The star and co-producer of 'Funny Woman' talks about 1960s sexism, being a 'Bond girl', and the pitfalls of press interviews
The star and co-producer of 'Funny Woman' talks about 1960s sexism, being a 'Bond girl', and the pitfalls of press interviews“Divorce still has a sense of shame around it,” says Gemma Arterton. “People still have this” – she wrinkles her nose – “this attitude, don’t you think?”
“It’s mad, isn’t it, how we think of the 60s as quite recent, quite modern,” shrugs Arterton. “But in so many ways, it was also still quite old-fashioned. Homosexuality was still illegal, for example.” Homosexual acts between men aged over 21 were only decriminalised in England and Wales by the Sexual Offences Act of 1967, which also increased penalties for street acts. In Scotland, the law was not changed until 1980 and not until 1982 in Northern Ireland.
The era’s feminism inspired Arterton’s mother. “She was great in raising us in a way that never placed value on appearances. She never said stuff like, ‘Oh you look so pretty.’ It was NEVER about that for her, which allowed me to grow up as a very scruffy girl.” This meant that the young Arterton’s school acting roles saw her cast first as an ox in the infant school nativity and later as Ratty in a junior school production of. “I loved that role,” she sighs.
You can hardly blame a working-class kid from Kent for grabbing all the fame and money when it was offered. The feminism of the era was still driven by sassy ideas of “Girl Power” and ladette culture. But Arterton’s tastes were always more art house.
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