A screening followed by a Q&A with Emily Mortimer and Dolly Wells.
Moderated by Lori Hammel.
SYNOPSIS
Doll & Em is an intimate and innovative half-hour HBO comedy series created, written and starring real-life best friends Emily Mortimer [The Newsroom] and Dolly Wells [Some Girls] as (slightly) fictionalized versions of themselves. With their friendship having nearly ended in Season 1 after Emily hired Dolly to be her personal assistant in L.A., the two women look to rekindle their mutual admiration in Season 2 by sequestering themselves in a lighthouse to write a play, which they hope to produce on Broadway or, at least, off-Broadway. Having secured a venue through ballet legend Mikhail Baryshnikov, and with two Hollywood stars, Olivia Wilde and Evan Rachel Wood, agreeing to play the lead roles in the play, Doll and Em excitedly make preparations for the show. But as always, life seems to get in the way. Doll bristles while living in the basement of Em’s family’s brownstone, Em becomes sidetracked by an enticing film offer and Wood and Wilde begin to lose faith in the project as the two creators start rewriting the play to reflect their growing frustrations with each other.
PANELIST BIO
Emily Mortimer - Actor
A talented and charming actress, Emily Mortimer continues to challenge herself with a variety of roles that have audiences fully captivated by her onscreen presence.
Mortimer can currently be seen starring in Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini’s Ten Thousand Saints, which debuted at Sundance and was released by Screen Media on August 14th. Set in the 1980s, the film follows a teenager from Vermont who moves to New York City to live with his father. Mortimer can next be seen in the second season of Doll & Em for HBO, co-written by and co-starring her real-life best friend Dolly Wells. This season follows the pair as they set out to write a Broadway play about themselves, and will premiere on Sunday, September 13th.
Upcoming, the actress will appear in Rio, eu te amo (Rio, I Love You), and Nic Mathieu’s Spectral, a sci-fi/ thriller centered on a special-ops team that is dispatched to fight supernatural beings that have taken over New York City. The film is set to be released by Universal on August 28, 2016.
Most recently, Mortimer starred in the third and final season of HBO’s The Newsroom created by Aaron Sorkin and costarring Jeff Daniels.
Throughout her career, Mortimer has worked with some of the most legendary film directors of our era including Martin Scorsese and Woody Allen. Mortimer marked her second collaboration with Martin Scorsese, opposite Sacha Baron Cohen in Hugo, which received 11 Academy Award nominations, and took home five awards. She had previously worked with Scorsese on the box office hit thriller, Shutter Island opposite Leonardo DiCaprio. Mortimer also starred in one of Woody Allen’s most loved films of the last ten years, Match Point, for which she received glowing reviews.
Mortimer’s break-out performance was in Nicole Holofcener’s critically-acclaimed, Lovely & Amazing, opposite Catherine Keener. The film won her rave reviews and an Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Actress. She went on to star in David Mackenzie’s film, Young Adam opposite Ewan McGregor and Tilda Swinton, and earned nominations for Best British Actress at the Empire Awards as well as Best British Actress in a Supporting Role at the London Film Critics Circle Awards.
Among her numerous other film credits are: Lars and the Real Girl; Leonie;Our Idiot Brother; Transsiberian; Redbelt; Dear Frankie ; City Island; Harry Brown; Bright Young Things; Love’s Labour’s Lost; Elizabeth; The Ghost and the Darkness ; Formula 51; Scream 3; The Kid; and the Pink Panther 1and 2; Cars 2; Howl’s Moving Castle.
In addition to her film projects, Mortimer has starred in a range of television projects for the BBC and played the recurring role of “Phoebe,” a love interest for Alec Baldwin’s character, during the 2007 season of the hit NBC series 30 Rock.
On stage, Mortimer’s theatre credits include her off-Broadway debut at the Atlantic Theater in the world premiere of Jez Butterworth’s Parlour Song, directed by Neil Pepe. In November 2007, Mortimer was invited by Eric Idle (Monty Python) to take part in two special performances of his play, What About Dick? with a stellar cast that included Billy Connolly, Tim Curry, Eric Idle, Eddie Izzard, and Tracy Ullman. Additional theatre credits include productions of The Merchant of Venice for the Lyceum Theatre and The Lights for the Royal Court.
On the production side, Mortimer and her husband, Alessandro Nivola, run King Bee Productions. The production company has several projects in development including the film, The Man Who Never Died, which they are producing in partnership with Jason Blum of Blumhouse Productions (The Reader, The Normal Heart, Paranormal Activity). Based on the book of the same title by William Adler, the movie is a biopic about folk hero Joe Hill whose trial and execution have been the cause of speculation for the last century. Adler’s book is full of romantic intrigue and for the first time provides evidence of Hill’s innocence. King Bee is also producing Respectable, written and directed by Louis Mellis (Sexy Beast) in partnership with producers Jim Wilson (The Lovely Bones, Under The Skin) and Ted Hope (The Ice Storm, Martha Marcy May Marlene). In addition, King Bee is developing a television series based on Kathy Lette’s comic novel The Boy Who Fell to Earth about her relationship with her son who has Asperger’s.
Mortimer was born in London, England – the daughter of famed writer Sir John Mortimer. She attended St. Paul’s Girls School in Hammersmith, London and went on to study English and Russian at Oxford University. She currently lives in Brooklyn, New York with her husband and their two children.
Dolly Wells- Actor
Notable for her starring roles on the comedy series Doll & Em (as Dolly) and Some Girls (as Anna Hitchcock), she is also recognized for her recurring roles on Star Stories (2006-08); Campus (2009-11); Spy (2011-12); and Noel Fielding's Luxury Comedy (2012-14). Her big screen credits include appearances in Bridget Jones's Diary (2001) and Black Mountain Poets (2015)
MODERATOR BIO
Lori Hammel
Lori Hammel is a NYC-based actress and writer who has performed on Broadway and Off Broadway and has toured around the world. Film work includes playing a morning show host in the Coen brother's feature Burn After Reading; An Invisible Sign; She's Lost Control (2014 Berlin Film Festival, SXSW) and playing the lead in Coney Island Queen (2014 Cannes Shorts Corner). TV includes 30 Rock, The Following, As The World Turns, The Colbert Report and the Today Show. Lori's improvisational skills have been put to use as recurring political pundit Leslie Hillerman on the Onion News Network series, In The Know and as her alter ego NY2 Broadway reporter character, Margo Rose Ferderer (www.margorose.com).
Lori performed on Broadway and in the national tour of Mamma Mia!, the national tour of Dolly Parton's 9 to 5: The Musical and just returned from portraying Ethel Mertz on the national tour of I Love Lucy Live. Off Broadway credits include the 2013 world premiere of the play Unbroken Circle; I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change; Forbidden Broadway and The Bardy Bunch. Regional theatre includes Handicapped People in Their Formal Attire (Premiere Stages); Forbidden Hollywood (Jeff Award & After Dark Award); The Bikinis (Long Wharf, Goodspeed); Little Me (Jeff nomination) and Singin' in the Rain (Jeff nomination & After Dark Award). In national commercials Lori has had the pleasure of being directed by David Steinberg, Oscar winning documentarian Errol Morris, Phil Morrison and Rupert Sanders. In August she was given an Excellence in Acting Award at the New York International Fringe Festival. She is the 2014 recipient of the SAG-AFTRA Joseph C. Riley Service Award. Lori is co-author of Minding the Edge – Strategies for a Fulfilling, Successful Career as an Actor (2012 Waveland Press).
