A True One Off - Helena Bonham Carter at 50
Helena Bonham Carter at 50
The convention-defying actress is back on screen this week in Alice Through the Looking Glass. She talks about being single, her 100-year-old knees and having her very own girl squad
The other day, I was getting changed at the gym,” says Helena Bonham Carter, adjusting her vast bird’s-nest hairdo while talking at 90 miles an hour, “and this woman, a stranger, looked me up and down and said, ‘Do you have a broomstick at home?’ I thought, ‘Honestly, I’m just trying to do some exercise here.’ Another time I was doing yoga, and someone tweeted ‘Bonham Carter’s wearing bloomers to the yoga!’ I was going to tweet back saying they’re not bloomers, but then I realised that actually they were. Hahahahaha!”
This is how conversations tend to run with Bonham Carter — intelligent points segueing into self-effacing personal anecdotes, before exploding in fruity, tobacco-smoked, whisky-marinated laughs. We were supposed to be talking about media intrusion, but never mind. What did she tell the gym woman?
This is how conversations tend to run with Bonham Carter — intelligent points segueing into self-effacing personal anecdotes, before exploding in fruity, tobacco-smoked, whisky-marinated laughs. We were supposed to be talking about media intrusion, but never mind. What did she tell the gym woman?
Miss Bonham Carter: English rose to Red Queen
“I said, ‘Of course I have.’”
And do you?
“Of course. I do witches, you know! Now,” she says, looking at the sofa on which we are sitting, “budge up, because I’m going to lie down while we talk. But it’s just because I’m knackered, don’t be getting any ideas. Heheheheheh!”
The grande dame of goth, with her black lace corset and army boots, is here to do publicity for her latest film, Alice Through the Looking Glass, in which she reprises her 2010 role as the Red Queen from Alice in Wonderland. She turns 50 on Friday, but finds no shortage of good parts; in fact, since she ditched her English-rose image in 1999 by starring as Brad Pitt’s girlfriend in Fight Club, her characters have become increasingly varied and unusual. Unlike some actors, she finds Hollywood and popular culture in general are becoming less ageist, “because they know we are bored with looking at the same kind of people. It’s the same as the way sexuality has gone, everyone wants to try everything now.”
One thing she is less keen on is social media. “Apparently there are people pretending to be me,” she says indifferently. “But I don’t do it much, because I don’t have time to answer everyone. My kids aren’t interested yet, and I hope it stays like that, because I hate the liking and disliking. I think it puts young people in such positions of vulnerability. I do hope we’ll give our children enough sense of self-esteem to listen to their own intuition.”
“I said, ‘Of course I have.’”
And do you?
“Of course. I do witches, you know! Now,” she says, looking at the sofa on which we are sitting, “budge up, because I’m going to lie down while we talk. But it’s just because I’m knackered, don’t be getting any ideas. Heheheheheh!”
The grande dame of goth, with her black lace corset and army boots, is here to do publicity for her latest film, Alice Through the Looking Glass, in which she reprises her 2010 role as the Red Queen from Alice in Wonderland. She turns 50 on Friday, but finds no shortage of good parts; in fact, since she ditched her English-rose image in 1999 by starring as Brad Pitt’s girlfriend in Fight Club, her characters have become increasingly varied and unusual. Unlike some actors, she finds Hollywood and popular culture in general are becoming less ageist, “because they know we are bored with looking at the same kind of people. It’s the same as the way sexuality has gone, everyone wants to try everything now.”
One thing she is less keen on is social media. “Apparently there are people pretending to be me,” she says indifferently. “But I don’t do it much, because I don’t have time to answer everyone. My kids aren’t interested yet, and I hope it stays like that, because I hate the liking and disliking. I think it puts young people in such positions of vulnerability. I do hope we’ll give our children enough sense of self-esteem to listen to their own intuition.”
This “we”, of course, is Bonham Carter and Tim Burton, her now former partner (“boyfriend” was her preferred term), who directed her in seminally batty films such as Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and the first Alice. Having begun their relationship in 2001, after Burton cast her as a chimpanzee in Planet of the Apes, the tousle-topped power couple separated in 2014, causing what seemed a remarkably heartfelt sadness among their fans.
Although they never married (she doesn’t believe in marriage, thinking “people are not necessarily meant to be together for ever”), they have two children, Billy Ray, 12, and Nell, 9, and still operate as a family. “Both of us are strongly individualistic and have always done our own thing, but I’d still like to think we have a partnership in raising the children,” she says. “That definitely still exists.”
The partnership works because they still maintain their famously unconventional domestic arrangements. They live in a short terrace comprising three 19th-century artists’ cottages in Belsize Park, northwest London, which are connected internally, with Bonham Carter, Burton and the children and nanny each using one as their own territory.
She isn’t dating yet, but is coming to terms with being single. She recently told Harper’s Bazaar that she knows she’ll fall in love again at some point, but is “beginning to have fun again, which is nice. I can now watch whatever I want on telly. I go to bed early, probably about 8pm. I’m being entirely selfish, or as selfish as you can be when you have kids.”
Although they never married (she doesn’t believe in marriage, thinking “people are not necessarily meant to be together for ever”), they have two children, Billy Ray, 12, and Nell, 9, and still operate as a family. “Both of us are strongly individualistic and have always done our own thing, but I’d still like to think we have a partnership in raising the children,” she says. “That definitely still exists.”
The partnership works because they still maintain their famously unconventional domestic arrangements. They live in a short terrace comprising three 19th-century artists’ cottages in Belsize Park, northwest London, which are connected internally, with Bonham Carter, Burton and the children and nanny each using one as their own territory.
She isn’t dating yet, but is coming to terms with being single. She recently told Harper’s Bazaar that she knows she’ll fall in love again at some point, but is “beginning to have fun again, which is nice. I can now watch whatever I want on telly. I go to bed early, probably about 8pm. I’m being entirely selfish, or as selfish as you can be when you have kids.”
She also says she sees no barrier to working with Burton again. “I understand him well and he understands me. It might be easier to work together without being together any more.” He was a co-producer on Alice Through the Looking Glass (it was directed by James Bobin), but she didn’t mind reprising the Red Queen role he created for her, a character she based partly on the then-two-year-old Nell.
So it sounds terribly sanguine, but I wonder if, in darker moments, she doesn’t have the sense of failure that most of us have when a relationship ends? “No, because I think the success of a relationship…” she pauses and thinks for a moment. “If it isn’t for ever, that doesn’t mean it’s a failure. The important thing is that you have to allow the other person to grow. And if they’re not going in the same direction, however heartbreaking, you have to do what is right for that growth. It’s hard to do something for ever because life is very short.” She pauses again, and suddenly resets herself. “And yet, at the same time, it can feel very long. Ha-ha-ha!”
So it sounds terribly sanguine, but I wonder if, in darker moments, she doesn’t have the sense of failure that most of us have when a relationship ends? “No, because I think the success of a relationship…” she pauses and thinks for a moment. “If it isn’t for ever, that doesn’t mean it’s a failure. The important thing is that you have to allow the other person to grow. And if they’re not going in the same direction, however heartbreaking, you have to do what is right for that growth. It’s hard to do something for ever because life is very short.” She pauses again, and suddenly resets herself. “And yet, at the same time, it can feel very long. Ha-ha-ha!”
What kind of growth she means she doesn’t say, but perhaps, behind her laugh, there’s a glimpse of the Burton and Bonham Carter who, for all their outward kookiness, are in fact hard-working, high-profile establishment figures. Bonham Carter, the great-granddaughter of the former prime minister Herbert Asquith, hails from a distinguished family and is close to the Camerons; Burton is one of Hollywood’s highest-earning directors and estimated to be worth $140m. They are often seen out and about in Belsize Park displaying no airs and graces whatsoever, but talking to her, you occasionally sense the dedication and strain required to maintain their positions. Nell, she says, once talked about directing, but decided against it because “Dad’s always stressed”. (“I said, OK, that is a point.”)
Her most important support network is a local girl squad that dates back to her pre-fame days. She grew up only a few miles up the road in Golders Green, and is still close to her classmates from South Hampstead High School — she has known her oldest friend since they were both four. “So there are all these 50th parties now. It’s, like, do we all have to have a party? It’s exhausting. But then I think, well, I made it!”
No angst, then? No staring at the ceiling at 3am with “the fear”? “Well, it’s preferable to being dead, isn’t it? I don’t think it’s something you can bother much about. I’m here, I’m reasonably healthy and I’m having fun. Anyway, we don’t all age at the same rate, do we?”
She freely admits to having a bit of Botox now and again, but tries to focus on the body parts that are holding up well, because “you can get depressed about little bits, and feel like, ‘Oh God, a wrinkle!’ But if you do that, you get a negative list in your head. The thing is, bits of you age at different speeds. I mean, my knees are incredibly old, they’re about 100, but there are other bits of me that are not so old. There are a lot of really active older people, and if you keep your basic health, including your mental health, you can only get better.”
In some ways, she has already proven her point about improving with age. While entertainers usually start wild and grow more conservative, she began as a Merchant Ivory twee lady and turned into a midlifer with a unique, bonkers signature look that made her a fashion icon after 40. She usually wears Vivienne Westwood on the red carpet, but at 45 was cast by Marc Jacobs in his Juergen Teller-shot campaign for his AW11 collection.
It has been a gratifying experience for a woman who, after her role in A Room with a View in 1985 made her famous at 20, found that media attention made her feel somewhat anxious about her appearance. “I was called an English rose, but I never looked British. My mother is half-French, half-Spanish, and I look like her, dark. When I was young, it was weird. Until you have a bit of confidence in yourself and learn not to pay too much attention to body shape or looks or what people say, it can be lethal.”
In some ways, she has already proven her point about improving with age. While entertainers usually start wild and grow more conservative, she began as a Merchant Ivory twee lady and turned into a midlifer with a unique, bonkers signature look that made her a fashion icon after 40. She usually wears Vivienne Westwood on the red carpet, but at 45 was cast by Marc Jacobs in his Juergen Teller-shot campaign for his AW11 collection.
It has been a gratifying experience for a woman who, after her role in A Room with a View in 1985 made her famous at 20, found that media attention made her feel somewhat anxious about her appearance. “I was called an English rose, but I never looked British. My mother is half-French, half-Spanish, and I look like her, dark. When I was young, it was weird. Until you have a bit of confidence in yourself and learn not to pay too much attention to body shape or looks or what people say, it can be lethal.”
With her former partner Tim Burton in 2012It was partly through a shared sense of style that she bonded with Johnny Depp, whom she describes as her “little brother” and who is godfather to both Billy Ray and Nell. “When we meet, it’s always ‘What have you come as?’” she says. “We’ll both be looking at each other, because we both like getting dressed up. We both wear too much. I’m really envious of all his accessories and paraphernalia. He loves to disguise himself, as I have a tendency to do, too.”
I ask who else she’d like to work with, and she says “anyone with talent and a vision”, though not if it means spending a long time in Hollywood (“It has a different outlook to me, though I do like the weather and the parking”). Maybe a big TV series, a Netflix, say, or HBO? Certainly, she says, because the quality of writing is there now, and “most telly gets seen. You have an automatic audience of a few million, which isn’t the case with a low-budget film. I’ve done many films like that, that I’m proud of, but that have hardly seen the light of day.
“There are specific people I’d like to do things with, but, to be honest, I can’t think of them because I’m knackered after a long photoshoot, and what I’d really like is a nice long snooze,” she says. “I want to do something I haven’t done before, and if not, I’d like to be at home. I like pretending to be other people, and it’s a bonus that I get paid for it.”
She laughs again, and then it is time for her to leave for the school run. It is tempting to make a pseudo-profound point about pretending to be other people and not knowing who she really is, but it just seems that she’s happiest mucking about with the kids or immersed in work — like every other middle-aged person in Britain, except she does it dressed in a black lace bodice and army boots while laughing in the pasty face of convention. Which is probably why we love her so very much — broomstick, bloomers and all.
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