free forum make a forum for free message boards free forum hosting free phpbb forum phpbb create free forum

Last edited by scottishsuzee on Tue Jan 06, 2009 2:51 am; edited 1 time in total

Thought i would copy some of the stuff from my wee site that i had for Alien Autopsy over to this one...just a few articles that i found and put up...hope you enjoy them

Razz

Here are the Q&A from the Mirror newspaper just before the premieres-

EXCLUSIVE: ANT & DEC ANSWER YOUR QUESTIONS

Kiki King, Eva Simpson & Caroline Hedley

HE's been a single man since splitting with Clare Buckfield in 2004 - and girls, we're happy to report that Declan Donnelly is still on the market.

Despite being romantically linked to Waking The Dead actress Kate Braithwaite, Dec insisted he's not in a relationship when we invited readers to quiz him and his long-term buddy, Ant McPartlin.

The likely lads, who are both 30, were also grilled about their bigscreen debut in the £5million movie Alien Autopsy, which is based on a true story. They play geeky British UFO enthusiasts who convinced the world they had film of an autopsy on an alien.

Here, the Geordie duo field your questions about the film, fights and more...

What was the best and worst thing about making Alien Autopsy?

Patricia Broadhurst Tyne-and-Wear

Dec: The best was filming in LA - you couldn't help but feel like a film star! The worst was cold, rainy shoots filming until 4am.

Would you ever quit the UK for Hollywood?

Richard Hardcastle, Essex

Ant: It would be great to work there some more, but we would never fully quit the UK.

What pranks did you play on each other on set?

Graham Mackintosh, Aberdeen

Ant: We always tried to make each other laugh when we were doing close-ups. There was a penalty of a fiver for a laugh.

Dec: Ant owes me £2,500 - and he'd better pay up.

Would you ever do a nude scene?

Ashley Terry, Port Talbot, South Wales

Ant: Yes, but in a tasteful way.

Dec: There's a scene in Alien Autopsy featuring Ant in a dressing gown. Frankly, that's as much as anybody wants to see.

If you could pick a leading lady to star with, who would it be?

Katherine Chan, Hythe, Kent

Ant: Angelina Jolie.

Dec: Eva Longoria, Jessica Simpson, Evangeline Lilly, or Big Mo from EastEnders - beggars can't be choosers

Ant, what's the worst thing that could happen at your wedding?

Nasim Latif, Leicester

Ant: If I faint it'll be embarrassing.

Dec: Yeah, but at least you'd get £250 from You've Been Framed.

Dec, I was happy to read that you'd been dating Kate Braithwaite. What's the story?

Sarah Slater, Carlisle

Dec: I've known Kate for a while. She's a great girl but we're just mates. I'm still a single man!

Would you ever work independently of each other?

Jessica Morris Crawley, East Sussex

Dec: I'm sure we will do stuff apart, but everything we've got planned is for both of us.

Have you ever rowed?

Liz Turner, Camden, London

Dec: We've only ever had one fight that was in a lift in Spain. Ant punched me in the chest and I knocked his cap off. That was it - it was a pitiful fight.

Which famous person has impressed you the most?

Gerald Otto, Peckham, London

Ant: We interviewed Prince Charles five years ago. He was charming and had a great sense of humour.

Dec: We're interviewing him again next month so we must have done something right.

When you look back over your career what are your proudest and most embarrassing moments?

Rebecca Atkinson, Folkestone, Kent

Ant: We'll both be really proud on Monday at the premiere.

Dec: We've got three premieres, three nights in a row, in London, Newcastle and Dublin, so it's really exciting.

Ant: Most embarrassing? We went on holiday together many years ago. When we arrived at the hotel room there was a double bed for us. They thought we were a gay couple!

An Interview from an Irish Newspaper

First children's drama, next a pop career, then Ant and Dec made Saturday evening television their own with a string of mega-popular entertainment shows. Now they're venturing into film, starring in a UFO comedy alongside 'proper' actors. Michael Dwyer meets the ubiquitous geordies

ANTHONY McPartlin and Declan Donnelly had already spent more than half their lives in show business when they turned 30 within two months of each other last autumn. Unlike so many performers who started young, they sidetracked the path to excess, keeping their feet firmly on the ground and taking control of their careers as their collective star rose inexorably, presenting SM:TV Live, Pop Idol, I'm a Celebrity . . . Get Me Out of Here and Ant & Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway. Ant and Dec are the face of Saturday night television in Britain, their appeal spanning across the generations. What you see is what you get with Ant and Dec, and they are just as engaging off-screen. They exude enthusiasm for their work, and their symbiotic relationship is reflected in the way they finish each other's sentences. Two minds think as one.

We met last week in west London's Ealing Studios, which provided all the interior sets for Ant and Dec's first star vehicle as movie actors. Alien Autopsy is a breezy light comedy inspired by a scam in which two Englishmen faked a documentary purporting to show footage shot at Roswell, New Mexico in 1947.

The duo are cast against type: Ant, the extrovert on their TV shows, wears glasses as the practical, sensible Gary Shoefield, while Dec is stubbly, scruffy and reckless as Ray Santilli, the mastermind of the hoax.

"When we read the script," Ant says, "we instinctively thought about playing the roles the other way round. It was suggested that we try switching the roles. At first we doubted that would work, but they liked it when we tried it, and now I couldn't imagine doing it the other way."

Alien Autopsy takes them back to their roots as actors in the popular BBC children's series Byker Grove. "We've always wanted to act again," says Ant. "For years we told ITV we'd love to do some comedy-drama or maybe a sitcom. We've been sent quite a few film scripts, but they never quite hit the mark. They were all very much in the style of Ant & Dec: The Movie - a bit like Spiceworld, if you know what I mean."

Perish the thought. "We never wanted to do anything like that," Ant insists. "Then this came through and it was exactly what we wanted. It's interesting, too, because it's a true story, which caused such a hullabaloo."

They were chuffed to be working with US actors Bill Pullman and Harry Dean Stanton. "To be on set with Bill was quite strange because he's a proper movie actor, whereas we were just pretending," says Dec. "But he was really generous to work with, and Harry Dean was just a legend."

Ant notes that Stanton was a bit grumpy. "He hadn't a clue who we were, and we didn't expect he would. Harry's quiet in the mornings because he likes his late nights, although he's brilliant on set. On our last night shooting in LA, he took us out to this little 24-hour drinking hole of his. It was just great sitting there with him, and everyone who came in knew him. It was a late night."

Alien Autopsy plays like it was written specifically with Ant and Dec in mind, but it wasn't, Dec says. "The director, Jonny Campbell, and his wife were watching I'm a Celebrity one night and she said: 'What about those two?' His first reaction was to say no way. Then he thought about it and wondered if we could fast-track that chemistry we have into the movie."

That effervescent chemistry stems from the close friendship between Ant and Dec since they met on Byker Grove when they were 13. They went to different schools in their native Newcastle, Ant to a comprehensive and Dec, one of seven children born to a couple who moved from Derry in the late 1950s, to a Catholic school for boys.

Achieving TV fame as PJ and Duncan on Byker Grove had its drawbacks when they were back in their classrooms.

"It was difficult to start with," Ant says. "You know what kids are like at that age. There's a lot of jealousy. It wasn't as if we'd gone to drama school and other kids would be pleased for you when you got roles. It was quite difficult with certain teachers, who were quite jealous, too. We were in our GCSE years and were taking time off school and we would have a tutor on the set."

"It was a great time, though," says Dec, "to be getting out of school and to be on telly at that age and to have a bit of money in your pocket." Maybe as much money as the teachers got? "Probably," says Ant, "but at 15, to get off school and to buy whatever trainers you like, that's all you want."

Did they get on well from the first day they met? "No, not at all," Ant says, to which Dec responds: "I thought he was just really miserable. He would sit in the corner and not say very much." Ant concurs: "I was really nervous and shy and didn't really speak to anybody. I came into the show on series two, and all the rest of the cast already knew each other. After a while, we started going to matches together because we're both Newcastle supporters. That's where our off-screen friendship started."

When they were 18, Ant and Dec experienced the harsh taste of rejection that comes with the territory that is show business: They were dropped from Byker Grove.

"We were having a great time," Dec says. "We were two of the most popular characters on the show and we were getting the most fanmail. We got called into the producer's office and he said sorry, but he was going to have to let us go. We were amazed, but he made the point that we were 18, and 18-year-olds don't hang around youth clubs unless they're a bit weird."

They had performed a song on the show, and a record company offered them a contract. Retaining the names of TV characters PJ and Duncan, Ant and Dec recorded 12 consecutive Top 20 hit singles between 1994 and 1997. Their biggest success was Let's Get Ready to Rumble, along with a Top 5 record, Psyche - The Album.

"That was it," Dec says, "the average shelf-life of about three years for a group. It was a great laugh. We toured the world, all over Europe and to the Far East and Australia. It was the first time we had been anywhere apart from Spain or Ireland. We had three amazing years, but it was always at the back of our minds that it wouldn't last forever. So we kept an eye on getting back on the telly at some stage."

As the presenters of the original Pop Idol, they sympathised with the losers, playing good cops to judge Simon Cowell's bitchy bad cop.

"That was genuine," Dec says. "It was the first show where the public got to choose and where the contestants were really brutally critiqued in front of a live audience. We felt a real affinity with them because we'd all done auditions. It's bad enough not getting the gig, but to get savaged like that in public is very tough. Of course, there were some awful acts as well. Celebrity will eat itself."

On that subject, they will return later in the year to present another I'm a Celebrity . . . Get Me Out of Here. They always stay in a comfortable apartment while the contestants eat worms and live in tents. And they are planning another series of Ant & Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway. For sheer entertainment value, there isn't a show to match its pace, exuberance and good humour, and the hosts have to set and sustain the crucial energy levels.

"You have to be totally wired," Ant says. "It's live, so you've got to be on your toes and just ready for anything. It's hugely exciting, a great adrenaline rush. It's our favourite show. As soon as it starts, it's like getting on a rollercoaster and there's no getting off till it's over. Whatever happens, you've got to go with it."

They've also devised The Con Test, a quiz show they will present over seven consecutive nights in July. The winner is guaranteed to take home £1 million.

"It's a question-and-answer quiz you can win without understanding any of the questions or knowing any of the answers," says Dec. "All you have to do is make everyone else think you do. It's a bluff, like a game of poker without the cards."

Ant says they got the idea from watching poker games on TV. "We thought of what would happen if we replaced the cards with questions and had the same kind of principle where you don't know how anyone else is doing and you've just got to make them believe you're doing very well in order for them to fall and for you to win the jackpot. We had a few dummy runs in a room over our local pub and it went very well. Then we shot a pilot and pitched it to ITV. They really liked it."

The concept - and the duo's Midas touch - should ensure another sure-fire ratings hit. Ant and Dec are, no doubt, millionaires in their own right, but they seem entirely grounded and unaffected by their rise and rise through the fiercely competitive ranks of show business.

"I think we're very lucky," Dec says, "that there are two of us and we've always got another opinion. We talk about everything and carefully consider every decision. I sometimes feel sorry for people who are doing this on their own."

Adds Ant: "We had a certain level of fame on Byker Grove over a period of years, so we dipped quite slowly into the fame game. It didn't happen overnight, so we had time to get used to it, which was good for us."

Is there a downside? Can they walk down the street?

"We can, quite easily," Ant says. "We get recognised a lot. The good thing is that most people leave you alone. They might come up and shake your hand, or give us a toot on the horn. There's a lot of goodwill towards us, which is really nice. People just think we're one of them. It's not like it is with, say, Robbie Williams and all that mass hysteria. Actually, one time when we were over in Dublin and shopping on Grafton Street, everyone was saying hello, but nobody was bothering us."

In keeping with their relationship with the viewing public who think they're "one of them", there will be no financial arrangement with any glossy magazine when Ant marries his long-time girlfriend, make-up artist Lisa Armstrong, in the summer. "We're doing it in private," he says. "We haven't signed up to any kind of deal. It will just be family and friends."

Impishly, Dec gets the last word: "Although the best man's story is available to the highest bidder!"

Ant and Dec will attend the Dublin premiere of Alien Autopsy at Cineworld on Wednesday night. The film goes on release from Friday next

TV funnyman's giggles with naughty Nichole

NO WONDER Ant & Dec star Declan Donnelly can't find a girl. As soon as he had a close encounter with sexy film star Nichole Hiltz all he could do was burst out giggling.

The I'm A Celebrity presenter collapsed in laughter as he recorded a love-making scene with 27-year-old Hollywood beauty Nichole for his new comedy sci-fi flick, Alien Autopsy.

Nichole, who has appeared in TV hits The OC, Desperate Housewives and Buffy The Vampire k Slayer, confessed in one interview that the v naughtiest thing in her bedroom "is me". But Dec still had trouble recording their sexy scene.

He admitted: "I was going 'ooh' and 'aaahh' but after a few seconds I was giggling like a I schoolboy. It was so embarrassing. Nichole was so cool."

Dec, 30, has failed to find romance since his 2003 split with his girlfriend of 11 years, TV actress Clare Buckfield. Yesterday he said he was still single because he's not been "out in the market place". He added: "Since we split, I've been too busy."

Dec and telly sidekick Ant McPartlin play a pair of hoaxers in the new movie based on the real-life "Roswell" incident. The tricksters claim to have film of the postmortem in 1947 when an extra-terrestrial was supposedly found in a UFO crash.

Total Film Press Conference Interview

The press conference for Alien Autopsy has just wrapped up. Nice pastries, damn fine tea and the usual ‘they were a pleasure to work with’ kind of fare was thrown from the floor. One crucial difference that stuck out like a fat kid on The OC – Ant and Dec, those cheeky japesters from Saturday night telly, were sitting front and centre.

“I know, it’s weird isn’t it, it’s still weird for us,” Dec says, now safely tucked away in a plush London hotel suite - trademark glint and schoolboy grin in place. “Today is amazing to be honest, our first junket and premiere and for all we know, it’s our last, so we’re enjoying every minute of it.”

Hang on, hold up, take a step back – how the hell did Geordieland’s favourite nephews end up on the big screen? Step forward Twins scribbler Will Davies and Shameless helmer Jonny Campbell. “I’d gotten a call asking if I’d be interested in this amazing story and when I got there, I had to sign a confidentiality agreement before I could even hear the plot,” Davies tells TF.

Having signed on the line, Davies met Ray Santilli and Gary Shoefield and listened to their outlandish tale of how two men from North London fooled the world with faked footage of an alien autopsy. “It was such an incredible story, so I called Jonny and told him he had to hear it.” Jonny Campbell is the Manchester-born director, behind the lens for modern classics such the aforementioned Shameless and Peter Kay’s keynote contribution to comedy, Phoenix Nights. Campbell was equally intrigued and with script written, set about trying to find the right pair to play Santilli and Shoefield.

“We looked at comedians, we looked at everybody. Then I’m sitting there watching I’m A Celebrity… one night and my wife said ‘What about Ant and Dec?’ I went into a production meeting the next day and gingerly put it to them and it turns out Will’s girlfriend had said the same thing to him but he didn’t want to be the first to suggest it.”

So Campbell contacted the dynamic duo, who, lest we forget, had an acting career once before.

“Ah yes, Byker Grove,” Ant McPartlin says with a slow nod of the head, “that was literally the first and last thing we did. So we had to re-learn how to act. We’re so used to hosting that we found ourselves talking through the script like presenters at that first read-through. To Jonny’s credit, he was such a massive help to us every step of the way on this project.”

“Except he made us audition!” Donnelly almost leaps from his seat in mock disgust. “It was like, ‘Great, you’re interested, come along and screen test.’ Oh dear god. But at least it made it real, it’s what we’d been looking for. So we went through a kind of acting boot camp because we didn’t want this to be ‘The Ant & Dec Movie’.”

“I remember thinking ‘this is the Ant & Dec Movie,” says comic and cult movie star Omid Djalili. “I didn’t realise they’d audtioned and everything but then I hadn’t even read the script because I was on tour and putting my Edinburgh show together.”

TF looks Omid square in the eyes and goes for broke. So what were the boys really like? Come on, you can tell us, we won’t share it with (hardly) anyone.

“Yeah, okay. They’re all cunts! Every last one of ‘em!” He bursts into a robust guffaw. “Honestly? I’ve never worked with two such professional people. They were on set early, they knew all their lines. I mean the first read through was shit, they’ll tell you that, really shit but the hard work paid off, they’re really good.”

Djalili is carving out a sweet little niche for himself as a character actor having shamelessly pinched scenes from under the noses of Hollywood’s finest in flicks such as The Mummy, Gladiator and Mean Machine. So how do Ant and Dec shape up in the finished product?

“Dec does some really excellent stuff, really subtle. I worked with Robert Redford and he’d be talking to you right up to the point he hears ‘action!’ Then he snaps into character. Dec is the only other actor who’s done that with me, chatting away about how he’s played football with Peter Beardsley and then snap, we’re into the scene. Amazing.”

Donnelly wafts his hand through the air and feigns modesty. “But I bet Robert bloody Redford hasn’t played football with Peter Beardsley, eh?” The room erupts with cannons of laughter. “I actually know Alan Shearer. Redford can’t say that, can he?”

Despite some shallow hopes that in reality the compact comedy pair aren’t the nice guys they seem to be, they truly are effortlessly likeable in person and you can’t help but wish them success. As Djalili observes, “It’s Ant and Dec for Christ’s sake. I had to do it. I love them. Everybody loves these guys.”

ANT AND DEC: OUR ALIEN IS A HAGGIS
EXCLUSIVE TV pair sliced up national dish in out of this world autopsy
By Heather Greenaway

ANT and Dec have revealed the gruesome innards of the extra terrestrial in their new movie Alien Autopsy were made from haggis.

When the pair slice through the skin of the latex alien they cut into layers of Scotland's national dish, wrapped in tights.

The TV presenters, starring in their first comedy movie, said the haggis - also used as the alien's brain - stopped them throwing up.

Declan Donnelly, 30, said: "We never thought we would be able to stomach the autopsy scene but we did.

"It's weird because you watch things like Casualty and Holby City and it looks so real.

"I'm really squeamish and I always thought if I ever got a job on one of those shows I couldn't do it. I couldn't be in the operating theatre when they did that stuff. "But, actually, when it comes to doing it on the day when you know it's a latex dummy with strawberry jam and a bit of haggis in a pair of tights, it's not that bad."
Anthony McPartlin, 30, said: "We took friends to watch the first screening and they were going, 'Ooh, Aah' and thinking it was gross. But I had to tell them, 'Calm down - it's just jam and haggis'."

The comedy is based on a true story of best friends Ray Santilli and Gary Shoefield, who claim they found film of a real-life alien autopsy 10 years ago.

But when the real film starts to rot, the pair decide to re-create the footage themselves.

The presenters, who have scored TV hits with I'm A Celebrity and Ant 'n' Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway, are not planning to make a permanent move into movies.

Dec said: "We wanted to see how this went and to see how people reacted to us doing it.

We'll see how this goes and if things come up, we'll look at them. But we're not looking to launch an assault on Tinseltown yet."

ITV Entertainment Interview

Until Alien Autopsy, Ant and Dec were famous for two things: being the nation’s favourite cheeky chappies, and PJ and Duncan. They're still the former, but they’ve put the latter far behind them.

You’ve been praised for your professionalism on set…

Dec: We started Byker Grove when we were 13, and when you’re a child working in telly or an adult world, you quickly pick up the discipline that there’s no messing about. You’ve got to get a certain amount of filming done, time is money. Stop fartin’ on and get the job done!

That’s what was drummed into us from 13 so it’s just always the way we’ve worked really. Up until now, doing our TV projects and our Saturday night stuff, we kind of go into that heavily prepared. We take all week over it, we have a hand in some of the writing as well, we rehearse, we rehearse, we rehearse and then we do it live.

Ant: We were sensitive to the fact that it was a job, and also I think it would be very rude of us to turn up and think, ‘We’re the stars of this, I won’t learn my lines, I’m just going to bumble along.’ I think it would be very disrespectful to everybody else, Johnny [the director] included.

How are you finding the movie star lifestyle that goes with the film’s launch?

Ant: Oh it’s brilliant! We do TV and even though it’s big when we launch a new show, when we launch a new series of ‘I’m a Celebrity…’ we certainly don’t have 17 rooms at Claridges and a premiere at Leicester Square! That’s very exciting!

We shot the film last summer, and you do all your hard work and then leave it, do some more TV and we’ve done our bit. Now’s the really nice, glamorous part of it. So this week we’ve got a premiere tonight, one in Newcastle and one in Dublin as well. It’s very enjoyable, I have to say!

Now that you’re big movie stars, you’ve been airbrushed on the poster!

Dec: That was the most exciting bit about the whole thing! I’ve never been airbrushed before and I want it to happen again!

Will you get very demanding now?

Ant: Now? I’ve always been very demanding!

Did the numerous Ant and Dec devoted film offers get you down before you were offered this script?

Ant: That is exactly why we agreed to it. We didn’t want an Ant and Dec vehicle. They were going to make this film regardless, and they’d find two actors to play the lead roles. The story is almost bigger than any cast member and that’s exactly what we liked about it.

Dec: We’ve had a lot of scripts come through, and you always give them 20 pages and then if you’re not sucked in by then, you think there’s something not right about it. With this, I finished it in an hour and was like, ‘Oh my god, it’s such a good story!’ As soon as I read it I said to Ant, ‘Just read it, you’ll do it in an hour,’ and he phoned me up and said, ‘It’s brilliant, this is the one!’ So we phoned our manager and told him we wanted to do it and he was like, ‘Really?!’ He was so used to us going, ‘Nah!’

To go and audition for it was something we haven’t done for years! It made us step back a bit.

Ant: The fact that they asked us to audition meant that it wasn’t just an Ant and Dec vehicle, and that they were serious about this film and wanted to get the best people for the job.

Are you in sync like Ray and Gary in the film, ie. swapping bits of sandwiches and ice in your coke?

Ant:Yeah, probably!

Dec: Well I don’t want you to take this the wrong way but I do like Ant’s gherkin if you know what I’m saying!

Ant: You do get to the point where you don’t have to speak to each other. Like, I’m making a cup of tea I know Dec doesn’t have milk in his tea. Or if someone’s going to pour milk in (if we’re in a hotel or whatever) I’ll stop them! Until we shot this film, I never thought about those idiosyncrasies that we’ve got. Then I stopped and thought, ‘Oh my go, what a pair of weirdos!’

How was the love scene Dec?

Dec: It was in the set we used for Harvey’s house in LA, and it was Nicole’s (the actress) last day and Johnny said, ‘Last thing, we need the sound effects for the sex scene.’ I was like, ‘What?’ I’d forgotten about that. So they cleared all the crew out of the set, and there was just me, Nicole, Johnny the director and the sound guy, who just came in between us and held this boom mic and said, ‘Action!’

And I went, ‘Ughrrrrr!’ And she went, ‘Oooh!’ And I went, ‘Ughrrr’ again! We just started laughing and I said, ‘I’m sorry, I just can’t do this!’

So eventually, after many takes, we got going and we did it. After much stopping and laughing and starting again, I went like a Trojan and we got it in the end! Then we walked out the set and all the crew were outside with their headphones on clapping!

It was one of the most embarrassing moments of my life!

What was it like for you listening to the playback Ant?

Ant: Thankfully I didn’t listen to it until we watched it.

Dec: It was just like we were back sharing a flat again!

Do you believe in aliens?

Ant: I think it is naïve to think that we’re the only living beings in this universe. Obviously there is some kind of life form somewhere else. I’m sure it’ll be something that we couldn’t possibly imagine. But yeah, I do believe in aliens.

Dec: I’d like to think so. I remember the autopsy footage coming out in 1995 and I remember not really 100% believing it, but kind of wanting to believe it. Wanting to believe that there was some massive cover up by the American government, and that a space craft did land in Roswell in 1947. It’s just a great story.

But I do think there is something else out there. I agree with the boys in that I think it’s naïve to think that we were the only intelligent (using that term loosely!) life force in the universe. There must be something else out there.

Who would be your ideal premiere guests?

Ant: Anyone from the Newcastle United squad and Angelina Jolie and I would be very happy!

Dec: Cameron Diaz would be good, Jessica Simpson, Jimmy Saville, Mr T (I’d ask him to come into the jungle then!)…I don’t know actually.

Right let me know if you want anymore i have quite a few more i can put up but i'll let you all read these first...ENJOY

thanks for them they were all great to read