Black Hawk Down star Ewan McGregor is once again to team up with his actor/director uncle Denis Lawson, this time to make a TV movie. The new film, which Denis wrote and is to direct, focuses on the story of an ad exec who begins to apply to his own life a mathematical concept discovered in some diaries he inherits from a relative.
It is not the first time Ewan, who this week picked up a best actor gong at the UK’s Empire Awards for his role in Moulin Rouge, has collaborated with his uncle. They worked together on the West End theatre project Little Malcolm And His Struggle Against The Eunuchs, which Denis directed.
The pair have always had a strong relationship and it was Denis, who played the ace pilot Wedge Antilles in the first episode of the Star Wars series, who inspired his nephew to take up acting. A year’s studying drama in Kirkcaldy, Fife, was followed by a stint at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama with Ewan later being launched into the public consciousness with his role in Trainspotting.
The family’s cinematic link came full circle when Ewan followed in his uncle’s footsteps by landing the coveted role of the young Obi Wan Kenobi in the Stars Wars prequel Episode One: The Phantom Menace.