GQ & A
Kate Winslet
by Dylan Jones

February 2003 edition of GQ

Photos by Jason Bell

She's our homegrown Hollywood heroine,a curvaceous,silver-screen natural who made a major splash with Titanic. But when her marriage failed, the press turned on her, looking for thorns in the English rose. However, as GQ discovers, a decade of fame hasn't brought out the diva in 'Our Kate' Photographs by Jason Bell. Styling by Geriada Kefford

London's Covent Garden Hotel is a very particular sort of oasis - a thespian oasis. Covcrrt Garden itself is as frenetic as ever, a neon-lit shopping experience that seems to become more like Oxford Street every year, what with the jeans shops, the mid-Atlantic coffee houses and cheap jewellery stores. Bouncing from pavement to pavement it's impossible to escape the amplified strains of Röyksopp or Moby, and after a while - a very short while actually - the area begins to make you feel like a beleaguered tourist..

The world of the Covent Garden Hotel is very different indeed. This is where die theatrical media meets itself for cocktails, where luvvies and love objects sink into sofas and plough through rewrites, where soap stars court impresarios in the hope of reinventing themselves. If you live and work in

London and your work is somehow associated with stage or screen - big or small - then you hangout at the Groucho Club, Soho House, or here. And it's here we are today, to meet Britain's most famous, and currently most successful, actress, the 27-year-old suburban siren that is Kate Winslet.

She bounds upstairs to the library, puffing hellos, apologising for being a little late (she lives a few miles away in Hampstcad with the director Sam Mendes), nuking herself a roll-up and talking ten-to-the-dozen. This cliche was invented for Kate Winslet, as you'll never meet an actress who talks so much, or who is, for that matter, more self-deprecating. Try giving her a compliment and you could be here all day. Call her a sex symbol and you may as well book a room for the nighl (but not in that way...). But sex symbol she is, as well as a national treasure, an incongruity she is only too aware of.

She has been famous now for nearly a decade, as she was only 17 when she starred in the 1994 thriller Heavenly Creatures. Since then there has been Sense And Sensibility, Jude, Hamlet, and of course Titanic, followed by Hideous Kinky, Holy Smoke, Quills, Enigma and Iris ("The Death Rattle") to name just a few. Her latest film is The Life Of David Gale, an Alan Parker rape and murder mystery that also stars Kevin Spacey (who appears to be gradually turning into Robert Lindsay). She plays Pulitzer-hungry journalist, Bitsey Bloom, who eagerly becomes embroiled in the killer's life in order to pursue her story. And while it may not rank as one of the best films to inhabit the world of newspapers, Gale has the best twist of any film you will see this year. It is also the first film Winslet has shot in America (Titanic was shot in Mexico), and because of its provenance, as well as its subject matter, will do nothing to diminish her international stardom.

Fame now surrounds her like a Ready Brek glow, and while for many in Britain she is still the Girl Next Door, recently she has appeared to develop the prickly demeanour of the fully famous. For a period "Our Kate" could do no wrong. Indeed she was a veritable press darling. While she won Oscar nominations for Sense And Sensibility and Titanic she still had her feet firmly on terra firma. She ate bangers and mash at her wedding to assistant director Jim Threapleton, revelled in her oh-so-womanly figure, and managed to put more staged expletives into her conversation than the Gallagher brothers put together. Apparently even Jennifer Aniston has a picture of Kate on her fridge because "she's one of the good ones."

Then, on 2 September 2001, the night before she was due to hand Sir Elton John his Lifetime Achievement award at the GQMen Of The Year dinner, she announced that she had split from her husband. The once benevolent press turned on her overnight. She was cast as a fame-hungry actress just like any other, and as a result she is now more circumspect in dealing with the media. "The details of the divorce are confidential," she says. "Life is life, and divorce happens to lots of people. When your first priority is the happiness of your child, [you] act accordingly. That's simply what we did."

She was never quite as sweet as the press wanted to paint her however. My favourite Winslet story is one she tells herself. In Christmas 1995, having just been nominated for an Oscar for Seme And Sensibility, she was shopping in John Lewis in London. She walked into the make-up department and saw a girl behind the counter who had bullied her at school. "So I walked up to her and said, 'Hello, how are you?' And she said, 'Oh fine, how are you?' - a bit panicky because she remembered how much of a bitch she'd been and suddenly I was a bit too well-known and she felt very embarrassed, and I said, 'So, working [here] then?' This girl was going to be a model and have horses and her dad was going to buy her a car if she grew her fingernails and all this stuff and I said, 'Don't you want to be a model or a dancer?' She said [in a whiney voice], 'No, I'm just waiting for, um, y'know a couple of contracts to come in and just doing this for the time being,' and I said, 'Oh great,' and she said, 'Things good for you then?' and I said, 'Yeah, they are - and I just wanted to say thanks for being such a bitch 'cos you made me much, much stronger,' and just walked off. And I thought, 'Yeeees! Come on!'"

The Kate I meet in the Covent Garden Hotel is bubbly and prickle-free. She's certainly wary, but no more than anyone who has spent over a third of her life with her name above the title. Now one half of the power couple dujour, and with a two-year-old daughter, Mia, she exudes contentment. She looks sexier than ever - slim, elegant and self-consciously flirty, although probably won't thank me for saying so. Her appearance is something that is rarely omitted from interviews. She has lived with "body issues" forever, and for a while - in the press at least - they almost came to define her. Like the novelist Donna Tartt, another sporadically high-profile figure whose media presence is determined by her size (she is so small she wears boys' clothes from Gap Kids and when she was born she was so unnaturally tiny she had to wear dolls clothes), Winslet rarely seems to appear in the papers without some snide comment about her shape (too big, too trim, blah). Today, when I ask her which part of her body she'd change if she could, she immediately mentions her feet: "They're just like huge meat hooks. They're size 81/2, and Leonardo DiCaprio gave me such a complex about them because they're exactly the same size as his. I have these enormous canoes at the end of my legs so I have to get Sergio Rossi to make shoes for me. Either that or Caterpillar boots."

Welcome to the 2003 Kate Winslet, the sexiest Girl Next Door you're ever likely to meet.

You seem to have an ambivalent attitude towards being a sex symbol.

You see this is the thing that just makes me laugh and I can't... I really don't think that I am one of those things. I'm not a sex symbol! I think when you've been a fat kid, you always see yourself in some way as a bit of a black sheep.l'm completely physically comfortable with who I am and I have no particular issues any more and I don't feel I have to run around waving my flag about thefemale body any more.

You did for a while though, didn't you?

Yeah, I did. Because I feel quite strongly about it and I did think the world was becoming obsessive with beauty being about being thin and of course on some level that will always be the case, but I can't change that. I certainly had a good stab at it.

Well you kind of are because you are a sex symbol.

God, but I'm certainly not a sex symbol who doesn't eat.

Because you are famous, because you are an attractive woman, you are a sex symbol.

Careful, I'll go red in a minute.

I just want you to admit that you're a sex symbol.

I won't be able to. What is sexy? All I know from the men I've ever spoken to is that they like girls to have an arse on them, so why is it that women think in orderto be adored they have to be thin? Very thin. I just don't understand that way of thinking. When I was 22 and Titanic had come out and I was a slightly more Marilyn Monroe-y shape, I just became aware that there hadn't really been anyone young out of this country that had a shape,and was becoming successful, for a long time. And because I, as a teenager, went through dieting,fat, thin, was very chubby as a child and was at a point where I thought, "My God," - I just couldn't believe my luck. I though, "My God, I did all of this... I've done this enormous great big film and look I'm not starving. Wow. Maybe I should tell someone about that. Maybe I should actually say to these young women, 'Look, I did it. I did it really. And I'm just a normal person.'" So I did feel as though I had to wave that flag a bit. And now I just feel that I said all that and I still have those theories but you can't talk about it forever.

Are you happy with the way you get treated by the press?

From the age of 17 I've grown up in the public eye and I think to a certain extent the press have felt as though they've known exactly what I was doing for all of that time and they've quite liked that. And also I've never really done anything wrong.l've never been a really outrageous human being. I've never been photographed falling drunk out of a nightclub. I've never taken any drugs,and it seems to me that I committed a crime which was to get divorced. And that unfortunately turned my life into something of a soap opera. And actually my life is not a soap opera and as I've always said, the situation between myself and my ex-husband is, and always has been, incredibly amicable. The thing that I do find difficult is the way in which they have now attempted to turn my child's life into a soap opera.That has really driven me insane and that is the one thing that has made me literally want to run out of my front door with a knife some days when there's paparazzi out there and I think, "I want to go and feed the fucking ducks. Please go away." That has really driven me mad and it's never particularly got to me before but when it is to do with my child then it drives me insane like I think it does for Jude Law and Sadie Frost and all these other celebrity parents.

They say you can't choose who you fall in love with, but you can choose where you look. Did you think, "lf I become part of a very high-profile media couple then my life is going to be even more exposed"?

Again, you can't choose who you fall in love with.

But you can choose where you look.

Yes, I suppose you can but I was absolutely not looking. I was absolutely not looking and it was one of things that came and hit me smack in the middle of my forehead. But "no" is the answer to that. I certainly didn't go out and think, "I know I'll just go and find someone with whom I'll be on a completely equal footing and then everything will be fine. "l certainly never...it never even occurred to me.

Do you like the fact that you are described as an English rose?

It's incredibly flattering, yeah and I didn't know I was still referred to like that. Am I a sex symbol and an English rose then?

The two things are not necessarily mutually exclusive. On a scale from one to ten, how good looking are you?

Oh no. Oh dear.

You can be as self-deprecating as you want.

God. I don't know,about a three.

I'm sorry-Excuse me.

Well, what am I going to say? "0oh yeah, I'm a ten"? When l don't think l amfor one second.

I don't know. Seven? Eight? You can't say you're a three.

Can l say l'm a four then?

What are the three essential ingredients of love?

Damn you. Do I have to answer that?

Your character in David Gale is a journalist. Did you spend any time in a newspaper or magazine office?

I didn't but I was set up with some pretty high-profile New York journalists who were very, very useful and I spoke to them a lot. I would consistently talk to them and one thing they all said to me is there is no such thing as "off the record" all of them without fail.

That's not true though.

Mmm, possibly, possibly not, I don't know.

Well, tell me something off the record and I'll prove it.

I have never been particularly good at being guarded but I like to think I'm getting a little better at it.

How much of Bitsey was on the page and how much is you driving the character?

I think with any acting role it's 50 per cent on the page and 50 percent is the job that you have to do and I was really blessed with some fantastic dialogue and a water-tight script.

Actors tend to say that everything they choose is based on a need to stretch themselves. But do you ever consciously choose characters that you feel are close to your own personality?

Sometimes, I mean I think there's a reason why I've been drawn to playing a lot of very headstrong women in my life. I've just been compelled to feel excited by those people and if you wanted to sit and psychoanalyse me, you could possibly tell me why that might be.

How do your ambitions change, the more successful you become?

I don't know that when I was five years old I wanted to be an actress, I don't know that I even thought about doing films. ln fact, l know l didn't, never, because l came from a working-class, middle- to working-class background. I just aspired to work in the theatre and suddenly I was doing Heavenly Creatures when I was 17 and it was like being hit over the head with a sledgehammer.

This is probably the most mainstream thing you've done since Titanic...

Yeah it is. Again, I have always tried to invest in material that I really believe in regardless of whether it's a studio movie or an independent. It's just the way that I've operated,actually,and I've never had an agenda.l just really haven't had an agenda because it really is about the material being good and obviously the director and the cast and so on and so forth. I would put my hand on my heart and say there was an agenda behind doing Hideous Kinky, because it was the first thing I did after Titanic and I literally felt, in order to save my sanity, I had to do a tiny little film. And thank God l did. l thought, 'Doyou know what? I just want to run away and hide and do something that I really, really believe in because my world was turned upside down." And people would say to me, "How are you going to stop your life from changing?"-and I'd become all defensive and say "My life isn't going to change". And of course it did.

What's your definition of a luvvie?

Oh dear, oh dear. Probably someone who does far too many air kisses and can always be seen attending the opening of an envelope.

Describe the way you dance.

When dancing in the kitchen with my younger sister Beth, like two teenagers on a trashy disco dance floor and when dancing with somebody else, I don't know. There's bit of arse wiggling that goes on.

You are allowed to write just one letter. To whom and about what?

Probably to my father about how I understand... lump in throat...how I understand what he had to go through when I was ten. He had a very serious accident on a boat when he lost his foot and I didn't understand how much of an impact that would have on the whole of the rest of his life and his parenting. I would probably want to write a letter to him about how wonderful a father he is.

Have you seen a dead body?

Yes. My ex-boyfriend's. Stephen Tred re who died of cancer when I was 21. And yeah, I did go and see him.

When were you last hog-wimperingly drunk?

God, well I don't like getting completely bladdered because I don't like getting out of control. I had a night out about eight months ago with a friend of mine and went out on a benderand at one point I remember her clutching to my arm and saying, 'Help me, help me, l can't see." We just went out for what was meant to be a quiet girly dinner and we just ended up necking a few more glasses of Chardonnay than we'd originally intended.

What's been the most memorable phone call of your life?

Probably the call I got telling me that I'd been cast in Heavenly Creatures, simply because I was working in a delicatessen in Reading and I was 17 and I was in the middle of making a ham sandwich for a customer and my boss came up and said, 'Kate, phone call for you," and the thing that was so memorable about it is that as the phone rang, I heard it and I knew it was going to be for me and I knew it was going to be something about whether I'd got the job or not and so to stand there and hear my agent at the time saying to me, "You clever girl" was unbelievable.

If you could make one apology, what would it be?

I'd probably apologise to my older sister for being a bitch teenager.

What was your nickname at school?

Blubber.

Quote a song lyric that really means something to you.

"And I miss you like the deserts miss the rain." Everything But The Girl, you know? I absolutely love that song and because I think missing someone makes the heart grow fonder and you miss them I think it literally starves your soul in the way that a desert is starving when there's no rain hitting it. God I sound like a wanker.

Do angels exist?

Yep. I think they do. I absolutely think they do. And even if they don't, it's comforting to think that they might.

What colour do you think Tuesday is?

Yellow. God knows why I said that.

What are seven nines?

Bloody hell, what are seven nines? Oh my God, I can tell you this. (Long pause). Oh for crying out loud...60...this is appalling.

I'm timing you.

Oh for crying out loud.

You're on 35 seconds.

63? Are they 63?

When did you last laugh until you cried?

I really am going to sound like a wanker now because the only time I have actually ever laughed until I cried is when I went to the first preview of Twelfth Night, which my boyfriend Sam Mendes has directed and there is an actor in it named David Bradley who is absolutely hilarious. I was in pain in my stomach, my face hurt and I had tears rolling down my cheeks and at one point I was laughing so loudly I was almost howling.

What TV show did you never miss as a child?

Grange Hill.

Which drug is the most intriguing?

Couldn't tell you.

Never taken anything?

Never, in my life. Hand on heart. l think I never fell into those circles at a time when I think impressionable young people do, and I was adventuring in other ways in my life from the age of 16, which was exactly that time that most people go off to college and start taking drugs.

You've never smoked a joint?

Never, never. Really never. And so many of my friends can vouch for that because they laugh at me hilariously when I just say "0h, no, no, I can't, I wouldn't know what to do..."

Have you ever engaged in same gender sex?

No. Only on film.

Where do you stand on facial hair?

What, on men or on women?

Your call.

I don't have any particular thoughts about it really. I honestly don't.

Tell us five facts about Muhammad Ali.

Oh God, do I have to? Well I can tell you he was a womaniser. That is one fact. And no, I don't like boxing. He was deeply religious. That's true too isn't it? Tell me that's true. He was boxing king of the world. He spoke very, very quickly in a very soft, relatively feminine voice that was quite difficult to understand. That'sanother one isn't it? That is another one. And he refused to be in the army. That's another one, isn't it?

When did you last flounce?

I don't know. How would you define flouncing?

Oh, having a hissy fit and storming out.

Can I admit that I've never flounced? No, I'm not a flouncer. I don't think it gets you anywhere, I'm afraid, and I always feel a tremendous sense of responsibility to my own in terms of other young British actors. I don't think it achieves anything, I think it's often a waste of energy, and why should an actor be given permission to flounce just because they're sometimes getting paid more than a gaffer or a grip or a make-up artist?

If the role demanded it, would you consider keeping your clothes on?

Ha ha ha. Good one. Oh my God,look,l have kept my clothes on before now. I said to Alan Parker, 'You've got to let me play this part because I don't have to get cold and wet and I don't have to take my fucking clothes off." GQ

The Life Of David Gale is released on 14 March.

Source: GQ Magazine (UK Edition)
Scans by Kevin, Edited by z