THE Lady in the Van will be the next film to be screened at the Forest Community Centre as part of its Food and Film programme.

The Forest Community Cinema screening will be at Bordon’s Forest Community Centre on Friday, March 18.

The bar will open at 7pm, when those who have pre booked (by March 14) will also be able to sit down to eat a curry at the centre. The curry will be cooked by Whitehill’s Dhanmondi tandoori restaurant (in Petersfield Road).

The film will start at 7.45pm. Written by Alan Bennett, it stars Maggie Smith, who recently won the Evening Standard’s best-actress accolade for her performance.

The Lady in the Van tells the true story of Alan Bennett’s strained friendship with Miss Mary Shepherd, an eccentric homeless woman whom Bennett befriended in the 1970s before allowing her, temporarily, to park her Bedford van in the driveway of his Camden home. She stayed there for 15 years.

As the story develops Bennett learns that Miss Shepherd (who died in 1989) was really Margaret Fairchild, a former gifted pupil of the pianist Alfred Cortot.

Tickets, priced £13 with curry and £5 without, are available in advance by calling 01420 488978 or visiting forestcommunitycentre.co.uk.