Kate Winslet is playing photographer Elizabeth “Lee” Miller, a fashion model who became an acclaimed war correspondent for Vogue during World War II, in “Lee.”
“Extra’s” Terri Seymour spoke with Kate, who reacted to the discourse about her appearing nude and without makeup in the film being “brave.”
Kate noted, “We don’t say about the men, ‘Oh, isn’t he brave, he didn’t shave his beard? Isn’t he brave, he took his shirt off?' It’s actually baffling to me and it’s very interesting because it’s a whole other conversation about how we are still so obsessed with women’s bodies on-screen. It’s just crazy.”
Winslet added, “Lee was a very free woman. She was totally at ease with her physical self. It was very important that energy was emulated, and those principles were also a part of the film, and when we see her naked in the film in any capacity, it is always on her terms. She’s always the one choosing. We deliberately never sexualized her because that’s not what the film is about. It’s about a woman who she felt like taking her clothes off and getting into Hitler’s bathtub, she was going to do it… It was really about honoring the truth of who she was.”
Going nude for the role wasn’t brave, but she revealed what was, saying, “The brave part was saying in 2015, ‘I’m going to make a film about Lee Miller,' and nine years later, I did it. That’s the brave part. Forget the no makeup and taking clothes off bit — it’s just part of my job.”
Winslet spent five years developing the movie, immersing herself in Lee’s archives and working closely with Lee’s son Antony Penrose.
She shared, “I had my hands on everything, from her camera to her clothes to photographs to her negatives to letters between her and Audrey Withers and letters between her and [Sir Roland Penrose], of which there are a lot.”
She continued, “I also had Antony Penrose, Lee’s son, who was a creative consultant on the film. He was very much a part of the process for me, and we formed a really close bond. And I couldn’t have done any of it without that kind of access. But most importantly, my friendship with Antony, it gave me access to what it had been for him, being raised by her. She had terrible PTSD after the war. She became a mother after the war. They had a very difficult relationship and he documented that in the books that he’s written about her.”
Winslet explained that the movie was “closure” for Antony, who has spent a lot of his life “looking for answers after he found 60,000 negatives and prints of her that she had put in boxes and shoved into the attic… He has devoted his life since then to making sure that the world knows about who she truly was and upholding her legacy.”
Kate reflected on how powerful Lee was and how she redefined femininity to mean passion, perseverance, and courage.
Winslet explained, “This sheer determination she had to cut through all the red tape, to go into male-dominated spaces that she was not allowed into, but she just would not take no for an answer. She knew that she had as much of a right to be seated at that table as the men did and she was really one of the early reportage photographers.”
“Lee” is out September 27.
Local News
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