The Empress of Ireland

Christopher Robbins was a bright but impoverished young journalist when he met Brian Desmond Hurst in the early 1970s. Hurst was then in the twilight of his career as Ireland's most prolific film director -- many years had passed since he'd made his most famous film, an adaptation of A CHRISTMAS CAROL with Alastair Sim in 1951. But Brian's formidable desire, energy and joie de vivre were still much in evidence, and Robbins was contracted to write the screenplay for Hurst's swansong, a vast biblical epic starring Laurence Olivier and Michael Redgrave. Thus began a friendship that lasted until Brian's death in 1986. It was a period full of laughter, eccentricity, laughter, travel, adventure -- and laughter. They made an odd pair -- the elderly, theatrical and larger-than-life Hurst and the young, slightly naive but keen Robbins -- but Chris now acknowledges the debt he owes his mentor: a debt of friendship he wants to repay. This wonderful book is the result. The Box Office Blockbuster never happened, but in trying to get the project off the ground Chris had entered Brian's world. This, his memoir of that time and their friendship, is a wonderfully engaging and often hilarious portra