Penelope Wilton: a woman of substance Nina Myskow / 30 January 2015
Penelope(马修妈)七十年代曾经有个儿子,早产9周生下来即是死胎。次年生了一个女儿,同样早产两个多月但是活下来了。说自己想生养三个孩子,但是只能有这个女儿了。采访时候女儿还正好打了电话进来,用的是特别关注铃声她还立刻接听了。 Penelope Wilton talks about her TV, film and stage career, love in later life and the burden of child loss.
——2020.8.18修改 (大体机翻,我修改了很多不对的地方)
在采访的最后几分钟,我突然得以一瞥这位受人尊敬的著名女演员背后真实的佩内洛普 · 威尔顿。
直到这个时候---- 加班五分钟后---- 外面的车正等着把她从摄影和采访中送回家,《唐顿庄园》中的伊莎贝尔 · 克劳利一直魅力十足、彬彬有礼、乐于助人,尽管你感觉到这整个过程并不是她的菜。
作为专业人士,她勇敢地融入了这一切的精神,尝试着她平时不会穿的颜色,最终在摄影棚里随着音乐摇摆,相机快门咔嗒一声关上。之后,她热情而流利地谈论她的工作。
佩内洛普拥有大英帝国官佐勋章和荣誉文学博士学位,这两项荣誉都是对她演技的赞扬,因此她无疑是目前演艺事业中的佼佼者。
/舞台、银幕和情景喜剧/
自从在80年代的情景喜剧(Ever reducing Circles)中扮演安(Ann)以来,她就是这样一张熟悉的面孔。安是理查德 · 布莱尔(Richard Briers)执着的马丁(Martin)的妻子,长期忍受着痛苦。她一劳永逸地坚信,年长的女演员很难找到角色,除非她们是朱迪 · 丹奇(Judi Dench)或玛吉 · 史密斯(Maggie Smith) ,她们都是她的同事,也算是朋友。
这些天最著名的是《唐顿庄园》,她不仅出演了这部令人惊讶的卖座电影的续集《金盏花大酒店2》,还在伦敦西区的舞台上出演了《午夜场》 ,这是一部以30年代纳粹德国为背景的强有力的新剧,在20世纪90年代奇贾斯特节日剧院获得了热烈的评价。
剧院,电视,电影?她看起来已经无缝连接了它们。“我自己也很震惊,”她笑着说,用一种典型的谦虚的方式说: “这很了不起,我真的很高兴,但这只是偶然事件: 这些事情时常发生。”。我得感谢我的经纪人。”
我想事实应该是反过来的(她在这个引人注目的版本中对一个未知的真实故事的表现被誉为“卓越”和“伟大”) ,但是她太谦虚了,不会这么想。
/午夜拍摄/
佩内洛普扮演著名年轻律师 Hans Litten 的母亲,1931年,Hans Litten 将希特勒送上了证人席,并将他置于灼热的反复询问之下。两年后,希特勒一上台,利滕就遭到了报复,被关进了 Sonnenberg 集中营。她说,这是一个母亲努力拯救儿子的故事。这出戏讲的是反抗暴政的高昂代价。
她的儿子消失了,就像当时德国成千上万的政治信仰错误的人一样。那是在战争和大规模围捕犹太人之前。她不希望他被遗忘。这是一出精彩的戏剧,我简直不敢相信我的运气。”
然而,这是一种情感上的消耗: 当我做这件事的时候,我没有做很多其他的事情,她说。“但我已经克服了抑郁,那是自我放纵。我只是在讲这个故事,而且很高兴它就在那里。这是关于freedom of speech,提醒我们democracy是一个脆弱的东西。我们认为这是理所当然的——这就是democracy——但我们必须捍卫它。这是件神圣的事情,真的。非常珍贵。
/失踪者的母亲/
这是关于那些愿意做任何事情的母亲们,那些为她们的孩子而战的母亲们,这是在阿根廷,在智利,在波斯尼亚和埃及的母亲们的心声。失踪者的母亲。它正在发生。博科圣地带走了非洲所有的女孩,那些总是站在前线的女人们,她们不会让她们被遗忘。这是母亲的本能。我们照顾我们的孩子,他们是第一位的。”
/家庭关系/
佩内洛普有一个女儿,爱丽丝,现年36岁,是一名剧院项目经理,和她已故前夫生的。她的电话铃响了(一个口哨铃声) ,是爱丽丝。佩内洛普一边快速接听电话,一边向她道歉,告诉她我们的位置恰巧在伦敦西部的阳光工作室。我们所在的地方和爱丽丝几年前结婚的地方一样,天花板宽敞。
你还记得阳光汽车吗她挂断电话时问道。我问你,是不是阳光剑?”“就是这个。这个建筑在变成工作室之前曾经是阳光展示厅。我们为婚礼租的。太棒了,我们度过了一段美好的时光。我有一个可爱的女婿叫埃利奥特,还有一个两岁半的孙子丹尼尔。
/金盏花大酒店2/
与午夜拍摄形成鲜明对比的是,《金盏花大酒店2》是一部轻松搞笑的电影。在续集中,一群退休人员为了生命的最后机会搬到了印度的一家酒店,佩内洛普回来扮演珍,不像其他人,她厌恶这种经历,愤怒地离开了她与道格拉斯(比尔 · 奈伊[ Bill Nighy ]饰)和印度的婚姻。
宁可和典型对立?佩内洛普具有与生俱来的道德权威,正直,一种你能感觉到的善良。“我向你保证,我没那么好,”她笑着说。
“可怜的女人,她精神崩溃了。在印度,不是每个人都会充满甜蜜和光明。如果你有一段不幸福的婚姻,要去另一个地方,你要把它带在身边。你带上你自己。”
/婚姻线/
佩内洛普结过两次婚,又离过两次婚。当我读到她的第一任丈夫在两年后娶了自己的妹妹时,我们讨论了结婚的问题。她的第二任丈夫伊恩 · 霍尔姆爵士也是一名演员。我问两位演员是否更了解对方,她说他们理解这个职业的不安全感,但她补充说,“你在婚姻中的任何成功或失败都是个人的事情。”。
我提到她的第二任丈夫,她突然说: “如果你不介意的话,实际上我不想谈论我的婚姻。”她彬彬有礼,但态度坚决。“我想我们只能说他们是非常好的演员”。她笑了,有点紧张。
这真的不值得谈论。我在两段婚姻中的某些时候都非常幸福,但婚姻都没有成功,所以最好就这样离开。”有道理。
我们坚持在更安全的地方工作,在印度拍电影。“我的角色简不像其他人那样经常出现,因为她回来了,但是她带着女儿回来了。”还有一条令人难以置信的黄色线条。她调查了所有其他退休人员后宣称,“我无法抗拒回来参观破败的古老废墟的机会,也无法抗拒看看酒店建筑是如何运作的! ”她喜欢演喜剧,与朱迪 · 丹奇和玛吉 · 史密斯这样的老朋友一起工作是一种享受。
玛吉和朱迪很有趣,很有趣。而我们所有人,都是一群非常随和的人。”还有西莉亚 · 伊姆里的购物之旅。印度的面料很漂亮,但你必须小心。他们在那边看起来很棒,然后你把他们带回家,然后想,“我到底为什么要买那个? ”但是很棒的棉花、睡衣和睡袍,都是给孩子们穿的。
“因为你经常参与拍摄,我们玩了很多 Bananagrams,一种非常快速的拼字游戏。”他们在《唐顿庄园》里也这么演: “他们在片场外为我们摆了一张桌子。大多数情况下都是 Maggie 赢了,但是扮演 Edith 小姐的Laura Carmichael,却非常擅长这个。很好的比赛。”
伊泽贝尔 · 克劳利和默顿勋爵之间的恋情目前已经停止。
她说,他的儿子们非常反对婚礼。“他们认为她不够格取代他们母亲的位置。然而,他已经被要求回归下一季,所以也许事情会继续。她笑着说。
/晚年的爱情/
晚花之爱的思想是非常振奋人心的。哦,是的,她同意。这种情况经常发生。我是说看看 Judi。她已故的丈夫麦可·威廉斯是一个非常好的人。但现在大卫(她现在的伴侣,大卫 · 米尔斯)非常好,她也非常快乐。所以真的很好。”
但是她怎么办?“哦,我现在很高兴,”她说。”“我一个人住。我已经独自生活了很长时间了。我一点也不介意。我有客人来,特别是我的孙子,他喜欢躺在我的床上,胜过世界上的任何东西。这就是和我分享生活的人。” “还有你的床”,我补充。我们都笑了。
“我永远不会说永远,”她承认。“如果我没有和别人在一起,我不会认为自己只是个不完整的人。但谁知道呢”
谁知道呢?她看起来棒极了。68岁的她身材苗条,身体健康,皮肤光滑,眼睛炯炯有神。
她说,“年龄不是我考虑的问题。”。年龄不是问题。她不吃很多加工食物,而且喜欢做饭。“我喜欢喝一杯葡萄酒,主要是红酒。我也喜欢酒。好吧,我喜欢任何旧的东西。她咯咯地笑着。普罗塞克酒很不错。
她是个很棒的步行者,经常去英格兰北部度假,每天早上在伦敦的公园里走大约5英里: ‘比去健身房有趣多了,太无聊了。这样你就有时间独处了。你可以安排你的一天,清理你的思绪。”
她热爱伦敦,充分利用艺术和古典音乐: “欣赏绘画,听音乐会,散步。”。听起来有点拘谨,但这正是我喜欢的。”
在她年轻的时候,她喜欢滚石乐队、披头士乐队、汤姆 · 琼斯: “但是有了孩子,你就错过了一代音乐。”史蒂夫 · 旺德让她跳起舞来: “他和我同时有了一个女儿,所以《Isn’t She Lovely》这首歌似乎是我对她的感觉的缩影。”
访谈即将结束,我问她生活中是否有遗憾。她停顿了一下,相当惊讶地吐露: “我希望我的婚姻能够成功,但是你看。”我希望我的第一次婚姻能有更好的结果。”
/失去孩子/
她犹豫了一下。我希望我有更多的孩子,但是在我有了爱丽丝之前,我失去了一个孩子。在我失去爱丽丝之前,我有一个小男孩。爱丽丝只有两磅九盎司重,所以她很小。她早产了十个星期。我本来想要三个孩子,但是我只能有她了。
她都说出来了: ‘我在怀孕12周的时候进去,在怀孕30周的时候生下了她。我在医院里等了她四个月,在圣托马斯医院他们一直在照顾我。但是我得到了她,所以我们走吧,我很幸运。”但是这是一次多么可怕的经历,多么痛苦,我同情她,她继续说道: 他早产了,比爱丽丝小一个星期,29周,他就是没能活下来,可怜的小家伙。是的,这很可怕,但那是很久以前的事了。”她紧咬着上嘴唇说。
但是这些事情会一直萦绕在你的脑海里,不是吗?是的,但是我很幸运,我现在有了爱丽丝,还有这个小孙子。她给她失去的孩子取名字了吗?“不,”她说。”“那时候不给早产的死婴起名字,医院他们甚至没有告诉你。他直接被带走了。”
当她起身准备离开时,她说: “但是这一切都过去了。”。这个孙子叫丹尼尔,是爱丽丝的父亲的名字。现在一切都没事了。是的,那是一个艰难的时期,但是我不想把它看得太重。这只是发生在很多人身上的事情之一。”
当她要走的时候。” “它改变了我吗?我想我更感激一切。我感激我女儿的存在,不能用言语来表达。” —— Actor Penelope Wilton Penlope Wilton talks to Saga It’s in the dying minutes of the interview that I get a sudden glimpse of the real Penelope Wilton behind the respected and celebrated actress. Up until this point, five minutes into overtime, with the car waiting outside to take her home from the photoshoot and interview, Downton Abbey’s Isobel Crawley has been charming and polite and obliging, despite the fact that you sense that this whole process is not really her cup of tea. Ever the professional, she gamely enters into the spirit of it all however, trying on colours that she would never normally wear, eventually swaying to the music in the studio as the camera shutter clicks away. Afterwards she talks enthusiastically and fluently about her work. With an OBE and an honorary Doctor of Letters, both tributes to her acting skills, Penelope is undoubtedly at the top of her game at the moment. Stage, screen and sitcom A familiar face since Ever Decreasing Circles, the Eighties sitcom in which she played Ann, the long-suffering wife of Richard Briers’ obsessive Martin, she puts paid once and for all to the theory that older actresses struggle to find parts unless they’re Judi Dench or Maggie Smith, both of whom she works with and counts as friends. Best known these days for Downton (which also stars Peter Egan who played her 'will they? won't they?' neighbour Paul in Ever Decreasing Circles), she is not only returning in The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel, a sequel to the surprise hit film, which pulled in $135 million, but is also starring on the West End stage in Taken at Midnight, a powerful new play set in Thirties Nazi Germany, which garnered her glowing reviews on its run at Chichester Festival Theatre. Theatre, television, film? She seems to have them all sewn up right now. ‘I’m astounded, myself,’ she laughs, and in typically modest fashion says: ‘It’s marvellous and I’m really delighted, but it’s happenstance: these things happen from time to time. I have to thank my agent.’ I expect it’s the other way round (her performance in this compelling version of an unknown true story has been hailed as ‘superb’ and ‘magnificent’), but she’d be too unassuming to think that. Taken at Midnight Penelope plays the mother of a celebrated young lawyer, Hans Litten, who in 1931 put Adolf Hitler on the witness stand, subjecting him to a searing cross-examination. As soon as Hitler came to power two years later, Litten was seized in retribution, and incarcerated in Sonnenberg concentration camp. ‘It’s the story of a mother’s struggle to save her son,’ she says. The play is about the high price of resisting tyranny. ‘Her son disappeared, like thousands in Germany of the wrong political persuasion at the time. It was before the war and the big round-up of the Jewish population. She didn’t want him to be forgotten. It’s a wonderful play and I can’t believe my luck.’ It is, though, emotionally draining: ‘I don’t do much else when I’m doing this,’ she says. ‘But I’ve got over being depressed, that’s self-indulgent. I’m just telling the story, and delighted it’s out there. It’s about freedom of speech and reminds us that democracy is a fragile thing. We take it for granted – that’s what democracy is – but we do have to guard it. It’s a sacred thing, really. Very precious. Mothers of the 'disappeared' ‘It’s about mothers who will do anything, who fight for their children, and it speaks for mothers who are in Argentina, in Chile, in Bosnia and Egypt. Mothers of the disappeared. It’s happening now. Boko Haram have taken all those girls away in Africa, and it’s the women who always stand there on the front line, and they won’t let them be forgotten. It’s instinctive for mothers. We look after our children, they come first.’ Family ties Penelope has a daughter, Alice, now 36, a theatre projects manager, from her first marriage to the late actor Daniel Massey. On cue her phone rings (a whistle ringtone), and it’s Alice. Penelope apologises as she takes the call quickly to tell her the coincidence of our location, Sunbeam Studios in West London. We are in the same vast-ceilinged space where Alice married a couple of years ago. ‘Do you remember Sunbeam cars?’ she asks when she hangs up. Sunbeam Rapier, I ask? ‘That’s the one. This building used to be the Sunbeam showroom before it was turned into studios. We hired it for the wedding. It was marvellous, we had a lovely time. So I have a lovely son-in-law called Elliott and a grandson Daniel who’s two and a half.’ The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel As a complete contrast to Taken at Midnight, The Second Best Exotic Marigold Hotel is a romp and great fun. In the sequel to the story of a bunch of retirees who move to a hotel in India for a last chance at life, Penelope returns as Jean who, unlike the others, loathed the experience and exited her marriage to Douglas (Bill Nighy) and India in high dudgeon. Rather playing against type? Penelope has innate moral authority, integrity, a kind of goodness that you sense. ‘I assure you I’m not that good,’ she laughs. ‘Well, poor woman, she was having a nervous breakdown. Not everyone is going to be filled with sweetness and light in India. And if you’re having an unhappy marriage, going to another place, you take that with you. You take yourself with you.’ Marriage lines Penelope has been twice married and divorced. As I’d read that her first husband married her own sister two years later, we discussed marriage. Her second husband, Sir Ian Holm, was also an actor. I ask if two actors understand each other better and she says they understand the insecurity of the profession, but adds, ‘Any success or failure you have in a marriage is a personal one’. I mention her second husband and suddenly she says: ‘Actually I don’t want to talk about my marriages, if you don’t mind.’ She is polite but firm. ‘I think we’ll just say they were very good actors.’ She laughs, a bit nervously. ‘It’s not worth speaking about really. I was very happy at certain times in both marriages, but they didn’t work out, so probably best to leave it like that.’ Fair enough. We stick to safer territory, working on the film in India. ‘My character Jean’s not in it as much as the others because she’s gone back, but she returns with her daughter.’ And with a fabulously waspish line. Surveying all the other retirees she declares, ‘I couldn’t resist the chance to come back and visit the crumbling old ruins – and to see how the hotel building’s going as well!’ She loves doing comedy, and working with old chums such as Judi Dench and Maggie Smith is a treat. ‘Maggie and Judi are lots of laughs, great fun. And all of us, it’s a very easy group of people.’ There are shopping trips with Celia Imrie as well. ‘India has lovely fabrics but you’ve got to be careful. They look wonderful over there, and then you bring them home and think, “Why on earth did I buy that?” But wonderful cottons, nighties and dressing gowns, stuff for children. ‘Because you hang about a lot with filming, we play a lot of Bananagrams, a very quick sort of Scrabble.’ They play it on Downton, too: ‘They put up a table for us off-set. Maggie mostly wins, but Laura Carmichael, who plays Lady Edith, is extremely good at it. Great game.’ The romance between Isobel Crawley and Lord Merton is currently stalled. ‘His sons are very anti the wedding,’ she says. ‘They don’t think she’s good enough to take their mother’s place. However, he’s been asked back for the next series, so perhaps things will move on!’ she reveals with a laugh. Love in later life The thought of late-flowering love is very uplifting. ‘Oh, it is,’ she agrees. ‘And it happens a lot. I mean, look at Judi. Her late husband Michael Williams was such a darling man. But now David [her current partner, David Mills] is extremely nice, and she’s very happy. So it’s really lovely.’ But what about her? ‘Oh, I’m very happy as I am,’ she says. ‘I live on my own. I’ve lived on my own for quite a while now. I don’t mind it at all. I have visitors, especially my grandson, who likes to be in my bed more than anything in the world. So that’s who shares my life.’ And your bed, I suggest. We laugh. ‘I’d never say never,’ she confesses. ‘I’m not looking out thinking I’m only half a person if I’m not with someone. But who knows?’ Who knows indeed? She looks terrific. At 68 she is slender and fit, healthy, with glowing skin and twinkling, intelligent eyes. ‘Age is not something I think about,’ she says. ‘Age doesn’t come into it.’ She doesn’t eat much processed food, and loves cooking. ‘I love a glass of wine, red mostly. I like white too. Well, I like any old thing!’ She giggles. ‘And prosecco’s nice.’ She’s a great walker, often goes for walking holidays in the north of England and does about five miles every morning through the parks in London: ‘Much more interesting than going to a gym, so boring. And it gives you time to yourself. You can sort out your day, clear your mind.’ She loves London, and makes great use of the art, the classical music: ‘Looking at paintings, going to concerts, and walking. Sounds rather po-faced but it’s what I like.’ In her younger days she loved The Stones, The Beatles, Tom Jones: ‘But with children you miss out on a generation of music.’ Stevie Wonder makes her dance: ‘He had a daughter at the same time I had Alice, so Isn’t She Lovely seemed to epitomise what I felt about her.’ The interview is drawing to a close and I ask if she has any regrets in life. She pauses and rather surprisingly confides, ‘I wish my marriages had worked, but there you go. I wish my first marriage had worked more.’ Loss of a child She hesitates. ‘I wish I’d had more children, but I lost one before I had Alice. I had a little boy before Alice, whom I lost. Alice was only two pounds nine ounces, so she was tiny. She was ten weeks early. I would have liked to have had three children, but I’ve got her.’ She just lets it out: ‘I went in at 12 weeks and had her at 30 weeks. I was in the hospital four months waiting for her, and all that time they looked after me at St Thomas’s. But I’ve got her, so there we go, I’m very lucky.’ But what a dreadful experience, how traumatic, I sympathise, and she continues: ‘He was premature, a week younger than Alice, 29 weeks, and he just didn’t survive, poor little chap. And yes it was dreadful, but it was a long time ago.’ She is marvellously stiff upper lip. But these things hang on, linger in your mind, don’t they? ‘They do, but I’m so lucky I’ve got Alice, and this little grandson now.’ Did she name the baby she lost? ‘No,’ she says. ‘You didn’t in those days, they didn’t even tell you. He was just taken away.’ As she gets up to leave, she says: ‘But that’s all gone. And this little chap is called Daniel, after Alice’s father. And it’s all right now. Yes, it was a difficult time, but one doesn’t want to make too much of it. It’s just one of those things that happens, and it happens to a lot of people.’ And, as she’s on her way. ‘Has it changed me? I think I appreciate things. I appreciate my daughter more than I can say.’