And it's not that going out for a hack is wrong or bad, I certainly don't view it as that; it's just that there's something about the dressage, being put through your paces, that makes you better.
And so for me what I needed was to get my head out of my bottom, and so to go off and do First Knight - gallivanting around on a horse, with a cape, and knights in blue corduroy - was quite fun.
At first I was a bit indignant about it, and then I realised, 'No, that's what people want, so that's what is given.' But it's not in your control. It's just what happens to you, and that's what's frightening.
For sure, you don't believe the good stuff. I mean, the good stuff is just insane - wacky. If you don't take it too much to heart, it does help when the negative stuff hits. And you know the negative stuff is coming. It's got to! What comes up must come down.
I feel that David took a risk with me. I have a sense that by starting off in the theatre and going off to do films you are seen to sell out in some way. I don't hold truck with that, but you can't stop people from feeling it.
I found it all very scary. This fairytale gets built around you - as if you've been walking through the streets and then Sydney Pollack sees you and goes, 'I'll put you in something!'
I ride, and doing theatre after doing film is a bit like doing dressage or showjumping after you've been out for endless hacks, having just a wild old time. You're put through your paces in a different way.
I think people are a little guarded about me. Oh, God! It's never just about the piece. Something else always washes over it.
I was hungry for the learning experience and didn't feel secure enough to say no. You need to be bloody secure to say no.
I'd seemed to play a lot of people who'd slit their wrists or cut off their hair or shot themselves or died of the plague.
I'm not making any comment on how we execute it or what we achieve through doing it, but reading it, it's a phenomenal play.
If you do anything for too long, it starts to lack edge, to become too easy. Easy is the kiss of death.
It was a fantastic learning experience and OK, I got slammed because I wasn't Audrey Hepburn but you could have predicted that, really, if you'd opened your eyes wide enough.
My sense is that Hollywood is something in the past - I've escaped it.
That made me feel very disturbed, because it never seemed to be about how much hard work was involved. Ever. It was about... 'hazel eyes'. It does help if you can brush that stuff off.
The fact that David had written it and David was directing it at the Royal Court and it was a new three-hander. Plus, it's a brilliant play.
The odd thing for me is the focus on looks which happened in the States. I'd always felt that was not going to be a strong point.
They seem to be very sure things are going to be a success. I'm not being negative about it, but I'm hedging my bets.
When really you've gone to drama school and rep and then you've come to London and gone to auditions and you've worked, solidly, for years. But that all gets forgotten.
Signed a two year contract with Fox Searchlight Pictures to produce, direct and write. [May 1997]
Attended West Surrey College of Art and Design (1989); received London Drama Critics Award for best newcomer.
Formed a production company called Indican (a take-off on the words "in the can").
For the title role Sabrina (1995), she was instructed to cut her waist-length hair, which did not thrill her fans.
She actually plays the intro piano part in an early scene in Legends of the Fall (1994).
She starred in three consecutive films in which she is caught between two or more men: Brad Pitt, Aidan Quinn, and Henry Thomas in Legends of the Fall (1994); Sean Connery and Richard Gere in First Knight (1995); and Harrison Ford and Greg Kinnear in Sabrina (1995).
She was nominated for a Laurence Olivier Theatre Award in 2001 (2000 season) for Best Actress for her performance in My Zinc Bed at the Royal Court Theatre.
She was awarded the 1989 London Critics Circle Theatre Award (Drama Theatre Award) for Most Promising Newcomer for her performance in Faith, Hope and Charity.
Trained at the Webber Douglas Academy of Dramatic Arts in London, whose alumni include Terence Stamp, Hugh Bonneville, Rupert Friend, Angela Lansbury, Matthew Goode, Sue Johnston, Minnie Driver and Julian Fellowes.
Announced (Jan 2005) that she gave birth to a baby girl. The baby was born fall 2004.
Is said to be a direct, if distant niece of the Welsh rebel and prince Owain Glyndwr through her paternal grandmother, by way of Glyndwr's sister.
Member of jury at the Cannes Film Festival in 2001
Daughter, Sophie (born fall 2004).
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