Color Me Thandie
Born in London to a Zimbabwean Shona princess and British father Thandie Newton has made a name for herself appearing in over 30 films and TV roles since her feature film debut in 1991.
Since then she has intrigued moviegoers and the public with her formable talent and air of mystery in such films as The Pursuit of Happyness,Beloved, Crash and W.
In her latest portrayal of the promiscuous,sadly troubled Tangie in Tyler Perry’s film versionof For Colored Girls, she goes to extremes as she has never done before.
Recently Ebony had an opportunity to talk to Thandie about her character Tangie, how difficult it was to portray her and why she considers herself a character actress and not a movie star.
EBONY: Your body of work so far is pretty eclectic. You’ve played all sorts of roles in everything from mega budget Hollywood blockbuster films to low budget independentmovies shot on digital video. Is that a conscious choice?
NEWTON: It is conscious. I guess there is a degree of choice in there. But it’s also the fact that the glory of not being “in a box” means that many different kinds of directors consider me for roles. But it’s funny. It can work the opposite way as well. Sometimes people can’t use their imagination with what I can do unless they’ve seen me do it, because I’m not an obvious anything. People tend not to have very strong imaginations. This isn’t a time where actors are viewed as transformers that can do anything. It’s very very rare. People like Cate Blanchett, Daniel Day Lewis, Meryl Strep, Johnny Depp are chameleons. It’s tricky to be viewed as that if you’ve, like, got “good looks” because there are people who want me to be a “movie star” —to be a leading lady. But I know I’m a character actress. And character actresses, you know, do all kinds of things, big movies, small movies, theater… It’s just unusual for a “mooooooovie” star to do all those kind of different things.
Which brings up the point that your character, Tangie is pretty extreme and very troubled. You pretty much bare yourself emotionally and somewhat physically as well. How difficult was it for you to get into hermindset?
Oh it was hard. It was hard because there was nothing that I could relate to. I really mean that. I’m a sympathetic person, a compassionate person, but I found it hard to be compassionate towards Tangie because she’s so unconscious and I feel like: “C’mon!” Everyone has a choice to treat people well or not.
As soon as you start treating people badly and not see that that’s a symptom of your s___t, you’re not a good person. Treating someone badly should be a wake up call. Hurting someone’s feelings, making someone uncomfortable should be a wakeup call.
But the truth is when you’re traumatized, that sensitivity is gone. And I did find it hard to be compassionate. I found it hard to be sympathetic towards her until I got deeper into it. Because I had so little time to prepare for this role it wasn’t until I was actually playing the role did I start to find my sympathy. Usually that happens way before I start shooting. So I find myself on the first couple of days playing this person and feeling really uncomfortable in my body because it was hard for me to be her. But that actually ended being a character trait, thank God!
The discomfort I felt in being her was actually the discomfort she felt on an unconscious level. And I think the key for Tangie is her lack of education. That’s what’s creating this disconnect that she doesn’t even want to explore and the denial that she allows.
So what you’re saying instead of the more old fashioned “give me my lines, where’s my mark, saymy lines and move on to the next scene”approach to acting your way is similar to the "method” approach in which you “become” in way the character you’re playing?
Oh yeah it’s very much so. I’m not formally trained,Stanislavski, Brecht, how-am-I-going-to-do-it? It’s my own brand of discovering who the character is and how I tackle it has charged over the years, too. I tackle it on an intellectual level like, I’ve just said to you, I couldn’t find compassion for her because I couldn’t trying to rationalize how someone would continue to treat people badly.
And treat herself badly as well.
She doesn’t think she’s treating herself badly becauseit feels good, it all feels so good, But that “feeling good” thing is obviously not good for you. There’s that disconnect. But there’s also the physical. And what’s helped with that is my dancing background definitely. I always, in every character that I’ve played, tried to adopt a different physical persona because the way a person moves his hugely relevant. You know, in Oliver Stone’s film W. about Bush where I played Condoleezza Rice it was fascinating for me to watch her move, the way she stood, the way she walked with an expression of who she was and what she was dealing with and her insecurities, the pretense of who she is and so on. That really informed me, that was a masterclass in how much the physical persona can do. So with Tangie I swing my weight around in a way that I would never do, I was freer with my body. So yeah, it was complete physical transformation which evolved as I was doing it.
Speaking of being “freer” do you believe that non-American actresses such as yourself, are more open to doing riskier roles, say sexually, than American actresses who have too many hang ups or am I stereotyping?I don’t know. I would be similarly careful; as long as the material needed it I would do whatever was required. And I would use whatever is at my disposal which means obviously, including my body and so on, because I am very confident that, when I make my transformation into another character, it’s not me.
So yeah, I am liberated in that respect in a complete transformation. But another reason why I think I’ve found it sort of freeing, being a non-American, is that I’m much more objective about material. I don’t carry any baggage with me. For example when I started out and I was playing slaves like in Beloved or Jefferson in Paris I didn’t play the roles with a defiance because from what I’ve read the reality is that if you’re in a subservient position, there’s an acceptance, that goes with it, sometimes, because that’s all you know.
So I think when playing a role like that it’s more uncomfortable to watch because there’s a luxury to be defiant in a way. It suggests a chance for liberation.
When in fact that’s who you are, that’s what you were born into and that’s what you’ve been taught to do, there’s an acceptance with it and that’s not a nice fact. And that’s something to feel horrified by. But I know that I would not have been able to have that kind of objectivity had I been an American. I wouldn’t have wanted to do that because it’s part of my history.
You know of course that there are going to be women upset with you playing a loose promiscuous woman in For Colored Girls, bringing out all these fears of black women being stereotyped. Halle Berry is still getting grief over Monster’s Ball.I get it, but that complaint is a symptom of their pain and their need to protect themselves.That personal reaction is telling something about themselves which is valuable, absolutely valuable.
So the criticism, if it comes, won’t bother you?
It wouldn’t bother me because I’m playing a role, I don’t make any apology for playing that role because I think the way Tangie behaves is a very real symptom of her kind of trauma. Someone who has been sexually abused and for her sex becomes a very confused part of her identity. So it made perfect sense to me. So if you’re going to criticize it, it’s got be criticizing it because it’s not faithful to how a person would actually behave. I think what you’re talking about is people not going to like it. Something that’s not going to make them comfortable.Absolutely! And nor should it make them feel comfortable. Because let’s hope that if you know a person who behaves like this you’ll say: “What are you doing to yourself?” And that you’ll help them, you’ll help them. And that is valuable.
