So Keira I absolutely loved Imitation Game. I keep saying it and saying it but I genuinely
from the heart loved this film when I came out. -Thank you very much.
What was is that made you want to be a part of it because it is an amazing story?
It is an amazing story. I first read about Alan Turing in the Guardian about, maybe five
years ago. I keep saying five it might be less than that I don't know. And I remember
reading the article and thinking how do I not know who this person is and what he did
and what was done to him? And being sort of, just completely shocked by it really. So I remember
phoning my agent up and saying look if there is a film of this, because I sort of have
a feeling that there will be, you know would you keep your eye out for it because I'd really
love to be a part of it and then a couple years later she phoned up and said well actually,
do you remember that conversation? Because here it is. -Amazing.
I think you look at the cast - I'm not a huge part in this - and a lot of actors who normally
play very big roles have come in to do tiny bits and I think it's all because everybody
felt like it was a very important story to tell.
But it was so well cast, everyone was just so perfect in their role.
Morten was very lucky. That's what he said, I think he got all of his first choices just
because everybody was just like, yep definitely want to be a part of that.
I'm not surprised. It turned out amazingly and I want everyone to go and see it and
love is as much as I did.
Well, hopefully. -Maybe a young audience who aren't familiar with Alan Turing's story,
how would you sell it to them?
Well, I guess you can only say what it's about, which is he was the man that broke, one of
the men that broke, the enigma code in the second world war, which was basically the
reason that we beat the Nazis--who was gay and was prosecuted for being gay and then
chemically castrated by the British government. So I think this is a story about the tragedies
that can occur when you allow prejudice into policy and for that reason I think it seems
very relevant because I think prejudice is always a problem that we have within all of
our societies--very much still today and there's potential brain drain that can happen when we don't celebrate
differences but we allow those to build up barriers between us so it feels like a very
important story to tell for lots of different reasons.
Matthew Beard called it Avengers in cardigans so that's how I'm selling it to the kids. -Avengers.
Avengers, yeah here you go kids. It's Avengers in cardigans. That's amazing.
Good one, Matthew Beard.
And it has got a very strong feminism kind of topic to the whole film. Could you draw
on any real life experience from that to put into your character?
Yeah, sure you know I'm one of only two actresses in this film and normally I'm the only one.
I really go out of my way to sort of try and find, try and find films with more women in
them. It's really, really, really hard to do that and so yes, clearly--I think it's
something like there's one female actor's job to every 100 males or something like that.
In every single walk of life the under representation is absolutely huge so I think that's also
why this felt relevant from that point of view as that feminists today are still fighting
for a place at the table and equal pay and actually that's exactly what Joan Clarke was fighting
for in 1943.
I have a quick code breaker game to play with you. -Oh no.
It's alright, they're really easy. -Okay. -These are all your films and people at home
can play along as well. This one's really easy. -Okay, that's got to be The Imitation
Game. -There you go, see. Benedict was quite good. There was two he couldn't get for him.
They're all that you're in.
I'm in... Anna Karenina. -They're you go, see. Not doing so badly. -Oh what's that? -Thick dabble in meek.
Thick dabble in meek.
-What's that? Give me a clue!
One of your early films. -Early films... It's not... Oh, Bend It Like Beckham. -There you go.
Phobia benefits rat race. I don't know what that is. -It's one of your bigger films. -Pride
and Prejudice. No, because they'd have to be two Ps. Pirates of the Caribbean.
There you go. See, you got all of them.
I hate this. I was exhausted. The last time I did quite well. Radio Times interview, let
me tell you, I did quite well on the anagrams. This one, I've ruined it.
It's alright, you're a great code breaker. -Thanks, yeah good. -Alan Turing would be
proud. -Yeah, yeah, yeah obviously.