At a time when the word has come to be used quite loosely, Helen Mirren is a legend in the truest sense of the term. The septuagenarian screen luminary, widely acknowledged as one of the greatest actors of all time, was born Helen Lydia Mironoff and has had a massively successful five-decade-long career in theatre, film and television.
In a career peppered with statistics — she is the only performer to have achieved the Triple Crown of Acting in both the United States and the United Kingdom — Mirren may have won only one of the four Academy Awards she has been nominated for, but her dominance over her craft, and the fact that she’s a great ambassador of it, is of far more import.
But it doesn’t really hurt to look at the remarkable accolades that have come her way, and still do. The statuesque Mirren has received an Academy Award and a British Academy Film Award for her portrayal of Queen Elizabeth II in The Queen, a Tony Award and a Laurence Olivier Award for the same role in The Audience, three British Academy Television Awards for her performance as DCI Jane Tennison in Prime Suspect, and four Primetime Emmy Awards, including two, for Prime Suspect.
During Queen Elizabeth II’s 2003 birthday honours, Mirren was appointed a Dame (DBE) for her services to drama, with the investiture taking place at Buckingham Palace. In 2013, she received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and in 2014, she was awarded the BAFTA Fellowship for lifetime achievement from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts. Last year, she was announced as the recipient of the Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award. She has, for most of her career, been a firm advocate of women’s rights and has always been a great champion of her art.
Yet, when Mirren — fellow actor Andie MacDowell for company — let herself loose and broke into an impromptu jig on the red carpet of the Cannes Film Festival last week, striking in a a long-sleeved gown decorated with silver sequins and a metallic fringe with eye-catching eye make-up and sleek silver-coloured hair — she seemed to be just another woman having a great time. Dame Helen Mirren — who once famously said, “Your 40s are good. Your 50s are great. Your 60s are fab. And 70 is f*****g awesome”— is clearly having the time of her life at age 76.
And it’s her mantra of “growing up, not ageing” that Mirren chose to highlight in her conversation with The Telegraph, just moments before she walked on the Cannes red carpet. Mirren has been a brand ambassador for beauty brand L’Oréal Paris for a decade now, which — apart from her film duties — takes her to Cannes almost every year.
“When I first started with L’Oréal (Paris), I was amazed and impressed by the fact that they asked me to be their brand ambassador not when I was 25 or 35 or when I was 45... they asked me when I was 65! They understand the fact that the people who want to look great and feel confident are of all ages and of all genders. L’Oréal was one of the first beauty brands to embrace that idea, and they have taken that to the mainstream as well,” Mirren smiles, looking luminous even across a computer screen thousands of miles away.
Festival Favourite
For Mirren, being at Cannes is special, especially so in 2022 when the festival — widely acknowledged as one of the most prolific in world cinema — has made a glorious comeback after a muted pandemic-hit edition last year. “There are many great festivals in the world, but the Cannes Film Festival is probably the mothership of all festivals,” smiles Mirren. “Of course, Cannes has the beautiful red carpets and the gorgeous dresses and the celebration of film is fantastic. But it’s also there to remind audiences that to go to a movie is a great night-out. Over the last two years (of the pandemic), people from various walks of life — the restaurant business, the airline industry — really suffered because of Covid. And so did the movie industry. And so all of us are very excited to see Cannes back like this,” she adds. Mirren’s track record at Cannes, like everywhere else, is worthy of envy. She has won the Best Actress honour twice at the prestigious festival, the first in 1984 for Cal and then again in 1995 for The Madness of King George.
Cannes, of course, has her heart, but Mirren firmly believes that film festivals across the world are important for marketing a film, for film-makers to allow the world a first look at their movies, to advertise the fact that a film is a great source of entertainment, of succour for the mind. “I know there are some great film festivals in India, a country which I have never visited, incidentally. I am hoping to visit India this year, I am very keen to,” she says.
Female First
Mirren, over the decades, has been a great supporter of women in film. And putting her weight behind The Lights On Women Award, that L’Oréal Paris initiated last year to give a fillip to rising female talents in cinema, is the actor, who rues the fact that even now, there aren’t too many women on a film set. “I was on a film set last week... it’s 95 per cent men! The lighting department, the cinematography department, the digital department... there are so many different departments in film-making and that’s where I want to see women in the future,” she says.
Though she admits that Chloe Zhao (for Nomadland) and Jane Campion (for The Power of the Dog) winning the Academy Award for Best Directing in successive years has given a shot in the arm for women in film, Mirren is of the firm opinion that the ground reality is quite different. “Of course it’s a great advertisement, if you like. But the more nitty-gritty, the everyday aspect of getting women into film is different. When you look at Jane Campion, you realise, ‘Yes, it’s possible for a woman to make a film and win an Oscar and also win Best Film at Cannes’.” Mirren, however, is quite upbeat, believing that “things have changed enormously for women in the last five years”.
Romancing the camera
Ever since her breakout role in the 1980 film The Long Good Friday, Mirren has been an indelible part of Hollywood, even as she has juggled a prolific career in theatre and on TV on the side. Her serious acting parts aside, Mirren has showed us how much fun she can have on screen, starring in big-ticket action-oriented films like Fast and the Furious and Red. She has just wrapped up Shazam! Fury of the Gods — the latest outing of the popular DC superhero — in which she plays Hespera.
Even as we speak, Mirren’s insatiable passion for her craft is unmistakable. What is it about being in front of the camera that makes her get up and go to work with the same zeal and excitement every morning, we ask. “Part of it is the challenge that you never feel that you have done it quite right!” she laughs. It’s the diverse experience though, she confesses, that continues to keep her on her toes. “On a film set, every day is a different day. You aren’t repeating the same thing because every film is a different experience. You find yourself in very difficult environments every day.... At the same time, you are aware that you are putting something on film that will last forever. So when you are doing it, it’s a creative moment, but it’s also a moment that you can’t pin down... it’s inexplicable, the creation of art. It’s endlessly fascinating, it’s endlessly challenging and none of us really get it right,” she says.
Breaking the mould
Mirren — whether it’s through her stellar acts on camera or her consistent calling out of the powers that be in Hollywood — has always broken the mould, and very often, the glass ceiling. Has it all been organic or has at least some part of it been a feminist statement on Mirren’s part? “A combination of both,” she says before pausing and adding, “Some of it has to do with my upbringing. Growing up, we were two girls and one boy, and our parents absolutely encouraged us to be financially independent. For me, being financially independent is the most important thing for a woman. We didn’t come from a wealthy family at all, we were a poor family and the only way to become financially independent was to work. And my sister and I were very much encouraged to do that. That is not to get married and become secure, but to make our own money.”
So would she call herself a feminist, not by the definitions with which it’s now being increasingly diluted, but in the purist sort of way? “I think I have always naturally been a feminist, right from when I was very young. I had a very strong judgment of what was fair and I was also aware of what women were dealing with. When I was young, that really made me very angry. And hence, I was very passionate about it. I have certainly lived my life as a feminist,” she signs off.
Helen Mirren and fellow actor Andie Macdowell dance on the Cannes 2022 red carpet
Helen at the Cannes premiere of Mother And Son
A young Helen on stage in 1968
In The Queen that earned her an Academy Award for Best Actress
Rocking it as Maggie Frisby in the musical play Teeth ’n’ Smiles