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Woody Allen wrote the screenplay for her. She was the Irene Adler who captivated Holmes in Guy Ritchie’s film. She got a role in the cult “True Detective”. But: she refused to be a “Bond girl”, did not want to star in “The Devil Wears Prada”, turned down a photo shoot for Vanity Fair. A meeting with Rachel McAdams, for whom not achievements are important, but experiences.
Toronto has a beautiful golden autumn. And the autumn gold of Toronto, and the sky of crystal-crystal clearness, and naive, such Canadian home-made greenhouses on the roofs are well viewed from here – from the sixth floor of the grandiose festival center Bell Lightbox, because of the glass walls of the Malaparte restaurant.
We meet here because she loves Lightbox. Because everything in it breathes “a modern understanding of culture – not culture-luggage, but culture-needs and culture-way of life.” Because they have great spaghetti and quinoa salad. Because after our conversation, she will surely be able to go to the local cinema to see some important art-house film. Because she can easily get here on her bike. Because…
Rachel McAdams always has enough reasons to do something she likes. She herself says so, this small, smiling “girly woman”, as she characterizes herself. She has moles and dimples, and a mischievous upturned nose, and funny bangs, and flawless baby skin, and short-cut nails, and sneakers in a bold combination with a feminine blouse with frills and multi-colored buttons. She is 35 years old and really has a lot of girlishness about her. But she gives me a firm handshake, resolutely announces that she has studied the local menu “literally”, so she will order the best one herself, and she starts the conversation herself – she asks how I like “her Toronto” – her favorite city, her only home, her “place of power” …
Rachel McAdams is one of those rare stars who does not recognize interviews, but only conversations – on an equal footing. She is interested in people, she does not get tired of them, and she has never had such that “fans got it.” It is generally, she claims, “impossible to get.” And this is where I get worried. And I begin to object to her, so positive and convincing in her positivity.
Genre variety
Rachel McAdams was born on November 17, 1978 in the town of London near Toronto (Canada) in the family of a nurse and a truck driver. At the University of York (Toronto) she received a theatrical education. And a year later, in 2002, she made her debut in Hollywood in the comedy “Chick” by Tom Brady, where she did not fade against the backdrop of the king of comedy Rob Schneider: critics called the debutante the most promising character actress of her generation. 2004 was a breakthrough year for McAdams. She played a nasty egoist in the comedy “Mean Girls” by Mark Waters and a romantic girl in the drama “The Notebook” by Nick Cassavetes. In 2009, she was entrusted with a truly tragic role in Robert Schwentke’s The Time Traveler’s Wife, and McAdams declared herself as an actress of a large scale. Her other projects are the fatal Irene Adler in Guy Ritchie’s film Holmes (2009, 2011), the hero’s bitchy bride in Woody Allen’s Midnight in Paris (2011), the fragile Annabelle in Anton Corbijn’s thriller The Most Dangerous Man (2014).
Psychologies: But after all, it is impossible to get only truly indifferent people. And you are clearly not one of them. For example, it is known that a few years ago, at the peak of demand, you interrupted your film career for more than a year, refused all offers to play in Toronto in the very controversial Vagina Monologues play. The feeling is that the movie “got you” by that moment.
Rachel McAdams: It’s not that the movie got me. The fact is that I have … such a psychological problem – I would call it “adaptive dysfunction.” I try to get along with everyone, to be a darling, I succeed … But at some point I feel that I can no longer correspond to the circumstances I created myself. I can’t go to auditions, I can’t get into the trailer on set, I can’t stand the spotlights on set. Can’t live! That is what I felt then. And I realized that I needed to stop. You see, there were too many dishes being cooked in the kitchen, too loud rattling of dishes, high temperature from the burners and many voices. And then the cook ran to the cold store! Take a break, for the time being. To hear your own voice, your own thoughts. And I succeeded. I returned with a role in The Marriage, modest in the Hollywood sense (dir. Ira Sachs, 2007), where amazing actors – Chris Cooper and Pierce Brosnan – are the soloists, and I am an unwitting source of trouble, an object, not a subject. But this film gave me a chance to play in another wonderful picture. It was the tragic Sci-Fi The Time Traveler’s Wife (dir. Robert Schwentke, 2009). The role is almost Shakespearean, I call such roles “ophelic”. The possibilities for an actress are unimaginable. She changed the perception of me. My ideas about myself. I went out of the refrigerator to the same kitchen. But with your own voice, with self-understanding… No, this is not what is called the word “get it.”
Read more:
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You know, I still find it hard to believe in your unwavering equanimity. Even I was outraged by the speculation of the press about how you were affected by the news that your friend of many years in the past, Ryan Gozling, is expecting a child with a new girlfriend no less famous than you. In one glossy publication, they even came up with a script: how do you feel when you read this news, and how does your mother call you asking if you should contact Ryan to congratulate …
RM: Oh, this is really funny! Because it is so in the spirit of my mother! She is everyone’s mother! She was also a mother to Ryan, although he is far from an orphan! And I inherited something really good from her. I also love to take care of. I sometimes think that this craving for care of mine is connected with the fact that … it’s true, I had several novels that were so significant that we did not hide them. And all my relationships were serious, were like marriage and did not end in resentment. We just parted ways. We’re just not together anymore. But with the one you love, you learn so much about yourself and the very nature of the relationship! Each novel is separate, everything is in its own way – this is exactly what I like so much about relationships. Even if you break up, you don’t leave this “set” without luggage.
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What do you call adaptive dysfunction then, if you, in your words, get along with everyone?
RM: But it’s hard for me to get along, fit in, be right in all circumstances. This is a constant effort. See… I’m not used to that kind of effort. I grew up in quiet Canada, in a small cozy town where everyone knew each other and tried to help. In a family where everyone cared about each other, where parents have been together since school and have had a clear, sincere relationship for 36 years, where dad has always set an example of mom’s elegance to everyone, and mom – dad’s organization and bright mind. Where I, the eldest, sat with my younger brother and sister, but this was never a burden to me, because they themselves helped me to sit with them. I now understand: I grew up in some kind of laboratory of emotional well-being, in an aviary of love. When I told my parents at the age of 7 that I was going to become an actress, and even wrote them a letter about it – consisting of nothing but mistakes, of course! – it was taken seriously. Dad just said that we need to finish school and find an agent, and that will take time. Said like an adult. This is how I reacted to this – that before that you need to finish some things. Our parents taught us to always finish what we started. I was involved in sports, figure skating. She was engaged seriously, until the age of 18, she won regional competitions, but sometimes she broke down from failures. And my mother agreed: quit, but still, first you need to finish the year or, there, the competitive season. So I learned to finish what I myself started … And from this harmonious world I got into the real world. Not hostile, but simply not always rationally arranged, sometimes chaotic, reasonless – in it the consequences do not always follow from clear causes. I faced failures, with rejections due to the “frivolity” of my appearance. For the first time I began to overcome – the attitude towards myself, external circumstances in general.
Everything will be fine
In the coming year, the living classic Wim Wenders, after a seven-year hiatus, will release a new full-length feature film “Everything will be fine.” McAdams will play Kate, the mother of the deceased child. Thomas (James Franco), a writer who seeks her forgiveness, is guilty of his death … It seems that this will be almost the best role of the actress in her entire film career.
Sports experience here, probably, helped you – in overcoming?
RM: But I did figure skating! Figure skating is a sport of individual achievement. In it you need to overcome only yourself. And then I ended up in a team sport – in life, where everything depends not only on you, where a lot depends on interaction. Even… it all depends on the interaction. It was a kind of lesson not learned in childhood.
And what did he teach you?
RM: I now choose a team. Not only a project, not only a business, not a role, not just a scenario. I choose with whom. This is the criterion for me. What will I experience in this collaboration. What emotions are waiting for me. And I’m not talking about comfort. I’m talking about the content of team actions. Good people, it seems to me, can’t do bad things. Another question is that bad people may well do good deeds… Well, this is the same multi-variant life. And when you find your team, it turns out, for example, that Pierce Brosnan is the best teacher in the world. And he taught me such purely acting techniques, which are not known in any acting school. Or that it’s incredibly easy to work because your partner helps you. This is me about Channing Tatum and our filming of The Vow (dir. Michael Saxey, 2012). There’s an episode where Channing walks naked into the kitchen where I’m, like, making coffee. And I have to, uh, play how I precipitate. Amazed. Do you know what Channing did? He went out into this kitchen with an overhead penis of such dimensions … At first I did not understand that, so to speak, the organ was not his. And it did fall apart. I didn’t even have to play. This is partner assistance, I understand!
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Is your “team spirit”, does it only apply to your professional and social life?
RM: Oh, in personal matters I am a victim of “chemistry” – by and large. It’s as if I don’t choose, there is no such process that would precede my own choice. I have everything at a glance. It even seems to me that we are more victims of our bodies and hormonal surges than we arrogant like to think. Sometimes I literally physically felt that I was drawn to a person. And attracted! And here it’s not about the merits … Sometimes even the shortcomings. His shortcomings, so cute, touching… Incorrect, right just for you! It’s like gifts – I don’t like valuable gifts. They are binding, I think. There is something mercenary in them – it seems like a person highly appreciates you and therefore gives you something valuable. Type: expresses your value in the price of a gift. And I like to receive in the form of a gift what is dictated by the person’s knowledge of you, his knowledge of you. Something intimate that expresses your… connectedness.
And do you manage to receive such gifts?
RM: The most amazing thing is yes.
And what was that?
RM: I will not say. I do not give out such secrets. And then, we are talking about my “team”! So, I am pulled and attracted, and then it enters … You see, I like to feel part of a certain community – a friendly, family circle, an urban community. I guess that’s why I don’t understand how a person can be my partner, but not be friends with my friends and not go fishing with my dad. And how can I love a man and not become his sister’s friend? For me, the union of people who love each other is the union of their families and, even more broadly, clans.
You are a very family man, Rachel. Don’t you think it’s archaic?
RM: Hell, I’m just against all these family values! This fundamentalism! I’m not a family man, I’m an absolute romantic! I believe that we are connected only by feelings. Not obligations, not the idea of fidelity. Only feelings. Although I … I love my garden. And your kitchen. I do not insist on family values, I insist on freedom within any community, and families too. But I’m a homebuilder. I love my space. That’s how more than ten years ago we bought a house with my brother, so we live in it – each in his own apartment, but not parting. And my sister – she is a make-up artist – often acts as my personal makeup artist and often travels with me. Here the trick is also that the closest ones, they are not afraid to damage your relationship with a directly expressed opinion – you remain who you were 30 years ago for them. And they always tell you the truth. And what is more valuable than the truth expressed with love?
I was reminded of a story almost ten years ago – how you categorically refused to pose nude for Vanity Fair, although everything looked fine: three young actresses next to Tom Ford. And they even fired their press agent… Are these the consequences of your romanticism, which here manifested itself in bashfulness?
RM: No, I’m not shy about nudity! I can do nude scenes, I have no prejudices here. And I don’t understand what beauty is that Ford is dressed, and Keira Knightley and Scarlett Johansson are completely naked. Why is this needed? What is there besides the exploitation of nakedness, the exploitation of the body? And most importantly: I hate being manipulated. And no one warned me about such shooting conditions.
But it’s so prestigious for a young actress to be on the cover of Vanity Fair!
RM: And I think there is something more prestigious than being on the cover of Vanity Fair. This is to refuse the cover of Vanity Fair.
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Four of her favorites
It seems that Rachel McAdams – a man of ingenuity. Her chosen ones are most often colleagues, and relationships were established “at the place of work.” Which, of course, is a bit naive…
Ryan Gozling, one of the most interesting actors of his generation (now 34 years old), was with Rachel for almost 4 years. They met on the set of Nick Cassavetes’ The Notebook (2004), the romantic drama that made both of them famous. They parted and reunited, their relationship was clearly not easy …
Josh Lucas, “the king of deceit”, is 8 years older than McAdams. After the novel in 2009, they broke up due to “a categorical mismatch in life plans.”
Michael Sheen, the famous Welsh Briton, starred with McAdams in Woody Allen’s Midnight in Paris. Their romance began in 2010 and lasted three years. It was Sheen who perhaps expressed the feelings of all the lovers of the actress: “Rachel lives in Toronto. I mean – only there she lives a full life and breathes deeply. And she doesn’t want to go anywhere from there … This is her house. Not mine.”
Patrick Sambrook – finally also a Canadian and also lives in Toronto. A well-known music producer is 10 years older than Rachel. And this, as Humphrey Bogart – Rick in the classic “Casablanca” said, “the beginning of a beautiful friendship.” V. B.
