Sally Potter’s Orlando (1992) is one of the most radical and enduring films in British cinema. Based on Virginia Woolf’s 1928 novel, it follows Orlando, a young Elizabethan nobleman who, by royal decree, does not age — and who, four centuries later, wakes up one morning as a woman. The story begins in 1600, when the aging Queen Elizabeth I — played by Quentin Crisp — takes a shine to the young nobleman Orlando and grants him a magnificent estate on a single condition: “Do not fade. Do not wither. Do not grow old.” Orlando takes the Queen at her word. And doesn’t age. Swept through the centuries by romantic adventure, artistic ambition, political intrigue, and one extraordinary morning of transformation, Orlando arrives in the present day free — finally — of the constraints of destiny, gender, and the past. Seen today, in the context of the ongoing debate about trans rights and who is permitted to exist in public life, Orlando speaks with a new urgency. It is a film about the freedom to simply be oneself — across time, across gender, across everything the world insists you must be. Join us after the screening for a panel discussion hosted by actor Lexa Rowley, with a video message from Sally Potter. Panellists include writer and director Adrian Goycoolea, Quentin Crisp’s great-nephew, queer film scholar Kit Bradbury-Rance, filmmaker and activist Fox Fisher, and composer Nick Hudson — the creative team behind Do Not Fade, a new short film directly inspired by Orlando and by the trans identity of Quentin Crisp.