Cate Blanchett
Cate Blanchett
Catherine Élise "Cate" Blanchettis an Australian actress and theatre director. She has received international acclaim and many accolades, including two Academy Awards, three Screen Actors Guild Awards, three Golden Globe Awards, and three British Academy Awards. Blanchett came to international attention for her role as Elizabeth I of England in Shekhar Kapur's 1998 film Elizabeth, for which she won the BAFTA Award for Best Actress, the Golden Globe Award, and earned her first Academy Award for Best Actress nomination. Her...
NationalityAustralian
ProfessionMovie Actress
Date of Birth14 May 1969
CityMelbourne, Australia
CountryAustralia
Men are boys for such a long time and really don't start getting the great roles until they're in their mid-thirties. But then they've got a long time to do them, whereas for women, it's all about playing younger and younger and younger.
Playing the lead in a film where you shoot for three months away from home is not an easy thing for me when my children are in school and my husband is running a theatre company.
I never feel particularly comfortable holding a gun, but when you're playing somebody who lived in the frontier southwest, guns are a part of their life. Anyone who lives on land has a gun.
When anyone plays a mother on film, there is a whole raft of judgment in that a mother is a particular archetype or that every mother is the same. That's complete rubbish.
I think the height of ridiculousness was when I was playing Elizabeth in 'The Golden Age' while preparing to start shooting 'I'm Not There.' I literally finished filming Elizabethan grandeur on Friday, flew to Montreal, and started being Bob Dylan on Monday.
I remember thinking, when I was playing Hedda Gabler, that several sequences of the play were utterly absurd.
I always dressed as a man when I was at school. I loved wearing a tie and a shirt, and I was always wearing suits. Annie Lennox was my hero. I was always playing men in high school.
That's why so many people want to play Hamlet: because it's a completely demarked role, and the actor playing it has to be prepared, through the language, to allow the audience to see into who he is.
It's part of my job. You can't play Veronica Guerin sounding like this. It just wouldn't wash. But what I find fascinating about doing an accent - unless it's a farce - is that it's not slapped on.
I love theatre - it's where I started - and I've directed a play myself. I'm not sure if I want to direct a film, but certainly, as an actress, I'm always thinking, 'Surely this must be my last film.'
I think we should all feel lucky and blessed that people are still, in this day and age, getting in their cars with other people and driving to a location and paying money to sit in a theater and watch a play.
No, it's very comforting actually, to know that you're sitting in a long legacy of actresses who've played the role. I'm absolutely all for absorbing all of those influences, so you understand the pedigree of the part as much as you understand the figure in history... because you are playing the part. You don't say: "Gosh, I want to play Peter Sellers..." because you can sort of do that in your own bathroom.
I've been pretty lucky in the leading men department.
I've been mostly influenced by experiences in the theater growing up.