“I started, by Hollywood standards, quite late,” Naomi Watts began this morning when quizzed on whether the treatment of older women in Hollywood has improved during a press conference at the San Sebastián Film Festival. The British-Aussie actor is at the Spanish festival to receive an honorary Donostia Award for career achievement.
“I launched with Mulholland Drive, and I was 30 or 31,” Watts continued. “And I was told that I better get my skates on because it all finishes at the age of 40, but here we are today. I’m in my late 50s now.”
Watts continued to praise the improvements in the Hollywood industry that have prolonged women’s careers.
“Look at the Emmys just last week, there were a number of women in strong categories over 50, so that’s heartening to see,” she said. “I do think things have changed. Women are consumers of film and TV. Their stories should be reflected. Everybody needs to see their story reflected in storytelling, so that narrative had to be shifted, and I’m grateful to be a small part of that shift.”
Here in San Sebastian, Watts is also joined by her Housewife cast and director, Ben Shirinian. The film will screen this evening at the festival following Watts’ Donostia Award presentation.
Set in 1964, The Housewife follows Hermine (Watts) and her hardworking husband Russel (Luke Evans), who enjoy a seemingly normal life in New York City — until the fateful day Hermine meets The New York Times journalist Joseph Lelyveld (Tye Sheridan). Following a tip from a Holocaust survivor, Joseph is investigating the possibility that Russel might be a Nazi in hiding. As his inquiry deepens — and his exchanges with Hermine become increasingly intimate — Joseph discovers a series of revelations far stranger and more complicated than he could have imagined.
Watts described the role as a challenging “mind twister.”
“The storyline was compelling. It is based on true events, and so it really drew me in,” she said.
Elsewhere during the press conference, Watts was asked whether she had any professional goals or directors that she’d still like to work with. She responded: “Paul Thomas Anderson is someone I’ve wanted to work with for a long time.”
Anderson debuts his next feature, a concert filmed at Carnegie Hall with Geese frontman Cameron Winter, next month at the New York Film Festival. A24 will release that film in cinemas.
San Sebastián runs until September 26.
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