Cate Blanchett in "The Talented Mr Ripley"

spk_0:   0:00
What do you do on Sunday? We talk about Cate Blanchett acting the costumes, the awards, but mostly blanche it of it all. Oh, I'm not think this is Erica. This is Sunday's escape, and I'm your host. Mortada.

spk_1:   0:29
Hello and welcome to a new episode of Sunday's Escape for this week's episode. We're discussing The talented Mr Ripley and my guess it was a so lease.

spk_0:   0:41
Hi, we're tighter. Thank you for having me.

spk_1:   0:45
I'm very excited to have you here.

spk_0:   0:46
I'm the first. I'm so thrilled. Also,

spk_1:   0:50
like we have exchange, I think, hundreds of text about Kate. Well, throughout the years, maybe thousands millions. So it's very exciting to have you here and talk about a movie that I think we both love The talented Mr Ripley. But before we jump in, why don't you tell our listeners about you?

spk_0:   1:13
Well, I'm in Aires Can shouldn't make checks. I'm sorry. I'm a freelance theatre critic. I write for American Theater magazine, the New York Times and T. D. F, among others, and I have a show called Token Theater Friends on American Theater magazine.

spk_1:   1:29
Oh, yes, and if you are in New York and listening to this podcast. Definitely. Look up. Jose's theater reviews usually started asking my gas about the first time they saw. Okay, it was the

spk_0:   1:44
poster for Elizabeth, and I remember her as she looks yellow like she looks like the sun. And I remember walking by the theater. I was 12 years old when Elizabeth came out, and I just remember seeing this like, red background with this woman who looked like the sudden and that's my first memory of Kate.

spk_1:   2:06
Wow. Elizabeth was also my first time. Miss Kate. What is your favorite Cape Flashes performance?

spk_0:   2:13
It varies these days. It's some days it's blue Jasmine. Some days it's Carol, and I mean, who am I kidding? It's probably definitely MEREDITH Logue in the Talented. Mr. That's

spk_1:   2:29
why you are here to discuss the talented Mr Ripley. What do you think of when you think of K when somebody brings her up?

spk_0:   2:36
Yeah, I think about you. I mean, yeah, I called you take, so yeah.

spk_1:   2:41
Yes. You are the person that I most comfortable with sharing my obsession with Gates.

spk_0:   2:47
I am. Yeah. Well, I feel very on.

spk_1:   2:52
Let's introduce our film. So we're talking about the talented Mr Ripley that Natalie, Mr Ripley was release in 1999. It was directed by Anthony Minghella. It starred Matt Damon, Wetness Paltrow and Jude Law in his breakout, And the movie is about Tom Ripley, played by Damon, who is Ah, young con artist who meets this man in New York and pretends the man things that he went to. Princeton was his son, so he sends him to Italy to meet his rich son, Dickie Greenleaf, played by law, and to try and convince him to come back. But you know, once there he seduced by the life it's maybe the life that he always wanted. And then things happen. Amazing things happen, including murder, love, death, their suicide, everything. In this movie, Kate plays MEREDITH's Lok, a wealthy heiress who is actually the first person that Tom Ripley meets when he lands in Italy. And then she becomes the person who sort of complicates the story as it goes along. This movie is based on a novel by Patricia Highsmith, but actually married the slogans, a character that Anthony Minghella created for the movie. So it wasn't in the original book. Have you read the book?

spk_0:   4:16
I have not? No,

spk_1:   4:17
nor have I. But it's It's funny that Meritus if somebody who was created for the movie because she fits the sort of Patricia Highsmith's No Use so well. So she another wealthy American traveling in Italy. All these Americans are traveling in Italy, escaping America, although they are very American and whatever they dio. And so she's the one who sort of complicates Tom Ripley's journey as he tries to live that Dickie Greenleaf life. Gay comes in eight minutes and which is very early in the movie. It's a small part, which is funny because Kate, in the beginning of her Korea, she did a lot of small price. Like the shipping news comes to mind, Babble comes to mind, so this is a very small part for her. She comes in eight minutes, which is early, but then she sort of disappears for long stretches. So she's in the middle of the movie, very impactful, amended the end. She completely changes, But with the ends, how are the character? So what did you think of Kate's introduction?

spk_0:   5:23
I never noticed that her blonde hair kind of like, you know, it's like for shattering for her Carol. What wasn't 15 16 years after Ripley? She that's those. Are those the only two times where she's had this, like a beautiful blond hair like that? I mean, I don't think the fur

spk_1:   5:44
is blonde, but maybe that sort of long is share. Yeah, like a short like a longest Bob.

spk_0:   5:52
And it's the first thing we see. Her hair is just giving us her back. And I was like, even just that. And it's like herself. Fucking case where? Yes, you can see her so fucking Gloria ce that it reminded me about me thinking Kate as the sun the first time I saw her because it's just like air and, you know, you know, like she's surrounded by strangers because she's trying to find her luggage. Yeah, but you know that we're supposed to be looking at her?

spk_1:   6:21
Yes, definitely. And she's like she she appears in this Blair Hayes, but yes, you're right. The blond hair is what you see. And then her first words to Tom are What's your secret?

spk_0:   6:34
Well, what's your secret? Ah, which is? She's asking

spk_1:   6:38
about why he travels light, but it is sort of sort of fits with the theme of the movie. He is a man with a secret on, and she really sets. That character really sets the tone.

spk_0:   6:50
What's your secret? Excuse me? No, it's just No, no, it's just that what I have so much luggage in yourself streamlines. Humiliating. A merited. But Hello, Dicky Randall. Really? Wow, you're not shifting green. Oh, trying not to be

spk_1:   7:21
so. We can talk a little bit more about the movie before we get into Kate. So the movie. And in a Tom Ripley, who is this sort of con artists who wants he needs this rich American Dickie Greenleaf labor Jude Law. He wants his life he seduced by the life Dickie lives in Italy. He has his girlfriend, March, played by Dennis Paltrow. They're living it up Idol. Wealthy Americans living in Italy, trying to escape the wealth. Onda responsibility, basically, and Dickie's seduced by that, and the movie has always to me. When I first saw it, I remember a conversation that I had somebody I was going out with at the time that I'm like he is trying to kiss came being queer, and I remember in 1999 I was very young and impressionable, And I thought that were saying to me, were very explicit. What do you think about that?

spk_0:   8:19
Well, I was a young president little teenager when I saw it. It was one of the first movies where I can't stop myself now that I'm a con artist or anything is one of the things that I really love. That Ripley is that he Yes, he wants Dickie's live, But more than that, I think he wants anyone else's life but his own, because when we first meet him, he's also playing someone else. He's borrowed a jacket from someone else, so he's always putting on a disguise. And I think anyone who's queer and who's been closeted can identify with that. Like we're always pretending, like, How long? How long did you claim to be to be by four, for instance? God knows I did

spk_1:   9:07
yeah, as I never claimed to be by. But I did claim to be just not gay, but yes, you're right. Dickie's trying to escape his identity and his identity as a queer man. He's trying to escape that, and he sees Dickie Greenleaf as sort of this thing. This idea of exemplary life or happy life that he can escape to. And that's like. And even if we go back to what Kate is playing, she has that scene where she explains, sort of the baggage of being rich, where, she says, the famous quote, I think, is if you have. If you've had money your entire life, either you despise it, which we do, but you're only comfortable around other people who have it, and this spies it. So all the rich people in this movie. Freddie Miles, played by Philip Seymour Hoffman, who will get to Marge Dickie. They're trying to escape this identity of being rich. But Ripley is trying to escape the identity of being here into this life of confidence. What people, I think one of the things we talk about class jealousy, it sort of dock tailed into the seam of trying Thomas trying to escape into this life. So he is jealous, uh, of Dickie and Marge and and definitely jealous of, you know, in the contest between human Freddy, where Freddie's very comfortable being Dickey's friend. But Tom is not, and he's always trying to prove something. So class jealousies, another theme and the flip side of that is that Dicky's always making fun of how low class Tom is. When I remember that scene resets such low class, does this guy know anything? You said it was a joke, but it's also indicative of reading what he thinks.

spk_0:   11:01
Yeah, that's classes so fascinating in this movie because we're both immigrants and we both know and I'm sorry from speaking for you, but we both know that Americans like pretending that there's no class system in America when they're ISS. So I find the poor trader you know, this people pretending that they're not rich while being rich and while knowing that if they need money, they can just, like, ask their parents or their trust. But just, you know, like to get Gucci and to get yachts and stuff. I've always found it so delicious, and I think maybe that's one of the reasons why, at some point I don't feel like Americans really embraced the movie because it's such a critique of America. And I had never noticed, for instance, and I don't think it's a coincidence. Do you remember? I had never noticed this before, that when Tom, you know, fake meats, Dickie and March for the first time. One of the first things that Dickie says to him is you're so white. Yes, and he goes march. Have you seen anyone so white? And this is set in the 50. Yeah. And I'm wondering how much that these people, you know, take with them to Italy to escape both class and having to deal with racism in America. And now they're they're so out of touch with reality that they don't think of themselves as rich and what, Apparently because God knows, there's no one whiter than Gwyneth Paltrow. Yes, that actually

spk_1:   12:42
brings me to, Sort of, like, you know, when we're talking about favorite moments for for the other actors in the movie, and we'll get decayed him a little bit. I think that that scene you were talking about is why Jude Law is still an enduring movie star because that introduction of him golden sun so just so beautiful, you know, laying there in his bikini, so beautiful is why he's still a big, huge movie star. People still watch him

spk_0:   13:13
was a paying homage to himself in that young pope shooting from a few months ago Yeah, he's walking around in a Speedo again. In Italy. Yes, Go Jude. More s'more, Speedos and more. Full Frontal. Yeah,

spk_1:   13:27
Another person who's really delicious in this movie is Philip Seymour Hoffman, who also embodies sort of this carefree American rich boy who just does what he wants. Tom wants to be Dicky. Tom Ripley wants to be Dicky, but he definitely wants to be able to intimidate Freddie Miles. But he can. And my favorite moment of Freddie Miles is Dickie and Marge are having sex in in the boat, and Tom is looking at them. And then, you know, Freddie goes Tommy, Tommy, How's the peeping Tommy, Nick? How's

spk_0:   14:13
it anything? Don't talk. He's such a dick. I you know, I I never grew fond of Philip Seymour Hoffman, and I know he's one of the greatest American accuracy of the last couple of decades, and I can I can. I can acknowledge that, but I never warmed up to him because I know his character in this movie, and it's one of those things where you meet, you know, an actor for the first time, probably saying it up and then watching Magnolia, which came out in 99 Also after Ripley and I was like, This is such a douche bag. And I never I never learned how to love him because I was like, he was Freddie miles for me, for all of eternity.

spk_1:   14:58
So we can blame the talented Mr Ripley for that. Yes. So you are a fan of Gwen. So why don't you tell our listeners you would have seen a favorite Glennis moment and this

spk_0:   15:10
Who? How long do we have? I don't want to turn this into the coop podcast. Um, I don't think I have a specific moment that I love Quit it. And because what I like is the warmth that she brought Marge, which is something that I don't think people knew she had before. I just really love the warm through brings. And, you know, it was she was always thought of a such an icy blonde. Kind of like a Grace Kelly figure. And in this movie, I think that you can see how much she really loves Dickie. And I think one of my favorite things is when she Every time she cries, you should try a lot. And this cream, obviously your memory was in the trailer, and it's take out of context in a trailer. But such a fabulous cream,

spk_1:   16:02
the crime reminded me of something that I read. So one of the patterns of this movie was the review from Amy Tilden, who is a critic that I love. And she wrote this review in the Village Way. She was on a fan of his house, Mr Ripley, but she said about Venice is, she says, when it's Poultry is more tiresome than usual, indulging her specialty of scrunch face tear lis crying.

spk_0:   16:28
That's a vicious

spk_1:   16:30
I know we talked about the actors, but we didn't talk about Matt Damon, who plays the talented Mr Ripley himself. I think this is probably his best performance. It's definitely the best part he's ever had. Do you agree?

spk_0:   16:44
I agree. It's also my favorite.

spk_1:   16:46
Yeah, it is. Without a doubt. I love to scenes for him When Jude Law, Beautiful son So Tan Jude Law is in the tub, which is a scene I think that gave directions to lots of young queer boys at the time. And Matt Damon is Tom replace says to him, Can I get in? I think That's a fantastic moment for for Damon, and he plays it really well with sort of desire but also kind of trying to keep it in and not show it. What's your favorite scene of Damon's?

spk_0:   17:25
I have a couple like one of my favorites is at the very beginning, when he's learning all about jazz to to know what to talk to Dickie about because he's learned from his father. That Dig is a huge jazz fan and Tom's apparently more into classical music. And he's trying to memorize all the songs and identify them despite listening to them. And then a Chet Baker's on place. And he goes, I can't even tell if this is a matter of women, which is also the, you know, the that duality and his identity. Like, Who is he Like What issue? Yeah, yeah, and and then when he ends up like singing that song, he almost sounds like Chet Baker, which is I wonder how that was for Matt. Damon and I also love the other moment when he and Dickie Goto, a jazz club and the Italian host, asks him to come and sing a song, and it's that song to Worf. I'm any kind of which then a few years later became his like, huge dance hit. Remember, there was Oh, yeah, trying to remember. And I think that movie put that song in that and that map again.

spk_1:   18:31
Yeah, yeah, I also like the Damon scene later on in the film where Ripley is at the piano, playing and basically confessing to the murder of Dickie and asking Peter to absolve him. He's finally opening up. I love that scene, and it's the scene where you finally feel something for Ripley and Damon does it meeting great

spk_0:   18:56
whatever you do, however terrible, however hurtful. It don't make sense, doesn't it? In your head, you never meet anybody who thinks they're a bad person. Don't you just take the past and put it in a room in the basement and lock the door? Never go in there. That's what I do. And then you meet someone special you know you want to do is toss them the key. They open up, step inside, but you can't. Is it so dark? Your demons, anybody saw? So

spk_1:   19:39
now that we've talked about, you know Jude and Gwyneth and everyone, let's talk about Kate. So I remember you know I love a lot about came in this movie. It is if you're just if we're just looking at about movies that she made, it's definitely in the top percentile of the movie that she made a scene that I really love is the Oprah scene. I love that scene because they're watching the opera. Tom Ripley and MEREDITH Slow Damon and Blanchett Watching Thai cops is Eugene Onegin, and it's the sort of fatal duel I'm seeing and somebody you know is dying and Thomas so verklempt and he's you know, he's crying, tears streaming down his eyes, and he's so in his this world in trapped by that. And I think that's me when I watch Kate.

spk_0:   20:33
Uh oh, that's very cute. So So

spk_1:   20:36
I love that. What is your favorite scene of cake in this film?

spk_0:   20:40
There's a thing that when I was preparing forthis to do this with you and you know, I kept thinking how Quinn it, I think even in reviews, you definitely read more reviews of the movie recently than I have, and I think it reviews. People would comment on how Gwyneth was Grace Kelly But finding an equivalent for Kate is very difficult, and I kept thinking how you know, she reminded me up like Jim Tierney, because she's so glamorous meets Vera Miles and like Psycho character because I don't know about you. But I remember the first time I watched the movie. I was terrified for Kate the entire time. I was like, When it's done, really gonna murder her because she's so no See, she's

spk_1:   21:26
she's always up in his business, so true she complicates his story. But the thing is, in the end, she makes him kill other people. But never heard right.

spk_0:   21:35
She's like this nosy like Hitchcock to reserve right in shadow of a doubt character where she's so no See, she's everywhere, and you're always worried that they're gonna murder her. But one of my favorite moments is a moment after the opera scene were. She's not just being nosy, but she's also very vulnerable. And she knows that Tom, who's pretending to be Dicky, who's pretending to be in love with March, doesn't want to be with her, and she has a huge crush on Tom as sticky, and they take this like big and carry carriage ride and he drops her home. And then when he's about to say something about like, You know, like I'm involved with March and she goes, you should always save pain for daylight. Oh, yeah, like every minor me of one of my favorite lines in any movie and breakfast at Tiffany's when in the cabin, the lasting Audrey Hepburn gets a note and she goes, a girl can't read this kind of note with her lipstick on it. So beautiful because the movie is modern, I'm in it. It doesn't feel like a classic movie, but also Kate is living in both worlds. She's like she gets this wonderful, almost campy lines that he wanted quote endless sea. But she's still very much in a 1999 movie. She's not. She doesn't feel like she's acting somewhere else. Yeah, what do you make me tomorrow just to say goodbye properly? Daylight. So it's not just this course married? I'm sorry. Of course I'll meet you. You should always save pain. Like

spk_1:   23:22
my second favorite Cade Scene is one that we've already talked about the money scene where she shows, as her true Holte grandeur. Has anyone ever been more deliciously pompous.

spk_0:   23:36
Truth more. If you've had money your entire life, even if you despise it, which we d'oh agree, you only truly comfortable around other people who have it and despise it. No, I've never admitted that to anyone.

spk_1:   23:56
What I love is her voice modulation. It reminded me of that line from the Great Gatsby, where he says about Daisy. Her voice had money or was I don't carry over the lighting

spk_0:   24:09
guy. Yeah, yeah,

spk_1:   24:11
I think. And so in her voice and in her accent, which is a very specific 19 fifties patrician East American, sort of like East USA accent, you can hear the money not only because she's the she's the one character explicitly talks about being rich, but you can just hear it whenever, whenever she goes, you can hear the money in her voice. She is a rich bitch.

spk_0:   24:38
Do you think this movie is a recent by Scorsese Castor as Katharine Hepburn? Five years later,

spk_1:   24:43
I mean, probably because Captain Hepburn probably waas also sort of like MEREDITH flow from the same you Leo.

spk_0:   24:52
And she even walks like this that she's like, I don't know how she's like she's so incredible.

spk_1:   24:57
I mean, in the aviators she's introduced walking, and in this movie she has that long seen wish. They're walking on the steps on the Spanish Steps, which in Rome is the beautiful scene, so that a lot of her acting is walking. It's really great to, you know, attribute that I have read, and I was very surprised by that. Married A Slope was a character that Anthony Minghella created for the movie. She's not in the Patricia Highsmith's book, but she feels so just if she feels like she is in this story.

spk_0:   25:34
I think he just wanted to scare her share office, she said. She's always in danger, and I was like, You're in danger girl Every time mirror that shows up even after I've watched his movie at least 20 times and I'm always so worried for her,

spk_1:   25:47
the context of it within Kate's career, I think it's a movie that people think about a lot, and I think that's because 16 years later she famously played another Patricia Highsmith's creation in Parallel Aired and Todd Haynes Carol so once when that movie came and it is arguably Cates was beloved performance and character people started talking about how she was married. It's low before, so this is definitely, I think, in the top of Cates movies. It's also when you think about her career. This was her follow up to her break break out in Elizabeth's, although it wasthe filmed before Elizabeth was. So. If you think about nine, the 1988 Oscars where Kate and Dennis were fighting to win Glennis and Shakespeare in Love and Kate in Elizabeths. They had actually filmed this movie before that award season, which I think prompted witness in her teary eyed speech to save my friend Cate Blanchett. When she was thanking the other nominees,

spk_0:   26:54
Father and I had decided we were being such ridiculous boys about it. We had decided that we were either gonna be Team Kate or 10 quid on. He was Kate and I was winning. So for the longest time, I refused to even watch Elizabeth because I was like, I am acquitted boy. And now I love them both

spk_1:   27:17
equally. Hey, and the other thing that I, you know, reading these reviews and they all sort of like you came like this movie came in the wake of Elizabeth, and I think you know Peter Bradshaw in The Guardian, for instance, says the Blanchard does her very considerable best was Meritus. So yet again, I wonder if anyone is ever going to give her a role equal to Elizabeth. So it's very funny that critics at the time in 1999 felt that Kate Flash it will never get another part as good as Elizabeth. And they were right For a time. The early two thousands were not a very good time to be a gay blast fat, but obviously she did a lot since then. So it's funny to read reviews like that going back to the queer Seems I wanted to go back to this other review from also the same review from Amy Taubin, who we talked about. What she said about Gwen is what she said about Jude Law was also very funny to me, she says, low queens his way through the supposedly straight role, which is he studied to be because he is sort of playing the queer object of desire. But I didn't think he was cleaning his way

spk_0:   28:31
and so wrong. That's so funny. It's so funny to go back and read how people were talking about things that today they said something like that someone would fire them, right? Yeah, for sure. She was obviously being very narrow minded. Yes. I think all the men in this movie are queer. Yes, all the man cares. March and MEREDITH are the ones who are very straight right there. Talk about husbands and getting married. Well, all the boys and I fucking anything that moves,

spk_1:   29:00
which is sort of adds to the queer sensibility of the movie. Because we know that gay men and straight women I should have allies in bare of objectification of beautiful men like Jude Law.

spk_0:   29:10
Um, I got married. That is such a beard. I never thought about it. Yes, she's the ultimate beers. Yeah. Jack

spk_1:   29:17
Davenport, who is place? Peter Smith. Kingsley. That character is a sort of old Onley, explicitly clear character to because he's the one who, like, wants to build a life with Tom Ripley and sort of wants to be with him very openly, while everybody else is just, you know, hiding their desires as maybe queer men in the fifties. It's

spk_0:   29:41
Matt Damon and fishermen. I think

spk_1:   29:43
the German No, he's not in the good German. That's Toby Spider Man. Tobey. Obviously, we talked about Kate and Dennis and how they're connected together. Kate and dude Mel Connection. Except they're too blond Gods famously, when you know there is this photo that goes around of the five isn't five minutes, five of them. The five actors was being yellow, in which Glennis, um had brown hair. You know, the movie she was in for that brown bounce, an app like rope. So anyway, that that sort of photo goes around every time, if and people always everything. That is why this movie sort of still lives in people's minds. Is that movie That photo comes up and it's like these people who are still all of them. With exception, of course, of Philip Seymour Hoffman, who you know, passed away a few years ago. But they're all five amazing, respected actors who people love and who made a lot of movies and when it doesn't do it, make movies anymore. But one of one of my favorite treat is about this movie. Is that to the premiere of the Ripley Kate Julianna Margulies as her date? You remember that video. I showed it Thio and which is very funny to me because I think they did that movie about the concentration camp during the Second World War. Two years before Ripley two or three years, Paradise Road, which had a killer cast. In addition to Juliana and Kate, there's Frances McDormand. There's Jennifer really and Glenn Close. But it's a movie that nobody talks about now. I mean, I know nothing about it, but I know that Kate and Julianna were in it. And that's probably why Juliana Margulies, with skates, date to the premiere of his hounded Mr Ripley.

spk_0:   31:36
I thought it was Kate was like a huge P R fan or something that

spk_1:   31:41
maybe that, uh, the movie wasn't as ecstatically reviewed at the time. It was sort of well reviewed, and it was successful, you know, It made almost $100 million in the U. S. Box office, which is for a movie like this. Now is almost unheard of. Yet it was thought off as not very successful, despite that, because it was expected to be this big, huge Oscar John or not. And in the end, it wasn't. It did receive several Oscar nominations, but the most from it and one was the Jude Law nomination and then all the other nominations where in below the line. So it received nominations for that screenplay. Costumes score in our direction, Um, and I think that's sort of at the time made it. I feel like it's not a successful. It should have been on a lot of that, I think is about it. Being the follow up to Miguel is the English Patient, which just three years before that was huge, made a gazillion dollars and also was took a real hold on the culture, even being spoofed on on Seinfeld. So I think for that, for the talented Mr Ripley come after it. It was sort of always compared, and maybe at the time people found it lacking. But I think now it's very funny when you think about it 20 years later, and this this year in December will be the 20th anniversary of its release. I think more people love Ripley than they love the English Patient, and it certainly has become better loved now than it was then.

spk_0:   33:28
I hope so, cause I still think The English Patient It's so boring, I don't know, but I

spk_1:   33:37
love Ripley more. That's true. Do you? Let's open that costumes so it's very funny. Kate is somebody who has always had a special relationship with costumes. You're somebody who wears them well. People always saw not just, you know, when she goes out to red carpets, you know, playing the movie star. But even in character, it's people always talk about our costumes in this movie. She only has a few scenes, but her costumes are very memorable. What do you What is a memorable?

spk_0:   34:06
I love the opera dress. Obviously, yes, yes, like the little bouquet in her between her boobs. But I really love the light green dress. She worse when she again just snoops went poor, Tom replies. I Gucci and she just drives up. She's burning like beautiful light green, almost like sea from green dress. And she just some simple like nothing should worsen this movie. Second

spk_1:   34:32
coat dress. Yes, yeah, yeah, that that actually is my favorite custom of hers. And funny that, you know, these costumes were by, you know, every now constant designer and Ross who surprisingly Onley costume. Kate this one time,

spk_0:   34:48
you know buddy didn't talk about that. I remember just right now, I thought it was so interesting is how MEREDITH is kind of like she's rich, obviously. But she's kind of like a big nerd, right? She's like a light in the Piazza kind of girl because she's travelling with her arms and Celia Weston writing Silly Weston. And she's always pretending that she knows everyone who's like, you know, like an it person because she's like, of course, I don't Tom. How can she know Tom when she only knows Tom asked Dickie. Yeah, or she's like, Of course, I know Freddie Like she's pretending. She knows she's like she knows everyone.

spk_1:   35:26
So maybe she is another Tom Ripley in that she's trying to, you know, to be who she is, not It is or Aah! Hiding version of herself.

spk_0:   35:37
Maybe she's like Now Voyager, and she was, I don't know. She had a makeover, and now she's going to Europe to meet you men.

spk_1:   35:45
Yeah, that's why she's the one who complicates Tom's life. Just I love that Indiana and you know this movie seven years old, so we conduct exploit it. So Indiana and Tom, after he killed Dickie and Gets Away was the murder. And he's trying to build this life with Peter Smith Kingsley, the character played by Jack Davenport. When you know they go, they're going to Athens. And then Meritus materializes at the end of the movie in the ship, calling him Dickie because she has always known Tom is Dickie and he thought he had gotten away with the murder, and now he has the choice. You can either kill MEREDITH and everybody she's traveling with, which I guess is the reason why he decides not to kill her to your point earlier, where you said you thought she was gonna die and he kills poor people's Miss Kingsley. Good court, Jack. Yeah, I do want a sequel, although they're both much older now of like, What did they do in Athens after he killed Peterson asking Lee MEREDITH's and Tom Ripley? So those things married? This was a character created for the movie. She was not in any of those of the Sequels, and, you know, when we talk about Kate, we have to talk about what she wears, and we talked about what she wore in the movie, but what did she wear to sort of promote this movie. You like her Oscar, her Oscar outfit. It

spk_0:   37:16
was the black go ta with. I just remember all like the bracelets and all the gold. She had it. She looked like like a goddess, like, almost like a Greek goddess with her bare that have, like bare shoulders like bareback e should Oh, God, that sounds like a gay porn pothead. But I remember all like her dangling like Goal price, Let's and how e. C. She makes everything look, which is also what she doesn't. A movie like MEREDITH. It's so easy, she feels like. But cotton candy? Almost.

spk_1:   37:55
Yeah, I love that. Go ta, uh, dress, too. It's one of my favorite sort of Kate Oscar dresses like If you were ranking the kid Oscar dresses, I would think this would be my second favorite after

spk_0:   38:11
the year she won

spk_1:   38:12
for No. My favorite is the Valentino she wore when she won the Oscar for The Aviator. Yes, that yellow was the move Sash. Is this my second favorite? But the Gagliano the year before, when she was nominated for Elizabeth,

spk_0:   38:32
your neighbour. Oh, yes.

spk_1:   38:35
So that's your favorite Oscar dress. So this now, since you are my guests, this for this episode, I just want to ask you general questions about Kate don't have nothing to do with the talented Mr Ripley. Come for. And we're right there. Since we were talking about dresses and tour Kay, When has Gate taking your breath away? With what? She was very on the red carpet

spk_0:   38:57
so many times, but the wanted comes to mind instantly. Is that pink pollen? See, Agasshi pulled out of the art lives to work where she was promoting Blue Jasmine.

spk_1:   39:08
It is gorgeous.

spk_0:   39:09
And people like all this like basic people were saying she looked like a lamp. And I'm like, Whoa, so what? E wish my lamps, But it's fucking stylish.

spk_1:   39:21
That was a gorgeous dress on guy. Remember? You and I have thought Remember when she were that Cristian? Look, Watch that. She went to some event in Shanghai.

spk_0:   39:32
Rad one? Yes. Wow. Yes.

spk_1:   39:35
We have gushed about battle.

spk_0:   39:36
Yes, you and I. And also that, you know, she worked to the A can for Terrel. Yeah, it's a paper. No teeth. Yeah. Yeah.

spk_1:   39:46
So she's always great on you know, she is maybe the best person in the world who can wear things as cults were with your favorite Kate scene partner

spk_0:   40:00
Rooney Mara. Carol

spk_1:   40:02
Course. That's the best answer Kate has said on Ellen DeGeneres. That's her favorite person that she has kissed, knows great. What do you think is Cates most underrated performance

spk_0:   40:16
That is like such a good question, cause she's one of those actors who a lot of people say is overrated constantly. And I actually really like her a lot in the shipping

spk_1:   40:30
news. Oh, that is not my beloved movie. Do not like that movie. What do you like about that? It's one of four other sort of smaller parts.

spk_0:   40:39
She's the most memorable thing in the movie. She has, like one scene, and she's just like changing her clothes basically, and she's the only person you can think off, Like Also, I don't not for one second believe that kinds Basie that she would marry someone can space about whatever. That's another story, you

spk_1:   40:55
know. Famously, she was offered the lead in that movie, which I think is the role that Julianne Moore in the unplayed, and she turned it down because I didn't find it interesting, and she was like, I'd rather do something that I haven't done before, which I guess was that small part Come, Kate when I who would you like to see her work with that she hasn't worked with before?

spk_0:   41:16
I think that Pedro Almodovar would do amazing things to her. And with her.

spk_1:   41:21
Yes, she should start learning Spanish pronto. She should. And what is your favorite line delivery of hers in anybody?

spk_0:   41:30
Do your worst, Mr Hughes from The Aviator.

spk_1:   41:35
That's that's like a good That's a good one,

spk_0:   41:37
like a little adventurous upper do. Yo, Woz, Mr Hughes,

spk_1:   41:42
Any last thoughts about Cate Blanchett or the talented Mr Rood?

spk_0:   41:47
Well, I'm glad that I got over my ridiculous fight with my father about victim Quentin for Team Kate, and now I'm everybody's team and I don't know. It's just it's such a delight to go back and watch this movie, which I hadn't watched in a few years. But I obviously did to prep for this, and it's such a delight to know that 20 years ago she gave my favorite of her performances. In the 20 years since, she's done nothing but turn in incredible work like most actors I feel would retire after something like Elizabeth and Ripley. And she just kept giving us more.

spk_1:   42:26
Yeah, and she continues to give us more And also, you know, as a theatre critic, G, I think things of herself primarily as a stage actor. Unfortunately, she doesn't come to New York as much as we would like our tools. Oh, she did come to New York a lot of times, and you've seen her on stage in the maids, I think. Right? And the president? I was not a fan of the present, but you were.

spk_0:   42:48
I'm not event of the present. I'm a kind of Cate Blanchett in the present, which I think is her sexiest performance.

spk_1:   42:57
Yeah, Thank you so much. Was a for coming to talk to me about the talented Mr Ripley. This Waas so much fun on a joy. And why don't you tell our listeners where they can find you?

spk_0:   43:08
Well, thank you, Kate. You can find me on trader at whole Cecil. These my end, and you go there all my legs. So my work are there?

spk_1:   43:17
Yes. Jose is a great twitter. Follow. So give him a follow and you can find me on Twitter at m E,

spk_0:   43:24
underscored says and followed podcast at Sunday's escape. And until next time, thank you for listening.