PHILIP McHUGH has been many things – singer, artist, writer, poet, film-maker and house-husband. Now you can add actor to the list.
Birkenhead-born McHugh, 30, is the star of a new film, Eternal Youth, commissioned from film-makers Al Taylor and Al Holmes by Liverpool’s FACT.
It runs for 23 minutes but for AL + AL, as the film-makers are billed, it is almost an epic. Previous films like Perpetual Motion in the Land of Milk and Honey ran for 6mins, Interstellar Stella for 12.
The film-makers work with blue screen technology which means they mix live action with computerised images.
For McHugh it meant performing in front of a screen with all the sur- roundings added by computer. “It was a strange experience,” he said.
He had shown experimental short films of his own at FACT, in one performing at Speaker’s Rock at Egremont, in another singing for 30 minutes and then cutting it all back to three minutes of film.
He entered one in a selection being viewed by the two Als. “They asked if I would be in their film and I was buzzing.”
In Eternal Youth, McHugh plays a singer named Winston Glory who is the subject of an assassination attempt by a fan.
As a performer, he was able to do the singing required of his charac-ter Winston Glory, so much so that McHugh and his screen character are getting a little confused.
He has already recorded an album under the name of Winston Glory and there are hopes he may perform them as Winston in the film run at FACT from April 18.
Eighteen months ago, London based AL + AL transferred to Edge Hill Station in Liverpool where the artists’ group METAL is setting up an arts community.
* ETERNAL Youth is at FACT, Wood Street, from April 18-June 8.
