Mrs. Henderson Presents / Tea With Mussolini

Mrs Henderson Presents: From Oscar-nominated director Stephen Frears comes the remarkable true life story Mrs Henderson Presents, featuring the incomparable Dame Judi Dench and Bob Hoskins. Set in pre-World War II London, Dench plays the eccentric society figure Laura Henderson who, at seventy years old, finds herself widowed and at loose ends. She decides to buy an abandoned Soho cinema and turns it into what would become the historic Windmill Theatre. Knowing nothing about theatre, she hires the irascible Vivian van Damm (Hoskins) to run it an comes up with an inspired idea to get audiences in: produce a nude revue. Penetrating, lively and featuring a captivating duel played out by two of Britains finest actors in Dench and Hoskins, Mrs Henderson Presents is an uplifting tale likely to live long in the memory of audiences everywhere.
Tea with Mussolini: Florence, 1943. A diverse group of cultured ladies meet for tea each afternoon: Lady Hester Random (Maggie Smith), widow of the British Ambassador to Italy, Arabella (Judi Dench), an artist and singer, Georgie (Lily Tomlin), the exuberant American archaeologist and the brash and uninhibited Elsa (Cher). One of their fold, Mary (Joan Plowright), becomes surrogate mother to a young boy, Luca and he is soon virtually adopted and brought up by the group of ladies. But the shifting political climate begins to have serious consequences for this unconventional community and the maturing Luca must face up to a personal challenge on independence. Director Franco Zefferelli, with co-screenwriter John Mortimer, based Tea With Mussolini on his own experiences growing up in Florence.