Samantha Morton: 'I haven’t worked for a year since making The Odyssey'
Samantha Morton said she has been out of work "for a year" since making The Odyssey.
Samantha Morton has not "worked for a year" since making The Odyssey.
Despite having "really good agents" and a manager, the 49-year-old actress - who plays Circe in Sir Christopher Nolan's take on Homer's ancient Greek epic - blames her age for failing to land roles.
On the latest episode of Josh Horowitz's Happy, Sad, Confused podcast, Samantha said: "I haven’t worked for a year since making The Odyssey, you know, and I’ve got really good agents and a manager, but at the end of the day, I’m 49.
"I do believe I’m a good actor, there are other good actors out there. Do you know what I mean? So, the politics of the industry has changed massively."
Amid the lull in work, the Oscar nominee believes that she will keep working until her 80s.
Samantha said: "So what this means to me - first of all, regardless of carrying on working, which I feel confident that you know with the ups and the downs, I will keep working, till I'm in my 80s or whatever, touch wood."
However, the entertainer is thrilled to have finally worked with Christopher Nolan after years of hoping to collaborate with the director, having been eager to audition for his 2006 thriller, The Prestige.
Samantha said: "But it's more that for me, I got to work with Christopher Nolan in my lifetime. That's it. I'm happy now.
"I was happy before I've worked with some brilliant people, but you're always at the mercy as an actor of who your employer is and what they expect of you and what they believe in you to do for them.
"And without sounding corny, I genuinely cried when I got the call from my team saying, 'Christopher Nolan would like to meet you.'"
Samantha felt like she had been chosen for the Olympics when she was cast in The Odyssey, which also stars Matt Damon (Odysseus), Anne Hathaway (Penelope), Tom Holland (Telemachus), Zendaya (Athena), and Robert Pattinson (Antinous).
She explained to The Sunday Times' Culture magazine: "It feels like the Olympics. Chris is picking his squad, and after years of working I’ve finally been picked for a team.
"You have to be the best of the best to work for him - and you know me, I’ve been cracking on for years, but I wanted to audition for him for ages, and it was not happening.
"Even thinking about meeting him makes me want to cry. It validates that I must be good at what I do.”
Samantha was nominated for the Best Actress Oscar for In America in 2003 and Best Supporting Actress for 1999's Sweet and Lowdown, and won critical acclaim in Steven Spielberg's Minority Report, but she thinks she has hit her best now.
Samantha said: “It was a different time. Now my skills and ability have matured, and I feel like I am the best I’ve ever been.
"I don’t perhaps look the best I’ve ever looked - I’m a 49-year-old woman who has never had facials or anything like that. I try to go to a gym if time permits, but I have children, dogs, a mortgage - a real life.
"I’ve never entered that Hollywood world. I lived in Derbyshire for years and now live near Hastings.
"I just hope I get another job.”
Samantha has Esme, 26, with former partner Charlie Creed-Miles, and Edie, 18, and 12-year-old Theodore with partner Harry Holm.
