AWARD-winning Dame Judi Dench plays a mother searching for her son. “This (true) story is worth telling,” she says. Photo by ruben nepales
LOS ANGELES—Part of the charm of “Philomena”—and the reason it earned honors, including acting nominations for its leads, Judi Dench and Steve Coogan— is the effective, very natural interaction between the two, who play real-life characters Philomena Lee and Martin Sixsmith.
Adapted by Steve and Jeff Pope from Martin’s book, “The Lost Child of Philomena Lee: A Mother, Her Son and a 50-Year Search,” the film chronicles the life of Philomena, a convent-educated teenager who gave birth to a boy in a Catholic shelter for unmarried mothers in Ireland. A few years later, the nuns forced Lee to give up her son, Anthony, who was sold for adoption in America.
Lee met the journalist Sixsmith in 2004. Together, they went on a journey to find her son. They learned that the boy’s new name was Michael Hess, and that he grew up to become a lawyer and a Republican politician. He was also a closeted gay man with AIDS, and had traveled to Ireland to ask the convent to reveal the identity of his mother so he could reunite with her before he died. The nuns said no.
This provoked Lee, whose faith remains strong despite these challenges, and Sixsmith, a lapsed Catholic, to engage in very interesting conversations about faith—or the lack of it.
Phenomenal woman
“People want to stress that it’s a kind of polemic against the Catholic Church,” said Judi of the movie directed by Stephen Frears, in an interview at The May Fair Hotel in London. “I don’t think the film is that at all. The film is about this extraordinary thing happening to this woman and who had very strong faith originally. She found it difficult to go to church after it… now, her faith is as strong as it was before. That’s what makes her this phenomenal woman.”
“The thing about the whole script is that it is very wonderfully observed and very beautifully written so you, in a way, absorb that on your own,” said Judi of the script vying for best screenplay in the coming Golden Globes. “Then it’s entirely to do with the person you act with and fortunately, with Steve. We hit it off very quickly. I admired him very much [though] I didn’t know him. We had a very natural banter between us.
“What is glorious about it is that the more serious the piece is, the more frivolous you have to be off the screen, the more jokes you have to [crack] and the more you can share. Then, when it actually comes to doing it, it can be distilled into something completely serious. It’s very interesting.”
Would Judi be as forgiving as Philomena? “No,” came Judi’s quick reply. “I wish but I think that’s why the film is worth telling. There are very, very few people who would be of that magnitude of strength to be able to turn and say, at the end of that journey, ‘Actually, I forgive you.’ But she says, ‘I don’t want to be angry.’ She says, ‘It’s not easy to do. I don’t want to be angry like you. I couldn’t live with that.’ And then is able to do that.”
After learning about Philomena through the script, Judi wanted to know more about the real life woman whose life she was about to essay on the big screen. “I needed to meet Philomena before I started filming. You just have to come face to face with this person and listen to her. You watch and try to get her essence. We met at lunch and she made me laugh so much.
“That’s very much what Steve and Jeff Pope understood about her—she has a wonderful, ironic sense of humor. Every time I spoke to her, she mentioned how much she loved that boy. Every time. So all I’m concerned with is that we didn’t sell her story short, that we didn’t in any way over-dramatize, over-glamorize or under-glamorize or sell her story in any way or cheapen her story.”
Out of ‘Bond’
While Judi is getting some of the best reviews of her career, thanks to “Philomena,” there’s also the sad news that her iconic M will not be in the new Bond movie, titled “Bond 24.”
Asked how the producers broke the news to her, Judi answered that they took her out to a grand café-restaurant in London. “I met them at The Wolseley in Piccadilly. They told me.
JUDI Dench and Steve Coogan in “Philomena” photo:ACESHOWBIZ.COM
There we were. I’ve had 17 years of being M—four films with Pierce (Brosnan) and three with Daniel (Craig). You can’t complain, can you? I think MI6 would have thrown me out this year, probably. I think they wouldn’t have had me any longer (she mock played a violin to joke at that sentiment). You never know. I might appear wafting across the back and pointing at Ralph Fiennes, ‘Rotten.’”
While demurring that she “couldn’t teach” (about acting), Judi offered some tips when asked what advice she would give to young acting talents. “I know that the most important thing you can do is watch other people doing it. I always say to young actors who are going to appear in theater—whatever you do, go to whatever is playing at the theater before you open in it. Before I did ‘Cabaret,’ I was taken to something at the Palace Theatre. It was ‘The Desert Song’ and it had nothing to do with ‘Cabaret.’ You somehow get the measure of the theater and you see what works and what doesn’t work. So that’s vital.
Theater tips
“Also, when I was at the Vic, I never left the side of the stage. I never went to my dressing room. I only stayed and watched what was happening on stage. You can only learn properly through watching other actors, sitting in a theater and seeing what you think works, seeing how things slightly change and how you can deal with the same play on different nights.
“When I came to making more films—it’s common knowledge that I was told I would never make many films after ‘Mrs. Brown’—the only way you can learn is to watch other actors doing it. And I know that I should be better at this, at going and watching a take as soon as I’ve done it. I know a lot of actors do that (watch the takes). I can’t do that because in my eyes, I’m 43, very tall with blonde hair and long legs. I don’t want that to be shattered so I don’t want to see. I’m very squeamish about seeing myself.”
The actress who turned 79 last Dec. 9 is not planning to rest at all. “Work is all I want,” she stressed with a smile. “People keep saying that terrible word. ‘Retire,’ people say. That’s such a filthy word in my case. I won’t have that word at all. I do love working and I love most of all the thought of doing something that is so totally different from ‘Philomena.’”
(E-mail the columnist at rvnepales_5585@yahoo.com. Follow him at https://twitter.com/nepalesruben.)