then you need no further explanation. If you don’t know him, his stand-up performances in Dress to Kill and Glorious serve as wonderful starting points to appreciate his brand of intelligent insanity. Believe is a bit different as far as Izzard releases go. Rather than being a performance piece, it’s a loose documentary covering the man’s life. Although not terribly edgy in its approach, Believe paints a sensitive portrait of the man behind the eye-shadow and reveals a side of the artist that his fans don’t typically get to see.

Believe starts with a compelling hook that serves as a framing device while providing structure to the entire piece. In 2000, Eddie Izzard was accused of committing ‘fraud’ by re-using comedy bits during his stand-up performances. Although the allegations were patently ridiculous in nature, they had quite the adverse effect on Izzard leading him to quit comedy altogether. After being on hiatus for a few years, he decided to return to his audience and his craft. Believe documents his return to the stage in 2003 before culminating in a series of massive performances at Wembley Arena playing to a crowd of 44,000 people. If that were all Believe gave us, it would be a serviceable promotional piece dressed up as an underdog story. Fortunately, it has much more in store for us. Intercut with sequences of Izzard preparing for his tour, we get interviews with Izzard’s friends and family while charting his progression from a wee lad through his early schooling all the way to his days as a street performer before hitting his stride as a stand-up comedian. It’s a compelling story as the past informs the present while giving us a perspective on the kind of grief that can drive a man to make the whole world laugh.

Born in Yemen to a father who was an accountant for British Petroleum and a mother who was a nurse, Izzard had a few happy years in his early childhood before his mother grew gravely ill and passed away. This was the turning point that would color the rest of his life even though there was no way a little boy could know that at the time. Faced with the prospect of raising two boys by himself, Izzard’s father sent Eddie and his brother to boarding school in Eastbourne. There he would get his first taste of performing for others as he would put on shows for his friends. By the time he was 16, he had decided that he wanted to be an actor. This realization led to the next stage of his life in which he would frantically look for any available venue to entertain a crowd of people. From choosing his college based on the resident sketch comedy troupe to scrounging his way into the Edinborough Fringe Festival, we get a clear sense of Eddie’s determination and tenacity. By the time we see Izzard take to becoming a street performer, it’s apparent that he is far past the point of no return. From then on, it’s just a matter of time as Izzard pounds the pavement for gigs in comedy clubs while coming to grips with his identity as a comic who also looks fetching in ladies clothing. As we follow him through his first shows, it is abundantly clear that Izzard’s climb to his present position has been an arduous one and that all of his success is well deserved.

Dates and places may give Believe its lyrics but the melody for this piece comes from the revealing interviews with Izzard himself. As the interviewer, Sarah Townsend, is Eddie’s ex-girlfriend, we sometimes get the sense that Eddie is saying things that he may not have told a complete stranger. We follow him as he returns to his childhood home and wistfully talks about memories of his mother. It’s tough watching a man who is normally a ball of energy, sitting frozen by the idea of a childhood that was seemingly stolen from him. In fact, much of Eddie’s motivation stems from the absence of his mother. When he says, “Everything I do in life is trying to get her back” we are faced with the sobering realization that some wounds never heal and try as we might, some things can never be replaced.

If I have made Believe sound too serious or self-important I assure you that’s not the case. We are treated to a number of smaller interviews with Eddie’s co-stars and friends over the years including the always charming George Clooney and Robin Williams. We also get to see Izzard, the comic, in action as he tries out new bits on unassuming audiences in order to gauge their response to the material’s effectiveness. Watching Izzard develop his material is often as much fun as the material itself. He belongs to the Python school of smart silliness and this comes across in his performances which are theatrical yet slightly surreal. Even though the Wembley performance was released separately (reviewed here ), it is fascinating watching him prepare for it. In fact, if I have any complaints about Believe, it’s that I would have gladly trimmed some of the saggy mid-section to give us a little more exposure to him working on his process. Although I suppose, much like a magician, the trick is told when the trick is sold.

THE DVD:

Video:
I received a screener copy for review so I can’t be certain of the Video quality until an official copy is obtained. For what it’s worth, the image on the screener was relatively clear given the sheer number and quality of the disparate sources involved. We have a variety of digital artifacts scattered throughout the older material but nothing that would prevent you from enjoying the release. The newer material is reasonably clean if a little visually flat.

Audio:
I received a screener copy for review so I can’t be certain of the Audio quality until an official copy is obtained. For what it’s worth, the English audio was presented in a 2.0 Stereo mix. The mix was adequate for the material at hand. There didn’t appear to be any Subtitles.

Extras:
I received a screener copy for review so I can’t be certain of the quality of the Extras until an official copy is obtained. For what it’s worth, the screener didn’t feature any extras at all.

FINAL THOUGHTS:
For fans of Eddie Izzard, Believe is a revealing look at the man behind the makeup. We gain a newfound appreciation for the forces that drive Eddie and compel him to perform. Admittedly, folks who are unfamiliar with his performances probably shouldn’t start here. This is clearly intended for the fans and on those terms it works quite nicely. Hopefully the final release will have a reasonable audio / video presentation that at least matches my screener in quality. A nice set of extras would also be highly desirable. As it stands, this release is Recommended.

Via @craigyferg on Twitter:

“Lovely Eddie Izzard making a secret surprise visit to the LLS tomorrow so don’t tell anyone. He will help me with the email & tweets”

[from denofgeek.com]

Normally on Den Of Geek, we plan what we’re to write about, but I just couldn’t help myself in spouting about this well hidden nugget of British TV. Eddie Izzard is a unique personality who has successfully combined acting and being a stand-up comedian, but a sportsman he’s not. So it’s with some degree of incredulity that I tuned into BBC Three to watch the first of three documentary episodes where, for the charity Sport Relief, he sets out to become an extreme athlete.

In the first of three portions he starts his running career in London with the objective to run to an old family home, with bitter memories, in Wales. The terrifying reality is that Eddie has committed to run more than a marathon’s distance six days out of seven, a horrific total of 43 in just 51 days. He attempts this with just a few weeks’ training and no history of running! It’s obvious from the outset that the future for Eddie involves pain and personal sacrifice of a nature that most of us will never actually experience.

The shock, and I don’t think this is a giveaway, is that Eddie might be a transvestite, but there is nothing ‘girly’ about his determination. Beneath that amiable exterior he’s a man of steel.

Adding to his adventure are a support team of people, some there to capture his initially awkward running style and torturous feet-repair sequences, others drive his accompanying ice cream van and provide other means of practical or moral support. They all seem very nice people, but it’s also plain to see that they’ve met in a pub beforehand and rationalised that Eddie isn’t fit or marathon ready and is a ‘comedian’. And, as such, if he gets through the first of the 43 days on the road it will be a miracle, and any more are highly unlikely.

Some of the giveaways to this are things like the battery-assisted tricycle they bring along to film him, which after a few days has entirely flat batteries – like they’d assumed it wouldn’t need to go that far.

They also, as things get tough (and they get tough very quickly), keep trying to offer him ‘outs’ which, frustratingly, Eddie almost entirely refuses to take.

I was massively impressed by his determination, given that I’d be dead in a gutter before I’d got out of earshot of Big Ben. One day turns into two, into three, into six. Eventually he gets a ‘rest day’, which is tempered by the information that he’ll need to walk 15 miles on that day just to stop his legs seizing up entirely.

As an interesting extra dimension to the athletic challenge, Eddie also runs to the home in Wales where, as a small child, he had the traumatic experience of his mother dying. This isn’t presented in an overly sentimental way, but in more of the context that, as we all get older, we’re often drawn to connect with powerful events from the past, even painful ones.

The first episode ends entirely implausibly with Eddie having ten Marathon distances under his belt and even more pain on the horizon. If his courage doesn’t make you want to sponsor him, I’m not sure what might. My only concern is that the BBC decided to relegate this to the relative viewer-free pastures of BBC Three, which makes me wonder what it is exactly Eddie would need to do to justify a BBC One or Two slot? Those that made that scheduling decision should be forced to repeat his challenge, I’d suggest.

Episode two is on at 10:30pm BBC Three on Thursday, and I’ll be tuning in to see Eddie run….

[from blogcritics.com]

Eddie Izzard stares at you from the back of his DVD case, strong, somewhat menacing in a black t-shirt, his look very don’t-f-with-me, and he’s… wait… what’s that… is that blue nail polish? Eddie Izzard, born in 1962 in Yemen to British parents, is the subject of Believe: The Eddie Izzard Story, a documentary that focuses on his return to comedy after a three-year hiatus. Cameras follow him as he works his way through workshops to a comeback tour, which was scheduled to culminate at Wembley Arena in London. The viewer sees the evolution of a show, from inception through production.

In one of the stupidest exposés ever, a British television program claimed that Izzard was committing fraud on the public by including older material in his latest stand-up show. It’s nearly impossible to believe that “the public” in question, who would have been stand-up comedy fans familiar with the practice of integrating new and old material, felt they were being defrauded. It was reported that many of the bits he did in his live show were available on the video of his previous show. So?

Watching a film of a live performance and catching the performance live do not provide the same experience. Fans may see a performer do the exact same act several times and find that there’s no such thing as “exact same”—the performer bringing different nuances and new material, constantly refreshing and refining. What seems like a molehill became a mountain in 2000, and Izzard stopped performing stand-up for three years. He continued acting in films (e.g., Ocean’s 12), television, and on stage, and was often seen on talk shows.

When Izzard was four years old, he would try on his mother’s dresses. When he was a young boy his mother died of cancer and he and his brother Mark were sent to boarding school. Believe: The Eddie Izzard Story is interwoven with old photographs and home movies, as well as videos of some of Izzard’s early performances. What we see in this documentary is an affecting story of a young man who worked incredibly hard to become a successful performer. From his early days as a street performer when he did an escape act, rode a unicycle, and did skits with a partner, through his triumphant return to the stage, we learn exactly how grueling a comic’s life can be. If you think that comedians do their time in small, local clubs and work their way up to comedy festivals, big venues, and The Tonight Show, you couldn’t be more mistaken. The amount of labor, time, and money expended to become successful is staggering. But, first, the talent has to be there.

>> REST OF ARTICLE

[from herald.ie]

Eddie Izzard is in the British Olympic medical centre, telling a doctor he plans to run a marathon a day, six days a week, for seven weeks — a round trip of 1,166 miles through England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland in aid of Sport Relief.

“I’ve run before,” Eddie tells him, “but mainly for buses.” Ha-ha! This is Eddie Izzard, after all, brilliant stand-up comedian, accomplished actor and also a transvestite more used to treading the boards in high heels than pounding the roads in trainers.

No, but seriously, what running has he done? “When I was a kid I ran around a bit in the playground. I think I was built for running,” says Eddie, who looks like he was built for lying on a sofa.

Ha-ha! And how long has he been training?

Three weeks. A professional athlete would normally take nine months to prepare for a feat like this, so how long has Eddie got? Five weeks. The doctor puts down his pen and turns to the camera crew: “Is this for real?”

But it is for real.

Five weeks later, having been whipped by his trainer, Dr Greg Whyte, into the best possible shape a tubbyish, 47-year-old man with no running experience can be, Eddie sets off from Trafalgar Square for his first 26.2-mile stretch, English flag in hand, accompanied by the camera crew and the medical team, travelling in an ice-cream van and a battery-powered rickshaw.

Eddie’s running technique is as digressive as his comedy act. He stops off to sightsee, nips into a shop to buy a Calippo and admires some ducks.

Nine miles in, his stop-start routine catches up with him as old injuries begin to flare up. But he makes it to the end, slowly, in 10 gruelling hours.

By the end of the second day, his legs are already seizing up and there are blisters on his feet. The medic lances them, gives him painkilling injections and fits orthopaedic inner soles to his trainers to compensate for his flat feet.

He looks mentally and physically exhausted by the third day.

This is no vanity-driven celebrity star trek. Eddie’s in agony all the time. The blisters become infected and he strips a long tendon in his right leg.

His manager, though, knows he will carry on. “He has no fear,” she says. “He’s walked the New York subway in six-inch heels.”

Eddie perks up when he’s joined for a few miles by a 72-year-old athlete who ran across America in 64 days straight.

Everyone, this man says, runs to prove something to themselves. For Eddie, charity aside, the goal on this first leg seems to be to reach the house in Wales he shared with his mother, who died when he was six.

When he does, it’s a moving moment, full of happy and sad memories.

It seems to regenerate him, driving him on through the Brecon Beacons, a punishing series of steep hills. Episode one leaves him nine marathons in, his brain and body at last beginning to click together.

There’s a lot of running ahead, but this is a terrific piece of television, funny, touching and genuinely inspiring, and worth every painful step. Go, Eddie!

[from the NYTimes.com]

As a warm-up to the big show on Sunday, indie filmmakers (and the actors that love them) have Film Independent’s Spirit Awards, which celebrate their 25th anniversary on Friday with a splashier party on a rooftop in downtown Los Angeles, in lieu of the usual beach-side digs in Santa Monica. By all accounts it is one of the most fun nights of awards season – IFC will televise it live — and the Bagger is excited to be there, tweeting away. To get a sense of what to expect, we recently spoke with another newbie, the show’s host, the comedian and actor Eddie Izzard.

Q.
Have you ever watched the Indie Spirits?

A.
I don’t think I have; I don’t tend to watch awards ceremonies.

Q.
Why don’t you watch them?

A.
Why do you watch them? I’d rather watch a film, don’t you think, than an awards ceremony.

Q.
So why are you hosting? Is it because it’s a challenge?

A.
Because they asked me. I don’t want it to be a challenge. I’m only doing it because it’s the Independent Spirit Awards. I don’t want to do any others. I’ll just do this one, because they’ve asked me. I’m a big fan of independence, that’s what I’m a fan of. I own all my copyrights of my DVDs. I like doing things differently. I’m a transvestite with a career. I ran 43 marathons in 51 days.

Q.
So hosting should be a breeze then. Do you have a plan?

A.
I plan to have a plan. I’ll talk about stuff. I haven’t done these before, but I’ve talked to a lot of people before. I’ve stood on stage at Madison Square Garden and sold that place out. I think I know how to talk. I don’t write anything you see, I never write standup, I just ad lib it on the night. It’s a different beast for me, so we’ll see where it goes to. I have no idea what’s going to happen.

Q.
What movies have you liked this year?

A.
I haven’t seen any. Gotta be pure.

Q.
So you don’t have any favorites.

A.
I hope they all win and I hope they all lose. Being nominated is more important than winning. Winning can sometimes be a curse.

Q.
It sounds like you’re pretty far removed from the Hollywood ecosystem.

A.
Ego system or ecosystem? You don’t need awards. It’s all gravy, as soon as we got paid for doing a gig in this arena. Everything else is juggling with ego and positioning and last man standing. You shouldn’t need it, but we thirst after it.