One Day star among actors reading from International Booker Prize shortlist
One Day star Ambika Mod and The Tick actor Peter Serafinowicz are among the famous faces selected to bring their “hugely gratifying” readings of the International Booker Prize shortlist to a series of films.
Booker, which has been releasing the films with well-known actors for its two annual prizes since 2022, believes the extract readings encourage more people to get interested in the prestigious book awards, especially on social media.
The 2025 line-up also includes Bohemian Rhapsody and A Cruel Love: The Ruth Ellis Story actress Lucy Boynton, Stath Lets Flats actor Jamie Demetriou, Black Doves actor Omari Douglas, and Slow Horses actress Rosalind Eleazar.
Mod, who was born in Hertfordshire to Indian parents, read a part of Heart Lamp by Banu Mushtaq, a book about the lives of women and girls in Muslim communities in southern India.
Serafinowicz, who recently appeared as a love interest in Amandaland and presents the Netflix psychological game show Million Dollar Secret, recites from French author Anne Serre’s A Leopard-Skin Hat about friendship and mental health.
Gaby Wood, chief executive of the Booker Prize Foundation, said: “It’s hugely gratifying to see this come to fruition.
“Since we started making these ‘film trailers for books’ three years ago they have been seen over a hundred million times, and their release has become one of the most anticipated moments of our prizes calendar.
“We’re hugely grateful to the incredibly talented people we’ve been lucky enough to work with on these short films, including our director for this year’s International Booker Prize shortlist films, Roxy Rezvany.
“We hope that as well as inspiring more readers to pick up the books, they showcase the best contemporary fiction in translation for the award-winning screenwriters and directors of tomorrow.”
The films are part of a tradition of Booker Prizes adaptations, after more than 70 longlisted or shortlisted books have been filmed for the big and small screen, including Sir Kazuo Ishiguro’s The Remains Of The Day, Sally Rooney’s Normal People and Michael Ondaatje’s The English Patient.
The six shorts were directed by Roxy Rezvany, who has been Bifa-nominated for domestic abuse short Honesty, and released the opera-documentary Photo Booth (2022) about penguins, Palestine, and queer themes.
Previous performers include London-born singer Dua Lipa, Poldark star Eleanor Tomlinson, Pulp frontman Jarvis Cocker, Homeland actor David Harewood, Bridgerton actress Adjoa Andoh, Irish comedian Aisling Bea, and Outlander actor Tobias Menzies.
Rezvany said: “All the books hold such vibrant worlds, so the approach was simply to lean into what excited us about the writing.
“It was a privilege to bring the work of all the nominated writers to life in some small way through these films.”
Boynton read On The Calculation Of Volume I, a story of waking up on the same day every day, by Solvej Balle, and Douglas recited English Channel migrants fiction Small Boat by Vincent Delecroix.
Eleazar read from Under The Eye Of The Big Bird, speculative fiction about humans nearly dying out, by Hiromi Kawakami and Demetriou took Perfection, focused on a couple feeling trapped in a middle class existence, by Vincenzo Latronico.
The 2025 International Booker Prize winner, who will receive £50,000 to share with their translator, will be announced at the Tate Modern, London, on May 20.
