Uncle David

Uncle David (2010)

Ashley, a young man with a childlike mind arrives to stay with his uncle, David. Escaping from his abusive mother, He enters into a sexual relationship with his uncle who offers his insights into the world and the nature of reality. Eventually he tells his uncle that he wants to die, and the latter agrees to carry out the killing.

Date of release
2010-03-25
TMDB
3.9 / 10 (9)
Runtime
1h 35m
Genres
Horror, Drama, Thriller
Director
Gary Reich, Mike Nichols, David Hoyle

Casting

Interesting facts

Uncle David is a 2010 British black comedy film directed by David Hoyle, Gary Reich, and Mike Nicholls. It was produced by Reich and stars Hoyle, an English performance artist, in the title role alongside English pornographic actor Ashley Ryder. Developed collectively under the banner of the Avant-Garde Alliance, it was filmed in October 2009. Created without a script, every scene was improvised and filmed in a single take.

Production

According to The Guardian, Hoyle became "something of a legend" on the British cabaret circuit during the 1990s, initially under the alter-ego of "The Divine David". The Divine David was an "anti-drag queen" who combined "lacerating social commentary" with "breathtaking instances of self-recrimination and even self-harm." Taking this character to television, Hoyle produced two shows for Channel 4, The Divine David Presents (1999) and The Divine D…

Ryder had hoped to be a fashion designer, undertaking a course at Central Saint Martins which he did not complete; from there he worked in retail, first for Prowler and then for the designer Vivienne Westwood. Subsequently, appearing in gay pornography as a twink bottom for production companies like Eurocreme and UK Naked Men, he starred in such films as Drunk on Spunk and Stretch that Hole, winning numerous awards for his work.

Hoyle and Ryder met at a performance art event, after which the former asked Ryder if he would appear in one of his stage shows. Ryder was busy at the time, but agreed to the request several years later. Staged at the Royal Vauxhall Tavern (RVT), a gay bar in Vauxhall, South London, the duo constructed a piece in which Ryder played the role of Hoyle's nephew in an ad-lib performance.

Reich – who had known Hoyle since the late 1990s – was in the audience, and enjoyed the chemistry between the two actors, suggesting that they appear in a feature film together. Over the course of a day, he filmed three shorts starring Hoyle and Ryder, in which they explored some of the scenarios and themes that made it into Uncle David. In these shorts Hoyle wore a wig and makeup, which were omitted from the later feature.

Uncle David was filmed over five days in October 2009 on the Isle of Sheppey, a location chosen for its proximity to London. Hoyle commented that the profusion of barbed wire fences there made him wonder if they were "keeping people out or keeping people in?". Reich said that he had been "obsessed" with Sheppey, a place he had considered "a truly Godforsaken wasteland" since working on a television show there ten years previously.

Read on Wikipedia · Text from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Data from Wikidata.

Recommended