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Blenheim Palace

Blenheim Palace has frequently been the setting for books, TV programs and films and other events. These include:

Architectural historian Dan Cruickshank selected the Palace as one of his four choices for the 2002 BBC television documentary series Britain's Best Buildings.

Blenheim Horse Trials is an annual three-day event rated CCI*** (the second highest level of eventing), and Blenheim hosted the European Eventing Championships in 2005.

Blenheim on film and TV

• Transformers: The Last Knight (2017)
• Fan (2016)
• The BFG (2016)
• Spectre (2015) - doubling for SPECTRE's meeting in central Rome
• Rogue Nation (2015)
• The Royals (2015)
• Cinderella (2015) (Cinderella arrives at the ball)
• The Amazing Race 25 (2014)
• A Little Chaos (2013)
• Gulliver's Travels (2010)
• Lewis (2009) – Episode 3.03: The Point of Vanishing
• The Young Victoria (2009)
• Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007) (Snape's flashback by the Black Lake as a Hogwarts student with The Marauders)
• The Libertine (2005)
• The Lost Prince (2003)
• The Four Feathers (2002)
• Kabhi Khushi Kabhi Gham (2001)
• Entrapment (1999)
• The Avengers (1998)
• Hamlet (1996) – The incumbent Duke has a role as a Norwegian captain. Only the exteriors of the palace were used.
• Inspector Morse: The Way Through the Woods (1995)
• Black Beauty (1994)
• Orlando (1992)
• Tonight Live with Steve Vizard (Australian TV Tonight Show) (1992)
• King Ralph (1991)
• Without a Clue (1988)
• Treasure Houses of Britain (1985)
• Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes (1984)
• The Scarlet Pimpernel (1982)
• Winston Churchill: The Wilderness Years (1981)
• History of the World, Part I (1981)
• Barry Lyndon (1975)
• The Legend of Hell House (1973)
• Young Winston (1972)
• Half A Sixpence (1967)

Other media

The BBC Radio Four programme Just a Minute was recorded (twice) at Blenheim with Clement Freud, Derek Nimmo, Peter Jones and Kit Hesketh-Harvey. They were broadcast in 1998.

In 2019 Blenheim was the subject of news-coverage concerning the exhibition and later theft of Maurizio Cattelan's sculpture America, a gold toilet.

Blenheim in fiction

• The setting for T. H. White's novel Mistress Masham's Repose is a huge, ruined estate called Malplaquet. While this is an obvious parody of Blenheim Palace, it is also related to the landscape, architecture and local geography of Stowe School where T.H. White taught for many years.
• In Neil Simon's play Brighton Beach Memoirs, (and the film adaptation), Eugene mentions "Blenheim Castle" in the dinner scene.
• There is a scene in a partially finished Blenheim Palace in The System of the World, the last volume of Neal Stephenson's Baroque Cycle. John Churchill also plays a prominent role in the last book.
• Blenheim features prominently in Karen Harper’s historical fiction account of Consuelo Vanderbilt’s life in the book American Duchess.
• Blenheim Palace, the 9th Duke, Consuelo Vanderbilt and Gladys Deacon feature prominently in Robin Paige's novel Death at Blenheim Palace.
• In Alan Hollinghurst, The Sparsholt Affair, the use of the Palace for secret war work is the background for undergraduate life at Oxford University.

• The novel "A Weekend at Blenheim", by J.P Morrissey, published 2002 by Thomas Dunne Books "A superb reconstrction of the aristocratic autumn of Edwardian England...a gripping tale of intrigue."-Iain Pears, author of An Instance of the Fingerpost

"In richly textured description J.P Morgan evokes a period and place - Blenheim Palace in the very early 1900s - rarely (if ever) touched upon in fiction. The characters are a delight: Winston Churchill (in his youth, which prtery much foretells his age); John Singer Sargent (deliciously at his peak); the Duchess of Marlborough (up to no good) among them. A winning mystery." -Martha Grimes, author of the bestselling Richard Jury series.

Blenheim in art

American musician Barry Manilow performed a concert for over 40,000 fans on the grounds of the Palace on August 27, 1983. The recorded concert was released on VHS and later on DVD as "Barry Manilow: The Concert at Blenheim Palace."

The British painter John Piper (1903–1992) was commissioned to paint scenes in the grounds of the palace during the 1980s. In 2012, an exhibition of the artist's work entitled John Piper at Blenheim Palace was held in a room at the palace to commemorate the 20th anniversary of Piper's death.

In October 2004, British jazz-pop pianist Jamie Cullum released "Live at Blenheim Palace," a 145-minute live concert DVD of his performance at the Blenheim Palace Music Festival on 1 July 2004.