Fry lands clairvoyant role in Sellers biopic

Stephen Fry is to appear in a screen biography of Peter Sellers, playing his trusted clairvoyant.

He has landed the part of the self-styled mystic Maurice Woodruff, who gave Sellers advice on every aspect of his life and career.

However, film-makers soon learned of his controlling influence on the insecure star, and would bribe him to offer favourable advice about taking roles in their movies.

The story is to be retold in the TV biopic The Life And Death Of Peter Sellers, based on Roger Lewis's definitive biography.

Geoffrey Rush will star as Sellers, and Charlize Theron as Britt Ekland. Model Sophie Dahl has landed the cameo part of Ursula Andress, who Sellers met while filming the James Bond spoof Casino Royale.

Work on the film has just started in Shepperton Studios.

How astrology shaped Sellers's life

Published: 7 May 2003