What Happens Now to Michael Aptedâs Lifelong Project âUpâ?
His documentary series chronicled the lives of its subjects every seven years since 1964. Now the participants ponder whether it can carry on without him.
Michael Apted in 2012. His death last week left the fate of his decades-long project up in the air.Credit...Robert Yager for The New York Times
Jan. 14, 2021
Every seven years or so for more than half a century, the filmmaker Michael Apted returned to what he referred to as his lifeâs work: documenting the same ordinary people heâd known since they were 7 years old.
Michael Apted, "Up" Series and "The World Is Not Enough" Director, Dead at 79
Tobias Carroll, provided by
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Coal Miner’s Daughter and the James Bond adventure
The World Is Not Enough. Apted’s most lasting legacy as a filmmaker, however, may come from his work as a documentarian —
The Up Series, which followed the same group of people at 7-year intervals for over half a century, is regarded as a towering achievement in documentary film.
The Hollywood Reporter and other publications report that Apted has died at the age of 79, with Roy Ashton at the Gersh Agency confirming the news. No additional details have been provided at this time.
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Apted began his career in the 1960s, with Granada Television. Working as a researcher for the broadcaster, he gathered the school-age subjects for an episode of the current affairs program
World In Action. That 1964 documentary,
Seven Up!, depicted the lives of 14 seven-year-olds representing various British social classes; in 1970, those same children were profiled in a follow-up,
7 Plus Seven, this time directed by Apted. And so it was every seven years afterward, each subsequent
Up entry charting the trajectories of these eventually not-so-young people, and adding more facets to a staggering, one-of-a-kind nonfiction project.