The awards continue to rain down on Cate Blanchett, once again showcasing her immense talent. The actress, accustomed to juries and awards, is a polymorphic performer, capable of playing an elf princess, Bob Dylan, as well as a famous conductor, a role which earned her a second prize for interpretation at the Mostra de Venice.
At 53, the Australian actress received her second Volpi Cup on Saturday evening on the Lido for the best female interpretation as a character drunk on power in Tarby Todd Field.
Harassment and abuse of power on the menu of Tar
This tall blonde, with a diaphanous face, delivers a marmoreal performance in this drama that evokes questions about identity or “cancel culture”. She plays an ultra-famous conductor, in a relationship with a violinist from her orchestra, who will be caught up in her past. A role that takes a complex look at the denunciation of harassment or the abuse of power by women over their subordinates, and echoes the commitments of the artist.
Fifteen years before this role as an artist, she had already won the prize in Venice for I’m not There of Todd Haynes, where she embodied, crossing the frontier of the genre, another musician, Bob Dylan. These awards add to a well-filled hunting list for the actress that the general public has discovered in the role of Queen of England Elisabeth I (elizabeth then Elizabeth: The Golden Age).
A committed feminist
The two-time Oscar winner has shown that she can play anything, transforming from one role to another. And not hesitating to take risks: she was also Katharine Hepburn, in Airmanas the elf heroine Galadriel, in The Lord of the Rings by Peter Jackson. And she proved her comedic talent again most recently in the climate comedy Don’t look up!where she played a TV presenter insensitive to climate change.
Beyond her roles, Cate Blanchett is a committed activist for the feminist cause, who with #MeToo has become a figure in the fight against sexual harassment. Her activism, however, placed her on the front lines when she was president of the jury at Cannes in 2018, where she had protested against the under-representation of women in the charts, then in Venice in 2020. She was also part, with Natalie Portman or Meryl Streep, from the Hollywood collective that launched the “Time’s Up” foundation to help victims of sexual harassment.
A commitment that should not, however, be confused with its characters: “I do not see artistic practice as an educational tool,” she said in Venice. “I’m not interested in agit-prop,” she added, saying that the place of actresses in the film industry had improved significantly in recent years but continued to be hampered by the lack of strong leading roles.