Actress Saoirse Ronan was thrilled to take the wrap off of her birthday present – because the wrap in question was Kate Winslet’s outfit.
And the present? One day filming a lesbian sex scene with the Hollywood legend in the new age romance film, Ammonite.
Kate organized her close friend and co-star Saoirse’s 25th birthday by asking the film’s director to change the filming schedule to the moment when the story of two Victorian women in an emerging romance exploded in passion.
“It was the best gift I could have asked for,” said Saoirse, Brooklyn’s Irish star, Little Women and Atonement.
(Image: GC Images)
“I had a wonderful time. I’ve never done a sex scene so intense and complete before. But being able to do that to her … I felt very safe, like we could go anywhere with this.
“I am very grateful that she scheduled this for my birthday. It also gave us the excuse to have a few glasses of Prosecco before we got into it. “
And Kate, 45, admits that the on-screen chemistry between the two heterosexual actresses continued after the cameras stopped shooting.
“We absolutely adored each other,” said the Titanic star. She also told how their sex scene was a little revealing, since she was always the submissive partner in love scenes with men.
Kate said: “Being in a situation with Saoirse where it was totally the same, made me feel a little angry at how it didn’t happen to me before. Why shouldn’t I have felt like my male colleagues? This is how society is, and now we have to make noise ”.
(Image: FilmMagic)
(Image: Getty)
It was revealing for Saoirse too, after director Francis Lee gave the couple the green light to improvise love as they wished.
“It was a great opportunity to be very creative with the sex scenes; explore the intimacy between two people who haven’t been touched in a long time, ”she said.
“It seemed true and correct. The gay women I know say that there is an intimacy that you can experience with another woman and that is what I compare. “
Ammonite – due to open on February 26 – explores the fictional passion of 1820 between the famous fossil hunter Mary Anning (Kate) and Charlotte Murchison (Saoirse), who had lost a baby. The two were close friends in real life.
Ammonites were sea creatures that evolved over 400 million years ago. Their fossils can be found on our shores – buried as the passion of women.
The film is the latest in a challenging career embraced by Saoirse, now 26, who is the youngest actress to have four Oscar nominations – for Atonement, Brooklyn, Lady Bird and Small Women last year.
Born in the Bronx, New York, the daughter of an Irish construction worker and nanny, she moved to Dublin with her Catholic family at the age of three and grew up in County Carlow, in southeastern Ireland. Saoirse made her acting debut on the Irish TV series The Clinic at nine. The atonement made her a Hollywood star at age 13, after she was educated at home.
“I never felt young,” said Saoirse. “When you are a teenager, you want to belong to something. For me, that was being on a film set, so I worked hard.
“When I’m working, I can’t do anything else. I can’t go out I can’t meet anyone. I don’t read anything. “
But that dedication has its rewards – it is now worth around £ 7 million.
Saoirse, whose first name – pronounced ‘Ser-sha’ – means “freedom” in Irish, lived three years in Greystones, County Wicklow. Ammonite was a challenge for her in several ways. She had to learn to play the piano and sew – and then there was the wardrobe that accompanied an introspective Victorian woman.
“Only the clothes she had to wear and how restrictive they were, I found it very restrictive,” she said.
Kate, who trained for months to ensure she was a convincing fossil hunter on the screen, also had to control her usual energy to portray the tranquil paleontologist Mary.
Rapport
“It didn’t come naturally to me,” she said. “So much communication at that time could not be in physical gestures – it was in silent looks and looks.”
Oddly, Saoirse felt most alive in the cold waves of Lyme Regis, Dorset, where she filmed fossil hunting scenes with a diving suit under her Victorian dress.
“I love cold water and I grew up near the Slaney River, where I learned to swim,” she said. “So, cold water is something that really attracts me. In fact, it is also the perfect cure for a hangover. “
The actress was impressed to see Kate plunging bravely into the icy sea. “She is ready to do everything for the job,” says Saoirse.
“She is willing to look as ridiculous as possible to get a certain photo or stay cold and wet in the rain for as long as it takes to get a good shot.”
Saoirse co-starred with Timothee Chalamet,
25 in Lady Bird
and again in Little Women, and the pair’s chemistry on the screen sparked rumors of a real-life romance.
“He keeps me alert,” says Saoirse.
“I’m never sure what Timmy is going to do next. We have a very natural relationship with each other. “
But she has long dated Jack Lowden, 30, who played her on-screen husband in the 2018 film Mary Queen of Scots – and her only other true love is Fran, her Westie-retriever mix.
However, Saoirse is delighted that she and Timothee were nicknamed Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio of the age-old generation.
“It’s great to be compared to them,” says Saoirse, who could easily be mistaken for the fan club president Kate Winslet. “We will be delighted to take this torch and continue with it for as long as we are allowed.
“I just hope to be similar to Kate.
“I really respect the path she took in the work she did, so it’s lovely to be compared.”
But there is a moment in the film when Saoirse admits that she and Timothee would disagree. “I would say that if Timmy and I were shipwrecked in the ocean and I was floating on a door waiting to be rescued, I would let Timmy climb on the door,” says Saoirse, recalling the Titanic weather scene.
“I wouldn’t allow him to sink to the bottom of the ocean, like Kate’s Rose did to Jack. That is the only difference, I would say – I am less selfish than Rose. “