No Ordinary Joe

The final hours of Joe Carstairs, “the fastest woman on water”, and her constant companion, Lord Tod Wadley—a toy doll.

Stop-motion master Barry Purves demonstrates his knack for inventive storytelling in this imaginative retelling of the life of heiress Marion "Joe" Carstairs. Openly gay and a champion powerboat racer in the 1920s, Lindsay Duncan portrays Carstairs in a two-hander with a puppet of her beloved Steiff doll, a gift from a girlfriend that remained her constant companion until her death in 1993.