EMMA THOMPSON

What is special about this woman?
 
She's 54, a name, a face that I recognize, and a star. Whenever I see Emma Thompson in a film, the role she's playing always seems very real: I find myself thinking, "That's really her!"

Actually, what stays with me after I've seen one of her films isn't Emma T. the actress -- it's a sense of the story, the film itself.

Maybe that's why Emma Thompson has gotten to play so many interesting, important roles in award-winning films.

She has won all the major, prestigious awards for roles she's played and for her screenplays. Emma Thompson is the only person who has ever gotten Oscars for writing and acting. Everything this woman tackles seem to work. I'd fill this page if I listed all her credits here, but I remember her in "Howards End" on television, and the film, "Remains of the Day," and I enjoyed "Sense and Sensibility." She wrote the screenplay for it, and worked as a writer on the Harry Potter film series, "Much Ado About Nothing," "Angels in America," "Men in Black 3," and was the star and writer for the hit film, "Nanny McPhee." Also, while married to actor- director Kenneth Branagh, Emma Thompson garnered more top awards as a stage actress.

What's interesting to me is that I can't rave about any scene in any of her films that thrilled me, or stays in my mind -- or describe her special anything -- like her glow, concentration, exceptional intensity, or her beauty.

In "Saving Mr. Banks," that opened this past December, in which she co-stars with Tom Hanks (as Walt Disney), Thompson plays the somewhat prissy, sixty-something woman who authored "Mary Poppins."

Emma Thompson told a reviewer for Britain's Sunday Times, "I never gave much thought to my appearance." She went on to say that she's refused cosmetic surgery, and Botox -- "I have many vile qualities, but vanity isn't one of them," and explained that after spending a few years at home with her two kids, she decided to re-focus her career and told her agent, "see what's out there." All that came in were parts for older women. "My friends said, do a couple of photo shoots, and have them retouched. I was shocked by how old I looked in the movie."

Time Magazine's interviewer quizzed her about her lovers, (Emma T. said she had quite a few), and how it felt being nanny, or an older woman, and Emma replied, "You have to be able to look at yourself, and say the harsh things, talk straight to your image -- be what you really are."

Wow -- to be, or not to be, a famous, well-known actress, and be what you are!

That's a question for each of us, no matter how old or good-looking or viable, we are.

Be what you are.

I think this is one of the reasons Emma Thompson is such an extraordinary, uniquely interesting artist.

Click --lsten to Emma  being what she is, as she's answering very personal questions Time Magazine Reporter Belinda Luscombe asks.