Being normal is Kate Winslet’s thing. That and being one of the most brilliantly talented actresses of her generation. She is an English actress. That means tea and Pringles, thank you very much. No kale juice, goji berries and joyless Hollywood detox lifestyle for her. Nor does she do airs and graces. In the past she went for full-on honesty, talking openly about everything from love to ambition – leading to some knives-out bitchy comments by newspaper columnists.

Career-wise, life has never been better. A serial Oscar nominee, she finally won Best Actress for ‘The Reader’ in 2009. She is ‘Revolutionary Road’-terrific in her new film ‘Labor Day’, playing an agoraphobic single mum of a teenage boy. Their lives are turned upside down over one sweltering bank holiday weekend when an escaped murderer (Josh Brolin) walks into their lives. As she says – ‘Just when you think he’s going to slit their throats, he bakes them a cake.’

Kate Winslet in ‘Labor Day’
Kate Winslet in ‘Labor Day’
You have a sixth sense when it comes to picking Oscar-grade films. What’s your secret?
‘Honestly, I think it’s just luck. I was 17 when Peter Jackson asked me to be in “Heavenly Creatures”. I’d grown up in a house where we had free school meals and school bus fares were covered by a charitable trust. I learned so much on the job. I got my foot in the door and everything opened up.’

You made ‘Heavenly Creatures’ and ‘Sense and Sensibility’ and ‘Titanic’ all by the age of 21. Do feel like you’ve had a charmed life?
‘I feel like I’ve had a charmed career, without question. I still get terrified in the middle of a film, thinking, oh my God, how am I going play this part. But I have been really blessed. The directors that I’ve worked with just taught me so much, particularly Todd Haynes, who directed “Mildred Pierce”. I learned so much from him.’

You’ll be at the London Film Festival premiere of ‘Labor Day’. Aren’t you a little bit afraid your waters might break on the red carpet?
‘[Laughing] It won’t be that close! I’ll be fine. It would give the photographers something to talk about. That would be funny, actually.’

Jason Reitman, the director of ‘Labor Day’, waited a year for you to become available. What were you busy doing?
‘Oh, Gawd. It slightly makes me cringe to hear you say that. It was very sweet of him. To be honest with you, when Jason originally sent me the script, there was a lot going on in my personal life. In my head, I was just committed to my children. But very sweetly he asked: “Well, when would you be free?”’

Your character in the film, Adele, is very fragile. She’s agoraphobic and depressed, but she has this incredibly strong love for her son. Was that a tricky balance to strike?
‘I’m so glad you say that, because I did find that challenging about her. I didn’t want her to be a nervous Nelly for the whole film. And I very much admired her ability as a mother to absolutely put her son first. She’s depressed and yet she’s not moping around in a dressing gown until three, sinking into a bottle of gin. She’s somehow just about pulling it together to raise that lovely boy.’

Could you have played the part before you were a mum?
‘No. It’s really interesting. I did “Hideous Kinky” when I was 22, 23, and there was a lot I had to guess about maternal instincts because I wasn’t a parent. But with Adele I don’t think I would have been able to play her had I not been a parent. Particularly a parent with a child of similar age. Mia is nearly 13 and it almost brings a lump to my throat to describe this time in a child’s life, because everything is a gigantic question. Every day it’s just exhausting because they’re just bursting with curiosity. “Is this right? Is this wrong? How should I be?” And you just have this desire to hug them, just be there and just listen. All they really want actually is to be heard.’
Continue reading TimeOut Interview