Kate Winslet

Interview By: Andrea Tuccillo
AndreaTuccillo@TheCinemaSource.com

Kate Winslet is enviable. She has the glowing, understated elegance that many women can only dream of possessing, and she has the kind of respected film career that most actresses strive to achieve. After the big budget blockbuster that made her into a household name (that would be Titanic), Winslet has hardly taken the easy road to fame. She consistently chooses challenging roles in smaller character-driven films, and has earned a remarkable four Oscar nominations (for Titanic, Sense and Sensibility, Iris, and Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind) by the age of 31. As those American Express commercials can attest, Winslet has led quite a life so far. Her new film, the dark Little Children is once again garnering this beautiful Brit some pre-awards season buzz.

In addition to carving out a smart and successful career for herself, Winslet has a second, even more satisfying job'being a mom to her two young children, 5-year-old Mia and 2-year-old Joe. Being a mother prepared Winslet in taking on the role of Sarah in Little Children, a restless suburban mother who embarks on an adulterous affair with Brad (Patrick Wilson), the father of a child in the neighborhood. However, the similarities between Winslet and her character end with them both being mothers.

'It was so key for me that I was a parent already', says Winslet. 'I really believe that I wouldn't have been able to play this part if I wasn't a mother myself just because your whole body language, the way you move your body, the way you speak, the way you exist is completely dictated by the fact that you have small children. And for me it was something that I love and it's the reason for my being. For Sarah, she doesn't understand herself as a parent and she isn't a very good parent and doesn't have a specific bond with her child.'

Unlike her character, Winslet adores parenthood'although she admits it can get a little hectic.

'Being a parent is the most extraordinary gift in the world but at the same time it is chaotic, it is crazy, there's a lot of juggling that goes on,' says Winslet. 'I'm always like the sweatiest, hottest mother on the school ground!'

(Winslet is quick to clear up that she means 'hot' as in 'temperature hot.' No vain statements coming from this down-to-earth mama.)

Speaking of 'hot,' Winslet specifically downplayed her looks for her role in Little Children. She prefers the realistic over the Hollywood-gorgeous. In fact, she had a blast making her character look as unattractive as possible.

'It was really fun to play someone who was not supposed to look great,' says Winslet. 'I love that I much prefer playing characters who look kind of ugly, with unkempt hair and very strange clothing. I'd much rather do that than play the glamorous chick. So I was in heaven [with this movie]. I was like come on let's make her look really bad. Let's put her in like the worst imaginable shirt and overalls you've ever seen.'

She may have dressed dowdy, but her torrid affair with Brad produced some very steamy love scenes. Love scenes can be awkward to film, but Winslet and Wilson found ways to make each other feel at ease.

'We wanted to get the scene right; the scene is directly from the book in terms of the setup and so on,' Winslet explains. 'We rehearsed it fully clothed with no one in the room, just us and Todd [Field, the director] and just kind of got a shape to the scene so we knew what to expect. So when we got there and were actually shooting that part of the movie we were able to for the most part just concentrate on getting the acting as precise as we possibly could. We did look out for each other and we laughed a hell of a lot. It sounds ridiculous but at a certain point you just kind of forget that you're naked with a relative stranger.'

Although the love scenes between Sarah and Brad are quite intimate, Winslet understands the importance and the significance of those scenes in the film.

'To me Sarah was the girl, the teenager, the woman who never got the guy,' Winslet says. 'She was the girl at the edge of the dance floor at the prom who never got invited up to dance with the hottest guy in her class. They didn't speak to her and it wasn't part of her world. Suddenly this thing she had been fantasizing about becomes a reality because of a result of his actions not hers and it's probably the biggest turning point of her life. So we both felt very strongly that these scenes were done as tastefully as possible but also as appropriately for the characters and for the story because they were just crucial to the whole storyline.'

Kate Winslet can marvelously balance her career with motherhood and a stable marriage. Is there anything she can't do' Well, scheduling a date night alone with her husband, director Sam Mendes, seems to be a struggle.

'It's possible to get everyone out the door and fed and to school and clothed and with their hair brushed and their teeth brushed, but somehow planning and scheduling to just go out and have a margarita and a pizza'that seems to be the most challenging thing of all!' she says.

Even successful actresses need a night off from the kids every once in a while.