Gavin Friday, Guggi, Bono, Michael Stipe, Brandon Flowers, Dave Gahan and others tell the story of Anton Corbijn, “the ultimate insider who now finds himself outside the Hollywood system” in Shadow Play: The Making of Anton Corbijn, a documentary by Josh Whiteman now making the rounds on the festival circuit.
[Read more →]

‘The Man who saved With or Without You’. That’s how Bono describes Gavin in “New York Tumble” a new documentary to be aired on RTE TV in Ireland. Film maker Gary Jermyn filmed Bono, Gavin and Guggi in New York in 2001, talking about their friendship. It features interviews with celebrities such as The Edge, Jim Sheridan and Michael Stipe. Gavin takes the film crew to his favourite place in New York… a meeting with Hal Willner in the Chelsea Hotel.
The documentary was renamed ‘Made in Manhattan’ after the events of September 11, 2001.
Synopsis:
Presented by Gary Jermyn and featuring Bono, The Edge, Christy Turlington and Ed Burns, ‘Made in Manhattan’ drops in on two events which have gathered together international celebrities from the worlds of Rock, Fashion, Film and Art. The two events are U2 playing at Madison Square Garden, as well as Bono’s long time friend, artist Guggi, who is opening a major exhibition of his work in one of New York’s most prestigious Art Galleries. In the downtime between these two events, Gary Jermyn spends time with Bono, The Edge, Guggi, Christy Turlington, Gavin Friday and the actor and fiancee of Christy Turlington, Ed Burns, as they bring him to their favourite places in New York to discuss Creativity, Fame, Faith and Friendship.
Gary visits John Lennon’s memorial with Bono; goes on a guitar pilgrimage with The Edge to some of New York’s most famous music stores; does yoga with Christy Turlington and visits her secret favourite place in New York; plays chess with actor Ed Burns; and travels to The Chelsea Hotel with Gavin Friday to meet a very special person. All the action of the week culminates in The Tony Shafrazi Gallery where Bono introduces Guggi’s infamous tumble.
A Graph Films production for RTÉ

Verve pictures are releasing Stephen Kijak’s ‘Scott Walker – 30 Century Man’ in April of this year, featuring exclusive behind-the-scenes footage of the making of Walker’s latest album ‘The Drift’, as well as interviews with friends, collaborators, and fans including, among others:

David Bowie, Radiohead, Jarvis Cocker, Brian Eno, Damon Albarn, Neil Hannon, Alison Goldfrapp, Sting, Dot Allison, Simon Raymonde, Richard Hawley, Rob Ellis, Johnny Marr, Gavin Friday, Lulu, Peter Olliff, Angela Morley, Ute Lemper, Ed Bicknell, Evan Parker, Benjamin Biolay, Hector Zazou, Mo Foster, Phil Sheppard, Pete Walsh, and more.

‘Scott Walker – 30 Century Man’, executive-produced by David Bowie, has been invited to the 57th Berlin International Film Festival.

Read more about the film and watch the trailer.

RTE (Irish television) will screen Gavin’s film ‘Three Wishes For Kosovo’ on Friday, December 17th at 8.00pm on RTE 1

By Gavin Friday
From: Irish Independent, September 26, 1999
“Taxi, Barry’s Balloon’s Phibsboro, then I’m off to Artane to see ‘Joe’ the magic man” ” What’s the story Bud?” “I’m just getting a crash course in balloon magic….” “What are you doing, starting up a circus?”
“No, I’m going to Kosovo” “Kosovo? Why? Are you alright in the head?”
I sat back in the taxi… lit up a cigarette and thought… “Jesus, maybe I’m losing it?”
Kosovo? Why? I don’t really know, it’s all too convoluted and to tell the truth the ‘why?’ is not that important. Like most things in my life, I make it up as I go along… a planned accident. In May of this year, over a few pints myself and a couple of friends, Anne-Louise Kelly and Sheila Roche decided to do something constructive to help the plight of the refugees in Kosovo. We approached ‘Concern’ and offered our services to help fundraise.
We had lots of ideas: one was an art exhibition…. ‘Artists For Kosovo’. Laura Magahy and Aileen Corkery of Temple Bar Properties immediately jumped on board and with their huge support, the Dublin artistic community and the children of St. Audeon’s Christchurch National School produced an incredible body of work.
Another mad idea was a giant flying piggybank. Once again Temple Bar Properties and a cast of thousands helped us out here, but it was the surreal genius of the sculptor Laurent Mellet that brought the idea truly to life: ‘Muc’ the flying piggy bank.
Then in July, three weeks after the N.A.T.O ceasefire, on Concern’s request, we went to Kosovo to shoot a short film, as hundreds of thousands of Kosovar refugees returned to their homeland.
Nothing could have prepared me for what I experienced in the few days I was in Kosovo. From the moment we crossed the border at Macedonia the tension and fear was enough to make one vomit. I was frightened, the film crew were frightened. Everywhere looked and felt like hell on earth. Every village, town, city, we went to was flattened to the ground, and everywhere we went people asked us: “Do you want to film the dead bodies?”
Hundreds of boobytrapped bodies lay decomposing in fields, streams, on roads. Limbs, skeletons, scattered all over the place. Fathers, sons, uncles, missing – presumed dead. Thousands were massacred, mostly men. Strangely my most vivid memory is the smell, something I can’t even begin to describe.
On our last day of filming, we spent an afternoon with a group of refugee children. We played party games, painted pictures, I even got to do a bit of balloon magic (I was crap, so much for my crash course with ‘Joe’ the magic man) it was in this context one could feel some sense of optimism.
I asked the children if they had ‘Three Wishes For Kosovo’… what would they be. Nearly every child said the same wishes:
“To have peace in Kosovo”
“To have a new house”
“To have things the way they used to be”
I put the same question to Dominick McSorley (Head of Concern in Kosovo), and his response struck me deeply:
“I suppose if we could put Kosovo back in time… I think that would be my first wish, maybe to an extent there is a certain amount of guilt on our part, we probably should have seen some of this happening. The signs were there. This country was struggling, and for whatever reasons we didn’t notice it, unfortunately we noticed too late” “My second wish is for the children. That is the future, we have to accept that the adults have borne the brunt of this tragedy and they may never come to terms fully with what has happened – but if the children can be protected now, I think there is a future for this country. And I think that’s it… I haven’t got a third wish…..”
Today in Kosovo over one million refugees have returned to a devastated homeland. Most are homeless. What does the future hold for them longterm? I don’t know, but the immediate future holds one of the coldest and most vicious winters in all of Europe. Please Help.

Gavin has written a piece for this Sunday’s Independent (Irish newspaper) called ‘Three Wishes For Kosovo’. Muc the flying piggy bank’s website should be online this weekend Sunday and will carry the text of the piece on it. The URL of the site will be www.mucoink.com.

The video documentary ‘Three Wishes For Kosovo’ has been completed. The footage was filmed by Gavin Friday & crew in Kosovo earlier this summer. It will be shown on Irish television later this year.
Muc the Flying Piggy Bank, part of the Artists for Kosovo project, will start his tour of Ireland in Cork, 28th September at the National Ploughing Championships.