Rachel Weisz at the Tribeca Film Festival this week | Photo: Bleecker Street
Rachel Weisz has contributed to the conversation around straight actors playing LGBTI roles, saying storytelling is ‘about becoming and representing someone else.’
The Oscar winner was speaking to Gay Star News ahead of the release of her new movie Disobedience, which explores a lesbian romance in London’s Orthodox Jewish community.
‘I wanted to tell this story and represent it; I see my task as not to tell the story I’ve lived,’ said the star.
‘When I played Blanche DuBois on the stage, I’m not an alcoholic. And I’m not interested in sleeping with teenage boys! But that’s the character. So I see storytelling as me becoming people that I’m not.’
Rachel McAdams and Rachel Weisz in Disobedience | Photo: Disobedience
‘I’m not anyone that I play, otherwise I’d just be in a documentary’
In an interview to be published in full tomorrow, Rachel furthermore discusses the idea of storytelling, referencing Disobedience’s director Sebastian Lelio.
Lelio’s movie A Fantastic Woman – about a trans woman in Santiago, starring trans actress Daniela Vega – of course won the 2018 Best Foreign Language Film Oscar.
‘Sebastian isn’t a gay woman,’ points out Rachel, who recently announced she is pregnant with her second child. ‘He has a trans woman play a trans woman in A Fantastic Woman, [but] he’s said he’s allowed to be disobedient and cast who he wants, I guess.
‘I don’t know what to say beyond that. It’s about becoming and representing someone else. I’m not anyone that I play, otherwise I’d just be in a documentary.’
Disobedience, which also features Mean Girls star Rachel McAdams, goes on general release in the US tomorrow [27 April]. It hits the UK on 28 September.
The movie is currently certified 86% ‘Fresh’ on Rotten Tomatoes.
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