Britain's Living Embodiment of Posh Totty on Being Hollywood's Queen of Romance...
Ian Nathan
If it hadn't been for The English Patient's cuckolding, comes-to-a-sorry-end-in-a-big-cave Katharine Clifton, Kristin Scott Thomas wouldn't be where she is today. It was, after all, a career-defining role in an Oscar-winning epic. And, to be frank -- as Scott Thomas undoubtedly is -- if she hadn't got the part she'd have thrown a complete wobbler and given up acting on the spot.
"It would have been devastating. I would have stopped working. It was that visceral," she says, without a hint of irony. "It was my role from when I read the novel. She was so like me."
Considering she only really had that posh bitchy one from Four Weddings to her name, the odds were against her. Yet director Anthony Minghella obviously recognised what she felt.
"I could have fallen flat on my face, everyone was against it," she recalls of the event. "But it worked out so well. I never actually felt vindicated by the success, I never actually believed I was going to get it, so it was just a relief."
The Kristin Scott Thomas of today, leading lady to Hollywood's top-notch male crumpet (Hugh Grant, Ralph Fiennes, Tom Cruise, Robert Redford, Harrison Ford and, er, Prince), is spread comfortably over an olde-style armchair and taking every question with the unruffleable ease of the total pro. Indeed, she is charming, easygoing and very intelligent, quite the opposite of the ice-queen reputation which has stuck to her since Four Weddings.
"I don't know why that is -- maybe it is what I do best," Scott Thomas replies, certainly a bit posh, but hardly aloof. "I do frighten people, though; it's the way I look. Some people have an unfortunate face -- I always seem to be looking down my nose. I was born with a condescending face. I am not at all like that, it is an image from my roles. I don't really mind; I am not doing roles for public approval."
Scott Thomas has lived in Paris since she was 18 -- happily married (to a top gynaecologist) with two kids, decamping to Hollywood only when she really loves the role and it doesn't interfere with the school holidays. Of course, since 1996's The English Patient, those frequent flyer miles have been adding up, starting with a journey into Robert Redford's lair.
"I got a call from my publicist," she recalls, "saying, `You have to come to LA.' I got a day off from the production I was working on, rushed to the airport and got a ticket at the desk. I am still astonished I had the balls to do it; walk straight into a meeting with him. And there is Robert Redford sitting there, completely charming. We just spent three or four hours going over the words. All this because of ambition."
The result was 1998's The Horse Whisperer, and even more demand. Next Harrison Ford began lobbying to have her as his co-star, starting with Six Days, Seven Nights (1998). Anne Heche got that part, but the pair went on to make last year's Random Hearts.
"It was so flattering," she recalls. "This is Harrison Ford, such an important guy and completely divine. Funny as well, but not the funniest I've worked with - that's Hugh Grant."
Currently Scott Thomas is doing the rounds for Up At The Villa. Not, sadly, a shocking portrayal of the travails of a Midlands soccer club, but more period drama based on a Somerset Maugham short story and co-starring yet another example of Hollywood's testosteronal talent, Sean Penn.
With this in mind, the moment really begs an entirely unfair compare and contrast exercise between all the men she's shared the screen with.
"Very difficult, they're so different," Scott Thomas sighs, far too clever to be drawn. "Tom (Cruise -- in Mission: Impossible) is a dream, so super professional, completely in control. Robert Redford is just a god. Harrison is just great. Hugh was fun. Ralph is a complete... When you work with Ralph or Sean they are extraordinarily intense... They are different, not running around with bodyguards."
And The Artist Then Known As Prince? Scott Thomas began her career with a role in the less than brilliant Under The Cherry Moon (1986) with the titchy onetime squiggle.
"It's so vague," she laughs, ever diplomatic. "It was my first job and I was such a fan. I spent a whole summer listening to him and I was parachuted into his world. It was quite eccentric -- there were lots of eccentrics around..."
