Top cast lined-up for Stephen Fry film The Liar

Wednesday 18th March 2020, 2:07pm

A Life On Screen - Stephen Fry. Stephen Fry. Copyright: BAFTA Productions / Whizz Kids Entertainment

A top cast has been lined up for The Liar, a film version of Stephen Fry's best-selling novel.

David Walliams, Charles Dance, Hugh Bonneville, Rupert Everett, Warwick Davis and Sally Phillips are amongst the cast that have been revealed as producers seek investment to fund the film.

Published in 1991, The Liar was Fry's debut novel. To date it has sold over 3 million copies. Described as "by turns eccentric, shocking, brilliantly comic and achingly romantic", the story focuses on Adrian Healey, a character "magnificently unprepared for the long littleness of life".

The Liar will be only the second of Fry's four novels to be filmed. The previous, 1994's The Hippopotamus, was released in 2017.

Producers explain that The Liar is about "a brilliant, manipulative young man, who has a strong compulsion to lie, becomes embroiled in an elaborate 'game' of lying and finds himself in a world where nobody can be trusted. This is the educational career of public school student Adrian Healey (Stephen Fry's alter-ego, and an inveterate liar), whose school pranks somehow get him embroiled in an international espionage case."

Currently still in development, the film is also set to feature The Full Monty star Tom Wilkinson and Sex Education actor Asa Butterfield if the producers can raise the required capital. An email to potential investors also teases The Liar would feature "a 'who's who' of British comedy cameos".

Producers describe the film as "a fast-paced, rude, dark and very funny comedy about learning to accept who you are in life".

Iain Smith, who has worked on films including Mad Max: Fury Road, is executive producing the project alongside Gavin James (Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines), for A-Z Films.

Further details are expected to be revealed about the project should it make it to the shooting stage.

The Hippopotamus

Triple Olivier Award winner Roger Allam heads a stellar cast as the cantankerous, whiskey-swilling protagonist in this brand-new adaptation of Stephen Fry's best-selling novel. With a supporting cast that includes Tim McInnerny, Emily Berrington, Russell Tovey, Fiona Shaw and Matthew Modine, director John Jencks realises a decade-long ambition to become the first person to bring one of Fry's novels to the screen.

Ted Wallace, lapsed poet and disgraced theatre critic, is summoned to his friends Lord and Lady Logan's Norfolk manor to investigate a series of unexplained miracle healings. Ted tracks down the perpetrator of the phenomena, his fifteen-year-old godson David Logan, whose parents believe he has healing hands. Unaware of David's disturbingly unorthodox methods, the Logans are now set on sharing their son's "gift" with the world. With a poet's passion for the truth, Ted hurries to debunk the miracles and save a young man from a lifetime of embarrassment.

First released: Monday 3rd July 2017

  • Distributor: Network
  • Region: B
  • Discs: 1
  • Minutes: 89
  • Subtitles: English
  • Catalogue: 7958130

Buy and sell old and new items
Search for this product on eBay

BCG may earn commission on sales generated through the links above.

  • Distributor: Network
  • Region: 2
  • Discs: 1
  • Minutes: 90
  • Subtitles: English
  • Catalogue: 7954780

Buy and sell old and new items
Search for this product on eBay

BCG may earn commission on sales generated through the links above.

Not in the UK?

Fear not! Many items can still be ordered. Amazon in the UK delivers to many international territories, whilst their Australia, USA and Canada stores also supply many equivalent or imported items.

If you are in the North America, look out for US/Canadian flag icons on popular product listings for direct links.

If you order from a UK store, please note that the UK is in Region 2 and B, respectively, for DVDs and Blu-rays - check your player's compatibility, or look for multi-region products if you are located in another region.

If you are in Australia or New Zealand (DVD Region 4), note that almost all DVDs distributed in the UK by the BBC and 2entertain are encoded for both Region 2 and Region 4. The UK and Australasia are in the same Blu-ray region (B).

The Liar

By Stephen Fry

Stephen Fry's breathtakingly outrageous debut novel, by turns eccentric, shocking, brilliantly comic and achingly romantic.

Adrian Healey is magnificently unprepared for the long littleness of life; unprepared too for the afternoon in Salzburg when he will witness the savage murder of a Hungarian violinist; unprepared to learn about the Mendax device; unprepared for more murders and wholly unprepared for the truth.

The Liar is a thrilling, sophisticated and laugh out loud hilarious novel from a brilliantly talented writer.

First published: Thursday 5th August 2004

  • Published: Tuesday 17th May 2016
  • Publisher: Palala Press
  • Pages: 156
  • Catalogue: 9781356955039

Buy and sell old and new items
Search for this product on eBay

BCG may earn commission on sales generated through the links above.

  • Publisher: Arrow Books
  • Pages: 400
  • Catalogue: 9780099457053

Buy and sell old and new items
Search for this product on eBay

BCG may earn commission on sales generated through the links above.

  • Published: Tuesday 24th August 2010

BCG may earn commission on sales generated through the links above.

  • Published: Wednesday 22nd September 2010
  • Publisher: Random House

Buy and sell old and new items
Search for this product on eBay

BCG may earn commission on sales generated through the links above.

Not in the UK?

Fear not! Many items can still be ordered. Amazon in the UK delivers to many international territories, whilst their Australia, USA and Canada stores also supply many equivalent or imported items.

If you are in the North America, look out for US/Canadian flag icons on popular product listings for direct links.

If you order from a UK store, please note that the UK is in Region 2 and B, respectively, for DVDs and Blu-rays - check your player's compatibility, or look for multi-region products if you are located in another region.

If you are in Australia or New Zealand (DVD Region 4), note that almost all DVDs distributed in the UK by the BBC and 2entertain are encoded for both Region 2 and Region 4. The UK and Australasia are in the same Blu-ray region (B).

Share this page