“It’s more a story of working-class struggle than anything else”: Kempton Bunton’s grandson Christopher Bunton on The Duke

From the director of iconic rom-com Notting Hill, comes this offbeat retelling of a true story of an unlikely heist mission in 1960s Newcastle. Roger Michell, who sadly passed about just weeks after The Duke premiered at the Venice Film Festival in September 2021, elicits some fantastic performances from national treasures Jim Broadbent and Helen Mirren as the eccentric, idealist, aspiring playwright Kempton Bunton and his put-upon, toilet-scrubbing wife Dorothy.

Working-class Bunton is determined to stick it to the man and find his own small ways to rebel against the lot he is has been given in stuffy British life, which starts as a refusal to pay his TV licence but then escalates to standing on trial for stealing one of the country’s most famous paintings, Francisco Goya’s portrait of the Duke of Wellington.

Brimming with nostalgia without being over-sentimental, sharply witty without resorting to over-the-top comedy and subtly poignant about issues such as grief, class and social justice, this is a heartwarming tale of standing up for what you believe in, whoever you are. That some of the script, such as Bunton’s moment on the stand, is taken almost word for word from the transcript, is a testament to what a funny and inspiring man he was.

The Upcoming had the pleasure of chatting to Kempton Bunton’s grandson, Christopher Bunton, about the journey to his grandfather’s story being told on the big screen, how it felt to have screen veterans Broadbent and Mirren starring in the film and its funny tone and inspirational message. 

Sarah Bradbury

The Duke is released nationwide on 25^th February 2022.

Watch the trailer for The Duke here: