I Couldn't Wait Any Longer to Be a Mum

A pregnant Kate Winslet admits that she just couldn't resist becoming a mother. She's been married to husband Jim Threapleton for 16 months and while she had planned to wait before having a family, she gave in to temptation.

'I'm so maternal that it's been more of a fight not to have a baby than to have one,' she says. 'Jim and I wanted some time together, but now we're completely prepared adn are ready to love every minute of it.'

Kate, 24, who travelled the world filming Titanic and her new film Holy Smoke (which opens here next week) before she married, has made sure that they've not spent a single night apart since the wedding.

'It's a great achievement in this business,'she says. 'Even when we're apart during the day, we speak on the phone about six times. But we don't have a slushy relationship and we've come down from the high of our honeymoon.

'We have the same rows as other people and we do piss each other off. The nice thing about marriage is that having an argument is OK, because you know it can be sorted out.

'I said to my mum: "I don't really remember - did you and dad have big arguments when you were younger?" And she said: "Oh, we fight all the time." Yet they've just celebrated 32 years together.

'She got married to Dad at the same age as I married Jim -23- but waited until she was 27 before giving birth to her first child, my eldest sister Anna. I could have let my head rule my heart and waited, too. But we're thrilled.'

There's no doubt that Kate's loving her marriage to 25-year-old video director and film-maker JIm. 'He's very busy writing scripts,' she reports. 'He's adamant that he won't work with me and I'm a bit angry about that, because I want to.

'He's directed a short film a few months ago and I was his runner for the day, going for this and that. I wasn't allowed on set, but I did hang around outside the studio for a while.

'Just hearing him shout "Action" and "Cut" made me so jealous. I thought: "Why can't I be in it?" But we have to keep that stuff separate for a couple of years, otherwise no one would take him seriously.

"He's good at what he does and is excellent with actors. he's also done everythign by himself and prefers to keep it that way. He could never become Mr. Winslet in a million years.'

Kate, in fact, has been happy to become Mrs. Threapleton, because my full name is Kate Elizabeth,' she says. 'When we were on honeymoon, I spent time writing different variations of my new signature.

'Even then, when my bank card came through I had to send it back because I did a signature which I knew wouldn't be my final version.'

Kate delivers another excellent performance in Holy Smoke, playing an Australian girl called Ruth who's entrapped by a religious cult in India. She's eventually enticed home by a specialist cul-buster (played by Harvey Keitel) hired by her family.

That's when the real story begins. They share a house in the Australian outback as he attempts to work on her mind to cut spiritual ties with her religious mentor. Instead, she turns the tables on him, engineering a sexual relationship in which she takes charge.

'She's quite a little madam and that was cool to play,' says Kate. 'I didn't like her and neither did Jim. He came out of the screening and said: "What a bitch!"'

As far as screenings of Titanic were concerned, however, kate has to wait to see the film. Just before the London premiere, she was taken ill with stomach problems on arrival from Morocco, where she'd been filming Hideous Kinky.

Then she had to pull out of the Los Angeles premiere to attend the funeral of her former long-time boyfriend, scriptwriter Steven Tredre,who died of cancer at the age of 34.

'I eventually went to a cinema in New York and was fidgeting because I'd been drinking a huge carton of Coca-Cola and was desperate to go to the loo,' she reports. 'I accidentally kicked a guy in front.

'He half turned around, gave me a scornful look and sighed. For the first time in my life, I wanted to tap him on the shoulder and say: "Hey, that's me up there." But I held on to my bladder and sat it out.'

Despite huge success and rich Hollywood offers which have come in the wake of two Oscar nominations for Titanic and Sense And Sensibility, Kate's spending has been remarkably modest. 'I bought a dishwasher, having fought against it for years,' she says. 'I'd thought we could just wash up - but I love it. And I bought a jeep for Jim as a surprise. 'I lived on people's floors before Titanic and that film allowed me to buy a flat. Since then, I've found it hard to splash out on myself - I feel guilty.'

Kate's next big film on screen in Quills, in which she appears as the daughter of a laundress who befriends the Marquis de Sade (Geoffrey Rush) during his last days in prison. There's a constant clash between a caring governor, played by Joaquin Phoenix and Michael Caine's hard-line, ambitious doctor.

Kate will be in another sex scene, this time with Phoenix, a former boyfriend of Liv Tyler. 'Some of this stuff is racy and up for discussion,' she says. 'But I'm full-front this time. I do keep my corset on.'

Before the film is released this autumn, Kate will be delivering her best production yet. 'I relise the baby means there'll have to be some changes,' she says, 'but we're ready for them.'