00:00Peter Gray from the AU Review, hello Connie, lovely to talk to you again, did you have
00:05fun last night?
00:06It was so lovely, it was also really amazing in that huge theatre and to see so many fantastic,
00:12you know, super excited people, it was really a great experience.
00:19It must be kind of surreal in a way to sort of step back into a role after 24 years, like
00:25how did you, like did the, I mean did the legacy of the original film sort of influence
00:30your performance in any way, stepping back into it?
00:33I mean for me Lucila is like somebody I know deeply and intimately and it doesn't matter
00:39how long has passed, you know, I still felt myself just sliding right into her experience
00:46and it was now enriched by, you know, 18 years of things that had happened in between and
00:53you know that was such a great story to bring in just in preparation for the character and
00:59then of course as soon as you step on set with Ridley Scott, it's just this extraordinary
01:06textured, layered, nuanced experience that where you see everyone is on their toes, everyone
01:15is ready to play, you know, it's a great experience.
01:18I was going to ask about, have you seen Ridley Scott as a director, like have you seen him
01:24change in any way to how he directed you in Gladiator 2?
01:27You know, he's a man in a hurry, you know, he has got like 15 more films he wants to
01:32do at least, you know, that he's planning and what's extraordinary is you can really
01:36see how technology has just followed up and just kept on evolving to the point where now
01:46Ridley is finding himself in a place where the technology makes it so available to him
01:53to make these extraordinary visions that he sees inside his mind and where before he needed
01:59more hours, more people, more space, more time to do that, now he can do so in a very
02:05short amount of time and space and so you can just see how he's just thriving with all
02:13the opportunities that that technology gives him.
02:15I mean, I love seeing like, you know, we obviously have like the flooding of the Coliseum and
02:20things like that, like I mean, how much of that was practical compared to special effects?
02:27I mean, I'm not going to give away the tricks, I can just say that Mr Scott knows what he's doing, yeah.
02:36And one of the great lines in the film is obviously, you know, what we do here echoes
02:39in eternity and we obviously see film as being immortal in many ways, like I mean, I hope
02:45film stays immortal, but is there a role for you that you've done that you would like
02:50to be looked at as like, if there's only one role that I could be remembered for, like
02:54what would it be?
02:55Oh, that's not fair.
02:58Obviously, Lucilla is this beautiful role.
03:02I feel kind of blessed that I have had this access to extraordinary, playing extraordinary
03:08women.
03:09During the past two years, I've released a miniseries about the Danish writer Karen
03:16Blixen, and where we really focused not on her romantic life, but her artistic life and
03:23what made it so extraordinary as part of her personal growth, and how it translated itself
03:30into her art.
03:31And that was something that was really dear to my heart, because we don't usually portray
03:37women artists as artists, we portray them as women.
03:41But when we portray men who are artists, we portray them as artists.
03:46And I wanted to kind of even the field on that one with Karen.
03:49And so to me, that particular work is just really close to my heart as well.
03:54Well, I mean, on the mention of that, like, I feel like we're starting to really see women
04:00get the sort of like the roles that they deserve, the stories that should be told.
04:06Is that a massive part of collaborating with Ridley in sort of bringing out the complexities
04:11of Lucilla?
04:12Absolutely, I feel like Ridley kind of creates all of these plot points and sets up incredible
04:17situations within the script, but he sees the script as something that's constantly
04:23evolving while we're shooting.
04:25So he does even on the first one is very much true for the first one and very much true
04:29for the second one as well, where there is just this real elastic, this really strong
04:35give and take.
04:36And so all of the actors we bring to the set every morning, plenty of ideas and almost
04:45heart blood because we really, really come in there and are pushing and advocating for
04:50our characters because those characters don't just exist for the story.
04:55They don't just exist for us as actors.
04:59Those characters exist as mirrors to everyday people who go and watch this film and who
05:07feel seen when we tell a kind of truth to them.
05:12And so I think a lot of people are on the set, we're trying to give that to the audience
05:18as well.
05:19And speaking of on the set, you obviously have a lot of actors in this film and like,
05:24we obviously have adopted Russell Crowe as one of our own, but you have him and then
05:27you have Paul Meskel and I know last night you were like, you couldn't choose between
05:31the two.
05:32There's no way.
05:33But like, how did you sort of see, I guess, because like Paul's kind of in the same realm
05:37as what Russell was back then, like, did you sort of see similarities in their performance
05:41and their personalities?
05:42I mean, obviously, Paul knows that he's playing Maximus's son.
05:48And so at the same time, I also see how Paul was really doing this extraordinary inner
05:54work to just really stay connected to what it is that he brings to the role.
06:02And I think he's just found this really great balance inside of himself where, and that
06:09I think is, like, makes you trust his instinct when you're going on scenes with him because
06:14he's very much playing something out of his own creation.
06:21But with a very humble, obviously, approach that honours all of Russell Crowe's enormous
06:30impact on film the last 30 years, right?
06:34Yeah.
06:35No, I mean, I, yeah, the film was, I was so excited to see where the story would go this
06:39time around and hats off to everybody involved and your performance was incredible.
06:44Thank you so much.
06:45Thank you so much.
06:46I appreciate it.
06:47Thank you so much.
Comments