thandie

Thandie Newton: 'It's not a play where you want to corpse'

2011-10-08T22:58:00.000-07:00

The actor on Baftas, backstage pranks and her West End debut in Death and the Maiden
Thandie Newton can't hide her excitement. The actress has starred with Tom Cruise and Will Smith and won a Bafta, but now she is about to make her stage debut in a West End run of Death and the Maiden. "I just can't wait. Ten years ago I would have been terrified, now emotionally I am ready to do this," she says.

It is a few days before rehearsals start and we are the only people in an enormous cafe at a west London studio where Newton, dressed casually in skinny grey jeans and a sweatshirt, has just been photographed for the play's poster. Isn't she jumping in at the deep end by playing the lead role as the tortured political prisoner in Ariel Dorfman's acclaimed play?

"It's such a great part and the opportunity to play a role from start to finish," she says quietly. "Acting on a film is like having to interrupt peeing or an orgasm. Literally having to 'uggh' [she takes a sharp intake of breath] start and stop."

Newton, 38, has starred in films for 20 years since her debut in Flirting, alongside her friend Nicole Kidman, but her stock rose significantly, especially in Britain, after she won a Bafta for Crash in 2005. "I don't think people ever really knew where I was from before, so they assumed I wasn't British." Her latest film, Retreat, a tense drama co-starring Cillian Murphy, about an unhappy couple stranded on a remote island, opens this month.

Working in the theatre means a short commute from her north-west London home where she lives with her husband, the writer and director Ol Parker, and their two daughters. With Parker busy directing his second film, Now Is Good, Newton has been on domestic duty. "I was feeling smug at the start of the summer as he was working really long hours and I was taking the kids off to Ibiza. Now I'm tired, it's such a marathon." A few minutes later Newton's mobile bleeps: it is her nanny phoning to say she has set off the smoke alarm by mistake.

As well as the opportunity to immerse herself in Death and the Maiden, Newton is looking forward to playing some pranks. During the press junket for Run Fatboy Run she filled Simon Pegg's water bottles with vodka, so what is she planning now? "I wouldn't want to do anything to them during the play, this is not a play where you want to corpse, just saying the word corpse in the context of this play seems incredibly inappropriate. But I think a dressing room door locked now and again is OK."

Huge out July 8th UK

2011-06-28T22:01:00.000-07:00

Kung Fu Panda 2

2011-06-09T22:30:00.001-07:00

Good Deeds still

2011-05-29T22:41:00.001-07:00

Savage Beauty" Costume Institute Gala At The Metropolitan Museum Of Art - Arrivals

2011-05-22T22:00:00.000-07:00

Retreat Poster

2011-05-22T21:47:00.001-07:00

instyle 2011

2011-05-11T19:48:00.000-07:00

Thandie Newton RETREAT trailer

2011-05-11T19:42:00.000-07:00

Thandie in ES Magazine

2011-04-27T21:33:00.000-07:00

10 minutes with Thandie Newton
Hannah Nathanson
15 Apr 2011

The fashionable film star talks protests, rehab and practical jokes with Hannah Nathanson

You studied social anthropology at Cambridge, would you have joined the recent protest?
God, yes! I think that protest was hugely significant. The government should take into account the fact that people have taken to the streets unhappy and allow that to be part of the ongoing dialogue.
How are the cuts affecting you?
It's always the arts. It's the most obvious place to make cuts, but it's also the place everyone goes when they need their broken hearts mended.
Who are you wearing today?
Jonathan Saunders. I get a huge amount of attention when I wear his designs. They flatter me and make me feel unique.
Would you feel comfortable wearing John Galliano?
If someone's gone into rehab, I'm not thinking about their clothes. This is a much bigger deal than clothes; this is about a human being who's trying to check out of life.
Would you be willing to forget about what he said?
It goes way beyond what was said and any insults or offence taken. This is a human being who is in pain and I hope to God that he finds a way through that. I will be there to applaud him.
You obviously feel strongly about it…
It makes me emotional to talk about it.
Let's change the subject. What do you do when you're bored?
I play practical jokes.
Do you have a signature prank?
Growing up in Cornwall, we used to play a joke called 'shitty handbag'.
Goodness. How does that work?
We'd scoop up hot, fresh horse poo, put it in an inexpensive handbag and leave it on the roadside. We'd then hide in the bushes nearby until some kind, honest person would come along and pick up the handbag thinking it had been accidentally dropped and look inside.
Did you run away at that point?
No, they'd be hit in the face by this steaming poo and at that moment we'd scream 'shitty handbag!' and then run off. It provided hours of fun. I played a version of it on Graham Norton when I went on his show.
Have you ever had your comeuppance?
Filming Mission: Impossible II, my co-star Richard Roxburgh got me good. It's a gorgeous feeling, though, when you think, 'Oh my God, someone's left a poo in my handbag!' and then you realise that it's actually a squashed Mars bar. It's a sense of relief followed by good humour.
Thandie Newton is ambassador for the British Designers Collective, a unique collaboration between Value Retail and the British Fashion Council (01869 245 618; bicestervillage.com)

Instyle 26th January 2011

2011-01-26T14:12:00.000-08:00

Guardian review of Shooting Stars

2011-01-02T09:52:00.000-08:00

And welcome, for example, to a special Christmas Shooting Stars (BBC2). No, I don't know what that "for example" is doing there either, but that's what Bob Mortimer says – and it's funny. Shooting Stars is about the baffling, the surreal, the unexpected and the unbelievably silly. This festive episode begins with a hanging (of a mouse) and ends with a race (between Ricky Tomlinson and Ronnie Wood, on mobility scooters). In between is half an hour of the usual lunacy.

Bob is impaled, up the arse, on the end of of Vic's electric guitar; Walter Hottle Bottle jumps in slow motion; Ulrikakaka downs a pint of Advocaat in one, then burps loudly; Jack Dee has a face like an abandoned winkle-picker, or a willy warmer with mouse droppings all over it; Joanna Page is Welsh and pronounces words funny; Thandie Newton is pestered by Bob; Angelous has been hiding in the trees outside Ulrikakaka's bedroom; the Christmas tree catches fire; a stuffed buzzard loses its confidence when a cocktail is thrown in its face; Ricky rides a rocking horse while eating chicken drumsticks.

And there are some fiendishly difficult questions. Like: true or false, muesli is a byproduct of coffin-making? (true). And will bacon stick to Bob's face? (Yes). And what's the latest Ron ever stayed up? (Very).

I'm still not convinced it was a good idea to bring back Shooting Stars. It was a show that fitted so perfectly into the 1990s, like Seinfeld and Britpop. But this Christmas special was a party.

Shooting stars clips

2010-12-30T00:31:00.000-08:00

New stills from Vanishing on 7th Street

2010-12-26T05:40:00.000-08:00

Thandie in the Sun

2010-12-12T17:42:00.000-08:00

Mum said stay calm... even when I’m told I’m not black enough
by GARTH PEARCE

BRITISH actress Thandie Newton is one of Hollywood's leading ladies.

She started her film career at just 16 and has since gone on to star in blockbusters Mission: Impossible II, Crash and 2012.

She was born in London to a Zimbabwean mother, Nyasha, and an English father, Nick, both pictured with Thandie below, but she was brought up in Penzance, Cornwall.

The 38-year-old is married to British writer and director Ol Parker. They have two daughters - Ripley, ten, and six-year-old Nico. Her new film, For Colored Girls, co-starring Whoopi Goldberg and Janet Jackson, is out now.
"MY mother taught me to remain calm and decide what is worth fighting for.

Lessons learnt ... Thandie grew up in Cornwall with her
English dad Nick and Zimbabwean mum Nyasha
She had a wide experience of life, which she passed on to me. It could have been difficult being an ethnic minority in a small seaside town, but she always made me feel unique and special.

Perhaps it was the confidence she gave me which made me never think of racism. I just did not encounter it.

There has been, how shall I put it, clumsiness with racial stereotypes. I remember having a meeting with a Hollywood studio head and talking about a role when she said: 'Yeah, Thandie, but are you black enough for this role?'

There was discussion when I took a role in the film Crash and I was told: 'But is it believable that your character has a degree?' I said: 'But I do have a degree, from Cambridge.' And the reaction was: 'Yes, but you're different.'

Even black filmmakers think I am not 'street' enough. But I am an actress - I can play anything.

How do I deal with such things? I remember my mum's advice and remain calm. If I fight for something, I do it without raising my voice or losing my temper.

If I do have doubts about black roles in films, it is about how the character is portrayed. Too often it is either a gun-toting, drugged-up role - or too poetic.

As for my own life, I do wish I had behaved differently at times. I was so young when I started acting - just 16.

It was an upsetting time in many ways. I was involved in a relationship which did not work and that affected me hugely. I was much too young. It is very easy for young women to be exploited by this industry. You see a loss of innocence everywhere - even on Big Brother.

Going to university just gave me a glaze on my mask.

Even having the world's best mum at times like these does not help!

But I wouldn't be here now, would not have met my husband, would not be the person I am, if I had not gone through that.

There is nothing else in my life in which I have been engaged so intensely as my relationship and marriage. I am a real romantic and a fairytale creator. Ol is unique, precious and gifted.

When I met him, I fell in love for the first time.

As for my career, the idea that you have a grand plan is nonsense. I just take the best of what is around at the time.

I've made many mistakes. My worst fashion one was at the premiere of Jefferson In Paris. I went to get a facial. But it was a matter of tweezing and pulling and by the time of the premiere I looked as if I had been through a mosquito air raid.

My parents gave me a happy upbringing and good education. My mum has always been there for me. She's even been on location with me to look after my daughters.

When I compare my life with my mum's, I know I've had an easy time. What has been happening in Zimbabwe (where Mugabe has brought the country to its knees) is painful for my mum. She still has sisters over there.

I have been waiting to go back to visit - it is a beautiful part of the world with very friendly people, but it has got worse and worse.

So my own life has been blessed - and I fully appreciate what I have."

London Fashion Awards

2010-12-07T22:34:00.000-08:00

Shooting Stars information

2010-12-04T19:33:00.000-08:00

Shooting Stars
Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer host a Christmas special of the bonkers quiz, with Rolling Stone legend Ronnie Wood, Hollywood actress Thandie Newton, Royle Family actor Ricky Tomlinson and Gavin & Stacey star Joanna Page. Folk singers Mulligan and O'Hare perform a medley of festive songs, and Angelos Epithemiou tries to move in with one of the guests
Category Game Show/Quiz
Director Ian Trill
Producer Lisa Clark
BBC2 10:00pm-10:30pm (30 minutes) Thu 30 Dec

Retreat Poster and more information

2010-11-02T15:44:00.001-07:00

Currently in post-production in Wales, Retreat is an intriguing pshycological thriller produced by that looks to play on the extent to which end of the world fears effect groups. Thanks to AFM we have the first poster art to share as well as an extended synopsis.

Synopsis:
In a last-ditch attempt to save their faltering marriage, a professional couple Martin & Kate Badenoch (Cillian Murphy & Thandie Newton) retreat to a beautiful, yet remote and unpopulated island of Dinnish, (U.K.). A place where they once shared a romantic holiday – an island that holds fond memories of happier times.

It is Autumn. The rocky, barren moors are blown by freezing winds, and the generator and radio communication in the couple’s cottage are failing. Relationships are already tense, and anxieties are pushed higher when they lose all contact with the mainland, and find themselves inexplicably stranded and cut off.

After a huge storm, a stranger is washed up on the shore. He has frightening news of cataclysmic events happening in the world outside. But who is this volatile, charismatic American dressed in uniform and carrying a gun. Is he telling the truth? Slowly, the couple become unwitting players in a ménage-a-trois.

In a series of tense twists the captive couple uses all their ingenuity to outwit the stranger and unravel the ‘truth’. But is the truth what they really want to hear? Loyalties divide and merge, paranoia runs high and conflicts bubble to the surface resulting in a violent and shocking conclusion.

Thandie Newton Loved Taking Her Role "To The Edge"

2010-11-02T15:23:00.000-07:00

By BlackVoices.com published on Tuesday, November 2, 2010 and is filed under Entertainment. You can follow responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site. ShareThis

Filed under: Interviews

It’s been a long time since Thandie Newton appeared in an ensemble film featuring mostly females. That was 1998 and the film was Jonathan Demme’s ‘Beloved.’

Now, twelve years later, Newton gets to work with her co-star Kimberly Elise again in Tyler Perry‘s film, ‘For Colored Girls,’ an adaptation of Ntozake Shange’s legendary play.

The London, England native plays Tangie, a promiscuous bartender who’s the daughter of Whoopi Goldberg‘s character and sister of Tessa Thompson‘s character.

In speaking with Black Voices, Newton talks about coming into the project knowing very little about the legendary play, and working with Elise again.

How did you come into this play initially, and how were you asked to be part of it?

Thandie Newton: The same thing happened at the same time. Tyler called me maybe 18 months ago and told me he wanted to do this piece, and I hadn’t read it or seen it being performed. I’m English, and it’s not my world, funnily enough. That was my first introduction to the piece. I read his script first, and then I read the play. I was completely intrigued by the possibilities. I could see what he wanted to do by obviously making it more contemporary, making it more accessible to the viewer, but at the same time using the poetry. I thought it was really cool, experimental and interesting. I couldn’t think of seeing it done before. In musicals people burst into song, but this is a whole different thing. I really loved the thought of performing the poetry. It was a challenge that was going to be a difficult one. You get that wrong… these moments of poetry can either elevate the material or make it laughable. From being on the set and seeing the other actors working, I know that they will provide real moments of lucid emotion.

How would you compare this character to your other roles?

TN: I’ve had a few other roles in my career where I felt challenged, satisfied, stimulated, afraid… all those things. ‘Beloved was one, ‘Crash’ was another. I’m able to really reach the edge of an emotional capacity through the character’s experiences. It’s not for my catharsis, it’s to actually take the character on an emotional journey and make that believable and to feel and experience their lives that I had never on my own. To have a completely unique moment that I have never had in my life, and probably will never have. That is pretty out there. It’s like a feeling of being possessed by a spirit medium, like a trance state. There were times with this, probably because we shot so fast, had a grueling schedule, I get home at the end of the day and I can barely remember what I’ve done, ’cause I’ve been in a really trippy state. That’s what it feels like, acting at its most complete, for me, is I’m totally out of my own experiences. It’s like being hypnotized.

Is there anything in the character you can relate to?

TN: Nothing. No, no, no.. Oh my lord. From the childhood, parenting, social background, everything’s different, and that was why it was such a satisfying, complete form of self-hypnosis. I really absorbed myself. What would it have been like to be this girl? To be abused by your grandfather, for your mother to have allowed it to happen. Your mother has coupled with a white man so she’ll have lighter-skinned babies so the grandfather will want to have sex with them? It’s just too crazy. In a way, the fact that it’s a complete universe away… listen, it’s not as if it’s any better or any worse for me, it’s another experience, that’s all, and how this woman deals with it. One of the things that’s so beautiful about playing her, and about watching a movie like this, is we cannot judge the outward behavior of people until we have walked in their shoes. As an actor that’s what you get to do. So the amount of sympathy that I can have for her is only because I have really considered what she has experienced. I feel changed by it, and I’m more like her now because I feel like she’s more like me now because she’s had the insights. It’s given her a greater sense of self-love, something I have the luxury to be able to access self-love because I haven’t been through the kind of shit she has.

You have a couple pivotal scenes, including one with Whoopi, one with Phylicia, one with Tessa, and they all stand out. How is working with this cast of amazing actresses?

TN: It was amazing. Working with Tessa Thompson, there was one scene where she tells me she needs some money and I figure out that she’s pregnant. I tell you it was one of those scenes where working with her and her level as an actress elevated what I was able to do. I’m so grateful for that. You’re only as good as the person you’re acting with, unless you’re one of those people that just do your own thing. I’ve worked with people who do that, and I’ve had to do that too when I’m not getting anything back from somebody. I really love collaborating, looking in someone’s eyes and actually being there in that moment. Whatever they do I do, what I do is what they do. To actually move as one. It’s knockout! It’s like being in a jazz quartet or something. You have to be so in tune with the other person, like a school of dolphins or geese flying. I tell you it’s the same, amazing, being in-synch with someone like that.

With Whoopi, I loved supporting her performance because she was so in her own trip in this movie. The fact that she hadn’t acted in a movie for 12-years, I couldn’t believe that information! She’s so prominent when I think about her and the work she’s done, from ‘Ghost’ to ‘The Color Purple.’ It was just amazing. It was such a privilege to be with her. She was like a fledgling, had the same insecurities as us and really grateful for the opportunity to do something she was proud of and bring her out of her acting retirement. I felt shame at the stuff I had to say to Phylicia, in the early days. By the end it was fun and I knew it was giving her stuff to respond to. At the beginning I did not feel comfortable telling her she was, “You fucking nasty bitch,” and all this. I’m like, “Whoa, don’t make me say that to Phylicia Rashad, please don’t make me!” (laughs) That’s what she’s supposed to be. There’s a movie called ‘Capote’ where this guy has murdered this family, and they were like, “Why did he do it?” He loved the family, they liked him very much, but he looked into the eyes of the father of the family, and the father looked at him with knowledge of who he was as if to say, “Why are you doing this?” That was why this boy killed him, ’cause he felt such shame to be looked at by someone he admired so much. That’s what Gilda makes Tangie feel, that’s why Tangie treats her with so much contempt. To have her gaze on her, with her pity, the shame she feels and she wants to destroy Gilda for what Gilda knows. Just to be looked at by someone you loved and admired so much. You picked on the right three scenes, I’ll tell you!

‘Beloved’ was so long ago, but how was it reminiscing with Kimberly?

TN: Oh my God. Kimberly is still to this day the most transcendental acting experience I’ve had. There’s one scene where the two sisters are talking about Beloved’s arrival. It was just electric. Nothing will ever reach that. Kim and I have one scene in the movie together, which I love, where I invite her to the party, and she says she doesn’t think so. It’s actually the one moment where Tangie is nurturing. I’m sure that has a little bit to do with the relationship I have with Kimberly, who is always going to be my sister for what we went through on ‘Beloved.’ It’s a peek at communication between two people who wouldn’t necessarily think are connected.

I know you have ‘Vanishing On 7th Street’ coming out at some point. What’s after that?

TN: I just wrapped a movie called ‘The Retreat,’ with Cillian Murphy and Jaime Bell. It’s a thriller. I loved it. It was a similarly intense movie. It’s three actors in one house. It was a really clever script, very tense; really character driven. I feel like I’m on a bit of a role, I’m enjoying acting and the work that’s been coming in. I’m really getting to explore characters that are more complex than of late. I often think, “What am I giving to the world? What’s my contribution?” I’m going through a period of, “Oh, I know what it is!” I don’t know what’s going to happen next, I’ll take a bit of time just to let the field lie fallow so whatever comes next I’ll be ready for. I’m pretty wrung out right now.

What keeps you grounded when you’re not doing the entertainment stuff?

TN: My husband and children. My babies. My girls. I have a ten-year-old, Ripley, and five-year-old Nico. I’m hugely fortunate that we have this little community and every moment is such a gift. Out of that I grow as a person and generate love and kindness, all those good things. As a family we allow that to go out to the world. What we do, how we teach our kids, how we communicate to other people. Each one of us, how healthy we keep ourselves and how we allow that energy to be spilled out around us. Having good, quiet times with them, teaching them about being a girl, being a woman. How to create health and happiness for all the people they come into contact with.

Another Coloured girls interview

2010-11-02T15:16:00.001-07:00

Coloured Girls Interview

2010-11-02T15:13:00.000-07:00

Exclusive: Thandie Newton on For Colored Girls Source: Edward Douglas November 2, 2010

For Colored Girls, Tyler Perry's adaptation of Ntozake Shange's acclaimed dramatic play "For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf," features a cavalcade of African-American actresses including Janet Jackson, Kerry Washington, Loretta Devine, Anika Noni Rose, Kimberly Elise and Phylicia Rashad but nestled among is the sole British actress of the cast, Thandie Newton. She plays a rebellious and promiscuous bartender named Tangie, who has different men in her bed every night. Her mother, played by Whoopi Goldberg, is a religious fanatic who disproves of her elder daughter's behavior and is trying her best to keep her younger daughter, played by Tessa Thompson, from ending up down the same path as her older sister. It's a really different role for Newton, who is almost unrecognizable to those who aren't aware it's her going in, and she certainly is given the chance to light a lot of emotional fireworks over the course of the film.

ComingSoon.net sat down with Ms. Newton at the New York junket for Tyler Perry's film and had a perfectly lovely conversation about working with the prolific filmmaker, doing scenes with Whoopi Goldberg, and the challenges and joys of playing an unrestrained character like Tangie.

ComingSoon.net: When Tyler Pyler first contacted you, did he tell you which role he wanted you to play and what was your first knowledge of this project?
Newton: It was about 18 months before the movie was made, he called to talk about this project that he wanted to mount. So I read the first draft of the script, and at that time, even some of the names that are in the final piece were different. What he's done is he's taken elements from different ladies in the play and some have been condensed into one character. It's faithful to the material, but he has license. At that time, there was a character in the movie which we were talking about, which then changed and then became another character in the current movie. So it went through quite a process even before the movie was shot, three significant drafts.

CS: So you were reading all of these scripts as it was being developed?
Newton: I've seen the first one and the last one.

CS: Tangie's a really different character from what you've played. I think Beloved had a little bit of a dark side to her, but this is a really pretty nasty, bad girl. There's very few redeeming qualities I think.
Newton: It's funny that you say that, and I guess this is by virtue of having explored all the roles that you're talking about. Every role is complex, every personality. It's how much I'm able to show through the piece. Every character that I've played could reach this kind of complexity, but it's not. So I don't really see Tangie as different, it's just I was able to go further with her, you know? I suppose with "Beloved," too; I went all the way with "Beloved," into the depths of her complicatedness. Yeah, I know it is, and it was fantastic to be able to use my capacity as an actor in a deeper way, not just playing the surface of what I'm able to do, but actually really be challenged. I loved it.

CS: You come from a very different background than some of the other actresses because you were born and raised in London as opposed to New York or Philly...
Newton: Yeah, I'm not an African-American.

CS: Had you had a chance to either read or see the play? I know that it's sometimes taught here in schools.
Newton: I haven't seen the play and I never read the play, but people who are knowledgeable about theater in England knew about the play very much. I don't come from a theater background, I come from a dance background. It wasn't something that was in my wheelhouse at all. I heard about it, my husband, I guess he's an intellectual, he knew everything about it. For me, it was looking at the piece more as a reflection on humanity than on the black experience, because I think it definitely speaks about universal issues, themes and so on. That for sure is part of its strength and what we hope is that it's not just for colored girls, it's not just for colored anybody, it's for humanity.

CS: You talk about the complexity of your character, and I've talked to actors who've played out-and-out villains, and you always have to find a way into them because you can't judge your character. In hindsight, if you saw this movie and didn't play Tangie, would you be able to relate to her at all? It is hard to find anything good in her, to be honest.
Newton: Well, she funnily enough, when we were making the movie, she was light relief, because on the days I was working, I knew it was going to be just outrageous. Outrageous. We would film a scene and Tyler was very cool about letting us ad lib and be spontaneous, and I'd say there's a good 40 percent of what I'm doing is just me letting it fly and getting so immersed in what I was doing that it just kept going and Tyler would push me. "Let's do another one and just say whatever you want," and that was incredible. Everything that she exhibits is defense, protection, and she doesn't want people to get close to her. She's very intimate with men and that's partly because of her fear and aversion towards men. What I love about the movie is that you get that three dimension, you see in the relationship with Phylicia Rashad's character, you understand her vulnerability, Tangie, and her shame. You see her mother who is violent and physically abusive and shaming, and you understand why she's this sexually provocative self-sabotaging human being. If that's your mother and the way she gave love was to condemn and shame and forcefeed them this religious, shaming diatribe is just - you see why she's repelling the world.

CS: I know they refer to them, but you don't really see the father figure in this family.
Newton: Well, you hear that her grandfather raped her and he also raped her mother, so the same guy had sexually abused both of them. What's fascinating and as Whoopi said and you come to realize quite beautifully and artfully and truthfully - is that they're very similar to one another. It's like Whoopi, Tangie and Nyla are three stages along the same uninterrupted cycle. Because Whoopi has abused Tangie, and Tangie's abusing Nyla. Unless this cycle is interrupted, it's just gonna keep going and they're gonna end up being like Whoopi...

CS: It's funny because Whoopi uses religion as her defense mechanism almost.
Newton: That's white-washing everything, literally white-washing everything. You see the way she's dressed and so on. What the movie is showing through my character is that you've got to interrupt the cycle and the only way you do that is with truth and going to the dark places, the painful places and judging them. I think in terms of entertainment, there's a lot that's redeeming about Tangie, because quite frankly, to be able to say the sh*t that she says and to be able to just speak her mind even though what's in her mind, there's a lot of garbage in there, but she just does not compromise. She says it. She's not going to bed that night wondering if, "I wish I said this or that." She just speaks what she thinks, and I LOVE that about her!

CS: That's pretty cool about her, yeah. When you came onto this project, was there anyone completely blew your mind when you found out you'd be working with them? Phylicia Rashad or Whoopi or Janet Jackson? It's just such an amazing cast and I was wondering if anyone blew your mind.
Newton: No, it wasn't so much in that deifying... (gasps) It's more to collaborate with people who I've admired and been competing against for a long time. Not actively competing against. I've lost roles to Kerry Washington, and I know about Kerry Washington and we've met along the way. But as opposed to us being the only black girl in a project, which is what all of us end up being from time to time, for us all to be working together and sharing and supporting each other, as opposed to being on opposite sides of the casting couch, it's really deeply satisfying and incredible. Anika Noni Rose, I've just loved her for so many years and she is a wonderful, sophisticated, brilliant talent. Yeah, I really felt like I was in the presence of the best of how I like to identify myself. These are my role models, and I was working with them.

CS: One thing I really like about Tyler is that he gets really amazing performances out of actresses. Obviously, having a movie like this where you have so many great actresses around each other and pushing each other, that helps. As someone who has worked with great directors like Jonathan Demme, what specifically does Tyler do? Does he just make actresses comfortable? What is it Tyler does that helps actresses be able to pull out such great performances?
Newton: I think it's more by example than by what he actually does. I mean, he sets this up. He created this environment where we could... and by environment, I mean, this project. He could get this movie made. He's Tyler Perry. He could carry on doing Madea, but he chose this piece. This is not an easy piece to get people excited about necessarily because it's quite heavy, but he has presented it and he has adapted it so that it's an accessible, everyday piece of material that people can actually experience and that's amazing. Then he cast well and he let us get on with it. He gave us the freedom. I didn't feel like it was his stamp all over it, which I think you have to be very confident not to be controlling every element. He was extremely open to ideas, like for example, there's a scene with me and Whoopi and we were both giving our pieces of poetry in this same scene. I turned up in the morning and I said, "Look, hey guys, why don't we try doing it where we both say the poem at the same time?" Because I wanted it to possibly be different. I didn't want the poetry to become this sort of predictable... So much about our characters are similar that is already there, even though we're hating each other, but it's partly because of the mirror image that's going on. He was open to it, and we did it and it was dynamite. Now, another director who needs to have had all the ideas, and there's nothing wrong with this necessarily, but who is the only source from which everything can spring, that kind of artistic need to have a single vision, it might not be so possible. What I think Tyler's greatest strength in directing this piece was that he gave us the freedom and the security to experiment and to go miles beyond what's on screen and what we thought we were capable of.

CS: It's funny you say that because when people think of Tyler, he writes and directs everything, they automatically assume he's that guy who has the vision and the control.
Newton: Controlling. He was in awe. I felt like he was in awe of us, and he is in awe of that female energy. He doesn't want to harness it and control it, and have it be his and own it, it's the opposite. He wants to honor it. It's a beautifully sophisticated and ultimately empowering thing. He got the best from us, and we got the best from him as a result, out of that permissive quality to his directing.

CS: I wanted to ask about that scene with Whoopi because I'd imagine a movie like this must be really emotionally-draining.
Newton: So draining.

CS: I remember when we talked about "The Pursuit of Happyness" and you had to go and do comedy just to get it out of your system. Was this a similar thing?
Newton: I'm telling you. Honey... It was. But it was funny, I felt like I was a little bit like "Beloved" actually, I felt like I was possessed. I found it very hard to even consider playing this role, to be honest. I came onto the final project very, very late in the day. They'd already started shooting and I felt uncomfortable exploring this sexually-depraved, mean, negative energy. I almost didn't. I just knew by the material it was going to have to be truthful. This wasn't going to be a one-dimensional character, so I knew that I was gonna have to be that and be perceived that. The most difficult thing is how other people perceive you, because if you're doing a good job, you're so believable as that, people actually start to perceive and react to you as that person. I found that really, really hard initially. Actually, I find it very upsetting. I really felt very vulnerable because it's SO not who I am, at all, to have people look, or even on the set, and treat me as this person who's got all those issues, I just...

CS: Yeah, but as an actor it must be the best thing in the world to play something so different from yourself.
Newton: It is, but I found it really painful at first, but then by the end I loved it because there was a strength to what Tangie's doing every day. Every foul word that comes out of her mouth is cathartic, is crying for help, is ANGRY about what has happened to her, but she's just unconscious about it, you see, so she's angry at the world as opposed to angry specifically at who she needs to be angry with. Then you see her gradually focus on what the truth of her anger is, and then deal with it. Somewhere in there I found my own personal catharsis, finally, which was liberating.

For Colored Girls opens everywhere on Friday, November 5.

Essence Magazine

2010-11-01T17:42:00.001-07:00

Coloured Girl stills

2010-10-30T22:09:00.000-07:00

Colored Girls interview

2010-10-29T07:01:00.000-07:00

Coloured Girls Premiere

2010-10-25T21:46:00.001-07:00

Colour Girls premiere and NYC television

2010-10-25T21:33:00.001-07:00

Colored Girls pictures

2010-10-25T15:20:00.000-07:00

Thandie's Christmas treat

2010-10-23T10:04:00.000-07:00

Thandie will be featured in Shooting Stars on Christmas day in the UK.
It is series 7 episode 7, not sure which channel as yet the listings are not out but its usually BBC2TV.

webfinds

2010-10-17T15:47:00.000-07:00

off subject Quinn Morgan 1976-2010

2010-10-16T20:47:00.000-07:00

Angie,
I thought you have read Quinn died after a long illness on the 4th July 2010.
I scattered most of her ashes where she wanted in London.
Her daughter has taken a few back to Jamaica and will scatter them in the Blue Mountains.
Think of her kindly
Paul

For Colored Girls trailer

2010-10-15T09:49:00.000-07:00

How many?

2010-09-19T00:32:00.001-07:00

Tiff Toronto

2010-09-14T19:09:00.000-07:00

Armani London 9th Sepetember 2010

2010-09-10T23:42:00.000-07:00

Colored girls poster

2010-09-10T23:40:00.000-07:00

picture from 1991

2010-09-06T14:58:00.000-07:00

For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf still

2010-09-05T04:46:00.001-07:00

From left to right: Anika Noni Rose (as Yasmine), Kerry Washington (as Kelly), Janet Jackson (as Joanna), Kimberly Elise (as Crystal), Phylicia Rashad (as Gilda), Loretta Devine (as Juanita), Tessa Thompson (Nyla) and Thandie Newton (Tangie) in For Colored Girls

London 17th August 2010

2010-08-21T13:43:00.000-07:00

Finch and Partners Pre-BAFTA Party 20th February 2010

2010-08-13T18:35:00.001-07:00

In the Hood 4th August 2010 London

2010-08-13T15:22:00.000-07:00

The Retreat update

2010-07-28T21:37:00.001-07:00

Deadline are reporting that Cillian Murphy (Inception) is set to star opposite Thandie Newton (2012) in the upcoming thriller, The Retreat. Cillian Murphy will replace Jason Isaacs, who was previously attached.

The film is set to shoot this September on location in Wales. However, it has not yet been revealed who will direct The Retreat, but expect an official announcement very soon, as this is a project that’s garnering a lot of buzz, even before camera have begun rolling.

According to Deadline, the film’s plot is as follows:

Murphy and Newton will play a husband and wife who rent a remote island cottage while trying to repair their marriage. One day they find a biohazard-suited soldier washed up on the beach, who warns them that everybody on the mainland has been killed by an airborne virus. That’s when the psychological fun-and-games begin…

The Retreat will be produced by Magnet Films, who pitched the film as a cross between Knife In the Water and Dead Calm. Sony Pictures will handle distribution in the UK.

Vanishing on 7th street trailer

2010-07-20T20:50:00.000-07:00

Thandie portrait

2010-07-15T23:07:00.000-07:00

Huge

2010-07-15T23:05:00.001-07:00

The comedian turned film director talks about his debut feature Huge, which had its world premiere at the Edinburgh Film Festival and stars Noel Clarke, Johnny Harris and Thandie Newton.

Ben Miller’s Huge started life as a play about a struggling comedy double act, which he co-wrote with Simon Godley and Jez Butterworth and performed for the first time at the Edinburgh Fringe festival in 1992. Nearly 20 years later, Miller, who is best known for being one half of UK TV comedy duo Armstrong And Miller, makes his feature directorial debut with the film version.

Tell us about the film.

It’s a buddy movie about two comedians. Bits of its DNA are in Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Stir Crazy, but 75% of its DNA is in Withnail and I. In the film, these two no hopers end up together on the stage in the comedy club one night and get a taste of possibly what is the most potent drug of all..other people’s laughter. I’ve spent my whole life chasing that feeling. I love making people laugh.

Have you always had aspirations to be a film director?

I’ve always been excited by the idea of making a film. I’ve been in lots of films, which is an enormous pleasure, particularly when I get to have creative imput. But you don’t get to make something that touches you, often you are trying to help someone else realise their creative urge.

Acting is often more interpretative than creative. I wanted to do something that was creative, that you could make something. Something about films, you watch them in the dark, images on the screen, you watch with other people in what can sometimes be an unpleasant environment. You wouldn’t sit in that room if the film wasn’t on. There must be something we all really crave in that experience.

What was the biggest challenge during the shoot?

It is set in a series of different comedy clubs, and that was the hardest thing to do on film, because while film isn’t a spontaneous medium, comedy really is. You can’t recreate a funny moment, so we had to do that brave thing where you shoot in one take and get the audiences’ reaction in that one take. Technically it was extremely challenging, and probably the thing I’m most pleased about. In the end, the solution wasn’t that complicated - it was just, shoot with masses of cameras and make sure we’ve got everything.

We had amazing sound design on the film, we spent a lot of time recreating the sound of a comedy club so that when you are watching the film, you experience the laughter like you do in a club, so that felt really real. That is real laughter, recorded in a club with real comedians.

How have you found the transition from theatre to TV to the film world?

I am very privileged because I work in a subset of real TV, high quality TV, so the experience is exactly the same, it is about honouring whatever it is you want to do, and doing whatever it takes to get it to work.

But still, film is a completely different medium to TV or theatre. I didn’t want it to look like TV, or like a film of a play, or even worse, a TV film of a play. With film, you expect to be there, but you don’t necessarily want the event in the frame. You approach it with a different language, I did a lot of preparation, the whole movie was storyboarded before we shot.

Was it easy to get Thandie Newton and Noel Clarke on board?

I really wanted Thandie to play the part, because I had written it for her. But she read the script, and she said she didn’t quite get what I was doing, and I listened to what she said and went and did a complete rewrite, with the help of an amazing script editor, Jay Basu, based on some stuff that Thandie had said. And then I phoned Thandie and said this is a different film, she read it and loved it. It was very 11th hour..but probably everything is.

I wrote all the parts for specific people, but with Noel it was pure luck. Noel ended up getting involved when we were in the final few weeks before the movie. It is a hard part to cast, and I am so massively fussy, as you can imagine. But I wanted non comedians for the main parts, because I didn’t want the audience to have any opinion as to whether they were any good or not. And also I thought the poster would look good. Noel Clarke in an Afro and big glasses, that’s going to sell tickets, right?

Were you tempted to go down the “studio” route?

I had been working on this big romantic comedy with some big stars in it, one of those multi million dollar things, big glossy thing, I had co written the film, set to direct it, but it ended up not happening, so I thought rather than start again, I just wanted to do something where I felt that I could raise the money myself, rather than having to rely on studio money.

And then, I started watching more carefully the films that had been made independently. I saw London to Brighton and was really inspired by it. I ended up asking Johnny Harris, who was in it, to play one of the main parts, and talking to Paul Andrew Williams about how he did it. And he said there is one very simple rule; Set a date. So that is what we did. We set a date to shoot, and once we had a date, we told all the actors agents “we are shooting on this date, it may be shot on video for £50K or it may be shot on film for £1m. I don’t know what’s going to happen, here’s the script, do they want to do it.” And so we got some very honest answers from people, people like to keep their options open, but at least they knew where they stood.

Thandie in Notting Hill London 10th June 2010

2010-07-10T05:39:00.000-07:00

Thandie Newton, plus Jason Isaacs in the thankless role of "Man Getting Dumped"

2010-06-18T19:41:00.000-07:00

Thandie Newton attends the launch of the Solange Azagury-Partridge Bond Street store on June 9, 2010 in London

2010-06-10T14:56:00.000-07:00

Thandie Newton Attends "Keep A Child Alive" Ball 27th May London

2010-05-31T03:24:00.001-07:00

The launch of the Louis Vuitton Bond Street boutique in London 25th May

2010-05-26T15:40:00.000-07:00

West London visit

2010-05-18T21:29:00.000-07:00

Vanishing on 7th Street Stills

2010-05-16T03:36:00.000-07:00

Video with dolls

2010-05-08T22:57:00.000-07:00

Thandie @ Met Gala

2010-05-08T01:50:00.001-07:00

Thandie Gaza

2010-04-29T08:35:00.000-07:00

Thandie Newton interview: her best films

2010-04-19T00:10:00.000-07:00

Thandie Newton interview: her best films
Thandie Newton will be a judge for this year's Virgin Media Shorts film competition, so we took her through a selection of the best - and not so best - parts of her film career.

Published: 9:00AM BST 18 Apr 2010

Thandie Newton is judging the Virgin Media Shorts annual film competition, which launched with this photoshoot by Lorenzo Aguis in tribute to the sex symbol of the short and silent film era, Theda Bara. It celebrates Bara's 1917 movie Cleopatra Photo: Lorenzo Aguis
Thandie Newton can boast that rarest of combinations - leading-actress looks with a character-actress CV. Since making her acclaimed debut in 1991's Flirting, she's been as hard to pin down as her cultural heritage (mother African, father British, raised in Cornwall, courted by Hollywood, living in North London), meandering from blockbusters to indies with ease, picking up Baftas, and working with everyone from Tom Cruise to Oprah Winfrey and Oliver Stone. Her career path suits her fine. Using the excuse of Thandie being named as a judge for the Virgin Media Shorts film competition, we took her through a selection of the best - and not so best - bits of her prodigiously varied portfolio, allowing her to elaborate on motivation, the art of vein-bulging, and the incongruity of Tom Cruise's 'modesty cup'. . .

FLIRTING (1991; Thandie Adjewa)

Q. You were only 16 when you made your debut - were you going into it wide-eyed?

A. Very much so. I only got into the movie by chance. I was taking time out from my dancing studies; the idea of acting had never crossed my mind. The chance to audition for a movie came along, and they wanted an African girl, and at the time I was the only dark-skinned girl in school. To me, it was just a nice day out in London, very posh hotel, all fabulous. I read a scene through, and the director (John Duigan) said I was awful. Then he gave me a very brief summary of what film acting was about: to make someone believe that what you're saying is occurring to you at that very moment. And that just clicked.

Was it the best possible start for you, with hindsight?

I was so eager. It was a cast of unknowns, apart from Nicole Kidman - she was already a big star in Australia. I kept every page of the script when we finished, and tried to keep in touch with every member of the cast and crew. There's this manufactured intimacy on movie sets, and I was so naïve, I thought we were all friends for life. Now I'm big on boundaries.

INTERVIEW WITH THE VAMPIRE (1994; Yvette)

A slightly different prospect to Flirting?

Yes. It was the first time I worked with Tom Cruise, though I knew him already, through Nicole. You could practically feel Tom's glow before he arrived on-set. And I mean that with reverence. I had posters of Top Gun on my wall. He's a presence.

Was it your first taste of a major Hollywood production?

In terms of star wattage, yes. But it happened in such a whirlwind. I was in New Orleans for a night shoot, went to bed for two hours, and had to go back to England to work on another film. Kind of appropriate for a film about the undead. The rest of the movie was shot at Pinewood. The veins on my neck were supposed to bulge, to attract Brad Pitt, and draw him into vampire-land. I'm like the bait. They tried to put me in a whole body-cast, and I had this massive neck with my tiny head coming out of it. And I told the director, Neil Jordan, that I could do it without the prosthetics. This is what comes of being a dancer for so long; I'm so body-conscious, I can make my neck vein bulge on cue. Neil was ecstatic.

BELOVED (1998; Beloved)

Where does this one rank?

It's my favourite. Of everything I've ever done. The book is my favourite novel ever. And it's the one that thrust me onto the world stage, though it wasn't half as successful as we thought it would be. Another valuable lesson learned; don't think about awards while you're working.

Did you feel an onerous responsibility to the material?

Oh my God, yeah. But also from just being on the set; this is (co-star, executive producer) Oprah Winfrey's love child. And (director) Jonathan Demme. And let me tell you, he made me feel like I had to really earn the right to be in this movie. I had the audition, and he didn't tell me for two weeks whether I had the role. So I called him, and he's like oh yeah, I knew two weeks ago. He's very controlling. But then again, I've been on movies where the director isn't in control, and it's terrifying. There's got to be someone at the tiller. Movies made by committee are s___.

A lot of people found you quite scary in the movie; you appeared genuinely possessed. . .

I did so much research, because I didn't really know who she was. So I made up a subtext; she was a woman who'd somehow been invaded by a malevolent spirit. And they'd got some speech-altering device that would make my voice go into a growly-deep timbre. So we had a read-through of the script, before we started shooting, at Oprah's ranch in Indiana. Jonathan was so shifty; he'd said we wouldn't read the script, we were just there to enjoy ourselves. So after supper, and wine, Jonathan says hey, let's read the script! And I'd been working on the voice; I can do crazy things with my voice and body. I should have joined the circus. So I did the voice without any artificial aids at all.

MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE 2 (2000; Nyah Nordoff-Hall)

Was this a sort of busman's holiday after Beloved?

Not exactly. I knew Tom Cruise already of course, and Nicole said he should cast me. And I think [director] John Woo's a genius. I went to LA for the big audition. John Woo put a deck of cards in front of me, and said, I want you to improvise a scene with Tom, where you're looking at these cards and you see your future. And I was like, what the hell is that? But I thought I'd make it romantic and tragic, and I actually brought myself to tears in this nonsensical little scene. They called me that afternoon and said I'd got it.

Was it your first genuine romantic Hollywood lead?

I guess so. I mean, I had to be gorgeous all the time. A sassy, fabulous minx. A real Barbie role. But it wasn't that much fun. It was stressful. John Woo didn't speak English - although I discovered at the end of the movie that he did actually speak English. And there were times when Tom would be frustrated by lack of direction, and I'd be stuck in the middle. And it was a long movie - it took nine months. I could have had a baby in that time, for Christ's sake. But then, there was the love scene between Tom and I, where we were in bed all day. We laughed till we cried. As soon as he got into the bed, I thought he was really aroused. It was terrifying. He was wearing one of those modesty cups. And it was massive. It was almost more distracting than if he'd actually had an erection. Which I certainly didn't expect him to have - I've never done a love scene where that's even been a remote possibility. So hysteria seemed a perfectly logical response. The whole thing, in the end, was like 100 movies in one.

CRASH (2004; Christine Thayer)

Is it true that you chased the role in Crash?

Not exactly. I was in Australia doing MI2, and I got a lovely letter from [director] Paul Haggis, saying I'm trying to put this together, I'd love you to play Christine, there's no money, blah-de-blah. I was technically the first actor to come on board; it took another 18 months for the thing to come together, and by then the script was legendary. Every actor in Hollywood had seen it; for Matt Dillon's role alone, you'd had John Cusack and Sean Penn expressing interest at one time. We all knew it was a movie we were doing for the love of it; we didn't think anyone would actually see it. I paid my own air fare to go out to LA for it. I knew that, even if I waited years and years, I'd never get a scene in the like one in the car again. It's an actor's dream to be so raw and intense and unwound.

Was it a pretty full-on experience?

Oh, utterly. For the scene in the car, I was upside-down all morning, unbuckled for lunch, and upside-down again all afternoon. I was so vulnerable and exposed in every way. This is a woman who was hand-raped by a policeman, and she's so angry with her husband that she causes their car to crash, and the guy who comes along to supposedly protect her is the guy who committed the original offence. My last scene of the movie was the one where I'm violated by Matt. When I read the script, I hadn't read it as him going all the way; it just said he puts his hand up her skirt,' something like that. So now Paul's saying, Thandie, you know we need to go all the way with this; it's what the whole movie pivots on. Matt was shuffling his feet, staring at the ground; and I suddenly saw it as this really hideous exploitative vile scene, and I went into the make-up trailer and burst into tears. I was freaked out. I felt so torn. But I had to admit that I'd misread it, and there was no time to suggest an alternative and come back with it the next day. I was really unsure, and it comes across in the performance; I'm not in control, and I'm hating it. If that was me in that scenario, I'd have kicked Matt's character in the bollocks and gone to prison. But I had to trust Paul Haggis. And we ended up with something that was incredibly powerful.

And it went on to sweep the Oscars, while you picked up a Bafta. . .

Yes, and I so nearly went to the Oscars, but my agent was like, don't bother, it's so not going to win. And I was genuinely shocked about the Bafta. But it's great to pick up an award for something you're genuinely proud of.

CHRONICLES OF RIDDICK (2004; Dame Vaako)

Talking of things you're genuinely proud of. . .this was your Cruella de Vil moment?

Camp as a row of tents. I remember [director] David Twohy about the role, and saying, I'm really intrigued, I'd never have cast myself in this, I admire your boldness. And he said, oh, it wasn't my idea, it was the head of the studio. So I thought f___ you, I'm going to do this film whether you like it or not. And I like being challenged and doing unexpected things, and I also love not being pigeonholed. All I was hearing when I was starting out was that if you're a black actor in England, you play pimps or policemen. Things have changed, and I'm really proud of that; I'm a champion for defying convention and challenging stereotypes. And I loved sashaying around in what they called my 'mock-odile.'

RUN FATBOY RUN (2007; Elizabeth Olivia 'Libby' Odell)

You were the self-elected unit prankster here, according to legend?

Simon Pegg is such a perfect victim. I felt like I was back in school or something. It wasn't the most taxing work; a very reactive and gentle role. So it started off with ice down Simon's back in our domestic scenes; simple. Nothing major. Then I started sewing up the collar of his t-shirt, and leaving Mars Bar 'stools' in the toilet. He would never react; that was his way of getting back at me. The best one was, when we were doing the movie's press junket, I turned up with two massive bottles of cheap vodka, and replaced all the still water in his hotel room. I could hear this cry from up the corridor: 'Thandie!' He'd taken a swig, burned his throat, reached for the bottle to calm himself, taken a bigger swig, and burned himself some more. Genius.

What did (director) David Schwimmer make of all this?

Dear David. He was so busy trying to figure out what on earth everyone was doing…he's very serious. Not at all like Ross. He had to play the stern dad.

W (2008; Condoleeza Rice)

How centred is (director) Oliver Stone in comparison?

Well, he's mellowed. He still gets grizzly. But it was such a leap of faith on his part, casting me in this. He loved the thought of me doing it. I thought he'd been smoking his wacky baccy a bit too much.

Is it true that you didn't know how to spell her name at the start?

True. I knew she was Secretary of State, but my attention hadn't been drawn to her. But I loved sinking my teeth into her. I'm so unlike her; I had to utterly transform. I don't sound like her, I'm 15 years younger, my body's different, my skin colour's different, my voice is different, my sensibilities are different. So I created a costume, head to toe, and stepped into it.

Isn't it tricky, playing someone who's current and well-known, not to slip into a Dead Ringers-style impression?

I didn't want it to be comedy, but I wanted a satirical element. I wanted to express the sycophantic nature of her relationship with Bush, the pseudo-intellectuality of dropping some French and Russian into her conversation. I had six weeks to prepare, so I read about 20 biographies, but I also got into deep YouTube. It was more revealing watching a grainy phone recording of her dancing to Shaggy than seeing any number of talk show appearances. I wanted people to think of her, warts and all, not of me being her, because I wanted this movie to judge these people. I liked to think of it as my personal contribution to the end of the Bush administration.

2012 (2009; Laura Wilson)

You've said that people sometimes give you roles that are underwritten, and you have to flesh them out - would this perhaps be a case in point?

Yeah. It was really an opportunity to be around really skilled craftsmen. There was a lot of blue-screen stuff, and a lot of scenes inside the pod-thing where we'd have a tidal wave coming towards us, which was real, and which would somehow magically disappear when they said ‘cut', to be rolled out again for the next take. The mind boggles. I mean, I love 2012, and I always knew I was going to be a puppet on a stage. At times I felt my life draining away. But you know what? You learn something from every movie. That's why you keep on doing it.

Thandie Newton smoulders as Queen Cleopatra

2010-04-11T23:03:00.000-07:00

Walk like an Egyptian: Thandie Newton smoulders as Queen Cleopatra - the role made famous by Elizabeth Taylor
By Daily Mail Reporter
Last updated at 1:45 AM on 12th April 2010
Comments (0) Add to My Stories It takes a lady with outstanding beauty to pull off the iconic image of Queen Cleopatra and Thandie Newton pulls it off with relative ease.
The British actress oozes sex appeal as she takes on the role of the Egyptian queen - a role that Elizabeth Taylor stamped her mark on back in 1963.
Thandie, 37, smoulders into the camera for one of the black and white shots which show off the actress' striking features to maximum effect.
Big screen queen: Thandie Newton smoulders as Cleopatra in conjunction with the launch of this year's Virgin Media Shorts competition, which champions undiscovered UK film talent
In another photo she reclines on a chair in a flowing dress, revealing her enviable legs, with a bejewelled crown on her head.
The series of pictures have been released to coincide with the Virgin Media Shorts film competition which showcases up and coming talent.
Last year's awards featured actors Gemma Arterton and Kevin Spacey on the judging panel, with the £30,000 prize eventually going to Luke Snelling for his film Mixtape.
Look into my eyes: The actress shows off her stunning features in the black and white photographs
Unmistakable: Elizabeth Taylor in her iconic role as Cleopatra in 1963
Miss Newton follows in the footsteps of Elizabeth Taylor and, most recently, Kim Cattrall in playing the infamous Egyptian queen.
It was Taylor, 78, who really made the role her own when she starred in the 1963 Hollywood production of the story of Anthony and Cleopatra.
Starring alongside Richard Burton and Rex Harrison, the actress was the epitome of beauty at the time and set the benchmark for other Cleopatra's to be measured against.
In other news Thandie Newton has become the new face of Olay as the cosmetic brand celebrates its 10th anniversary.
The actress will front the campaign for the cosmetic giant’s Total Effects range.
Her next big screen appearance will be in Huge, a comedy directed by TV comedian Ben Miller

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-1265273/Thandie-Newton-smoulders-Queen-Cleopatra--role-famous-Elizabeth-Taylor.html#ixzz0krZVh0t4

Thandie's Olay Advert

2010-04-08T15:14:00.000-07:00

Pepsi

2010-04-07T21:40:00.000-07:00

BAFTA Award-winning Thandie Newton is not only one of the world’s great beauties, but an actress of uncommon talent and range.

Newton was most recently seen in 2012 which was released by Sony and was one of the highest grossing films of 2009. The film was directed by Roland Emmerich and Thandie starred alongside John Cusack, Oliver Platt, Woody Harrelson, Amanda Peet, and Danny Glover.

She was previously seen in ROCKnROLLA, written and directed by Guy Ritchie, starring opposite Gerard Butler, Tom Wilkinson, Jeremy Piven, Chris “Ludacris” Bridges, and Idris Elba. Warner Brothers released the film wide on October 31, 2008. Newton also starred in Olive Stone’s film W, as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice opposite Josh Brolin, James Cromwell, Elizabeth Banks and Ellen Burstyn. Lionsgate released the film on October 17, 2008.

Newton was praised for her work in the Academy Award-winning Best Picture of 2006: CRASH, the story of a multiracial group of characters whose lives interconnect following a car accident in Los Angeles. For her performance, Thandie received BAFTA (Outstanding Supporting Actress) and SAG (Best Ensemble) Awards.

Newton also starred in David Schwimmer’s comedy RUN FAT BOY RUN opposite Hank Azaria and Simon Pegg, Gabriele Puccino’s critically acclaimed box office hit THE PURSUIT OF HAPPYNESS opposite Will Smith, Jonathan Demme’s contemporary romantic thriller THE TRUTH ABOUT CHARLIE, inspired by Stanley Donen’s 1963 film CHARADE and the John Woo-helmed action film MISSION IMPOSSIBLE 2. She received rave reviews for her astonishingly original and bold performance as the title character in Jonathan Demme’s 1998 adaptation of Toni Morrison’s novel, BELOVED co-starring Oprah Winfrey.

At age 16, while studying modern dance at the Arts Educational School, she won the lead role in the critically acclaimed 1990 coming-of-age Australian film, FLIRTING, playing a Ugandan girl isolated in an Australian Ladies Academy who begins a romance with a teenage boy from a neighboring boarding school. After completing the film, Thandie returned to England to continue her education, earning a B.A. with honors in anthropology at Cambridge University, while also acting in feature films for some of Hollywood’s most acclaimed director’s – including Neil Jordan’s INTERVIEW WITH A VAMPIRE and James Ivory’s JEFFERSON IN PARIS. Newton also appeared as a troubled singer opposite Tupac Shakur and Tim Roth in Vondie Curtis-Hall’s comedy-drama, “Gridlock’d,” and won critics’ praise as the exiled wife of an African leader in Bernardo Bertolucci’s “Besieged.”

On television, Newton made recurring guest appearances as Kem, a Congolese Aid Worker on NBC’s hit drama ER opposite Noah Wyle. It marked Thandie’s American television debut.

Thandie Newton resides in England with her husband and two children.

Where does Thandie holiday?

2010-04-07T15:10:00.001-07:00

"Situated on Antigua’s southern coast against a backdrop of undulating hills and lush rainforest is the one of the most highly praised luxury hotels in the world, Carlisle Bay. Roman Abramovich has moored his megayachts here and comes ashore for a cocktail. John Travolta loves it and Thandie Newton has popped in."

http://lovepeachykeen.blogspot.com/2010/04/win-beach-holiday-in-antigua-worth-3500.html

Grazia World Exclusive: Thandie Newton Signs as New Face of Olay Total Effects

2010-04-02T23:55:00.000-07:00

We are totally thrilled be the first to discover that Grazia Daily favourite and natural beauty Thandie Newton has just been signed as the new face of Olay’s famous multitasking skincare range Total Effects, in a new advertising campaign to celebrate the brand's 10th year in the UK.

We perpetually busy Grazia girls love the fact that this range is seriously hardworking and multi-talking; focusing on minimising lines, providing nourishing moisture, enhancing tone, exfoliating, refining pores, defeating anti-oxidants and firming skin…phewf. It appears that Thandie, not only an A-list actress but also a wife and mother of two, agrees. She told us that she reckons the Total Effect products are perfect for super busy women like her:

‘When filming, my working day is hectic, so trying to strike a balance between work, a family and time for myself can be challenging….Olay is a brand I trust and I love the fact that the range offers me an all-in-one, anti-ageing moisturiser which takes care of all my skincare needs.’

Olay meanwhile, say that Thandie perfectly personifies the Olay Total Effects woman and is an inspirational figure to other working ladies with children: 'Thandie's pragmatic approach to a beauty routine ensures her skincare is as multi-tasking as she is.’ Here, here!

We’re excited. What are your thoughts?

by Rose Beer

Thandie Newton new face of Olay

2010-03-31T09:07:00.000-07:00

Thandie Newton new face of Olay

HOLLYWOOD star Thandie Newton is going to be creaming it in as the new face of cosmetics giant Olay.
Sexy Thandie, 37, will star in the firm's next advertising campaign promoting its anti-ageing products.
The London-born actress — who bagged a BAFTA for best supporting actress in movie Crash — was chosen because of the mother-of-two's "inspirational" approach to work-life balance.
Thandie, who ditched the Oscars this month to be at pal Stella McCartney's Paris fashion show alongside dad Sir Paul, proves being a working mum doesn't have to be mission impossible after all. Read more:

http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/2915015/Thandie-Newton-new-face-of-Olay.html

Paris Fashion show 8th March 2010

2010-03-09T23:28:00.001-08:00

Notting Hill London 4th March 2010

2010-03-06T12:41:00.000-08:00

Premiere of new Banksy film London 2nd March 2010

2010-03-05T09:59:00.000-08:00

Pre Bafta Party

2010-02-26T17:13:00.001-08:00

Retreat

2010-02-23T00:15:00.000-08:00

Cast is announced for Magnet Films’ psychological thriller Retreat

Thandie Newton, Jason Isaacs and David Tennant are attached to star in Magnet Films’ psychological thriller Retreat.

The film, to be directed by newcomer Carl Tibbetts, follows a couple (played by Newton and Isaacs) who are seeking to rebuild their relationship by taking time out on a remote island but their peace is shattered when they find a man in military uniform (Tennant) half-dead on their doorstep who tells them there is a lethal virus killing millions on the mainland.

Tibbetts co-wrote the script with Janice Hallett and shooting is due to begin in May in Canada.

Magnet Films producer Gary Sinyor said: “It reminded me of Dead Calm when I first read it. Only better. It’s got a similar sexual tension but the battle of wits between the characters and plot twists are constantly surprising. We’re delighted to have secured three of the UK’s most powerful actors.”

It is UK based Magnet Film’s first foray into thrillers, following romantic comedy In Your Dreams, rock and roll adventure The Story Of _ and football documentary In The Hands Of The Gods.

Thandie Newton doesn't speak with spouse

2010-02-14T00:14:00.001-08:00

Thandie Newton is in constant contact with her personal assistant and thinks they speak more than she does with her husband.
Thandie Newton speaks to her assistant more than her husband.
The actress - who has two daughters, Ripley, eight, and Nico, four, with her producer spouse Ol Parker - admitted they both have such busy lives that they mainly communicate by text message.
The 'Crash' star said: "She's my right hand woman. I hate to say it but we may actually text and speak more than my husband and I!"
Speaking of her husband, the 37-year-old actress added: "We are so busy, our relationship is largely lived on texts - from, 'Remember to pack sandwiches for Nico's school trips', to figuring out when we can do stuff together.
"We text at least five times a day and probably talk the same amount. It's a real lifeline for us."
Thandie can call on her assistant for anything, but admits they are not always nice to one another.
She told Cosmopolitan magazine: "The most embarrassing thing I have asked her to do was to deliver some food for me last week on a shoot. I'm currently doing a detox and I feel like such a diva - not only having food delivered to the set, but also the fact that it was raw, vegan, had to be eaten within 24 hours... all this crap!
"We are also very rude to each other on text - I called her a lying bitch the other day! If anybody read a transcript without knowing us, they'd think we were crazed!"

Premiere for Food, Inc London 8th February 2010

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Thandie Newton Leaves Harrys Bar in Mayfair London- 1st February 2010

2010-02-02T14:22:00.000-08:00

Thandie is with Solange Azagury-Patridge

fame at last

2010-01-23T08:47:00.001-08:00

http://tweetmeme.com/domain/thandiedenisenewton.blogspot.com

Judith: Going Back To Congo

2010-01-23T08:30:00.000-08:00

Twenty-three-year-old Judith Wanga grew up in London and is proud to be British. But Judith was born thousands of miles away in the Democratic Republic Of Congo. She was sent to live in Britain by her parents when she was just three-years-old.

Twenty years later, Judith is going back to Congo to meet her parents for the first time. She wants to understand the childhood she missed and find the missing piece in the jigsaw puzzle of her life.

After the reunion with her parents, Judith visits an area of the country devastated by the conflict, where rape has become a weapon of war. Judith meets survivors, women and children as well as perpetrators, and finds out what is driving this brutality.

Discovering the harsh realities of her homeland, she develops a better understanding of why her parents sent her away all those years ago.

The film is narrated by Thandie Newton, who is involved in the work of campaign groups in the UK to stop violence against women in the Democratic Republic Of Congo.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/tv/comingup/judith-going-back-to-congo/

Thandie at special screening of Precious

2010-01-22T13:21:00.000-08:00

Thandie's been rocking this look for a while now.

I like it on her...

Thandie in London 17th December 2009

2009-12-17T16:16:00.001-08:00

Tach jewelry store on Thursday (December 10) in London, England.

2009-12-12T06:37:00.000-08:00

Thandie Newton and her husband, director Ol Parker, attend a champagne party at Tach jewelry store on Thursday (December 10) in London, England.

The evening’s events were hosted by Russian owner of Tach, Tatiana Anatoly, as well as fashion guru Lulu Kennedy.

Huge

2009-11-30T15:34:00.000-08:00

Huge, the directorial debut from British comedian Ben Miller, has started shooting in London.

The screenplay is based on an original play co-written by Jez Butterworth, Ben Miller and Simon Godley.

Miller, who started out in the film industry as an actor, said: “I’ve dreamt for years of directing a film and now I am directing the film of my dreams. I am literally pinching myself with pliers to be helming such a charabanc of talent on such a rollicking ride.”

Noel Clarke, Johnny Harris, Thandie Newton, Russell Tovey and Michelle Ryan star in the story about two friends who are trying to break onto the comedy circuit.

The film is produced by Rebecca Farhall and Colin Jones. Executive producers are Nigel Thomas and Charlotte Walls of Matador Pictures.

It is a Toff Media production in association with Matador Pictures and is backed by Cinema Three.

Premiere of the Letter 20th November 2009

2009-11-23T15:30:00.000-08:00

Phoebe Philo, Saffron Aldridge, Tom Dixon, Matthew Williamson, Francesca Versace, and a clutch of other London VIPs descended on the private members’ club Home House on Friday night to see the premiere of Letter, a short promotional film produced by jeweler Solange Azagury-Patridge starring her pal Thandie Newton. “I have lunch with Solange about once a week,” said the actress. “She always has these secret things going on that I have to try to extract out of her. When she finally told me she was planning this and wanted me to be in it, well, I jumped.”

Who wouldn’t love the chance to wear one of Azagury-Partridge’s baubles? Newton paired her iridescent lavender Vivienne Westwood gown with the star piece from her friend’s new Stoned collection. It’s the same one she wears in the movie, in which she plays a femme fatale preparing to leave her hapless husband for her lover—but not without her jewels. “The film is my letter, in a way, to all the fabulous women out there,” said Azagury-Partridge. “We really are all fab, aren’t we? And sometimes, it’s nice, but not quite enough to put a ring on it.”

To be sure, the filmvert left many in the crowd wanting to buy a bauble rather urgently. But, sadly, we’ll have to wait until next month for the gems to come out. “December, grrr,” said Versace. “Forget it. I want it now—excuse me while I schmooze Solange.”

2012 still

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2012 interview

2009-11-14T07:40:00.000-08:00

Thandie Newton had to get serious on the set of new disaster movie 2012
By John Hiscock on Nov 13, 09 05:00 AM in Interviews

Film prankster Thandie Newton is known for her practical jokes on movie sets. While shooting Run Fatboy Run, she switched Simon Pegg's water bottle for vodka and sewed up the neck and sleeves of his T-shirts. However, Thandie had to put aside the joking on the set of her latest movie, the disaster blockbuster 2012, because she was just too tired.

"This movie required a lot of stamina," says the 37-year-old, London-born actress. "There were huge sets, lots of cameras and it was kind of exhausting. Also, because there were so many people involved, there was less of a family feel to it.

"When I was working on Run Fatboy Run, it was really a tiny crew. We were all hanging out together and much more in each other's pockets. On 2012, when I'd finished a scene I'd go back to my trailer and just collapse."

The new $200m extravaganza from director Roland Emmerich uses spectacular computer-generated special effects to depict a global cataclysm that brings the world to an end. Cities crumble and millions die in a series of eye-popping natural disasters while a few survivors struggle to stay alive.

Thandie plays the US President's daughter who begins a relationship with a geologist, played by Chiwetel Ejiofor, while they are fighting for survival.

"Some of the cast are in the thick of the action, like John Cusack and Amanda Peet who are fighting for their lives," says Thandie.

"But because I play the president's daughter I'm kept very safe throughout the movie.

"The only really big action scenes I was involved in were two water sequences - one where I'm in a corridor and this huge tidal wave comes bursting down towards us. It was amazing but I forgot to act because gallons of water were rushing down from floor to ceiling towards me. The director had to shout "cut" and all the water went down. I don't even know where it drained to. Then 10 minutes later we did it again and the water comes rushing round the corner, blasting down the set."

As we chat, Thandie looks cool and relaxed in her white minidress in a beachfront suite at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Cancun, Mexico, where many of the 2012 cast had been flown for a party and promotional interviews.

Married for 10 years to English writer-director Oliver Parker, they have two children - nine-year-old Ripley, named after Sigourney Weaver's character in Alien, and Nico, four, named after the Velvet Underground singer.

Despite her success in films - including Mission Impossible: 2, The Pursuit Of Happyness and W - Thandie maintains she never had any special ambitions to be an actress.

Her parents, a Zambian nurse mother and a laboratory technician father, lived in the African country, but Thandie was born during a trip back to England. The family then returned to Zambia, but moved to Penzance in Cornwall when she was three years old.

"There were very few black people in the town and we were almost a novelty," Thandie recalls. "I always saw being black as a mysterious element I could use to enrich my personality. Then I went into the arts where difference is celebrated so I've never really experienced racial hassle."

In between her film commitments, the actress has returned to Africa on several occasions and she taught at Oprah Winfrey's school in South Africa for 10 days in July. But for now she has high hopes that filmgoers will appreciate the ingenuity that has gone into making 2012.

"It's just extraordinary to be able to create an illusion that takes you on a journey like this," Thandie smiles. "To have been able to push the boundaries like this is a real achievement."

2012 is out today.

InStyle scans

2009-11-11T02:38:00.000-08:00

Thandie Newton WOWS on new InStyle cover shoot

2009-11-05T07:35:00.000-08:00

Thandie Newton reveals her secret to keeping trim at 37... yoga and working out hard in the gym
By Lizzie Smith

Posing provocatively in an open fronted white blazer, Thandie Newton looks the picture of unachievable Hollywood perfection.
But the 37-year-old mother-of-two claims there's no secret to her amazing figure.
It's simply down to good genetics, hard work at the gym and yoga.
No flirt: Thandie Newton says she doesn't use her sexuality in her relationships with other men, and has never dated an actor
(she lived in LA with Jude Law..and went out with Brad Pitt...Quinn)

'I’m a Jivamukti yoga freak – it’s food for my soul,' she says. 'When I’m not working, I’ll drop Rip off at school and Nico at nursery, then I go to yoga.

'I also have an amazing personal trainer who I see whenever I can. His name is Liston Wingate-Denys.'
Jivamukti yoga involves physically stimulating routines, along with meditation, Sanskrit chanting, Yogic philosophical teachings and deep relaxation.

Thandie, the daughter of a Zimbabwean Princess of the Shona tribe and an English father, is the mother of Ripley, nine, and Nico, five.
Despite forging a career as an A-list actress with roles in films such as Crash, W and 2012, Thandie has managed to avoid becoming tabloid fodder.
The Cambridge graduate, who grew up in Cornwall, has been happily married to writer Ol Parker for 11 years.
In her latest interview with InStyle magazine she says she doesn't flirt with men.
'I’ve never dated an actor, just had the odd fling,' she said. 'Isn’t that weird?
'I don’t flirt with people – a long time ago, I stopped using my sexuality to have a relationship with people.

'I don’t think you really get a sense of me, sexually, and that’s why I have really great relationships with straight men.'
And she says he is supportive of her work - even when it involves intimate sex scenes.
'He heard it from my point of view, which is that love scenes are unnatural and not something that I leap out of bed in the morning to rush off to do,' she said.

Introducing InStyle’s new cover girl: Thandie Newton

Thandie Newton had every InStyler wishing they were her at the recent cover shoot for the December issue.

Not only is she intelligent (she studied Anthropology at Cambridge) and a Bafta-winner (Crash), she’s also open and down to earth (yes, that was the f-word that slipped out a couple of times!).

The RocknRolla actress was impossibly stunning for the shoot, working heavenly Chanel and fashion-forward Louis Vuitton to weep-worthy effect.

And how does the mum of two girls keep a body a 20-year-old would wish for at 37? ‘That’s genetic!’ she laughs, ‘and I’m a Jivamukti yoga freak – it’s food for my soul.

‘When I’m not working, I’ll drop Rip off at school and Nico at nursery, then I go to yoga. I also have an amazing personal trainer who I see whenever I can.’

And it certainly pays off!

For the full Thandie interview, where she opens up about love, life, fashion and being friends with Oprah, grab the December issue of InStyle – out

2012 Premiere Los Angeles

2009-11-04T02:40:00.000-08:00

other magazine finds

2009-11-01T19:44:00.000-08:00

Vibe magazine

2009-11-01T16:24:00.001-08:00

Thandie Newton on Guy Ritchie, racism in Hollywood and why Oliver Stone is 'crazy'

2009-10-31T21:32:00.000-07:00

Thandie Newton on Guy Ritchie, racism in Hollywood and why Oliver Stone is 'crazy'
By Martyn Palmer
Last updated at 9:00 PM on 31st October 2009

She's the Cambridge graduate who studied for her finals during the Cannes Film Festival, believes she was exploited on her first film and has no time for Gordon Ramsay
'I've experienced racism in Hollywood but not as conflict or in a threatening way, just the ignorance of people,' said Thandie Newton
Thandie Newton is small boned, beautiful and looks as fragile as a bird of paradise but she's certainly no pushover. For her role in disaster blockbuster 2012 - whose central premise is that the end of the world starts on December 21 2012, as predicted by the ancient Mayan civilisation - she had to spend days submerged in a water tank 'the size of a swimming pool', filming scenes of floods that follow devastating earthquakes when the planet's tectonic plates shift.
She grew up in Penzance, the daughter of a Zimbabwean mother and an English father, and started acting at 16, keeping her career on track while attending Downing College, Cambridge, where she graduated with a 2.1 in anthropology. She won a Bafta for best supporting actress in Crash and has also starred in Mission: Impossible II, The Pursuit of Happyness and RocknRolla. She has two daughters, Ripley, nine, and Nico, five, is married to director Ol Parker and turns 37 on Friday.

I was studying for my finals at Cambridge during the Cannes Film Festival.
I went to a party on the beach for the film I was in, Jefferson In Paris, but I didn't get drunk because I knew I had to revise. I wasn't going to the college bar and having fun, so I probably ended up working more than most people. I carried on making films while I was at Cambridge. I don't regret it because if I hadn't, maybe I wouldn't be an actress.

They paid me just $5,000 for my first film, Flirting.
It should have been a lot more, but how was I to know? It was major exploitation. These days you get a first-class ticket if you are working on a movie but I flew economy all the way to Australia and back. I was hanging out after doing my GCSEs and it came totally out of the blue. After it finished I went back to school.

Thandie in a scene from disaster blockbuster 2012
The Mayan calendar finishes its 13th cycle in 2012 and after that there's nothing.
I was a bit nervous when I heard about the Mayan prophecies for my new film. And then someone reassured me that it's all been disproved. I think 2012 is about appreciating the moment and the simple things, the value of relationships and the value of the people that we love. It's also a great adventure.

Guy Ritchie is an acquired taste.
But I like him. He is a no-messing-about kind of director (she worked with him on RocknRolla). I love how straight-talking he is and sometimes it's confrontational, but what he does say is on the money every time.

I am terrible for swearing.
There's always a lot of swearing on film sets and I'm so bad that my kids say 'Stop it Mummy!' They're always telling me off. I love hanging out with the boys on a set - it's almost more relaxing than hanging out with the girls.

I've experienced racism in Hollywood but not as conflict or in a threatening way, just the ignorance of people.
There was one time I went for a meeting for this big movie and I was up for a character who wasn't written as black. The character was a college graduate and the studio head, a woman, said, 'How can we make this role more black if we are going to have you in the film?' And I said, 'Well, I think as it's written it's fine...' And she said, 'Yeah, I know, but she is a graduate, she has been to university.' So I said, 'I've been to university.' And then it was, 'Yeah, but you're different.' I wasn't offended. It's just nonsense. But no, I didn't do the film.

'Guy Ritchie is an acquired taste': Thandie on her RocknRolla director
My attitude towards Hollywood can be summed up as 'smash and grab'.
I go into a meeting with a director as an equal, thinking that what I have to offer is of great value. It also makes me appreciate how much I have changed. Twenty years ago I wasn't so well-equipped to deal with Hollywood.

I thought Oliver Stone was crazy when he told me he wanted me to play Condoleezza Rice.
I remember preparing for the film (W) and the make-up artist saying, 'We're going for feel-alike rather than lookalike.' But I wanted to look like her. So I had false teeth and a completely different hairstyle. I hear she's joined my agency, William Morris, so maybe I'll run into her in the corridor - that would be funny.

I was shocked when two BNP candidates were elected to the European parliament.
We need an Obama in Britain. You want someone to rise up from somewhere and take everyone by surprise. I think the BNP picking up votes stems from disenchantment.

I was the only black girl and only non-Catholic at St Mary's Roman Catholic School in Penzance.Whenever they were all at prayers I had free time. I got into a lot of trouble - they made me sit on a baby chair. It was supposed to shame you, but it didn't break me. There was a footballing nun who used to play on the pitch with the boys. She'd even wear a wimple.

I hate it when Gordon Ramsay abuses people on TV.
Those people come from goodness knows where to be in the kitchen with him and he's swearing at them, shaming them, mocking them, abusing them, and they just take it. That's got nothing to do with being a chef.

'I thought Oliver Stone was crazy when he told me he wanted me to play Condoleezza Rice,' said Thandie of her role in the film W
I can't stand reality TV.
Apparently, some people even watch Big Brother when all of the contestants are asleep in the house. Can you believe that?

You go into newsagents now and the top shelf is all the way down to the bottom.
My kids are getting comics next to the cover of a men's mag with a girl who's topless. The boundaries have gone.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/home/moslive/article-1223590/Thandie-Newton-Guy-Ritchie-racism-Hollywood-Oliver-Stone-crazy.html?ITO=1490#ixzz0VZx06vNT

Thandie and girls at the Times BFI Film Festival in London

2009-10-27T10:31:00.001-07:00

They are so cuteeeee!

The Rainforest Foundation Photography Exhibition in London, Tuesday, Oct. 6, 2009.

2009-10-12T18:26:00.000-07:00

Fashion Week Comes to a Star-Studded Close in NYC

2009-09-19T18:37:00.001-07:00

2012 Stills

2009-09-11T19:01:00.000-07:00

From the Independent

2009-09-01T10:47:00.000-07:00

Of all the roles she’s had in the past 20 years there’s one Thandie Newton naturally prizes above all others: being a mother. She talks to Lucy Cavendish about family, the fame game and how she healed her past

When Thandie Newton walks into the Electric Bar in Notting Hill, west London, all heads turn to gaze. She is, after all, instantly recognisable. She has been in so many popular films — Mission: Impossible II, Norbit, The Pursuit of Happyness — and award-winning ones (Crash received an Oscar), as well as guesting in ER as Noah Wyle’s love interest. There can’t be a person in this fashionable bar who doesn’t know who she is. But the fact that everyone turns to look might also be down to the fact that, at 36, in a simple blue dress teamed with high wedges, she looks stunning. She has an amazing face — fine-boned, high-cheeked, a graceful smile — long, slim limbs and beautiful, dusky skin.

Just as I am musing on this, Newton greets me warmly, apologises sweetly for being late, then suddenly grabs my bags. “We must move,” she says forcefully. Then she marches down to the other end of the room.

She doesn’t like being recognised, she says, by way of explanation, although she understands why people approach her. “It’s called the fame game, isn’t it?” she says. “It’s a difficult one. In my day-to-day life I feel I am a wife and mother [she is married to the writer-director Ol Parker and they have two girls, Ripley, eight, and Nico, four]. I take the kids to school. I pick them up. We go to the park. I make food, that type of thing.”

Her children are now her priority, she tells me. She had them both naturally at home and, when she talks about them, her face lights up. “I cannot believe how much I love them,” she says. “I fed them both and carried them in me. When I see women who have plastic surgery done to their boobs I think, ‘How can you when they have fed your children?’”

So would she like to eschew all the glitz for full-time motherhood? “No,” she says, looking horrified. “I like escape, just as everyone else does.” Does she like the dressing up and presenting of gongs? She certainly does a lot of handing out of Baftas and Oscars and the like wearing a variety of gowns. “Love it,” she says fervently. “I love the dressing-up bit. I don’t shop much but, when I do, it’s great.” At the moment she is promoting the Martini Stay Beautiful campaign. “Well, it’s great, isn’t it?” she says. “I remember the advertisements as a child … Lots of beautiful people hanging out on yachts in St Tropez or wherever.”

She says that her daughters love to watch her getting ready. “They say ‘Mummy pretty’ and all that. Nico watched Norbit the other day on DVD. I don’t think she understood it but she spent the whole time stroking the screen and saying, ‘Mama?’.” Ripley — named after Sigourney Weaver’s character in the Alien films — already wants to act, she adds. “That’s how fame seems to children. They think it’s all glamour and glitz, but it’s really hard work.”

She should know. Newton has been acting ever since she was chosen to play the lead in the film Flirting when she was 16, 20 years ago. “It was a total fluke I got the job,” she says. “I was supposed to be a dancer.”

I tell her that a friend of mine taught her at Tring Park School for the Performing Arts in Hertfordshire, where Newton trained. I remember my friend telling me that there was a girl there who, she thought, would go on to become a major actor. “She’s called Thandie Newton,” my friend said, “and she’s amazingly beautiful and talented.”

Newton laughs slightly nervously. “I wish I’d known that,” she says. “I could have done with hearing something like that. I didn’t have much confidence then.”

Most girls who went to Tring studied dance and, the way my friend described it, it was tough, with endless practice at the barre. “It’s true that life was hard,” says Newton. “I was 11 when I went there. We all put ourselves under enormous pressure because we all wanted to be successful dancers but, you know, it’s at a time when your body is changing. If you’re going to dance you have to be tiny but also fit and strong. I got injured. I couldn’t carry on. No one from my year at Tring made it.”

It was Flirting that changed Newton’s life, in more ways than one. For a start, it also starred Nicole Kidman and Naomi Watts. “That’s amazing, isn’t it?” says Newton. “I went to film in Australia and there they were. We’ve all gone on to do well but Nicole was already a star. People followed her everywhere when we were filming.”

But the film also marked the beginning of a relationship between Newton and the director, John Duigan, who was 39 at the time. It wasn’t a happy period. Newton looks away when I ask about Duigan. She has talked a lot in the past about how her six-year relationship with Duigan damaged her, saying how she felt she should have been more protected. In a past interview she said: “It was unhealthy. I was separated from my parents and very young, and I ended up having years of self-doubt. I think I should have been more protected. It’s a profession that attracts unconventional people who pride themselves on being unconventional, because that’s sometimes an asset to being an artist, right? But sometimes conventions are there for a reason and they are conventions because they work, because they are more healthy.”

Today she says, “I was 16. I didn’t tell my parents about it but really young people who are vulnerable have to be looked out for. I’ve just been out to South Africa to Oprah’s Leadership Academy [Oprah Winfrey is a long-time friend]. It educates girls from impoverished backgrounds and I was taking part in an arts week. I looked at the 16-year-old girls there. How can it possibly be right to start a serious relationship with someone at that age when you are so much older?” Was she dazzled by Duigan? She sighs. “I suppose so but … I’ve been through a lot of therapy so I sort of know why people do things now. I am aware of how complicated people’s lives are, so, while I don’t forgive him, I do understand a bit more. I have moved on and it feels as if it happened a long time ago.”

The relationship did leave her with scars — literally. She has talked in the past of being so unhappy that her eating patterns became messed up (not uncommon for someone training to be a dancer) and has always been very open about suffering from eating disorders. She has said that she still has scars on her hands from putting her fingers down her throat and the acid burning them with the reflux. I do find myself staring at her hands, but see nothing. “I think many young women have eating disorders, don’t they?” she says slightly defensively when I ask her about bulimia. “When you don’t like yourself or the situation you are in, you do not-very-nice things to yourself — I know why I did. I’ve talked about it a lot and now I wonder if I should have done.” In what way, I ask her. “Oh, I don’t know,” she says vaguely. “I’m always asking myself, ‘Do people need to know about this?’ I know lots of women have suffered and do suffer from eating disorders, so talking about it and saying there is no shame in it is good. On the other hand, I feel I want to leave it behind now. I want to reclaim a bit of me.”

Yet the past keeps cropping up. She says, rather elliptically, that she thinks part of her problems in later life were the result of the circumstances of her childhood. She grew up in Penzance, Cornwall, with her Zimbabwean mother, Nyasha, a Shona princess who came to Britain to work as a nurse, her English father, Nick, a lab technician-turned-artist, and her brother, Jamie, who is now a television producer. Her relationship with her mother could, she tells me, be strained at times.

“I remember sensing that my mother was holding something back from me,” she says. “I used to think I had done something wrong because she could be so distant. I knew there was something going on that I didn’t know about and, because I was a child, I thought it was my fault. It took me years to work out that she had actually been protecting me as a child.” Protecting her from what? “Racism,” says Newton simply.

“It was Cornwall. I don’t blame people. I don’t think it was truly nasty, but there were comments, and my mother kept that all away from us and, to do that, she had to keep herself distant in order to be a barrier between us and them.” She says that she and her mother have talked it through.

‘She has explained it to me and of course I understand. There were times when I was so unhappy no one could reach me. It’s like a madness. But my mother and father have always supported me in what I do, even when I have had my own distance from them.” They were incredibly proud of her when she went to Cambridge to read anthropology. “I wasn’t sure if I was going to go,” she says. “My acting career was taking off but my parents were so excited and they wanted me to have a fall-back if everything went wrong. Also, my mother had a very rural upbringing. She walked for hours on end, backwards and forwards, just to get an education.”

Newton divided her Cambridge years between studying and dashing off to make films such as Jefferson in Paris and Interview with the Vampire. “I was sure I was going to flunk my finals,” she says. “I was in Cannes promoting a film and then dashing back to the hotel to revise.” She pulled it off, though.

“I got an upper second,” she says proudly. She says that she is very happy now. She spends a lot of her time campaigning for charities — as well as supporting Oprah’s Leadership Academy, she campaigns to highlight and help prevent the use of rape as a tool of war. “I’ve been to fundraisers to help women in the Congo,” she says. “Their stories are truly horrific.

“I used to go back to Zimbabwe all the time to see my relations,” she continues. “I don’t go now because of the political situation. Because I’m well known I don’t want anything I say or do to be misconstrued.” She would, however, love to take her children there. “I think Africa is an amazing continent. People there know what life is about. They are warm and kind and tactile. It’s like what Bono said to me: ‘Africa’s sexy.’ People forget that, but it is.”

She is also happy to take a back seat in her career so that her husband can work more. “We juggle it,” she says. “I’ve just finished making a blockbuster called 2012, and he is making a film now, so I am more at home.” She famously once turned down $6m to be in the film of Charlie’s Angels (Lucy Liu ended up taking the part). “I had been away for a year making Mission: Impossible II and I hadn’t seen Ol much and he wasn’t keen to travel. It’s our marriage, you know. It’s important.”

Interestingly enough, there are two Ol Parkers: the director who made An Ideal Husband and her Ol Parker. “The other one lives on our street,” she says. “We keep getting cheques for him through the post.” Does she cash them in? “Not big enough,” she says, laughing. Then she looks a bit worried. “I’m joking.”

Thandie Newton reveals her unique style

2009-08-18T19:49:00.001-07:00

Tue, 18 Aug 2009 10:03a.m.
Thandie Newton used to dress like a fisherman.

The 36-year-old actress grew up in the coastal county of Cornwall, south west England, and took fashion inspiration from the people she saw working on fishing trawlers.

She explained: “My mum’s wardrobe was always full of great stuff, as my parents lived in Zambia in the 70s. Later, when we lived in Cornwall, there was this whole fisherman thing going on. I used to wear gorgeous African batik skirts with a fisherman’s smock – that was my look!

“I think that’s one of the lovely things about fashion – it’s not just what’s in, but an anthropology of where you’ve come from.”

However, Thandie’s mother Nyasha was not always so enamoured with her daughter’s style.
Thandie used to love riffling through charity shops as a youngster, but Nyasha wasn’t so keen.

Thandie explained to Britain’s InStyle magazine: “When I was growing up, my mom was so sad when I was looking for vintage stuff – she thought it was because we couldn’t afford new things, but I had an instinct that that’s where you’d find interesting clothes on a budget.”

Thandie Newton says no to surgery

2009-08-18T19:47:00.000-07:00

'Crash' actress Thandie Newton has vowed she won't have cosmetic surgery on her breasts because she is a mother.
Thandie Newton will never have a boob job. The 'Crash' actress - who has two daughters, eight-year-old Ripley and Nico, four, with her husband, writer Ol Parker - won't have cosmetic surgery to enhance her breasts because she is a mother. She said: 'I cannot believe how much I love my children. I fed them both and carried them in me. When I see women who have plastic surgery done to their boobs I think, 'How can you when they have fed your children?' ' Thandie has also revealed she enjoys dressing up in designer gowns to attend awards ceremonies and glitzy events - and her kids love seeing their mother in glamorous outfits. The 36-year-old British beauty added to Britain's Stella magazine: 'I love it. I love the dressing up bit. I don't shop that much but, when I do, it's great. 'My daughters like watching me get ready. They say, 'Mummy pretty', and all that. 'That is how fame seems to children. They think it is all glamour and glitz, but it is really hard work.'

Thandie Newton's mother protected her from racism

2009-08-18T19:46:00.001-07:00

Wed, 19 Aug 2009 1:28p.m.
Thandie Newton has credited her mother with shielding her from racism while she was growing up in England - although her efforts strained their relationship at times.

The actress is the daughter of Englishman Nick and Zimbabwean Nyasha, who emigrated to Britain to work as a nurse.

As a result of her mixed heritage, the Crash star and her family were subjected to cruel taunting during her youth in the English county of Cornwall.

But Newton admits she frequently wasn't aware of the rude remarks because her mother worked hard to protect her from it.

She says, "I remember sensing that my mother was holding something back from me. I used to think I had done something wrong because she could be so distant. I knew there was something going on that I didn't know about, and, because I was a child, I thought it was my fault. It took me years to work out that she had actually been protecting me as a child (from) racism.

"It was Cornwall. I don't blame people. I don't think it was truly nasty, but there were comments, and my mother kept all that away from us and, to do that, she had to keep herself distant in order to be a barrier between us and them."

The 36-year-old struggled to understand her mother's distance, insisting it left her feeling deeply devastated: "She has explained it to me and of course I understand. There were times when I was so unhappy no one could reach me. It's like a madness."

But their relationship has since been patched up - and she's grateful for her mother's support: "My mother and father have always supported me in what I do, even when I have had my own distance from them."

Thandie's secret

2009-08-13T00:29:00.001-07:00

How Thandie Newton keeps her peepers wrinkle-free!

Her secret? Heal, an advanced healing gel from The Firm. Heal gel not only heals and softens scars and bruises, but it reduces swelling and inflammation, instantly soothing your skin.

Thandie Newton loves it so much she calls it an ‘elixir of life’ claiming that “a close-up after a 14-hour day is actually possible with Heal, it tightens the skin around my eyes immediatey".

This remarkable gel formula is the brainchild of a group of leading plastic surgeons and took three whole years to perfect.

It contains ten active ingredients that soothe, repair and reduce scarring, including arnica montana, a natural plant-based anti-inflammatory, healing peptides and signaline, which helps to regenerate the skin’s surface and boost collagen production.

Thandie Newton is not the only fan of Heal gel - Joely Richardson also can’t get enough of it saying, “I’ve come to love Heal. It’s like a protective layer that I wear daily now.”

Sounds like a medicine cabinet must

Thandie My London

2009-08-11T19:44:00.001-07:00

Thandie Newton - My London
Sylvia Mulder, ES Magazine
07.08.09 Home is...
Northwest London. I have been living there for a long time now, I really enjoy it.

Where did you last go on holiday?
I went to the Borgo Santo Pietro hotel in Tuscany recently, which was beautiful. One of my favourite family holidays was spent at the Carlisle Bay hotel in Antigua. Everything was right on the beach, so my husband and I could watch our two daughters play while having delicious food. The Cuixmala in Mexico was also heaven on earth. The girls released baby turtles into the ocean which they loved.

Which London shops do you rely on?
The farmers' market in Queens Park is incredible. I get my food for the week there. I also love Little Davis in the East End for ecologically responsible children's clothes. Start, in EC2, has a beautiful range of clothes, from Stella McCartney to Chloé. Everything there is wonderfully tailored.

What advice would you give a tourist?
Come in the winter when it's a bit quieter and not completely packed with tourists, so you can see the real London. It's the best time to visit the city, because the lights are on and you can spend a cosy night in the pub.

What's the best meal you've had in London?
I love the River Café in Hammersmith; I try to go there at least a couple of times a month.

What's your earliest London memory?
When I was 12 I got a part in the Royal Festival Ballet's The Nutcracker as one of the children. My whole family came from Cornwall for three weeks and I was performing every night and all the matinées. It was a dream come true.

What would be on your tombstone?
It's a really sad idea, so I'd rather not think about it.

What are you most afraid of?
Bees becoming extinct. There are scientific theories, which I'm a believer in, that claim that four years after bees become extinct, humans will, too, because bees are the key to the human cycle.

What are your guilty pleasures?
Watching Curb Your Enthusiasm in bed with a box of Baker & Spice chocolate cookies.

What would you do as Mayor for the day?
Oh, that's a never-ending list, but one thing I'd definitely do is make everyone do charity work.

What animal would you most like to be?
My mutt Maggie, because she gets to spoon my eldest daughter [Ripley] every night.

What was the last album you downloaded?
The album of this upcoming singer called Speech Debelle. It's fantastically lyrical; I love it.

What would you save from a fire? Other than my loved ones, I'd save my BlackBerry. It's so useful, and if there's a fire in my house I guess I'd need to call some people!

What makes you laugh?
The comedian Danny McBride. He's wonderfully self-conscious.

What are you up to at the moment?
I have a film coming out soon, called 2012, which is directed by Roland Emmerich. And next week I'm going to South Africa to teach an acting workshop at Oprah's girls' school. She asked me herself, so I'm really honoured.

Where do you shop in London?
Church Street in Marylebone, because it's like an interiors Walhalla. I absolutely love Alfies Antique Market. My favourite stall is called Dodo and it sells antique posters - I have several.

What do you like to wear?
At the moment I love my Georgina Goodman nude leather gladiator flats.

What's your favourite London pub?
The Chamberlayne in Queens Park. When my husband and I take the dogs for a long walk we usually pop in there for a cider, and the dogs can come in as well.

What are your favourite London discoveries?
Jivamukti Yoga came to Kensal Road a few years ago from New York and it is just a temple of self-love and energy.

Have you ever stolen anything?
I've stolen small change from my daughter's money box for parking. I will replace it, though.

Thandie Newton is the new face of Martini Rosato 'Stay Beautiful'.

2012 Press Conference Los Angeles

2009-08-10T20:15:00.001-07:00

2012

2009-08-10T15:27:00.001-07:00

Thandie to coach Oprah girls

2009-06-12T02:00:00.001-07:00

BRITISH actress Thandie Newton is coming to South Africa to teach acting to girls from the Oprah Winfrey Leadership Academy.

The actress, who has won awards from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, and from the Screen Actors Guild, will visit the Gauteng school during its annual arts and culture week, which starts on Monday.

Born to a Zimbabwean healthcare worker and an English laboratory technician, Newton has starred in films that include Mission: Impossible 2, Crash and the Winfrey-produced period piece Beloved.

The acting head of the Oprah Winfrey Academy, Joy Moore, said the week-long course would enable pupils to explore their creativity.

“The girls will learn more about the arts of poetry, acting and storytelling, and discover the beauty that lies within creative design and artistic presentation,” she said.

“It is Miss Winfrey’s hope that the experience will continue to help the girls integrate art, culture and creativity into their daily life.”

The workshops, which will cover everything from cooking and sculpture to dance, will be led by other well-known faces, such as South African storyteller Gcina Mhlophe, US dancer Alvin Ailey, US chef and author Art Smith and US fashion designer Ralph Lauren’s nephew, Greg Lauren, who will teach painting and comic-cover art.

Newton turns screenwriter

2009-06-11T22:35:00.001-07:00

Actress THANDIE NEWTON is to step away from the camera to try her hand at writing screenplays.
The Crash star is following in her writer husband Ol Parker's footsteps by putting pen to paper for her first big screen project. And Newton insists she could be tempted to become a full-time writer - because the work schedule suits her busy lifestyle as a mum of two.
She says of her first movie, "It's a comedy feature film. It's been really nice to do that: be at home, be around the kids. It's just a really nice lifestyle - I've been doing other, smaller jobs to supplement it and so on.

Thandie Martini Night

2009-06-11T22:32:00.000-07:00

New Martini girl Thandie Newton ruffles a few men's feathers in a dress that offers a real thigh-ful
Thandie Newton often champions Brit designers like Giles Deacon. But she may have taken the avant-garde look a little too far as she stepped out in a frock which looked like a pair of half-drawn curtains.

The unfinished-looking dress was a big style statement, but it left the Oscar-winning Crash star looking as if she had run out of the designer's salon before the dress was complete.

Thandie Newton makes an entrance in a ruffled dress which reveals a thighful at the Tini bar in Chelsea The dress was layers of taffeta ruffles held together by a sheer panel.It looked fine once she stood up upon exiting her car, but not before she had exposed a right thighful in London last night.

Thandie was at the appropriately named Tini bar in Chelsea to promote her role as the spokesperson for drinks company Martini's Stay Beautiful campaign.
The mother of two daughters, Ripley, nine, and Nico, five, told the Mail On Sunday's Nathan Kay: 'It looks like I'm having the time of my life with a group of my best friends but I met them that day,' describing the Martini photoshoot.

Thandie's taffeta ruffled dress looks great when she stands up and covers her modesty

Crash star Thandie is the spokeswoman for drinks company Martini's Stay Beautiful campaign 'They were a lovely bunch of people and we had so much fun that it looks like we have known each other for years.'

'They were all models and I was the only actor in it.'
'The only problem was the shoot started at 7am and ended late the same evening so I had to be wide awake even when I was tired.'

The Sunday Times May 24, 2009

2009-05-23T15:46:00.001-07:00

Thandie Newton: flirting with fame
She’s one of our most accomplished and beautiful actresses, yet Thandie Newton has struggled to balance blockbusters and babies. Now she’s upping her game with new star roles — and making peace with a troubled past

Giles Hattersley writes
Thandie Newton is in the throes of shooting a drinks ad when I tip up in east London for our meet, so I hang out for a bit, watching her enjoying glass after glass with some fake revellers as the flashbulbs pop. I try to order a drink myself, but it turns out the waiters are fake, too — damn cheek — so I stumble off to smoke on the roof until, two hours later, she’s ready.

Today, she’s in clipped, cool-prefect mode, though there’s an odd mix of over- and underconfidence about her that most actors work hard to disguise. Newton isn’t big on hiding, though. “I’m not very guarded,” she says. So, one minute she’ll be telling you that the upside to being both Cambridge-educated and utterly ravishing is that “it’s useful, because you can affect situations from all angles”, the next that she’s “chronically shy”. In person, she’s also shorter than you’d imagine, but thankfully less thin than in the days when it looked as if you could bash out a chorus of Chopsticks on her ribcage. Apparently, she has ditched a lot of baggage — eating disorders, destructive relationships — and reckons getting older is a treat. It’s a convincing argument, given she doesn’t appear to be physically ageing. At 36, she looks 23. “Good genes,” she explains with a shrug. “When my dad was 27, he couldn’t get served in pubs, and my mum is, well, beautiful.”

In fact, she’s such obvious movie-star material, it’s unsurprising to learn that it took some serious effort for her not to be a bigger one. In the late 1990s, she famously (stupidly, according to the Hollywood agent she later dropped) turned down a lead in Charlie’s Angels and its $6m fee. She’d overrun on Mission: Impossible II, with Tom Cruise, and decided that her marriage to Ol Parker, a British film and television director, could do without another year spent away from home. She returned to Queen’s Park, in northwest London, became pregnant with her first daughter after a couple of weeks, had a second a few years later, then chose to work only sporadically (a Bafta for Crash in 2006 was a highlight). For all the earth-mother vibe, though, the thing I can never work out is how she flits between rejecting showbiz one minute and gorging on it the next. She once described fame as “the toxic by-product of being an actor”, yet she’s forever dolled up in some Giles Deacon number on a red carpet. “It’s about being desperate to be loved — ‘Know me, know me,’ ” she says of the fame game, though she confesses to having used interviews in the past “to talk through my issues”.

Most odd. Especially as she’s now firmly back in sleb world. Last year, she played Condoleezza Rice for Oliver Stone in W, and a sexy accountant for Guy Ritchie, but her biggest multiplex outing for some time will be in the blockbuster 2012, released later this year. Presumably, it played havoc with this work/life balance of yours? “Well, it’s a riddle trying to keep your kids feeling they’ve got a secure life and at the same time literally dragging them across the world,” she concedes. So she took her hubbie and daughters — Ripley, 8, and Nico, 4 — with her. “We went to Vancouver for all the summer and a huge chunk of the winter.” What about school? “Ripley had a tutor, who was great,” she says, then, sensing an unintended accusation of selfishness, quickly adds: “It was necessary, so I had to do it.”

So, you get guilty? “I feel incredibly guilty,” she sighs. “I crave the time when I’m following Ol around, when it’s me keeping our little thing together.” But I suppose it’s not many wives who’ll give up $6m for some domestic downtime —and not many husbands who’d let them. “Yes, true. And I got Ripley,” she says. Is it true you named her after the Sigourney Weaver character in Alien? “Oh, yeah. Wouldn’t you? She is, like, the woman: kicks ass, saves the world with a kid under one arm and a huge weapon in the other.”

I’m not sure you could say the same for Newton. She strikes me as a worrier, though she’s protective of her brood. She certainly doesn’t like it when people confuse her husband with the other Oliver Parker, director of An Ideal Husband and St Trinian’s, who, by bizarre coincidence, lives on their street. “I was on a plane with Emma Thompson, who, for a 20-minute conversation, was talking about her ‘dear friend’ Oliver Parker,” she says coolly. “I thought she was talking about my husband, but actually she was talking about the other one. I was, like, ‘Babe, no.’ ”

Born in London to a Zimbabwean mother and an English father, Newton spent most of her early childhood in Cornwall before being sent to a boarding school near London at 11, to specialise in dance. The school didn’t allow younger students to call their parents. “I started to be much more introspective and rely on myself — which didn’t serve me well. I was very shy, very bright, so the way I dealt with my chronic shyness was to know the answers.”

A fluke audition for the Australian film Flirting, with Nicole Kidman, saw her saunter into movies. Then, at just 16, she began a six-year affair with its director, John Duigan, 23 years her senior. She says it messed her up big time, though she still managed to get through Cambridge — “I was studying for my finals at the Cannes film festival” — and clock up roles in Jefferson in Paris and Interview with the Vampire. She suffered from bulimia in her early twenties and — because of Duigan, she has hinted — had a generally dodgy relationship with her body for years. It was having kids that sorted her out. “Becoming a mum was the single most profound, self-adjusting moment in my life,” she says. “I birthed myself.” No surprise, given the tone of this, that she’s great mates with Oprah Winfrey. “It’s like I took back my life,” she continues of her pregnancy. “I took back the essence of who I am.”

Then, of course, she’s off to slink into another cocktail dress and down more Martini for the cameras. “Twenty years ago, you would not have recognised the person I am today,” she says — and I’m sure she’s right. With Newton, what you see is what you get. And it can change by the minute.

Thandie Newton to front Martini ads

2009-05-21T10:33:00.000-07:00

Thandie Newton to front Martini ads

Thandie Newton is the face of a new Martini campaign, it has been announced.

The British-born actress will front their Stay Beautiful campaign and will be the ambassador for a new rose version of the drink.

The Bafta-winning star - who has appeared in movies including Crash, W and The Pursuit Of Happyness - has the "perfect combination of composure, style and confidence", Martini said.

Thandie will feature in adverts styled by fashion guru Bay Garnett and photographed by A-list photographer Anders Overgaard in an exclusive London members club.

A spokesperson for Martini said: "She was a natural choice to be our ambassador for 2009 due to her cutting edge style and passion for fashion and beauty.

"She has an aspirational lifestyle, whilst still being a role model that women can relate to."

Fans can also access backstage footage of the photo shoot on the Martini Facebook page this summer.

To me a good Martini is pure class and sophistication in a glass, not to mention it’s utterly delicious. So I suppose it’s not surprise then, that the brand picked Thandie Newton to become the face of their ‘Stay Beautiful’ campaign. She follows in the footsteps of the equally delicious George Clooney and Natalie Imbruglia. Other than looking gorgeous, Thandie will become ambassador to the MARTINI® Rosato, a new blend, which is a mix of cloves, cinnamon, nutmeg and raspberry. Mixed with a dash of Pomegranate juice, it’s the perfect summer drink.

Watch out for the ads and the new Rosato, you’ll find me at the bar, Martini in hand

Desperate to bring back the glamour once associated with the brand, Martini has signed on class act Thandie Newton to be the spokeswoman for their new “stay beautiful” campaign. The actress will be featured in adverts styled by fashion guru Bay Garnett and photographed by A-list photographer Anders Overgaard in an exclusive London members club. A spokesperson for Martini said that "She [Newton] was a natural choice to be our ambassador for 2009 due to her cutting edge style and passion for fashion and beauty.
Martini is banking heavily on Newton's ability to influence women in the all important 25-34 year old age brackett into giving the beverage a shot. In fact, Bacardi Brown-Forman (the peeps that own Martini) plan to invest £5.6 million in marketing Martini this year with an integrated trade and consumer campaign. They are also focused on leveraging a number of Martini assets across fashion, film and Formula One motor racing to help promote the brand."
Well if anyone can revive the lagging company, it's definitely Thandie Newton. She's stylish, cool, and classy-exactly the same attributes that cats like Dean Martin and Sammy Davis Jr (both Martini sippers) were famous for.