Cage-a-rama is Scotland’s first Nicolas Cage film festival, co-founded and programmed by Matchbox Cineclub’s Sean Welsh and Megan Mitchell. Founded in 2018, the annual festival runs at Glasgow’s Centre for Contemporary Arts every January, to mark Cage’s birthday. Cage-a-rama branched out into spin-off events in 2019, beginning with Cage-a-rama 3D at Edinburgh International Film Festival.
Cage-a-rama 2020 | The third annual event took place on Friday 3rd, Saturday 4th and Sunday 5th January 2020 at CCA, Glasgow. Throughout the festival weekend, we were joined by Marco Kyris, Nicolas Cage’s official stand-in for over a decade and the height of his box office powers, who also joined National Treasure: Nicolas Cage author Lindsay Gibb for a special in-conversation event. We hosted the UK premieres of new Cage films Grand Isle and Primal and an anniversary screening of his Oscar-winning Leaving Las Vegas, complete with a specially-recorded Mike Figgis introduction.
Following our Glasgow festival, we took Marco Kyris on a brief Cage-a-rama Uncaged UK tour, hitting London’s Genesis Cinema and Bristol’s Improv Theatre (with Bristol Bad Film Club).
Cage-a-rama 3D 2019 | In 2019, Cage-a-rama joined the Edinburgh International Film Festival programme for a special event presenting two latter-day Cage classics as they were meant to be seen – in eye-popping 3D. EIFF allowed us to screen these films in state of the art 3D, with high-end, battery-powered 3D glasses and beautifully crisp transfers of the films – Ghost Rider: Spirits of Vengeance and Drive Angry have never looked better.
Cage-a-rama 2: Cage Uncaged | In 2019, we fully unleashed the wild side of Cage with nine films, classic and brand-new, featuring the Oscar-winner’s most iconic meltdowns, freakouts and outbursts. The line-up included: Mandy (with Casper Kelly + Shane Morton Q&A), Army of One, Bad Lieutenant: Port of Call New Orleans, The Wicker Man, Mom & Dad (with Brian Taylor Q&A), Adaptation, Vampire’s Kiss (with Maria Conchita Alonso Q&A), Nic Cage Birthday Quiz, Wild At Heart (with Barry Gifford pre-recorded interview), Between Worlds (UK premiere) (with Maria Pulera and David Hillary Q&A), Cage-a-rama 2 afterparty at Nice N Sleazy
The festival also featured a range of bonus content, including Cage’s 55th Birthday Quiz and Going Full Cage, a live event hosted by Tara Judah (Watershed Cinema producer) and Ti Singh (Bristol Bad Film Club founder and author).
Cage-a-rama | The inaugural, sold-out Cage-a-rama festival took place on Saturday 06/01/18 and Sunday 07/01/18 at Centre for Contemporary Arts, Glasgow. Over two days, we explored two facets of the unfathomable diamond that is Cage, starting with Cage the Fighter and the Holy Trinity of The Rock (1996) and Face/Off (1997) and Con Air (1997). Day two (Nicolas Cage’s 54th birthday) presented the gentler side of Nicolas, with Cage the Lover: Valley Girl (1983), Moonstruck (1987) and Raising Arizona (1987).
Marco Kyris, Cage’s stand-in on film productions from 1994 to 2005, introduced day one of Cage-a-rama 2018 via video before returning for a live Skype Q&A. The Saturday also featured a special Cavalcade of Cage supporting programme of rare clips, trailers and other work. Canadian academic Lindsay Gibb (author of National Treasure: Nicolas Cage) and the hosts of #CageCast, Joey Lewandowski & Mike Manzi, lent contributions to day two, which kicked off with a Nicolas Cage Birthday Brunch and Quiz.
Williams Bros Brewery were sponsors of Cage-a-rama 2018, providing refreshments all weekend.
Launching the festival, co-founder Sean Welsh said: “It’s high time we brought Nicolas Cage to Scotland. Since Cage appeared in person at the CAGED festival in Austin, Texas, earlier this year, we realised the only way to conjure the man himself was to start our own film festival in tribute. If this doesn’t work, next year we’ll burn a wicker effigy of him in Glasgow Green.”
cagearama@matchboxcineclub.com
Poster illustrations by Vero Navarro.