
THE NAME of our borough continues its march into the world of celebrity as the Hackney Picturehouse becomes “a destination”.
The poor loves in the fame game do not choose to be limoed to the middle of Hackney: they just do what the film company/management/publicists tells them. Nevertheless, the result is that Hollywood-style glamour is coming to what was one of the grimmest urban centres in London, the streets around the town hall square in E8.
The latest showbiz stunt had a slew of slebs parading along the red carpet for a clutch of men and one woman waving huge-lensed Nikons and Canons at the cast of Pusher, a crime feature filmed partly in the area, as Loving Dalston reported last year, and launched at the Picturehouse this week.
Once the likeliest place in the vicinity to see stars was the foyer of the Hackney Empire on the occasions it was used for big-name productions: Ralph Fiennes in 1995 and other great actors performed there — but they looked as if they had got lost on their way to the West End.

Once the Picturehouse group set up in Mare Street, more celebrities started to find their way there.
So if you want to get close to the famous, keep an eye on the cinema’s programme to choose your time for spotting these media manipulations. Many film-lovers, however, will deliberately avoid the cinema on those days. Who wants to have to push past impossibly good-looking people and gawping gormless fans?
Sad to report but the C-list slebs’ posing for paparazzi this week is probably not going to save this 89-minute remake of a Danish movie from two-star reviews. Still, the participants are good at posing, as you can see here.
* Pusher goes on show on Fri 12 Oct 2012.
