Don't be fooled by her delicate beauty Keira Knightley is a star of pure steel. But, as Brigid Delaney writes, she'd rather be home cooking a chook.
There are some interviews that are difficult to sit through not because the movie star is off-putting or arrogant or boring, but because in a group interview situation, the behaviour of the other journalists is slightly sick-making.
And so it was with Keira Knightley. With the bearing of a ballerina, crisp diction and startling beauty, upon her arrival the male journalists in the room who, moments before she walks in, seem tough and jaded, transform into schoolgirls. They giggle at her asides, blush like maiden aunts when she says "tits", they don't dare ask the questions that might alarm her, such as, "Keira, do you have an eating disorder?
". Instead, one older gent asks her how many pairs of shoes she has, while another stares agog and asks her about her favourite football team, and yet another praises her charity work. (She auctioned a dress she wore to the Oscars; proceeds went to Oxfam).
It is a relief when she doesn't engage in the kind of sycophantic role-playing that is part of film promotion these days: the pretence that every question is insightful, that the journalist opposite really is the most charming, intelligent person on Earth and quite possibly we could all be best friends if it wasn't for such demanding filming schedules. Instead, Knightley is haughty, sharp, and at 22 is not afraid of verbally kicking in the balls journalists twice her age. When asked by a leering journalist about, you know, getting your gear off, love (Knightley first appeared naked aged 15 in a movie called The Hole and more recently was starkers on the cover of Vanity Fair with fellow actor Scarlett Johansson) she is more than his match.
Journalist: "In Silk I hear you are appearing half-naked at some point. Is that right?" Journalist: "Err, sorry, in Silk .
. ." Knightley interjects in a posh, quite intimidating voice: "Have you read the book?
" The journalist persists: "Well, I just read that you might . . .
" Other journalists in the room are squirming in an "er, pull out now, mate" way. Knightley, sharper and slowly: "Have you read the book?" "Well, in the book there are several sex scenes.
" "So it's an adaptation that's very true to the book." "I mean, Jesus Christ, it's not like I haven't taken my clothes off before." "I was just going to ask if you are comfortable about it.
" "People will start paying me to keep my clothes on. No, I don't have a problem with it. I've never had a problem with it.
I don't believe in censorship. So I never think I have done anything wrong. I suppose I am very European in my feelings towards my body.
" In London promoting Pirates of The Caribbean: At World's End, the third in the franchise, it's clear Knightley has a remarkably strong sense of self. She has chocolate-brown, shoulder-length hair and skin the colour of milk. She looks lean and healthy; less emaciated actress, more sleek greyhound that has realised her body is a tool of the trade and has disciplined it accordingly.
Knightley is presently riding high as the Brit Pack's queen of Hollywood. She's gained a legion of fans in the three Pirates movies, but because she interspersed the blockbusters with arthouse flicks, riskier ventures and critically acclaimed classics such as Pride Prejudice (giving her an Oscar nomination), it's meant that while contemporaries such as Sienna Miller are still floundering looking for the right roles, Knightley is already a veteran of a wide range of television and film parts. Born in London in 1985 to an acting family (father is jobbing actor Will Knightley), Keira started as a child performer, appearing in shows such as The Bill.
But it wasn't till the 2002 indie hit Bend It Like Beckham that people started taking notice. She was an interesting choice for the role almost too feminine and willowy to be believable as the tomboy football player. She was more aptly cast in Love Actually as the English rose who is the focus of a painful, unrequited love.
Many of her more memorable scenes in that film were replayed video footage shots of her looking lovely: Keira wearing a pretty dress, Keira dancing, Keira waving goodbye, while the man who desired her sat passive and yearning before all that unattainable beauty. So it seems in real life that we can't get enough banal shots of this lovely girl. The British tabloids are full of pictures of her doing mundane things just being Keira, going for a walk or lying in the park with her boyfriend, the equally beautiful Rupert Friend.
It is as if we are all the unrequited boy in Love Actually, transfixed by her image. She fixes me with a fairly scary stare when I ask if she minds the paparazzi and says: "Legally I don't have a choice about it; I have to deal with it. I don't know; I think it's sick.
I think the pressure put on women of a young age of a very vulnerable group is huge. But indeed it's not about what people say or what the pictures look like. It's about a young woman being followed around by five men who could be anyone and you have no way of telling who they are: if they're legitimate photographers or if they're rapists.
It's terrifying, it's totally terrifying and I don't think that's right. I don't necessarily have a good level of anonymity in London; it's pretty much the same everywhere. I haven't really found it better or worse in any other city.
" It's the Pirates series more than any other film that has extended the reach of her global recognition. The appeal of the movies is basic: they are good, old-fashioned adventure films that are accessible to kids and adults alike, and each one has been more successful than the last. But they also sound a nightmare to shoot.
Some of it was to a blue screen, which Knightley found difficult. "It is slightly ridiculous when you suddenly go 'Ohhh, I'm meant to be really frightened of him', and it's Bill Nighy in his skinny grey suit." Shooting on location was also no walk in the park: "The last six weeks were in torrential rain with the stage on a rake so we were running uphill and we had to wear wetsuits and we had to do intense fight scenes in a wetsuit running uphill.
(Prior to shooting) I was training pretty nonstop on a cross trainer every night." Coming up is Silk, an adaptation of Ian McEwan's Atonement and a part in the Dylan Thomas biopic, The Best Time Of Our Lives. The screenwriter on that one was Keira's mother, Sharman Macdonald.
Knightley is excited about working with her mum. "The pressure was really on her to deliver a really great script and she totally, totally lived up to that it's an absolutely beautiful work." "I did absolutely nothing I walked around, I cooked a lot, I had friends over to my flat and we drank very good wine.
" Cooking a roast chicken is a favourite pastime, as is making her own stock and freezing it for risottos and soups later in the week. After the interview I wander around for a bit. The publicity machine for Pirates has taken up a whole floor of a Knightsbridge hotel.
There are make-up artists running around and cables taped to the ground, satellite feeds to Asia, someone shouting "Orlando? Yeah, Orlando's almost done!" in reference to her co-star, Orlando Bloom.
I think in the next room someone will ask Knightley about her weight and in another interview more journalists will either attack or fawn, and it will be hour after exhausting hour of unreality. Maybe that's where she gets her steeliness from; it's honed in these tedious hours of strangers asking you about everything from your body to your sexual relationships to your parents. Then when she gets to her home in central London, five or maybe more men will be there and they'll photograph her living the life she has just spent the day discussing with strangers.
I prefer to think of her at home cooking for her friends in her flat, freezing chicken stock, getting drunk on good red wine and having a laugh at how weird life is. I think that's the sort of girl she probably really is. The Sun-Herald
Stuff.co.nz is attending the film's premiere on May 23, and will have one of the country's first reviews on the morning of Thursday, May 24.
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