Julie Andrews to attend Jameson Dublin Film Festival

Dame Julie Andrews, one of cinema's most durable stars, is to attend two special events at next month's Jameson Dublin International Film Festival (JDIFF).

The actress will take part in a public interview at the Bord Gáis Energy Theatre and will then close the festival with a gala screening of The Sound of Music, currently celebrating its half-century, at the Savoy Cinema on O'Connell Street.

“The Festival is honoured to welcome Dame Julie Andrews to Dublin to introduce the 50th anniversary screening of The Sound of Music,” Grainne Humphreys, the Festival Director, commented. “Of all the illustrious guests who have attended the festival, few have brought such happiness to so many film fans.”

Aedín Gormley, host of the Movies and Musicals show on RTÉ Lyric FM, is to conduct the interview.

Originally a child actor, Dame Julie rose to fame as Eliza Doolittle in the Broadway production of My Fair Lady. She lost the part in the film version to Audrey Hepburn - whose singing was dubbed - but took famous revenge when she won the best actress Oscar for the incomparable Mary Poppins.

The Sound of Music, released in 1965, was briefly the highest-grossing film of all time and has enjoyed endless successful revivals over intervening decades. Married to the film director Blake Edwards until his death in 2010, Andrews later appeared in such successful films as Victor Victoria, SOB and The Princess Diaries.

It had earlier been confirmed that Russell Crowe is to attend JDIFF for the premiere of The Water Diviner, the Australian actor's directorial debut. Based on a true story, the film stars Crowe as a father searching for the remains of three sons, believed to have been killed in the assault on Gallipoli during the first World War. The screening will take place a few weeks before the centenary of that traumatic moment in Australian history.

Other confirmed guests include the actor Kim Cattrall, star of Sex and the City.

This year’s Jameson Dublin International Film Festival runs from March 19th until March 29th. The full programme will be launched on Wednesday February 25th.