Actors? Vagrants With A Whore's Profession

You have to tell that woman first that she has class. There she acts coy -not uncharmingly. But after that is clarified, she really gets going. And then she is brilliant.

From: Sueddeutsche Zeitung, 2005-03-20
Date added: 2005-11-22

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Thank you Layara for translating!

Cate Blanchett, 35, is one of the most versatile and brilliant actresses in film today. She was born in Melbourne in Australia and received her training at the National Institute of Dramatic Art. First successes she celebrated with the Sydney Theatre Company and on Australian television, before she had her international break-through as "Elizabeth" in Shekhar Kapur's queen-drama. Worldwide fame came with her performance as Galadriel in Peter Jackson's "Lord of the Rings" trilogy, critics celebrated her in movies like "Heaven" or "Veronica Guerin". In her newest work "The Life Aquatic" she plays a pregnant journalist on a nautical mission. She lives with her husband, screen-writer Andrew Upton, and her sons Dashiell (3) and Roman (1) in London.

SZaW: Mrs Blanchett, do you feel mentally fit [in the sense of being on the ball] enough for a conversation about class?

Blanchett: Class in which sense? Like: "that woman has class"?

SZaW: Exactly: When one does have class, and when not.

Blanchett: As a start we should pick a personality who definitely has class.

SZaW: You are welcome.

Blanchett: I suggest Katharine Hepburn, because I played that woman recently. Agree?

SZaW: Absolutely.

Blanchett: I think I know why she had class: because she maintained her mental independence during all those years in Hollywood. This independence nobody could take away from her. She was not at all always the star we remember today. When her movies were flops and she was labelled box-office poison, she went back to the east coast, to Connecticut, and played theatre. Then the play "The Philadelphia Story" was made a movie, in which she had starred on stage before. She got the role only because she had bought the movie rights before. So it wouldn't work without her. The movie then became a success and a real classic.

SZaW: That raises, by the way, an interesting question: if all those participating have class, does a movie automatically become a classic then? Would be a nice theory.

Blanchett: It is a nice theory, but of course not right. You can have class and still a bad day. Or a bad year. But, on the other hand, can you make a classic without having class? I am not so sure about that.

SZaW: Then we ask directly: do you have class?

Blanchett: Honestly, one can't answer that question. It's a trick question.

SZaW: Why?

Blanchett: Anybody claiming publicly to have class surely doesn't have any. Class is something that can only be attributed to one by others.

SZaW: I could attribute you class.

Blanchett: Hmmm, yes, you could.

SZaW: Done with the subject.

Blanchett: Thanks. But now it depends on your authority when talking. If you are currently confused or want to be polite only, it means absolutely nothing.

SZaW: Well, I will bring proof: Martin Scorsese looked all over the world for an actress who could play classy woman Katharine Hepburn in "The Aviator". He found: you.

Blanchett: Which could have been a stopgap. In the end, he really wanted to do the movie, and Katharine Hepburn had to appear.

SZaW: Director Shekhar Kapur searched all over the world for a young actress to play Elizabeth I.. A woman who not only needs class but also something regal in her behaviour. He found an unknown theatre actress in Australia: you.

Blanchett: Doing the role in "Elizabeth", I really thought that would end my career –which, by the way, had not even started then. How do you portray a queen, especially when you are from that classless Australian society? Those Australians are rather merry people… if you know, what I mean.

SZaW: Anyone who has ever encountered an Australian knows what you mean.

Blanchett: Anyway, I came to England and felt I had taken on too much. And then the English made such fuzz that some from the North of the country were allowed to play aristocrats. And an Australian their queen! That made me realize how much England still is a class society, and that it strangely also shows in films and theatre, the traditional domain of upper class since time immemorial. Only a man like Michael Caine has made it, being from working class and becoming a star.

SZaW: Another definition of class: you have it from birth on, because you are born into a special class.

Blanchett: You can't tell that to an actress! We actors have always been outcasts and pariahs, vagrants with a whore's profession. Once actors weren't buried on the churchyard like decent people, but at crossroads. And that makes it so absurd that in England the upper class has taken acting over.

SZaW: How does one discover the queen in oneself?

Blanchett: In fact, I was stuck with that question, but something else helped me. Elizabeth never called herself queen, but always king. Synonymous for absolute power. Her conflict was that she had absolute, god-given power, but at the same time was a woman –a role for which no power had been intended. That was her inner struggle, and it had certain parallels to the struggle of a young Australian who suddenly had been given the greatest role of her life.

SZaW: Does not Hollywood sell exactly that dream: everybody can become everything, star or millionaire, or even princess, like Grace Kelly. But then, there are those very subtle class differences again: who has real power, who pretends only, who must call whom back, who ha been put on hold. How did you experience this system?

Blanchett: Well, I believe these things have to do with a head for business, not with class. Class you do have independently from certain circumstances, I rather follow the aristocratic model there. If I'm a hot young star in Hollywood and suddenly nobody cares for me anymore –then I have nothing. Like a rich person who lost all money. Class, on the other hand, you have, no matter how much money you own, and no matter how hot you currently are. Perhaps that is a sign of class: that you don't care about such superficial things.

SZaW: Do you see any danger for yourself?

Blanchett: Absolutely. Hollywood is ok as long as you work and put your work first. Then you can experience great new things and make the most unbelievable experiences. But at the moment it is about fame, things get dangerous: fame smells pungent and soon feels, well, mouldy.

SZaW: Who has class in Hollywood you can tell from embarrassing headlines. Looks rather good for you, doesn't it?

Blanchett: To be frank, I don't know why. Am I even playing in the league for embarrassing headlines? Is it because of my life which seems very normal to me? I always feel the urge to tell anecdotes about my children: how great and funny they are, what geniuses they are… although I know very well how much you bore other people with such stories. But you are right, my life offers little for headlines.

SZaW: But there must be a trick how to prove one has class. Especially when the eyes of the world always rest on you.

Blanchett: I don't know what exactly you mean.

SZaW: Just take a little example: every woman who goes to the Oscars has to choose a dress. Some make horrible mistakes.

Blanchett: Absolutely! And I love it! Even when I'm only at home in front of the TV, I pray to heaven: please, please, who risks something bizarre or shocking? It needs a certain greatness to wear a swan dress with a mini skirt like Björk back then.

SZaW: But of course you'd never wear such a thing. A kind of inner compass prevents you from doing so. And that's what I mean.

Blanchett: Perhaps the explanation is simple: I am a very aesthetically oriented creature, beautiful things just attract me. Almost like Mondrian, who, as legend has it, would have intervened even on this table. (She starts to arrange all things parallel to the edge of the table.) See, it already looks better this way. I always have to intervene correcting in my environment, I can't help it. My favourite thing is to discuss with directors about scenes I am not involved in. Or fashion designers: in my eyes, they are artists: a fabric that falls the right way is the beginning of a sculpture. Fashion has this fabulous transitoriness. One of the most beautiful things I have seen was a fashion show by Alexander McQueen in London. All models ice-skated for only ten minutes, everything was light and movement and pictures. My husband is similar, by the way.

SZaW: How so?

Blanchett: He is obsessed with design, in the strict sense. He likes rooms with nothing in them. Perfect emptiness. I had to work on him for a while until he agreed we need a sofa. We researched for a while and finally found a sofa. It took some months, but we solved the sofa question now. End, deadline, over. We will never need another sofa again. What am I talking? Why do I talk about the sofa now? Where did we stop?

SZaW: That's what it is about. Class can be seen everywhere. I'd have one more request.

Blanchett: Go on.

SZaW: This interview will be published only after the Oscars.

Blanchett: Right. In time for the release of a delightful little film called "The Life Aquatic". An absolute must.

SZaW: You are then -perhaps- already an Oscar winner. And you could already say something regarding this. Just imagine you already had it in the bag.

Blanchett: Well. Oh, I feel great! The concurrence in my category was deadly, and I still can't believe that I really beat all those actresses. What an evening!

SZaW: Very good. Thanks a lot.

Blanchett: Am I supposed to say something in case I don't win?

SZaW: Not necessary, Mrs Blanchett.

P.S.: Mrs Blanchett really won the Oscar for her portrayal of Katharine Hepburn in Martin Scosese's Hollywood epic "The Aviator" on Feb. 27th.

Published March 20, 2005

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