Oscarwatch.com - January 4, 2006
August 2nd, 2007 | by mima |EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS CONTENDER RACHEL WEISZ
By Scott Feinberg (for oscarwatch.com)
Rachel Weisz, the thirty-four year old British beauty and rising star, granted me an exclusive interview late last month to discuss her life, career, and critically-acclaimed performance in Fernando Meirelles’ The Constant Gardener, for which she already has received a Golden Globe nomination. Weisz says she comes from a family of ‘daydreamers and, after briefly dabbling in modeling, was drawn to acting while studying at Cambridge. (She’s smart, too!) She recalls, ‘I started a theater company when I was in college, kind of an avant-garde, experimental theater company. And that’s when I realized I kind of got the bug.
She got her first break into the movies with a small role in Bernardo Bertolucci’s film Stealing Beauty (1996). After appearing in a few other movies, she was cast as Evelyn Carnahan opposite Brendan Fraser in the blockbuster hit The Mummy (1999). As Weisz recalls, ‘It was just, very self-consciously, a B-movie, and I thought it was very funny. And I love to do comedy, which is maybe not how most people remember it, but my role was actually a comedic role. And I just loved it. I had to audition for it two or three times. And I guess it changed things. It was so hugely popular, in a way that no one could have ever imagined. So I guess it brought me to audiences worldwide. Inevitably, there was a sequel, The Mummy Returns (2001), which made even more money. But Weisz sought a variety of experiences in the industry, and changed pace to appear in the charming romantic comedy About a Boy (2002) with Hugh Grant and Toni Collette, Runaway Jury (2003) with Dustin Hoffman, Gene Hackman, and John Cusack, and Constantine (2005) with Keanu Reeves.
While her career seemed to be going on the right track, Weisz”much like the character she plays in The Constant Gardener”is not someone willing to sit back and wait for things to happen to her. She is a go-getter in the best sense of the word. She explains, ‘I just want to work with good directors. So I’ll just keep try hunting down good directors. She’s not joking¦ that’s exactly how she got the part in the film. ‘I don’t think I’ve ever read a script or a character that I wanted to play quite so much. I read it and I was just burning to do it and be in it, she says. ‘I had seen City of God, so I really wanted to work with Fernando. I think he’s an extraordinary filmmaker¦ a great storyteller, a very original storyteller.
Weisz recounts, ‘I was working in Los Angeles at the time and I had a day off, so I flew to London”and back”in 24-hours¦ I think I was like a firecracker. I was very, very passionate to him about why I wanted to play the role and why he should cast me. He met me first, but he had to meet lots and lots and lots of other actors. And then he was, you know, meeting more and more people. And I wrote him a letter, again telling him why I wanted to do it. I was just very passionate. I’ve never wanted to a play a role that much.
It gives little away to report that Tessa Quayle, the feisty social activist Weisz portrays in the film, is murdered within its first few minutes. The rest of the story, told in flashback, is the account of how Tessa and diplomat Justin Quayle (Ralph Fiennes) meet, improbably fall in love, and then are trapped in a web of corruption, lies, and murder that heartbreakingly splits them apart. Weisz says she was drawn to the part because, ‘I think, in life, we all would like to change the world and stop injustice and corruption. But, the thing is, we just don’t know how. And here is a character, here is someone who does. And so that was really inspiring to me. And there are people in the world who are activists, who will put their lives in harm’s way and be willing to die for what they believe is right. And I’ve always been fascinated by what makes these people tick.
Weisz also was delighted by the opportunity to work with Fiennes, who she calls ‘an incredible actor. The two previously teamed up six years ago on the Hungarian film Sunshine (1999) and this time were comfortable enough with each other to improvise many of their scenes together. ‘It was a complete partnership, this film, she says. ‘I relied on him, and he relied on me. He’s so committed, and very passionate, and he really throws himself into the work and gets lost in it. He was a wonderful, wonderful acting partner.
The film was shot on location in Kenya. This is particularly remarkable because the John le Carre book on which the screenplay is based is banned there. ‘They figured we were going to make the film anyway, Weisz reasons. ‘If we didn’t make it there, we’d make it somewhere else. And so it was very important and helpful to their economic infrastructure that we did it there, because we created a lot of employment, and also paved the way for lots of other films to be made there. People always use South Africa instead of Kenya because people say it’s too dangerous in Kenya, and we kind of proved that wrong, so we did a lot to help their industry.
For the actors, the shoot was an eye-opening experience. Weisz emphasizes, ‘The Africa you see as a tourist was not the Africa that we saw. I mean, we were filming in slums and morgues and maternity hospitals where tourists don’t go. Almost all of the extras in the film are real Kenyans, and Weisz says she, Fiennes, and the crew were particularly impacted by their interactions with them in their home environment. ‘None of us, she says, ‘had ever seen poverty on that level up so close. It was very extreme poverty, with a million people living without running water or sanitation, and a very high level of disease. And yet these people were generous and warm”I mean, you saw them in the film. They were just open and kind and they were incredible people.
Weisz says she has particularly fond memories of the scene in which she walks through a spontaneously gathered crowd of fascinated young Kenyan children who embrace her, tug at her, and ask, ‘How are you? How are you? Of her overall interactions with the Kenyans she met, Weisz says ‘It was just very moving and very shaming for us, as Westerners from very comfortable lives. To honor them, those who worked on the film created ‘The Constant Gardener Trust, and have committed to fund it for at least the next five years. ‘We’ve already built a school in the slum, and provided some WC [water-closet/restroom] facilities, and shower facilities, and built a bridge across an un-passable part of the slum, and we built a secondary school in the north in a very remote area where there are no secondary schools… It’s just to say thank you. You know, we’re not changing the world. But it was very impactful on the communities that we met, so it was our way of saying thank you.
On a more personal level, Weisz says she (and her performance) was helped and inspired by a local Kenyan activist named Patricia. According to Weisz, Patricia had been living with HIV for ten years and ‘counseled the women of the slums who were HIV-positive. And she allowed me to go with her to people’s homes, so I was in the homes in the shantytowns with her, speaking to the women in their homes. She was a very, very inspiring woman, and a little bit like my character in that she wasn’t on anybody’s payroll. You know, she’s not employed by anybody. Like a lone warrior.
Weisz won’t pretend she isn’t very excited about her Golden Globe nomination and the strong possibility that she will receive her first Academy Awards nomination on January 31st. ‘It couldn’t be anything but an extreme honor, she says. But Weisz saves her strongest enthusiasm for the film, which she obviously believes in very strongly. ‘I’m very, very grateful to the Hollywood Foreign Press for supporting this film. I think it’s a really important story, and their support of it and their validation of it, I think, means that more people get to see it. It just brings more press to it, so there’s more awareness¦ It’s thrilling, and totally flabbergasting, and just very overexciting. (When pressed, she says that the one performance not from The Constant Gardener that she thought was the best of the year and would love to see recognized is Steve Carrell’s in The 40 Year Old Virgin. ‘I just thought it was tremendous! I mean, I’m not really joking. I think it might be my favorite movie of the year. And Walk the Line”Joaquin and Reese were just outstanding.)
Rachel Weisz may not yet be a star in the Julia Roberts-sense, but she has the looks and the talent to compete with anyone in the business. It may be that the success of The Constant Gardener (the film had a $25 million budget and has made $53 million worldwide, thus far) and the recognition that she is receiving for it will change that fact before long. For now, she has things that are more important on her mind. She and her fiancé (sorry boys) Darren Aronofsky, the director of Requiem for a Dream, are expecting a baby this summer. That may just coincide with another of their collaborations, their first movie together, The Fountain, which refers to the search for the fountain of youth.
She dishes, ‘It’s myself and Hugh Jackman. It’s set in three time zones”past, present, future. And it’s a kind of adult fairly tale about love, and it’s very romantic. It’s like a sci-fi love story. Three ages. And, yeah, it was great working with him [Aronofsky]. I got to meet the director, he got to meet the actress”it’s a very different side of our personalities at work. It’s true of everybody in their jobs, I think. We’re very different people at work, so it was thrilling to see him be so good at something, as well.
It seems we’ll be hearing a lot of Rachel Weisz in the near future”quite possibly as early as the end of the month!