From the Archive: Cate Blanchett on growing her own food, multiculturalism, and a disastrous Christmas dinner

Ruthie's Table 4

Cate Blanchett joins Ruthie at the River Cafe to reflect on her recent run in Thomas Ostermeyer's The Seagull at the Barbican Theatre and the ensemble energy of working with a company she describes as family. The

Key takeaways

• Cate Blanchett says she performed The Seagull at the Barbican Theatre for six weeks under Thomas Ostermeyer, whose ensemble approach differed from her previous loose Chekhov collaborations.
• Blanchett recalls working with Tom Burke on Soderbergh's Black Bag before the production and says she misses the people most after touring.

Main topics

• The Seagull and ensemble theatre
• Arts access, culture, and activism

Notable quotes

The thing I miss most is the people.

Conclusion

The episode offers a warm, reflective portrait of Cate Blanchett as an artist,

Transcript preview

Speaker 2 (0:00) This is an iHeart Podcast. Speaker 1 (0:02) Guaranteed human. Speaker 2 (0:08) People always ask me who my dream guest would be on Ruthie's Table 4. Cate Blanchett has always been top of that list, an actor, director, and a vocal activist for values and ideas close to my heart. A few weeks ago, Greta Gerwig and Noah Baumbach took me to see Cate in Thomas Ostermeyer's radical new version of The Seagull at the Barbican Theatre after a stunning performance. We all went for a small supper next door, talking about Chekhov, her roll in tar, and the serpentine party that she's co-hosting this summer. And as always, family. Kate lives with purpose in the countryside in East Sussex, keeping bees, growing vegetables in her garden, cooking and eating seasonally. Here we are at the River Cafe on the beautiful first day of summer. The sun is shining, the chefs are cooking, and the garden is flowering. Kate and I are going to talk about our shared love of food, artists, children, and a lot more. A dream come true, indeed. Speaker 1 (1:13) Aw. Thank you. I'm Speaker 2 (1:15) glad I got out of bed this morning. So I'm Speaker 1 (1:17) glad you did too. You're right, a little piece of sunshine has just come onto the table. That Speaker 2 (1:23) was such an incredible night. How do you feel post-sequel? What does it feel like? You did it for how many weeks? Speaker 1 (1:30) It was so short. We were at the Barbican, so it was six weeks. Speaker 2 (1:34) And Speaker 1 (1:34) I mean, I've known Thomas Ostemeyer for years and years and years. You know, he's running the Schaubühner and my husband and I were running the Sydney Theatre Company. So our paths continually crisscrossed. But we never actually worked together. And I think the thing, maybe it's a little bit like a dinner party. When you do Chekhov, it's all about the ensemble and the... the alchemy that happens or doesn't between the actors. And I've always done Chekhov with a loose ensemble of actors, whereas Thomas was assembling all of us. A few people had worked together before. I'd worked with Tom Burke on Soderbergh's Black Bag relatively recently before the production started. But a lot of us didn't know one another. And he was able to bring us all together. all from totally, wildly different approaches. And the thing I miss most is the people. I love them all so much. Speaker 2 (2:26) People here are like Speaker 1 (2:27) my family. We work Speaker 2 (2:30) together, we go out, we celebrate, or sometimes we also just work. Speaker 1 (2:35) But Speaker 2 (2:36) it's a very strong attachment when you're working. together and creating something. Here it's every day. In a way, they're parallels. The curtain goes up at 12.30 and the curtain goes up with you at 7.30, don't you think? There's an anticipation. You're very dependent on each other. Speaker 1 (2:54) And Speaker 2 (2:54) also, I think Speaker 1 (2:55) you're part of something that, and this is what maybe the patrons don't realize, what an audience doesn't realize, is that whatever happens in the kitchen will be totally influenced by the people who come through that. through your front door. And so the evening is a thing, you know what's on the menu, but you don't know how it's going to unfold. You don't know what people are going to order. And so it's fresh every time. And I, you know, being quite shy, I mean, I don't know if you are, but you get to know people by doing something together. Collaborating, being together. But Speaker 2 (3:29) we see actors on stage singing or the incredible gift that is given to us as an audience to be able to have that. And Britain has always been known for that. Exactly. Do you feel that this is something that is threatened now, that the priority of culture in this country is being lessened? There was a time when there was money for the arts. There was money for building a theatre. And I know that you are an activist. I know that you're engaged in political... life and what are Speaker 1 (4:02) you feeling about right now in terms of... Well, I mean, people talk about activism, you know, that it's political, but I think it's engaging in things that have been politicized. And it always is strange to me when we talk about the arts, this word elite is used. And if you think about an elite sports person... That term means that they have spent many, many years perfecting their ability, that they are at the top of their game. And that when we talk about the arts, yes, they are elite in the sense that those people who put those shows on are exceptional at what they do. It's not for an elite. I think the elite these days are the people who don't pay tax. And if they did pay tax, then all of these wonderful offerings, cultural offerings that Churchill said, what are we fighting for if we're not fighting for culture and the access to it, is that then they would be more accessible to people. And so there's this, I think it's a linguistic language division that's often created between people and culture. Speaker 2 (5:10) And Speaker 1 (5:11) I think that you... I mean, that's the joy of touring a play is that you will tour to a regional area, you'll do it in a major city, you'll do it in one country, in another country. And I think the reaction that people have in various different locations will feed the work and hopefully those people will be fed by the work. The first time I went to, you know, a gallery and saw, you know, a major work of portraiture, it changed the way, you know, at my little state primary school, the way I thought about the world. And dance does that. Music does that. But we're told that it's only for a certain set of people. And I think that's because access is not afforded them. Speaker 2 (5:53) Tell me about the early days of being in your family. Did you have sisters and brothers? Speaker 1 (5:58) Yes, I have an older brother and a younger sister. And my father was from Texas. Where were you Speaker 2 (6:04) born? Speaker 1 (6:05) I was born in Melbourne in Australia. Yeah, we were going to move to the States really early on and they decided, I think for our education, that they wanted us to be in Australia. So we stayed there. How did Speaker 2 (6:19) he come from Texas to Australia? Yeah, he was the Speaker 1 (6:24) child of two alcoholic... And so he grew up, I think, killing birds in a park. And it would never happen now. But, you know, a gentleman saw him and took him off the streets and educated him and put him through high school. And the minute he could, he wanted to get out. So he lied about his age, joined the Navy, and he went to the Antarctic. And I think he decided to become a Unitarian minister. And my mother, who was at Teachers College in Melbourne, his ship broke down leaving the Antarctic, so they had to dock in Melbourne. And there was a teacher's dance, and they didn't have enough men, so they went down to the port. And then my father came and my mother, and he danced all night. And then he left three weeks later, and they corresponded for two years. And then he decided to come out. It was quite old-fashioned. It was a little bit like this wonderful Patrick White novel called Voss, where there's an explorer. And I can't remember what she did. I think she might have also been a teacher. They fell in love but didn't consummate it or declaim it to one another. And then they corresponded through letters, and that's sort of what my mother and father did. And then they decided that he'd come out and they'd get married. That's Speaker 2 (7:47) a story of adventure and chance and Speaker 1 (7:51) pursuing Speaker 2 (7:52) an idea. Or two lonely people who found one another. And the idea of the harbor and meeting and the dancing all night. Speaker 1 (8:01) We celebrated Halloween and Thanksgiving. So I grew up with pumpkin pie and pecan pie and Speaker 2 (8:08) ribs. Speaker 1 (8:08) So did he make them or did he Speaker 2 (8:09) teach your mom how to make them? Both. Speaker 1 (8:13) Yeah, we grew up with quite a lot of American black-eyed peas, Speaker 2 (8:16) all Speaker 1 (8:17) of those things. Did you ever Speaker 2 (8:19) go back to Texas? Yeah, Speaker 1 (8:21) sadly. He died when he was 40, and we had planned a trip back to Texas. And he died in January, and we were going in May. And so we made the trip anyway and went and met his sort of diaspora of his family. Speaker 2 (8:39) And so growing up, there was a sense of the American influence. There was Australian influence as well. Yeah, my Speaker 1 (8:45) grandmother was, I think, Speaker 2 (8:46) a Scottish. And you said your grandmother Speaker 1 (8:47) lived with you? Yeah, she did. She lived with you and Speaker 2 (8:50) made the sandwiches? Made the sandwiches. Speaker 1 (8:52) I think she