KATE WINSLET: That is
incredibly flattering, but it’s just so far from how I view
myself. I mean, you are lucky my hair is even dry right now!
GLAMOUR: Well, then,
do you have a chef?
KATE WINSLET: [Laughs.]
I do! Her name is Kate! I love to cook; I cook every day.
Chicken features a lot in our lives. Chicken “bits and bobs,”
as my son calls it, which is basically roasted drumsticks.
GLAMOUR: Do you have a
personal trainer?
KATE WINSLET: [Continues
laughing.] No. I just do my own stuff at home with the help
of DVDs. A little bit of Pilates. And just recently I
started running, but I’m not very good.
GLAMOUR: During your
last interview for Glamour six years ago, you were asked
what you were going to be like in five years. And you
jokingly replied that you’d be doing liposuction and Botox.
Have you changed your mind about not trying those cosmetic
things?
KATE WINSLET: My face
is still moving, right? No, I have never tried any of that
stuff…. I don’t have parts of my body that I hate or would
like to trade for somebody else’s or wish I could surgically
adjust into some fantasy version of what they are.
GLAMOUR: I read that
you were literally called “blubber” when you were a teenager
because you were overweight.
KATE WINSLET: Yeah.
Not when I was a teenager, actually—between the ages of 8
and 11. Looking back on it, I really wasn’t that heavy. I
was just stockier than the other sporty, whippy-looking kids.
GLAMOUR: You stood
5’6” and weighed 200 pounds?
KATE WINSLET: When I
was 15, yes.
GLAMOUR: Were you
tormented? Because today you embrace your body in a way that
women love—but did you feel that way back then?
KATE WINSLET: Well,
that’s an enormous compliment. You know, I will tell you
that when I was heavy, people would say to me—and it was
such a backhanded comment—they would say, “You’ve got such a
beautiful face,” in the way of, like, “Oh, isn’t it a shame
that from the neck down you’re questionable.”
GLAMOUR: [Laughter.]
When you won your Oscar for The Reader, did you do what so
many people do after they win—did you wake up a couple of
days later and say, “Now what?”
KATE WINSLET: No. No.
No. I’m really, really proud to have won—to walk away with
the biggest red ribbon on school sports day that you could
be given. I was the kid who never won the races. I never
jumped the highest. I wasn’t on the list of the
high-achieving. That wasn’t me, so winning the Oscar was
like winning all the prizes in one single night that I never
won as a kid. For me, it was an internal-fist-pumping moment
of yes.
GLAMOUR: Has your
ambition changed?
KATE WINSLET: I
have just wanted to be an actress. That’s always been my
goal. I didn’t want to be famous. I wanted to play
incredibly challenging, multifaceted characters. Because
we are all a puzzle.
GLAMOUR: Which
brings us back to the puzzle of Mildred Pierce. Here
comes the obligatory question: Were there difficult
things in your life that you drew from to play Mildred?
KATE WINSLET: To
answer the question I know you are trying to ask me—“Did
I take on this role because of what was specifically
going on in my own life at the time?”—the answer is no.
When I committed to the role, those things were not
going on in my life.
GLAMOUR: I will
admit that in episode one, when your neighbor
sarcastically describes single motherhood as “the great
American institution,” I couldn’t help but wonder if the
concept of marriage is now less enjoyable to you.
KATE WINSLET: I am
a big believer in marriage.
GLAMOUR: Is the
idea of getting married again still appealing?
KATE WINSLET:
That’s a question I definitely can’t answer…but of
course I believe in marriage. Commitment to one other
person in life is glorious.
GLAMOUR: Let me
ask you about your kids. What is the challenge of
raising them as they become more and more conscious of
your public life?
KATE WINSLET: The
challenge is making sure that they’re never treated
different just because I sometimes am. I always want
them to be regular kids who are grateful and respectful
of other human beings. I want them to know that when we
fly first-class, that they are lucky. The highest
compliment I could ever receive about my kids—and I can
say that this does happen frequently—is when the
in-flight crew say to me, “Your children are wonderful.
They are so well-behaved.” Every time I am told that, I
could weep.
GLAMOUR: I assume
you’re worried about what they are going to learn when
they start surfing the Internet.
KATE WINSLET: I am
nervous about the day that Mia can google [my name].
That’s the reason I am so careful not to talk about the
question that people always ask of me: “So what actually
happened between you and Sam?” That explanation will
never come out of my mouth. Never.
GLAMOUR: You mean,
not in public?
KATE WINSLET:
Right, because when my children want to know what
actually happened, I want to be the first person they
have that conversation with. I don’t want them to read
something and believe it, when it probably isn’t true
anyway.
GLAMOUR: Are you
uncomfortable being a celebrity?
KATE WINSLET: It’s
bizarre. I am a person. I am not a soap opera. There is
never going to be a next [tabloid] installment about my
life because my own stuff is my own stuff.
GLAMOUR: There’s
a pretty good chance that you’ll be doing an
interview again five years from now when you are
still being named the Most Glam Woman of the Year by
Glamour magazine.
KATE WINSLET:
That I so doubt.
GLAMOUR: Well,
what do you think your life will be like in five
years, when you are 40?
KATE WINSLET:
I don’t want to know. As long as my kids are OK, I
think it is really good for me not to have the
answers.
