Robin Wright Penn

Interview By: Rocco Passafuime
RoccoPassafuime@TheCinemaSource.com

Robin Wright-Penn has had her share of memorable roles in her career from Princess Buttercup in the much-beloved The Princess Bride to Jennie Curran in Forrest Gump to the title character in Moll Flanders.

Her current role is as Liv in British director Anthony Minghella's Breaking and Entering. Liv is a Swedish-American single mother living in Britain dating a landscape architect, played by Jude Law, while taking care of her autistic daughter.

When asked about how she prepared to do a Swedish character, she notes Minghella giving her one simple piece of advice.

'I remember when I asked Anthony. I said, 'Yeah, well, I'm sure you know some Scandinavian women.' or 'Where did you get this character'' and he said, 'You know what' Just go to Stockholm.'' Wright-Penn recalls, 'So I said, 'OK.' So I went for 48 hours.'

She goes on to say that what she would learn in Sweden was unique to say the least.

'This is basically what I got,' Robin adds, 'I would interview a couple people and they would say, 'Well, you know, most of us are suicidal.' You know, thank you, that's all I needed. That's exactly what I needed. Well, why do it. [They replied,] 'Because we don't have a lot of light throughout the year.' And I said, 'Well, what do you do with that tendency, other than become alcoholic'' And she said nobody talks about it. And that's all I needed.'

When asked why she didn't dig any deeper, this was her explanation as to why.

'I didn't want to investigate further what the dynamics between those people and try to isolate that culture,' she explains, 'I felt like that was a culture in and of itself to have that feeling of doom everyday you wake up and then to be able to transpose that into the challenge of having that child. That takes all of your focus and all of your energy and all of your efforts go there and what do you have to spare for your mate'

Wright-Penn adds it's this cultural divide that she brought to her character in the film. 'Maybe that was [Liv's] excuse,' she notes, ''Oh, I can't! I can't deal! I got too much to do!' But it was very apropos when I was there to see that most of the women said this about each other. They say that, 'We all feel this way. We all feel this way, but we don't share it.''

One important social theme of the film is the difficulties of migrants adapting to life in a new country that does not fully welcome them. In regards to how the role of ethnicity applies to Robin's own life, she only had this jokingly self-deprecating reply.

'I'm just a southern girl from Texas,' Wright-Penn quips, 'I ain't got no roots. I'm not kidding. Other than I'm sorry I'm from Texas, no. That's the truth. That was just in reference to our president.'

'That is true, they sort of enforce with the belt,' she jokingly adds, 'The belt would come out if you were not a good person. That was very much instilled in you. That's just not right. And you would get whipped if you weren't a good person to other people. That's just Southern, you know. Even though it was all bullshit, you were nice to somebody, you fake it.'

As the plot of Breaking And Entering thickens, Robin's character is left unaware of a growing affair that emerges between her boyfriend, played by Jude Law, and the mother of the thief he pursues, played by Juliette Binoche. She feels, however, that even her character commits infidelities through her actions in the film in some form.

'I was thinking about the word, because I don't think the word lives up to its definition or what the clich' of the definition is,' Wright-Penn states, 'So within this movie, are you an infidel' You know, it's running to a different source. And I think we are all playing a different part in an infidelity in some way. It's not just sexual.'

'You're running away from yourself,' she adds, 'You're being unfaithful to you. And I think that theme plays in this movie in many different colors. So I don't think it's the clich' of, 'He fucked another woman.' It's so much more layered than that. That's why she can understand this woman is separate and apart from the event that happened.'