Dame Helen Mirren is something of an anomaly. Her long list of past roles have ranged from royalty (Queen Elizabeth, natch, in The Queen) to assassin (Red), and now she’s playing a woman in a 50-year-long marriage coming to terms with her own illness and her husband’s dementia in The Leisure Seeker.
While Mirren, 72, comes off as super-dignified and aloof, in reality she’s something of a joker. Constantly smiling and laughing, she possesses an acerbic wit and is sharp as a tack. She has a tiny tattoo on the top of her hand — meant to signify the old adage “love thy neighbour” — something you wouldn’t expect to see on such a seasoned thespian; but it definitely gives her a certain badassery.
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Mirren’s penchant for comedy seeps through in The Leisure Seeker. While it undoubtedly deals with tough issues, she and her costar Donald Sutherland play well off of each other and make the film genuine when it could easily be a sentimental mess. There is a comedic lightness to the Winnebago road-tripping Leisure Seeker despite its serious content.
Global News sat down with Mirren at the 2017 Toronto International Film Festival to talk about Leisure Seeker, dealing with death and working with Sutherland.
Helen Mirren: Death is refreshing! [Laughs] No, in seriousness, it’s not a subject we see on film very often. Film deals with optimism, a future, a “happily ever after” more than the end of life. Violent movies, sure, but they deal with death with no consequences, not the real thing.
The movie focuses on the end of life and going out on your own terms. How did it feel for you to portray those issues?
What we do as actors is imaginatively engage in whatever it is that we’re doing. Dealing with these things is really no different, honestly. I didn’t particularly want to watch it. Doing it was one thing, watching it is somehow a different thing. I guess I wanted to psychologically separate myself from that, I don’t know.
I haven’t watched it. I don’t know. I don’t want to depress myself! [Laughs] Not that it’s a depressing movie… I know I’ll eventually watch it.
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That’s the beauty of Paolo [Virzì, the director]’s approach. He has this wonderful Italian understanding, this gentle comedic understanding of life that doesn’t veer away from the absolute realities. American movies tend to in general, but as an Italian, the visceral, down-and-dirty side of life, he absolutely can embrace it.
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He’s extraordinary. He’s been a big movie star for a very long time. I haven’t been on his level… well… ever, maybe not until very recently. The last time we worked together [in 1990 on Bethune: The Making of a Hero], I was a mere blip on the landscape and he was a towering monument. He comes with that amazing body of work and experience, which can be rather intimidating.
Usually when we see a road trip movie, it’s always young adults or teens. In that sense, this movie is an interesting subversion of that.
It’s true, isn’t it? The reality of who’s out there in their RVs… it’s mostly retired people because they have the time and income to do it. Americans are wonderful travellers, they love to pack up and move. They don’t think anything of driving six, seven, eight hours.
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Exactly. “Have Winnie, will go.” [Laughs]
Did it ever feel like a road trip to you, shooting this movie?
Oh, absolutely. We did travel while making the movie. We spent hours in that Winnebago. Hours! Travelling up and down roads, Donald turning it around. The brakes and gears were really bad, it wouldn’t go up hills at all. Going downhill was scary. It was quite a hair-raising experience.
‘The Leisure Seeker’ opens in Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal on March 16. It opens in Calgary, Edmonton, Ottawa and Waterloo on March 23, and Halifax, Winnipeg and Victoria on March 30.
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