Sheathed in layers of golden fabric of an Oscar de la Renta gown appearing like a mythical Greek goddess, Cate Blanchett is featured on the cover of this December’s issue of VOGUE, appearing on newsstands November 24th, with an interview by VOGUE writer Adam Green about her greatest role to date: A Streetcar Named Desire’s Blanche DuBois. Green observes that Cate ‘’remains a creature of the stage” and also asks her about the importance of theater, family life and career path.
Here a few highlights from Adam Green’s interview with Cate, the self-proclaimed ‘theater geek’:
On the importance of theater:
“In the wake of everything that’s happened in the world in the last eighteen months, we’re thinking about what we’ve lost. So much of the play is about the death of poetry and idealism and hope—the fine, delicate things in our lives, the intangible, ephemeral things in our lives—which theater actually represents, doesn’t it? It’s ephemeral by its very nature. If you’re not there, you miss it. It’s gone.”
She is so dedicated to preserving theater, she and her husband of twelve years, Andrew Upton, became artistic directors of the Sydney Theatre Company, in Sydney, Australia, beginning in 2008.
On appreciating the sense of stability that staying semi-put and working regular hours has allowed both Blanchett and husband, Andrew Upton, to give their three boys:
“’There are so few experiences in our manicured, nanny-stated existence that have the quality of circus. Theater still does.’ And so, when the boys aren’t playing with friends, they can usually be found playing backstage. ‘They’re always engaged in the family business, so to speak.’”
Cate, with her sense of humor intact, on the matter of having children said, “The world is so massively overpopulated, but if you’re halfway decent-looking and you make nice ones, then I think it’s probably your responsibility to make more. That’s why we just have to have more of them!” We just adore Cate at LA’s The Place because she doesn’t take life too seriously!
On career choices:
“I’m not very cautious or careful. It’s always been more about having a variety of experiences than any planned trajectory… I think that in a way, projects choose you.”
From playing the ethereal Elf Queen Galadriel in the “Lord of the Rings” movies to the tough Katherine Hepburn in “Aviator” to the young Queen Elizabeth I in the movie, “Elizabeth”, this certainly demonstrates her immense range of acting abilities and diverse career projects. Geoffrey Rush makes a insightful comment about her intelligent acting technique.
Actor Geoffrey Rush on Cate Blanchett:
“As an actor, you either work off your own personality, and that’s what you’re peddling, or, like Cate, you draw out from the source material all the many dark, mysterious, and conflicting elements of the character that are going to make it engaging and trilling for the audience.”
To read the entire article from the December VOGUE article, “Truth or Dare” on Cate Blanchett, please click HERE.
Cate Blanchette, photographed for the cover of Vogue, by famed photographer Annie Leibovitz.
