Cate Blanchett has revealed that she is “serious about giving up acting” in the future.
The actress spoke to Radio Times in a new interview and said that despite all her years in the spotlight, fame is something she struggles with and that she also envisages a future for herself away from acting.
It comes as Blanchett is set to star in her first radio drama with BBC Radio 4’s The Fever. As part of her work promoting that, Blanchett shared her thoughts on the future of her career.
She told the Radio Times: “My family roll their eyes every time I say it, but I mean it. I am serious about giving up acting. [There are] a lot of things I want to do with my life.”
She added: “When you go on a talk show, or even here now, and then you see soundbites of things you’ve said, pulled out and italicised, they sound really loud…I’m not that person.
She continued: “I make more sense in motion – it’s been a long time to remotely get comfortable with the idea of being photographed. I’ve always felt like I’m on the periphery of things, so I’m always surprised when I belong anywhere. I go with curiosity into whatever environment that I’m in, not expecting to be accepted or welcomed. I’ve spent a lifetime getting comfortable with the feeling of being uncomfortable.”
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Recently, Blanchett praised the Bob Dylan biopic A Complete Unknown and Timothée Chalamet’s “fantastic” performance in it, for which he received an Oscar nomination – check out her full interview with NME below.
A Complete Unknown was released earlier this year and tells the story of Dylan’s rise to fame in the 1960s. Chalamet won the Best Performance By An Actor In A Leading Role trophy at the Screen Actors Guild Awards for his portrayal of the iconic musician as well as a Golden Globe.
In a recent interview with NME, Hollywood legend Blanchett – who previously played Dylan in Todd Haynes’ experimental 2007 biopic I’m Not There – confirmed she has seen A Complete Unknown and said of Chalamet: “I thought he was fantastic. I really loved the whole film.”
“A Complete Unknown is a very different endeavour to Todd Haynes’ film, which was about shape-shifting identity and an artist’s refusal to be pinned down,” she continued.
“I’ve never been more liberated than [when I was] asked to play so wildly against type and gender… Because you knew there was a woman [behind] that iconic silhouette of Dylan when he went electric, you were complicit with the audience in it. There was no way you’d ever be accused of mimicry.”
When asked if she’d go back and change anything about her performance in I’m Not There, which saw six actors play different aspects of Dylan’s personality, Blanchett said: “As time goes by you [realise] cinema is temporal so [if you went back], you’d probably do it entirely differently. But with that film, the character was made up of everyone’s portrayal. Christian Bale, Heath Ledger, Ben Whishaw, they all put in remarkable, astonishing performances. I was but a part of it.”
Blanchett’s most recent film, Black Bag, earned a four star rating from NME who said: “Black Bag mostly runs like clockwork – a sleek, witty, rock-solid exercise in restraint; and yet another chance for [Steven] Soderbergh to prove just how versatile he really is.”
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