Wednesday, July 14, 2010

Film about the making of Live Aid in production

This fall, the BBC will air a movie depicting Sir Bob Geldof's work in organizing the Live Aid concerts that took place 25 years ago this week. The film depicts Geldof's relationship with promoter Harvey Goldsmith as they put together something that had never been done before. The Live Aid concerts began a new era in charity and awareness of the needs in Africa, with the television audience reaching over 1.5 billion people worldwide.

From Reuters AlertNet, writer Kylie MacLellan tells us more about the film.

Filming has already begun in Dublin for the 90-minute drama "When Harvey met Bob", which follows the story from the moment Geldof arrived home to find his then girlfriend Paula Yates holding their baby and weeping as she watched television footage from feeding camps in Eritrea.

Played by Domhnall Gleeson, who stars in the upcoming seventh Harry Potter film, Geldof persuaded a host of rock stars to give their name and talents for free to the Band Aid charity Christmas record "Do they know it's Christmas?"

But it is on a trip to Ethiopia to ensure the proceeds from the record, which sold millions of copies, reached the starving that Geldof realised more needed to be done and teamed up with Goldsmith to stage a huge televised international charity gig, held simultaneously in London and Philadelphia.

"We were inspired by this story because it has, at its heart, a fantastic relationship that is funny, moving and born out of the real drama of trying to achieve something huge and unprecedented," said Kate Triggs of producers Great Meadow Productions.

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