GREENAWAY, Peter

Nationality: British. Born: Newport, Gwent, Wales, 5 April 1942. Education: Studied painting. Career: had first exhibition of paintings, London, 1964; worked as a film editor for the Central Office of Information, 1965–76; directed his first short film, Train, 1966; directed his first feature, The Falls, 1980. Awards: British Film Institute Special Award, for The Falls, 1980; Melbourne Film Festival Best Short Film, for Act of God, 1981; Cannes Film Festival Best Artistic Contribution, Seattle International Film Festival Golden Space Needle-Best Director, for Drowning by Numbers, 1988; Catalonian International Film Festival Best Director, for The Cook, the Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover, 1989; two prizes at Festival International du Nouveau Cinema et de la Video, for A TV Dante, 1990; Seattle International Film Festival Golden Space Needle-Best Director, Catalonian International Film Festival Best Film, for The Pillow Book, 1996; Istanbul International Film Festival Honorary Award, 1997.

Films as Director/Screenwriter:

1966

Train; Tree

1967

Revolution; Five Postcards from Capital Cities

1969

Intervals

1971

Erosion

1973

H Is for House (+ ph, ed, voice)

1975

Windows (+ ph, ed, voice); Water; Water Wrackets (+ ph, ed)

1976

Goole by Numbers

1977

Dear Phone (+ ph, ed)

1978

1–100; A Walk through H (+ ed); Vertical Features Remake (+ ph, ed)

1980

The Falls (+ ed, narration)

1981

Act of God (for TV) (doc); Zandra Rhodes; Terence Conran (d only)

1982

The Draughtsman's Contract

1983

Four American Composers

1984

Making a Splash (d only); A TV Dante—Canto 5

1985

Inside Rooms—The Bathroom (Inside Rooms: 26 Bathrooms, London & Oxfordshire, 1985) (doc) d only); A Zed and Two Noughts

1987

The Belly of an Architect

1988

Drowning by Numbers; Fear of Drowning (co-d) (+ narration); Death in the Seine

1989

The Cook, the Thief, His Wife and Her Lover; A TV Dante (co-d) (for TV); Hubert Bals Handshake (+ narration)

1991

Prospero's Books; M Is for Man, Music, Mozart

1992

Rosa (d only)

1993

The Baby of Macon; Darwin (for TV)

1995

Stairs 1 Geneva (doc) (d only) (+ narration); Lumiere and Company (co-d)

1996

The Pillow Book (+ ed)

1997

The Bridge (d only)

1999

8 1/2 Women; Death of a Composer (+ narration)

Other Films:

1968

Love Love Love (Nyman) (ed)

Publications

By GREENAWAY: books—

A Walk through H, London, 1978.

Verticle Features Remake, London, 1979.

The Falls, London, 1980.

The Droughtsman's Contract, London, 1982.

A Zed and Two Noughts, London, 1986.

The Belly of an Architect, London, 1988.

Drowning by Numbers, London, 1988.

The Cook, the Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover, London, 1989.

Fifty-five Men on Horseback, London, 1990.

Prospero's Books, New York, 1991.

Flying out of This World, Paris, 1992; Chicago, 1994.

100, Hundert Objekte zeigendie Welt, Stuttgart, 1992.

The World of Peter Greenaway, with Leon Steinmetz, Boston, 1995.

By GREENAWAY: articles—

Interview with Karen Jaehne, in Cineaste (New York), no. 2, 1984.

Interviews with Michel Ciment, in Positif (Paris), February 1984 and October 1987.

Interview with E. Decaux and B. Villien, in Cinématographe (Paris), March 1984.

Interview with Don Ranvaud, in Sight and Sound (London), Summer 1987.

"Architecture and Morality," interview with J. Clarke, in Films andFilming (London), October 1987.

Interview in Post Script (Jacksonville, Florida), Winter 1989.

Interview with Michel Ciment, in Positif (Paris), November 1989.

Interview in Cinema Papers (Melbourne), March 1990.

Interview with Gary Indiana, in Interview (New York), March 1990.

"Food for Thought," interview with Gavin Smith, in Film Comment (New York), May/June 1990.

Interview with Marcia Pally, in Cineaste (New York), no. 3, 1991.

"Paintbox-bilder," in Monthly Film Bulletin (London), no. 5–6, 1991.

"Die Moeglichkeiten dieser aufregenden Rahmen-Geschichten koneeen beliebig weitergesponnen werden," interview with M. Bodmer, in Filmbulletin (Winterthur, Switzerland), no. 5/6, 1991.

Interview with Michel Ciment, in Positif (Paris), April 1991.

"Notes de travail pour Les livres de Prospero," in Positif (Paris), May 1991.

"Past for the present," interview with A. Cogolo, in Cinema &Cinema (Bologna), September/December 1991.

Interview with Michel Ciment, in Positif (Paris), October 1991.

Interview with Lawrence Frascella, in Harper's Bazaar (New York), November 1991.

"Prospero's Books—Word and Spectacle," interview with M. Rodgers, in Film Quarterly (Berkeley), no. 2, 1991/1992.

Greenaway, Peter, "Otvenot ferfi lohaton," in Filmvilag (Budapest), no. 2, 1992.

Interview with D.E. Williams, in Film Threat (Beverly Hills), February 1992.

Interview with S. Turman, in Films in Review (New York), March/April 1992.

Interview with A. Berthin-Scaillet, in Avant-Scène du Cinéma (Paris), December/January 1992/1993.

Greenaway, Peter, "Minden, ami el minden, ami halott," in Filmvilag (Budapest), no. 1, 1993.

"Angyalokrol es szornyekrol," interview with M. Tranchant and F. Ferney, in Filmvilag (Budapest), no. 9, 1993.

On GREENAWAY: books—

Caux, Daniel, and others, Peter Greenaway, Paris, 1987.

Barchfield, Christiane, Filming by Numbers: Peter Greenaway, Tubingen, 1993.

Denham, Laura, The Films of Peter Greenaway, London 1993.

Bogani, Giovanni, Peter Greenaway, Rome 1995.

De Gaetano, Domenico, Il Cinema di Peter Greenaway, Torino 1995.

Gorostiza, Jorge, Peter Greenaway, Madrid, 1995.

Kremer, Detlef, Peter Greenaway Filme: vom Uberleben der BilderunBucher, Stuttgart, 1995.

Bencivenni, Alexxandro, and Anna Samueli, Peter Greenaway: ilcinema delle idee, Recco, Genova, 1996.

Woods, Alan, Being Naked—Playing Dead: The Art of PeterGreenaway, Manchester 1996.

Elliott, Bridget, and Anthony Purdy, Peter Greenaway: Architectureand Allegory, Chichester, West Sussex, 1997.

Lawrence, Amy, The Films of Peter Greenaway, Cambridge, New York, 1997.

Pascoe, David, Peter Greenaway: Museums and Moving Images, London 1997.

On GREENAWAY: articles—

Simon, L., "Music and Film: An Interview with Michael Nyman," in Millenium (New York), Fall 1981/Winter 1982.

Kennedy, Harlan, "Peter Greenaway: His Rise and Falls," in FilmComment (New York), January/February 1982.

Brown, R., "The Draughtsman's Contract: From a View to Death," in Monthly Film Bulletin (London), November 1982.

Auty, Chris, "Greenaway's Games," in Stills (London), May/June 1983.

Rayns, Tony, "Peter Greenaway," in American Cinematographer (Los Angeles), September 1983.

"The Draughtsman's Contract Issue" of Avant-Scène du Cinéma (Paris), October 1984.

Rayns, Tony, "Of Natural History and Mythology Born," in MonthlyFilm Bulletin (London), December 1985.

"Peter Greenaway Section" of Positif (Paris), April 1986.

Elsaesser, Thomas, and Tony Rayns, "Drowning by Numbers: Games of Love and Death," in Monthly Film Bulletin (London), October 1988.

Bohringer, R., article in Positif (Paris), November 1989.

De Feo, R., "Fantasy in Crimson," in Art News (New York), March 1990.

Trucco, T., "The Man Will Eat Literally Anything," in New YorkTimes, 1 April 1990.

Acker, K., "The Color of Myth," in Village Voice (New York), 17 April 1990.

Van Gelder, L., "At the Movies," in New York Times, 29 June 1990.

Pally, Marcia, "Order vs. Chaos: The Films of Peter Greenaway," in Cineaste (New York), no. 3, 1991.

Canavas, C., "Das Kino, das (neue) Fernsehen, die Maleri und ihr Liebhaber Peter Greenaway," in Filmbulletin Winterthur, Switzerland), no. 5/6, 1991.

Ardai, Z., "Az undor titokzatos targya," in Filmvilag (Budapest), no. 12, 1991.

Jacobs, K., "For Peter Greenaway, Movies Are a Dutch Treat," in New York Times, 21 April 1991.

Clark, J., "Filmographies," in Premiere (New York), September 1991.

Richard, F., article in Positif (Paris), October 1991.

Frascella, L., "Britain's Mavericks," in Harper's Bazaar (New York), November 1991.

Rodman, H.A., "Anatomy of a Wizard," in American Film (Los Angeles), November/December 1991.

Zagari, P., "Gli intoccabili," in Cinema Nuovo (Rome), November/December 1991.

Olofsson, A., "In pa bara skinnet," in Chaplin (Stockholm), no. 5, 1992.

Csake, M.C., "Az eltorhetetlen palca' in Filmvilag (Budapest), no. 7, 1992.

De Gaetano, R, "Lo spessore della superficie," in Cineforum (Bergamo, Italy), January/February 1992.

"Percorso fotografico nell'universo di Greenaway," in Cineforum (Bergamo, Italy), January/February 1992.

"Filmografie," in Segnocinema (Vicenza, Italy), January/February 1992.

Glombitza, B., "Peter Greenaway," in Filmfaust (Frankfurt), January/February 1992.

Imparato, E., "Il corpo salvato," in Cineforum (Bergamo, Italy), July/August 1992.

Dolinska, R., "Falszywe dokumenty Petera Greenawaya," in Kino (Warsaw), October 1992.

Bodmer, M., "Technik und Handwerk," in Filmwaerts (Hanover), Winter 1992.

Kapp, H.J., "Musik, Zeit und anderes," in Filmwaerts (Hanover), Winter 1992.

Rother, R., "Aesthetik der Quantitaet," in Filmwaerts (Hanover), Winter 1992.

Berthin-Scaillet, A., "Comment cadrer le cinema de Peter Greenaway," in Avant-Scène du Cinéma (Paris), December/January 1992/1993.

"Filmographie: plongees dans l'oeuvre de Peter Greenaway," in Avant-Scène du Cinéma (Paris), December/January 1992/1993.

Serravalli, L., "Peter Greenaway: Propsero's Books e la grande stagione del realismo barocco," in Cinema Sud (Avellino, Italy), December/January/February 1992/1993.

Lajta, G., "Vilagszertar," in Filmvilag (Budapest), no. 1, 1993.

Kozma, G., "A legy es a mezespohar," in Filmvilag (Budapest), no. 4, 1993.

Masson, A., "Le bruit des nuages," in Positif (Paris), January 1993.

Peck, A., "M Is for Music, etc.," in Positif (Paris), January 1993.

O'Pray, Michael, "Peter Greenaway, in International Film Guide (London, Hollywood), 1998.

An ancient Chinese encyclopedia, according to Borges, divides animals into "(a) those that belong to the Emperor, (b) embalmed ones, (c) those that are trained, (d) suckling pigs, (e) mermaids, (f) fabulous ones, (g) stray dogs, (h) those that are included in this classification, (i) those that tremble as if they are mad, (j) innumerable ones, (k) those drawn with a very fine camel's hair brush, (l) others, (m) those that have just broken a flower vase, (n) those that resemble flies from a distance." One is tempted to add, (o) those featured in Peter Greenaway's films. The inclusion would seem appropriate for a filmmaker who has constantly displayed a fascination for the organic and the classificatory in a body of films that have themselves retained an art-house individuality within the broader criteria of popular success.

Greenaway's biography implies a deeper integration between life and his art than some critics might suggest. He grew up in post-war Essex, his father was an ornithologist—perhaps the quintessential English hobby—and the petit-bourgeois world of public respectability and private eccentricity seems to have left him with a taste for the contradictory that hallmarks his work ("The black humour, irony, distancing, a quality of being in control, an interest in landscape, treating the world as equal with an image, these are very English qualities. I can't imagine myself living abroad"). He trained as a painter rather than a filmmaker, but his first exhibition, "Eisenstein at the Winter Palace," indicated an interest that led him into film editing at the Central Office of Information, the government department responsible for informing the public in the unique "homecounties" voice of domestic propaganda.

These years also saw Greenaway developing a crop of his own absurdist works—films, art, novels, illustrated books, drawings—with titles such as Goole by Numbers and Dear Phone, as well as directing (non-absurdist) Party Political Broadcasts for the Labour Party. They also saw the introduction of his fictional alter ego, Tulse Luper, archivist, cartographer, ornithologist extraordinaire ("He's me at about 65. A know-all, a Buckminster Fuller, a McLuhan, a John Cage, a pain"). Nomenclature means a lot to Greenaway in determining where one would be filed in the unfortunate event of a statistically (im)probable end. The Falls is a catalogue of victims of V.U.E. (Violent Unknown Event), with characters such as Mashanter Fallack, Carlos Fallanty, Raskado Fallcastle, and Hearty Fallparco. The epitome of absurdity was perhaps reached in Act of God, a film based around interviews with people who'd been struck by lightning in an attempt to find out what led to such an unpredictable event.

But perhaps the most tickling piece of absurdity for Greenaway came in the commercial success of The Draughtsman's Contract, his first film made on a reasonable budget. It made an uncharacteristic concession to plot, characterization, and scenic coherence. A stylish, lavish, and enigmatic puzzle revolving around murder in a stately seventeenth-century English home, it soon became the subject of a mythical French film conference that discussed its title for five days, and gained popular fame as everyone asked what was it all about. But it made Greenaway's name, and briefly contested box office ratings with the likes of E.T. and Gandhi, although Greenaway's intended length was four hours—"one suspects it was originally closer to Tristram Shandy than Murder at the Vicarage," as one critic remarked.

Greenaway's ideas tend to work in twos. A Zed and Two Noughts took Siamese twins separated at birth and saw them cope with their grief at the death of their wives in a study in the decomposition of zoo animals. Belly of an Architect silhouetted the visceral mortality of Stourley Kracklite against his plans for an exhibition on a visionary eighteenth-century architect, Etiénne-Louis Boullée. But the dialectic seems more important than the ideas themselves, as Greenaway hints: "The important thing about Boullée—and this is where he's very like a filmmaker, who tends to spend much more time on uncompleted projects than completed ones—is that very few of his buildings were constructed. I've taken that up in Kracklite's fear of committal, being prepared to go half-way and no further, which is Kracklite's position and maybe my position as well."

In this position Greenaway has always been most successful when casting strong leading actors. He secured Brian Dennehy as Kracklite, for instance, and the cast of arguably his most successful film, The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover, included Michael Gambon (the Thief) and Helen Mirren (his Wife).

Greenaway's ideas are always sufficiently ambiguous to resist trivialisation, but invariably involve death: Death and Landscape, Death and Animals, Death and Architecture, Death and Sex, Death and Food (cannibalism). But there are factors which make them more palatable. One of them is a taste for sumptuous framing (helped by cinematographer Sacha Vierney), in which he envisages an aesthetic complexity similar to that of the golden age of Dutch art, "where those amazing manifestations of the real world that we find in Vermeer and Rembrandt are enriched by a fantastic metaphorical language." The other is his close collaboration with the composer Michael Nyman, whose insistent scores lend an inexorable quality to Greenaway's sometimes spatial fabric of ideas.

The films of Peter Greenaway continue to be consistently outrageous and challenging. Drowning by Numbers is a bizarre, erotic concoction about three generations of women, each named Cissie Colpitts (and played by Joan Plowright, Juliet Stevenson, and Joely Richardson). Each Cissie is saddled with a husband who is lecherous or inattentive. And each one decides to murder her mate by drowning him. Madgett the coroner (Bernard Hill), who lusts after these women, agrees to list the deaths as natural. But the heroines hold the upper hand in the story, and Madgett's fate proves to be beyond his control.

Prospero's Books is an original, daring adaptation of Shakespeare's The Tempest, with almost all of the dialogue spoken by 87-year-old Sir John Gielgud (cast as Prospero, a role he played many times on stage). The other actors are little more than extras and, as in many of Greenaway's works, there is a mind-boggling amount of nudity. Purist defenders of the Bard may find much to fault in Prospero's Books, but the film remains noteworthy both for Gielgud's splendid reading of the text and its exquisitely layered imagery and production design.

The Baby of Macon, which featured Julia Ormond and Ralph Fiennes prior to their ascension to stardom, is a demanding drama. It is set in the seventeenth century and presented as a play being performed on a vast stage. The play depicts the birth and life of a saint-like baby. In typical Greenaway fashion, there is luminous cinematography (by the filmmaker's frequent collaborator, Sacha Vierny) and production design. Some will find The Baby of Macon stimulating; others will think it overblown; and still others will be perplexed by it all.

The Pillow Book is one of Greenaway's more thoughtful features: a multi-layered, mind-massaging tale that is at once highly literate and deeply erotic. Greenaway's heroine is Nagiko (Vivian Wu), a young Japanese woman, and his story spotlights how she develops the desire to have her body painted and thus transform herself into a living, breathing work of art. As he weaves his tale, Greenaway explores the relationship between art and eroticism. At one point, Nagiko declares, "I was determined to take lovers who would remind me of the pleasures of calligraphy." Among the filmmaker's other concerns are father-daughter bonds, and how the past relates to the present.

The Pillow Book is (yet again) stunningly photographed by Sacha Vierny; the images are dazzling, and there is abundant use of split screens and other visual devices. Part of the dialogue is in Japanese and is translated not so much by traditional subtitles as calligraphy, which blends into Greenaway's imagery and becomes an integral part of the film's overall design. Indeed, watching the film is the equivalent of viewing a moving painting.

Unfortunately, Greenaway's subsequent feature, 8 1/2 Women, is arguably his most disappointing. The story of a businessman and his son who create a bordello in their Geneva home, 8 1/2 Women is inconsequential and boring—and a trial even for the filmmaker's most ardent supporters.

There are contradictions in Greenaway's works, a fact that seems to openly provoke divided opinion. Some would suggest that the fecundity of his vision and intellectual rigor are the stuff of great cinema; others, while admitting his originality, would still look for evidence of a deeper engagement with film as a medium, rather than as a vehicle for ideas. Lauded in Europe, under-distributed in the United States, loved and reviled in his own country, Greenaway is, nevertheless, in an enviable position for a filmmaker.

—Saul Frampton, updated by Rob Edelman

Greenaway, Peter 1942–

PERSONAL

Born April 5, 1942, in Newport, Wales; father, a builder's merchant, mother, a teacher; married Carol (a potter; divorced, 1999); children: Hannah, Jessica. Education: Studied painting and art history at Walthamstow College of Art.

Addresses: Office—The Vue, 387b King St., London W6 9NH England.

Career: Director, screenwriter, film editor, and painter. British Film Institute, caretaker, beginning in 1965; British Government Central Office of Information, director and editor of documentaries, 1965–76. First exhibited paintings at Lords Gallery, 1964; art work has been exhibited at the Louvre (Paris) and at locations around the world, including Switzerland, Germany, Japan, Belgium, Australia, the Netherlands, Austria, Italy, and the United States.

Awards, Honors: Hugo Award, Chicago Film Festival, 1978, for A Walk Through H; Hugo Award, documentary section, Chicago Film Festival, 1981, for Zandra Rhodes; British Film Institute Award and L'Age d'Or Brussels, 1981, both for The Falls; Melbourne Film Festival Award, best short film, Sydney Film Festival Award, best short film, 1981, both for Act of God; International Fantasy Film Award nomination, best film, Fantasporto, 1984, for The Draughtsman's Contract; Golden Palm Award nomination, Cannes Film Festival, Artistic Merit Award, Chicago Film Festival, 1987, both for The Belly of an Architect; Golden Palm Award, best artistic contribution, Cannes International Film Festival, Golden Palm Award nomination, Cannes International Film Festival, Audience Award, Warsaw International Film Festival, 1988, Golden Space Needle Award, best director, Seattle International Film Festival, 1991, all for Drowning by Numbers; Best Director Award, Cata-lonian International Film Festival, Independent Spirit Award nomination, best foreign film, 1989, International Fantasy Film Award nomination, best film, Fan-tasporto, 1990, all for The Cook, the Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover; two prizes from Festival International du Nouveau Cinema et de la Video, 1990, for A TV Dante; Special Award, Evening Standard British Film Awards, 1990; International Fantasy Film Award nomination, best film, Fantasporto, Golden Lion Award nomination, Venice Film Festival, 1991, Audience Award, Warsaw International Film Festival, ALFS Award, British technical achievement of the year, London Critics Circle Film Awards, 1992, all for Prospero's Books; Dance Screen Award, 1992, for Rosa; Le Distinction Glace Gervais, Cannes International Film Festival, 1995, Best Film Award, Catalonian International Film Festival, 1996, Golden Space Needle Award, best director, Seattle International Film Festival, 1997, all for The Pillow Book; Honorary Award, Istanbul International Film Festival, 1997; Officer of the Order of Arts and Letters, French government, 1998; Golden Palm Award nomination, Cannes Film Festival, 1999, for Eight and a Half Women; Joseph Plateau Award of Honour, 1999; Time-Machine Honorary Award, Catalonian International Film Festival, 2001; Golden Palm Award nomination, Cannes Film Festival, 2003, for The Tulse Luper Suitcases, Part 1: The Moab Story; Honorary Golden Alexander, Thessaloniki Film Festival, 2004.

CREDITS

Film Director:

Death of Sentiment, 1962.

Train, 1966.

Tree, 1966.

Revolution, 1967.

5 Postcards from Capital Cities, 1967.

Intervals, British Film Institute, 1969.

Erosion, 1971.

H Is for House, British Film Institute, 1973.

Windows, British Film Institute, 1975.

Water, 1975.

Water Wrackets, British Film Institute, 1975.

Goole by Numbers, 1976.

Dear Phone, British Film Institute, 1977.

1-100, 1978.

A Walk through H (also known as The Re-Incarnation of an Ornithologist and A Walk Through H: The Reincarnation of an Ornithologist), British Film Institute, 1978.

Vertical Features Remake, Arts Council of Great Britain, 1978.

Eddie Kid, 1978.

Cut Above the Rest, 1978.

Women Artists, 1979.

Leeds Castle, 1979.

Zandra Rhodes (documentary), Central Office of Information, 1979.

Lacock Village, 1980.

The Falls, British Film Institute, 1980, released in the United States, 1983.

Country Diary, 1980.

Terence Conran (also known as Insight: Terence Conran), 1981.

The Draughtsman's Contract, British Film Institute, 1982, released in the United States by United Artists Classics, 1983.

The Coastline (also known as The Sea in Their Blood), 1983.

Making a Splash, National Film Archive, 1984.

"Modern American Composers 1: Cage and Monk" and "Modern American Composers 2: Glass and Ashley," Four American Composers (documentary), Trans Atlantic Films/Channel Four, 1984.

Inside Rooms: 26 Bathrooms (also known as Inside Rooms: 26 Bathrooms, London and Oxfordshire, 1985 and 26 Bathrooms), Channel 4, 1985.

A TV Dante Canto 5, 1985.

A Zed and Two Noughts (also known as Zoo: A Zed and Two Noughts), British Film Institute, 1985, released in the United States by Skouras, 1985.

The Belly of an Architect (also known as Il Ventre dell'architetto), Hemdale, 1987.

Drowning by Numbers, Prestige Films/Miramax, 1988.

Fear of Drowning, Channel 4, 1988.

(With Tom Phillips) A TV Dante Cantos 1-8, Rainer Moritz, 1989.

Hubert Bals Handshake, Allarts Enterprises, 1989.

The Cook, the Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover (also known as Le Cuisinier, le voleur, sa femme, et son amant and Spica), Miramax, 1989.

Prospero's Books (also known as L'Ultima tempesta), Miramax, 1991.

Rosa (opera), Argos, 1992.

The Baby of Macon (also known as Das Wunder von Macon), Cine Electra, 1993.

The Stairs, Geneva (documentary; also known as Stairs 1 Geneva), 1994.

The Pillow Book, CFP Distribution, 1995.

(With thirty-nine other contemporary directors) Lumiere et compagnie (documentary; also known as Lumiere and Company and Lumiere y compania), Fox Lorber, 1995.

The Bridge (opera), Cine 360, 1997.

Death of a Composer (also known as The Death of a Composer: Rosa, a Horse Drama), NVC Arts, 1999.

Eight and a Half Woman (also known as 8 1/2 Women), Lions Gate Films, 1999.

The Death of a Composer: Rosa, a Horse Drama (also known as Death of a Composer), 1999.

The Man in the Bath, 2001.

Cinema16: British Short Films (films shorts), 2003.

The Tulse Luper Suitcases: Part 1: The Moab Story (also known as Las Maletas de Tulse Luper: La historia de Moab and Le Valigie di Tulse Luper—La Storia di Moab), A-Film Distribution, 2003.

The Tulse Luuper Suitcases, Part 3: From Sark to the Finish, 2003.

The Tulse Luper Suitcases, Part 2: Vaux to the Sea, A-Film Distribution, 2004.

"European Showerbath," Visions of Europe (also known as Europaisch Visionen), 2004.

A Life in Suitcases, 2005.

Nightwatch, 2006.

Film Cinematographer:

H Is for House, British Film Institute, 1973.

Water Wrackets, British Film Institute, 1975.

Windows, British Film Institute, 1975.

Dear Phone, British Film Institute, 1977.

(Uncredited) Vertical Features Remake, Arts Council of Great Britain, 1978.

Film Editor:

Love Love Love, 1968.

H Is for House, British Film Institute, 1973.

Windows, British Film Institute, 1975.

Water Wrackets, British Film Institute, 1975.

Dear Phone, British Film Institute, 1977.

A Walk through H (also known as The Re-Incarnation of an Ornithologist and A Walk Through H: The Reincarnation of an Ornithologist), British Film Institute, 1978.

(Uncredited) Vertical Features Remake, Arts Council of Great Britain, 1978.

The Falls, British Film Institute, 1980, released in the United States, 1983.

The Pillow Book, CFP Distribution, 1995.

Film Producer:

Vertical Features Remake, Arts Council of Great Britain, 1978.

A Zed and Two Noughts (also known as Zoo: A Zed and Two Noughts), British Film Institute, 1985, released in the United States by Skouras, 1985.

Film Work; Other:

Production designer and maps, A Walk through H (also known as The Re-Incarnation of an Ornithologist and A Walk Through H: The Reincarnation of an Ornithologist), British Film Institute, 1978.

(Uncredited) Drawings: Mr. Neville and hand double: Anthony Higgins, The Draughtsman's Contract, British Film Institute, 1982, released in the United States by United Artists Classics, 1983.

(Uncredited) Sculptor: Prospero's books, Prospero's Books (also known as L'Ultima tempesta), Miramax, 1991.

Stage director, The Death of a Composer: Rosa, a Horse Drama (also known as Death of a Composer), 1999.

Film Appearances:

Voice, H Is for House, British Film Institute, 1973.

Narrator, Windows, British Film Institute, 1975.

Narrator, Dear Phone, British Film Institute, 1977.

The Falls, British Film Institute, 1980, released in the United States, 1983.

Narrator, Fear of Drowning, Channel 4, 1988.

Narrator, Hubert Bals Handshake, Allarts Enterprises, 1989.

Narrator, The Stairs, Geneva (also known as Stairs 1 Geneva), 1994.

Narrator, La Cosmologia di Piazza del Popolo, 1996.

Himself, Peter Greenaway in Indianapolis (documentary; also known as An Evening with Peter Green-away), 1997.

Narrator, Death of a Composer (also known as The Death of a Composer: Rosa, a Horse Drama), NVC Arts, 1999.

Eight and a Half Woman (also known as 8 1/2 Woman), Lions Gate Films, 1999.

Voice of commentary, "Dear Phone," Cinema 16: British Short Films, 2003.

Television Director; Movies:

Death in the Seine (also known as Les Morts de la Seine), 1988.

Darwin, Film Office, 1992.

Television Director; Specials:

Act of God (documentary), Thames, 1981.

A TV Dante: The Inferno Cantos I-VIII (also known as A TV Dante), 1989.

M Is for Man, Music, Mozart (also known as Not Mozart), Rainer Moritz, 1991.

A Walk through Prospero's Library, 1991.

Television Appearances; Specials:

Himself, "Segment 1: The Films That Shocked Britain," X-rated, 2004.

Television Appearances; Episodic:

Himself, Cinema mil, 2005.

Stage Director:

Rosa: A Horse Drama, De Nederlandse Opera, 1995.

Christopher Columbus, Staatoper, Berlin, Germany, 1998.

WRITINGS

Screenplays:

Death of Sentiment, 1962.

Train, 1966.

Tree, 1966.

Revolution, 1967.

5 Postcards from Capital Cities, 1967.

Love Love Love, 1968.

Intervals, British Film Institute, 1969.

Erosion, 1971.

H Is for House, British Film Institute, 1973.

Windows, British Film Institute, 1975.

Water, 1975.

Water Wrackets, British Film Institute, 1975.

Goole by Numbers, 1976.

Dear Phone, British Film Institute, 1977.

1-100, 1978.

A Walk through H (also known as The Re-Incarnation of an Ornithologist and A Walk through H: The Re-Incarnation of an Ornithologist), British Film Institute, 1978.

Vertical Features Remake, Arts Council of Great Britain, 1978.

The Falls, British Film Institute, 1980, released in the United States, 1983.

The Draughtsman's Contract, British Film Institute, 1982, released in the United States by United Artists Classics, 1983.

"Modern American Composers 1: Cage and Monk" and "Modern American Composers 2: Glass and Ashley," Four American Composers (documentary), Trans Atlantic Films/Channel Four, 1984.

A Zed and Two Noughts (also known as Zoo: A Zed and Two Noughts), British Film Institute, 1985, released in the United States by Skouras, 1985, published by Faber and Faber (London), 1986.

The Belly of an Architect (also known as Il Ventre dell'architetto), Hemdale, 1987.

Drowning by Numbers, Prestige Films/Miramax, 1988, published by Faber, 1988.

Fear of Drowning, Channel 4, 1988.

Hubert Bals Handshake, Allarts Enterprises, 1989.

The Cook, the Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover (also known as Le Cuisinier, le voleur, sa femme, et son amant and Spica), Miramax, 1989.

Prospero's Books (also known as L'Ultima tempesta; based on The Tempest by William Shakespeare), Miramax, 1991, published by Four Walls Eight Windows (New York City), 1991.

The Baby of Macon (also known as Das Wunder von Macon), Cine Electra, 1993.

The Pillow Book, CFP Distribution, 1995.

Peter Greenaway in Indianapolis (also known as An Evening with Peter Greenaway), 1997.

Eight and a Half Woman (also known as 8 1/2 Women), Lions Gate Films, 1999.

(And libretto) Death of a Composer (also known as The Death of a Composer: Rosa, a Horse Drama), NVC Arts, 1999.

The Tulse Luper Suitcases: Part 1: The Moab Story (also known as Las Maletas de Tulse Luper: La historia de Moab and Le Valigie di Tulse Luper—La Storia di Moab), A-Film Distribution, 2003.

The Tulse Luuper Suitcases, Part 3: From Sark to the Finish, 2003.

The Tulse Luper Suitcases, Part 2: Vaux to the Sea, A-Film Distribution, 2004.

"European Showerbath," Visions of Europe (also known as Europaisch Visionen), 2004.

A Life in Suitcases, 2005.

Nightwatch, 2006.

Television Movies:

Death in the Seine (also known as Les Morts de la Seine), 1988.

Darwin, Film Office, 1992.

Television Specials:

Zandra Rhodes, Central Office of Information, 1979.

M Is for Man, Music, Mozart (also known as Not Mozart), Rainer Moritz, 1991.

Opera Librettos:

Rosa: A Horse Drama, De Nederlandse Opera, 1995.

Writing to Vermeer, De Nederlandse Opera, 1999.

Books:

Papers/Papiers, Editions Dis Voir (Paris), 1990.

The Physical Self: A Selection by Peter Greenaway from the Selections of the Boymans-Van Beuningen Museum, Rotterdam, The Museum (Rotterdam, Netherlands), 1991.

Rosa, Editions Dis Voir, 1993.

Flying out of This World (art selections), University of Chicago Press (Chicago, IL), 1994.

(With Leon Steinmetz) The World of Peter Greenaway, Journey Editions, 1995.

Also wrote Gold (a novel).

OTHER SOURCES

Books:

Barchfeld, Christiane, Filming by Numbers, Peter Greenaway, Narr (Tuebingen, Germany), 1993.

Caux, Daniel and others, Peter Greenaway, 1987.

Contemporary Authors, Volume 127, Gale (Detroit, MI), 1989.

Gras, Vernon W., Peter Greenaway Interviews, University Press of Mississippi, 2000.

International Dictionary of Film and Filmmakers, Volume 2: Directors, 4th ed., St. James Press, 2000.

Lawrence, Amy, The Films of Peter Greenaway, Cambridge University Press, 1997.

Melia, Paul, and Alan Woods, Peter Greenaway, Manchester University Press, 1999.

Pascoe, Peter Greenaway: Museums and Moving Images, Reaktion Books, 1997.

Steinmetz, Leon, The World of Peter Greenaway, Journey Editions (Boston, MA), 1995.

Willoquet-Maricondi, Paula, and Mary Alemany-Galway, Peter Greenaway's Postmodern/Post-structuralist Cinema, Rowman & Littlefield, 2001.

Woods, Alan, Being Naked—Playing Dead: The Art of Peter Greenaway, St. Martin's (New York City), 1996.

Periodicals:

American Cinematographer, September, 1983.

American Film, November-December, 1991.

Chicago Tribune, July 13, 1997, p. 6.

Film Comment, January-February, 1982; May-June, 1990, p. 54.

Harper's Bazaar, November, 1991.

Interview, March, 1990, p. 120.

New York Times, April 1, 1990, p. H27; April 26, 1991, p. C7.

Sight and Sound, summer, 1987.

Greenaway, Peter

Greenaway, Peter, Welsh film director, writer, painter, and librettist; b. Newport, April 5, 1942. He went to England and studied at the Walthamstow Coll. of Art. From 1965 to 1976 he worked as a film editor in the Central Office of Information. His first exhibition of paintings was mounted in 1964, and his first one-man show was held in Canterbury in 1989. As a film director and writer, he began producing short films in 1966 and feature-length films in 1978, all highly structured, visu-ally complex, and elaborate; among the most well-known are The Cook, The Thief, His Wife and Her Lover (1990), Prospero’s Books (1991), and The Pillow Book (1991). His book The Falls appeared in 1993. He collaborated with Louis Andriessen as librettist for the operas Rosa (Amsterdam, Nov. 2, 1994) and Writing to Vemeer (1997-99; Amsterdam, Dec. 1, 1999). Greenaway was made a Chevalier de 1’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres of France in 1990.

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire

Greenaway, Peter (1942– ) Welsh film director and screenwriter. An innovative and painterly director, his breakthrough film was The Draughtsman's Contract (1983). Other films include The Cook, the Thief, His Wife and Her Lover (1989), Prospero's Books (1991), and The Pillow Book (1996).