Kristin Scott Thomas and Gary Oldman in “Slow Horses” still keep people entertained.
“We’ve worked together before. We have great acting chemistry and it’s really fun. These two characters are so beautifully written. You can’t beat a great script,” she told Variety at the Monte Carlo Television Festival, where she won the Crystal Nymph Award for her career.
The show also has fans in high places.
“Apparently, everyone at MI6 and MI5 loves this movie. They really love watching it! We’ve never seen people like this. We’ve never seen the inside of these spy facilities.”
Her character, Diana Taverner, is “the ultimate ice queen,” she says.
“I mean, I have my ideas, but we’ll never know what she’s like when she’s not working. She’s so ambitious and so dedicated to it that she’s kind of become a symbol of the security of the British Isles. She’s kind of an iron lady. Not a hair out of place, perfect lipstick.”
“She takes it to the extreme, so you have to think of it as something else. It’s really… perfect. The clothes she’s wearing are amazing. The clothes create this shape, and this shape means power. She’s thinking, ‘You want perfection? I’ll make it perfect. I’ll show you what it really means.'”
Taverner, like everyone around her, is “struggling with her own humanity.”
“They’re rambling, they make mistakes, and they’re human, so they have their own egos. Diana and Jackson Lamb (played by Oldman) balance each other out. He’s raunchy, she’s perfect,” she laughs.
“Despite themselves, they form a very good team together.”
After “Slow Horses,” fans’ approach to her changed.
“When you’re doing a TV show, you’re in someone’s living room being watched on their phone. They press a button, so they can control when you show up. When you do a movie, they promise they’ll come to you,” she says.
“Now people think they know me because I’m in their living room. It’s a much more personal connection. I’ve really noticed that.”
“In the theater, people are really friendly and open. Then when they come up to you, they see you on stage and really appreciate your work. In the movies, they’re a little in awe because you’re so big. But on TV, the image can be the size of a cell phone. So all of a sudden they’re more powerful than you.”
“If someone comes up to me on the street and says, ‘I love Slow Horses,’ I feel like they have a right to tell you that because they invited you into their home.”
With the next season already around the corner, what’s next for Taverner?
“I want to see her laugh,” Scott Thomas says.
“That means laughing appropriately. Laugh instead of laughing at someone. I want to see her sing something or hum something. I want to see her happy. I don’t see her happy very often. I see her happy, I see her smiling, I see her relieved, but I don’t actually see her happy. I don’t see her relaxed.”
Furthermore, she adds: “The last thing I want to do is get into another elevator, because I don’t like the lighting in the elevator.”
She hopes to share more scenes with Oldman.
“I would like to have more involvement with Gary, because I think the scenes between Jackson and Diana or River and Diana are often more about problems for Diana than Diana just solving them. We don’t get to spend time together.”
But while Taverner remains the ice queen, Scott Thomas is “much more relaxed” these days.
“That comes with growing up. I’m not shy anymore. I don’t have time to be shy.”
Later, at a press conference at the festival, she admitted: “Sometimes people in my life criticize me for being scary. And then I think, ‘What are you talking about? I’m not scared at all.'” I can’t help being scared because I’m scared. Then I saw “Slow Horses.” oh my god. ”
“I just saw how this woman looked at people, and I thought, ‘Oh, I get it now.'” Now, in my life, I’ve been very careful to laugh a lot. It’s intentional. I think it changed my way of life. ”
