How RA spent Valentine's Day

Do you celebrate Valentine's Day? For my better half and I, this is just a day like any other day. We are always kissing and cuddling and we never leave the house without saying 'I love you', so we don't need a day to remind us how happy we are together.
 
But even though we don't buy each other fancy presents or go out to dinner, I know a certain Brit who has been rather busy on Valentine's Day over the years. ;-)

In 2001, Craig Parker turned on the charm for this pretty blonde...

Richard played Craig Parker in one episode of the BBC drama Casualty

In 2004, two ladies were fighting for the honour of being RA's Valentine...

Lucy Brown (Ann Latimer), Richard Armitage (John Thornton) and Daniela Denby-Ashe (Margaret Hale)
in the BBC's adaptation of Elizabeth Gaskell's North & South

And although this lady may have thought she had him hooked...

 

His heart showed him his one true love with one single yellow rose...

In 2005, Richard dressed up as Guy of Gisborne to present Lady Marian with a token of his regard for her:


Richard Armitage and Lucy Griffiths as Guy of Gisborne and Lady Marian
in episode 6 of season 1 of the BBC's Robin Hood (2006)

In 2006, we fell in love with Harry Kennedy, but he fell in love with Geraldine...

Richard Armitage and Dawn French as Harry Kennedy and Geraldine Granger in The Vicar of Dibley

In 2009, our spy-cam spotted senior case officer Lucas North on a romantic date with yet another pretty blonde. Well, anything's better than Sarah Caulfield, right?

Richard Armitage as Lucas North in Season 8 of Spooks

In 2010, RA hoped these lovely flowers would cheer up his love, as she was not feeling well and had to stay in hospital...

Richard Armitage played Sgt. John Porter in Chris Ryan's Strike Back

In 2011, he declared his love for all the world to see...

Richard Armitage leads his fellow cast members in the Powhiri ceremony
on the first day of filming for The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey in Wellington, New Zealand

In 2012, he sent Valentine cards to all his friends!

And in 2013, under a Black Sky or threatened by Dragon fire, whether on Valentine's Day or not, may our very own King Richard love with all his heart and find that special someone who says 'I love you' back to him.



Let's make him number 1!

As of today, Richard Armitage is ranked #2 on the IMDb Starmeter.

http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0035514/

Wouldn't it be great if he got to number 1?
I know Richard probably couldn't care less about his rank, as it's a popularity contest of the purest form and he has no interest in being popular whatsoever.

Richard Armitage promotes The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey in Toronto, Canada on 3 December 2012

But still, as a fan, I would love to see my favourite man in the top spot.
And, as it's so easy to make it happen, why not?

All you need to do is get as many different people as possible to go to the IMDb website and visit pages related to Richard Armitage. Not only his profile page, but also the pages of the projects he's been involved in: Spooks, Captain America, North and South, The Hobbit, Chris Ryan's Strike Back, Black Sky, The Phantom Menace, Robin Hood - it all counts.

So let's all do this and show our man that he is our number 1!

Thirty Days to Thorin (21) - Warrior voice

OK, so yesterday was the premiere of The Hobbit:An Unexpected Journey in New York. Can I just say that Richard looked absolutely amazing!! There will be more about the fashion of the premieres soon, but I wanted to share this "Soundbites" video with you first.

In this video, Richard talks about Thorin, about Thorin's reasons for going on the quest to reclaim Erebor and about how safe he feels in the hands of Peter Jackson who "has the entire film in his head" and "knows this character better than I do".

The content of this interview is really nothing new: over the last week or so, we've seen more interviews with RA than we had in the last 2 years, so all of these questions have come up at some point. But this video is still very much worth watching - or rather, it's very much worth listening to.

As you can see, this was taped while filming for The Hobbit was still ongoing - hence the beard (by the way, I still love that beard, even though RA looks stunning without it). And I think Richard is still very much in Thorin-mode here: his voice is very deep, he speaks very slowly and deliberately - this is not Richard! No, I honestly think we are looking at Thorin, dressed up as Richard.

In the beginning of this video, although you can't hear the question, it's obviously "tell me about your character in this film" or something like that. I can almost see a look of frustration on RAs face. It's as if he's offended because some 'human' has basically said "who the hell are you?" and is not giving the King Under The Mountain the proper greeting and acknowledgements. When you get as immersed into a character as RA usually does, it must be very difficult to remind yourself who you really are, especially when you're asked to do interviews in between shoots.
He's talked before about how difficult it was for him to be friendly to fans when he was on his way to set to film a scene for Robin Hood. He would be so deep into the evil Guy of Gisbourne, that it was almost impossible to quickly become Richard again and smile and sign autographs. So now that he's been living as Thorin for the last 18 months, it must have been quite a recovery process to find the real Richard again.

Anyway, watch the video here. I would love to hear if you see what I see!

A birthday countdown in pictures (#16)

There's finally proof of Richard's return to designer stubble. The beard is indeed gone! As you all know by now, I really loved that beard. But I have to admit that it's good to see his face again. Basically, it's just good to see him: it looks like the RA drought is finally over!

As those new pictures were all over the Twitter and Facebook today, I decided not to post them here. Actually, I suddenly realised that after 16 days of this countdown, I have not posted one single picture of Richard as Guy of Gisbourne. (This one doesn't really count, right?) Shame on me!!

So, I tried to find the very best picture of Sir Guy but, as you can probably guess, that's an impossible task as almost every single one of them looks incredible.

Here's my favourite Black Knight:

One thing I've realised, looking at my selection: I like him in close-up! :-)

Whenever I think of Richard playing King Richard III, I imagine him looking like Guy of Gisbourne. That reminds me, I have a review to publish of a book about the reign of Richard III. So much to do, so little time... :-) That's coming soon!

Enjoy your Guy Day tomorrow!

What's a birthday without a birthday present? But what do you get the man who's living his dream?
This year, consider donating to one of Richard's selected charities (Shelter, The Salvation Army, Childline and Barnardo's) - visit his Just Giving page. Thank you!

A birthday countdown in pictures (#12)

If you visited this blog during FanstRAvaganza 3 last March, you have probably seen the post in which I talk about a picture of Ricky Deeming. At the time, I selected that picture because it showed so many things that I love about Richard Armitage. But today, I want to show you the pictures of Ricky that took my breath away - and they continue to do that every time I look at them...

Hey Ricky!

He still manages to blow my mind...

Richard played Ricky Deeming only once, for the pilot episode of George Gently, which was first shown in April 2007. If I've calculated this correctly, he must have been filming this during a break in the production of (Season 2 of) Robin Hood. That's probably why I see so much of Guy of Gisbourne in Ricky, and that's always a good thing!

What's a birthday without a birthday present? But what do you get the man who's living his dream?
This year, consider donating to one of Richard's selected charities (Shelter, The Salvation Army, Childline and Barnardo's) - visit his Just Giving page. Thank you!

A birthday countdown in pictures (#4)

This is day 4 of my countdown to 22 August. Can you believe that it's almost 1 year ago that we celebrated Richard Armitage's milestone 40th birthday? Phew, time flies!!

For some weekend fun, I would like to present a picture that I personally think is absolutely hilarious! I only discovered it today, but otherwise I would have added it to my previous post about Richard's height.

Here's Richard Armitage in the BBC's Robin Hood, episode 2 of season 2.

As always, a big THANK YOU to www.richardarmitagenet.com for the picture

Richard plays Sir Guy of Gisborne, the very tall, dark and handsome Black Knight.
Very tall indeed, 6'2.5'' to be exact. That's 189.25cm.
Next to him is Dexter Fletcher who played Count Friedrich in the episode 'Booby and the Beast'. 
Dexter is 5'6'', that's 168cm.

The camera angle of this picture captures the difference perfectly and shows off Richard's incredible physical presence. That physical presence is exactly one of the reasons why I'm eagerly looking forward to The Hobbit: his regal elegance combined which a deep, velvet voice and brooding, sorrowful blue eyes will capture the attention of audiences all over the world. And from that moment on, they will love him just as much as we already do... well, maybe not quite as much ;-)

What's a birthday without a birthday present? But what do you get the man who's living his dream?
This year, consider donating to one of Richard's selected charities (Shelter, The Salvation Army, Childline and Barnardo's) - visit his Just Giving page. Thank you!