Jennifer Connelly: You know, good-looking women can do great work!

 

 

By Jenny Cooney

Total Film (UK)

February, 2007

 

Blood Diamond is a serious, emotional movie, but we heard you were monkeying around on the set...

Oh, the monkeys? Yeah, we went on safari on some of my days off. Paul [Bettany, Connelly’s husband] had to do some press for The Da Vinci Code, but he was there as much as he could be and we went to the Kruger State Park in South Africa. They told us to make sure we locked the door to our balcony, but we forgot. The monkeys had a field day with the mini-bar... candy wrappers and milk everywhere. There were baboon footprints on the sofa.

The movie’s about the bloody trade in ‘conflict diamonds’, but you’re wearing diamonds now...

The message of the film isn’t to boycott African diamonds, because I think there are human rights implications in doing that as well. But I did learn from the folks at Global Witness and Amnesty International that the best thing we can do is to be ethical consumers. So what I did, in choosing my diamonds, was do some research into which companies could give me written guarantees that their diamonds were conflict-free.

Your character had a relationship with Leonardo DiCaprio, but you don’t get to snog him...

No! We never had a sex scene. The characters are almost adversaries at the beginning of the film, but you come to realise that potential is there. I thought there was something lovely about the fact it’s never realised.

What’s DiCaprio like?

He’s one of the most generous actors I’ve worked with. He’s very interested in telling the story as effectively as he can, and in supporting the actors he’s working with.

Your character is a journalist and you had a friend help you with researching the role, right?

Yes, my friend Donna Harman had been in Sierra Leone in 1999 writing a piece on conflict diamonds. She introduced me to other journalists who indulged my questions, from meaningful ones to really superficial things, like what kind of shoes to wear! I was really impressed by the combination all the women had of a fierce intelligence matched by a ferocious lust for life.

Did you talk about how they used their femininity on the job?

Yeah, Sierra Leone was sort of... sexy. For everything that was going on, it had this weird combination of sitting on the brink of destruction but also being vibrant and electric and sexy. The women told me in some places they felt safe to use their sexuality, in others it was more dangerous. But Sierra Leone seemed like a place where they felt able to be themselves to their fullest.

This is an action-packed movie, but you look pretty knockout. Were you ever tempted to ask the director, “Make me ugly”?

No! I think the character is very natural. She didn’t wear make-up. When she’s in the wild she’s unwashed, so I think it’s realistic. If you think she looked great, fantastic. You know, good-looking women can do great work!

Were there any problems during filming?

Problems filming? Always. Every day there was something. I don’t know: baboons in your room, snakes in the canoe or Leo hurt his knee or whatever.

It’s an emotional film - was there any one scene you found particularly moving?

The fall of Freetown. It’s shocking, the slaughter that went on. Those action sequences are beautifully captured. They had a huge impact on me. The scenes with the child soldiers were all the more disturbing for the fact that they’re historically accurate.

And how did you experience traveling in Africa affect you?

I had never seen anything like the townships outside Cape Town, South Africa. On days off I would go to an orphanage. I saw 45 children sleeping in the same room. It makes one feel ashamed of ever feeling ungrateful for things in our own lives. It put things in perspective.