Cate Blanchett: I never said I have had sexual relationships with women
Cate Blanchett has clarified comments from earlier this week to say she has never had a sexual relationship with a woman.
In an interview earlier this week, Blanchett was quoted as having said she has had “many” relationships with women in the past.
The quotes released did not include any explanation, however Blanchett has now said it was edited to remove the part where she said she had never had a sexual relationship with a woman.
At a press conference, she said: “From memory, the conversation ran: ‘Have you had relationships with women?’ And I said: ‘Yes, many times. Do you mean have I had sexual relationships with women? Then the answer is no.’ But that obviously didn’t make it.”
She also said she hoped for a time when it would no longer necessary for people to have to come out, saying: “But in 2015, the point should be: who cares? Call me old fashioned but I thought one’s job as an actor was not to present one’s boring, small, microscopic universe but to make a psychological connection to another character’s experiences. My own life is of no interest to anyone else. Or maybe it is. But I certainly have no interest in putting my own thoughts and opinions out there.”
The Hollywood star made the comments in an interview with Variety about her new film ‘Carol’, based on the Patricia Highsmith novel ‘The Price of Salt’.
Blanchett’s character, an older woman in 1950s New York, has an affair with a younger woman, who is played by Rooney Mara..
She said: “I read a lot of girl-on-girl books from the period. I think there are a lot of people that exist like [her character] who don’t feel the need to shout things from the rafters.”
The Highsmith novel, also published under the name ‘The Price of Salt’, was groundbreaking in its portrayal of a romance between two women.
At a time when most lesbian love stories were resigned to pulp fiction with doomed characters, the characters in ‘Carol’ are given a realistic relationship and a chance at a happy ending. The story itself, in which young department store worker Therese becomes infatuated with a wealthy wife and mother, was based on an incident in Highsmith’s own life.
