BBC's Diary of Anne Frank 2009
New Drama Shown in Five Half-Hour Episodes Across the Week
Dec 24, 2008
It took the BBC two years to obtain the rights to the story of Anne and her fugitive Jewish family. The serial is being shown at 7:00pm over five nights, from Monday 5th January to Friday 9th.
It stars 18-year-old Ellie Kendrick as Anne, who, as a 13-year-old was forced to go into hiding with her family when the Nazis occupied Amsterdam in 1942.
The Franks moved into a secret annexe in the workplace of Anne’s father, Otto. They were joined by another family, the Van Daans, and a single man, Albert Dussel. Only four others knew of the hidden families – Mr Keiman, Mr Kugler, Bep and Miep – and they risked their lives to help them survive.
Ellie Kendrick Stars as Anne Frank
Anne Frank’s diary was published in 1947, has been translated into many languages and is studied in schools today. It describes her fears – they lived through air raids and dread of the Germans discovering them – her daily routine, and her frustrations of being a teen imprisoned in the annexe.
Ellie Kendrick, who has appeared in Lewis and Prime Suspect 7 on British TV, says, ‘Anne is this fascinating combination of immature teenager and contemplative, inspiring thinker – and she had such unfailing hope.
‘There's a real wit and verve that comes across in her diaries in the face of all her hardship, which no reader can help but like.’
'Anne Frank's Just a Teenage Kid, Quite Sarky'
Deborah Moggach, who adapted the diaries for the BBC, said, ‘Anne’s just a teenage kid, quite sarky [sarcastic].’
Of the families hiding in the annexe, Moggach said she wanted to ‘recreate them as people who have not been sanctified by history. Anne’s locked behind a bookcase with her parents, her sister and another family. And not only locked away but fearing for her life every day for two years.’
To depict the claustrophobia of the crowded hideout, the production company, Darlow Smithson, rebuilt the annexe to scale at a studio in the East End of London.
Iain Glenn, Tamsin Greig and Lesley Sharp in the Cast
Also starring are Iain Glenn as Otto Frank, Tamsin Greig as Anne’s mother, Edith, and Lesley Sharp as Petronella van Daan.
The diary has a rich heritage on stage and screen. There was a Pulitzer-winning play, and numerous TV adaptations, including ones made in 1967, 1980, 1987 and 2001. In 1988 Mary Steenburgen and Paul Scofield starred in The Attic: The Hiding of Anne Frank, based on Miep Gies’s book, Anne Frank Remembered.
Audrey Hepburn
The 1959 big-screen version, starring Millie Perkins, won three Oscars. Otto Frank's first choice of actress to portray his daughter was Audrey Hepburn. She was the same age as Anne, had read her diary – 'It destroyed me' – and had lived in the Nazi-occupied Netherlands. She eventually turned down the role, partly because she found the prospect of reliving the war too upsetting.
But Hepburn remained friends with Otto Frank until his death in 1980 and became patron of the Anne Frank Educational Trust UK. The Trust has a range of educational resources available for free download in conjunction with the BBC’s new serial.
Viewers will follow Anne’s story until the disturbing moment she and her family are discovered by an SS officer and Dutch police in 1944.
'Many People Feel Like They're Anne's Friends'
She eventually died in Belsen of typhus. Had she survived, she would have been 80 this year.
Ellie Kendrick admits she felt the burden of portraying Anne. ‘I was terrified. I almost started crying down the phone to my mum about it! I hope I've done justice to her, because Anne Frank is such a fantastic character. She leaps off the page.
‘Many people who have read the diaries almost feel like they're friends with her already.’
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