Composer George Fenton (Dangerous Liaisons, Groundhog Day, The Blue Planet, Anna and the King, Hitch) is reuniting with director Richard Eyre (Notes on a Scandal, Iris) on the upcoming British comedy drama Allelujah. The film is based on the stage play of the same name by Alan Bennett and stars Jennifer Saunders, Judi Dench, Derek Jacobi, Bally Gill, Russell Tovey and David Bradley. The movie is set on a geriatric ward in Yorkshire that is on the verge of closure and and follows the hospital’s attempts to fight back by inviting a news crew to film their preparations for a concert in honor of the place’s most distinguished nurse. Heidi Thomas (Call the Midwife, Upstairs Downstairs) wrote the screenplay. Damian Jones (Belle, The Iron Lady) and Kevin Loader (The Death of Stalin, The Personal History of David Copperfield) are producing the project. Jones has previously collaborated with Eyre on the 2004 feature Stage Beauty and the 1985 TV movie Past Caring. He also scored the Jones- & Loader-produced movies The Lady in the Van and The Nowhere Boys. Allelujah is expected to premiere in 2022.
Fenton has also recently composed the music for Roger Michell’s The Duke, which received an awards-qualifying release earlier this month and is set to be released in U.S. theaters on March 25, 2022 by Sony Pictures Classics. He also has Michell’s documentary Elizabeth coming up.
