Uncool, according to Cate

From: The Sunday Mail, 2005-08-25
Date added: 2005-09-09

Australian movie and stage actor Cate Blanchett is renowned for ignoring her superstar status. So the Oscar winner was more than happy for co-star Noni Hazlehurst to grab the limelight while filming Little Fish in Sydney's Little Saigon.

The Melbourne-born star of Elizabeth and The Aviator discovered that Hazlehurst's time in Play School and Better Homes and Gardens had more impact with Cabramatta's bustling multi-cultural population than a British royal and Hollywood legend Katharine Hepburn.

Blanchett, who won a Golden Globe as Elizabeth I and a best supporting actress Academy Award as Hepburn, says the film crew had no trouble fitting into the suburb's colourful market life.

"Most of the time everyone was too busy getting on with their own lives to worry about us and our film, but Noni caused a bit of a stir," she said with a laugh.

"I think our director, Rowan Woods was a little shocked and perhaps a little disappointed with the lack of interest in me but it gave me a chance to talk to some people seriously about the role of Tracy Heart.

"I was glad that Noni received the attention because she's a wonderful actress who goes through a whole range of emotions like a maelstrom."

Blanchett, who was filming the contemporary drama on the streets of Sydney at the end of 2004 along with Hugo Weaving and Sam Neill, says Little Fish puts characters who rarely get seen in Australian movies under the microscope.

"These characters, who had so many exciting dreams in their 20s but are forced to re-apprentice themselves to their parents in their 30s, come from an uncool and unfashionable side of society," she said.

"I see the actor's role as a kind of anthropologist where we get the chance to get under a character's skin and look at them from a human perspective. "I am not going to pretend that I am familiar with Tracy's world, but as I see her she's a woman at 32 who is desperately trying to put her life in order after coming out of a drug addiction."

This confronting streetwise drama from Woods - whose debut feature The Boys caused a stir in 1997 - centres on the Heart family and deals with a myriad issues including drug use, homosexuality and organised crime.

Central character Tracy (Blanchett) works in a video shop but is desperate to raise the $30,000 needed to start her own business while coping with the dysfunctional people around her such as ex-footy star and drug-addicted homosexual Lionel Dawson (Weaving) and crippled brother Ray (Martin Henderson).

The Heart family's battling matriarch Janelle (Hazlehurst), who refers to daughter Tracy as "her shiny, shiny girl" brings the power of motherhood and family life to the film, which resonates with Blanchett.

The star, who rose to fame following her major feature debut in Bruce Beresford's Paradise Road in 1997, has often been seen as an actor's actor in the tradition of Meryl Streep.

Blanchett, 36, who is married to script writer and continuity man Andrew Upton and has two small boys, also has strong family ties which have often had as much influence on her decisions as the quality of roles offered.

The daughter of an ex-US navy man and advertising consultant from Texas and a teacher mum, Cate had an idyllic childhood until her father died suddenly when she was 10.

Blanchett, a talented classical musician, was sitting at the piano practising when her dad, Bob, passed the window and waved goodbye for the last time before falling dead nearby.

The actress credits the trauma of that farewell with having turned her into an obsessive-compulsive who couldn't leave the house without a farewell ritual of kissing everyone goodbye.

She also became a perfectionist.

The young Blanchett spent some time on the road before heading to Australia's National Institute of Dramatic Art, where she was recognised as a major talent by her teachers and fellow actors such as long-time friend Geoffrey Rush.

When the actress took on a series of smaller but interesting roles following the success of Elizabeth, Rush noted that she was laying down the foundations of a long-term plan to be an actress rather than a star.

Blanchett, who has shrugged off accolades such as being named one of the world's most beautiful women, has nominated family and her art as two of the most important things in her life.

With that in mind she worked with the Sydney Theatre Company in the title role of Hedda Gabler last year and now the production - which featured an adaptation by husband Upton, and co-stars Hugo Weaving - is heading to New York in March next year.

"When the boys - Dashiell and Roman - go to school we might consider returning to Australia because I would like them to be with their peers, but I also believe that in this day and age travel is important. It gives you a better understanding of the world."

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