Meryl Streep as Margaret Thatcher
06/01/2012 § Leave a Comment
The 62-year-old Oscar winner said she has only seen Thatcher once, when she watched her deliver a lecture, but was deeply affected.
Meryl said ‘I did not meet her. I did see her once at my daughter’s university in 2001/2002. We went to see her lecture and that made an indelible impression on me.’
The film’s director’s Phyllida Lloyd, who also directed Mamma Mia!, revealed in an interview with BBC’s World At One programme that she had tried to reach out to the Baroness’ family.
She said: ‘We did make contact with the family sometime ago to tell them what we were trying to do but they perhaps quite understandably have sort of stepped back from the whole thing.
‘They were the first people we invited to see the finished film. They didn’t take up our offer and I can quite understand them not wanting to see it in the public gaze so we are not actually sure whether they have seen it or not.’
The Iron Lady is largely based on an autobiography by Thatcher’s daughter Carol but it has been reported that she along with her brother Mark are ‘appalled’ about how the movie depicts the Prime Minister as suffering from dementia.
Streep and director Phyllida Lloyd have been criticised in some circles for taking on the project, considering the former prime minister is in frail health at the moment, with some describing it as ‘shameful’.
However, the actress believes that this would only be the case if a person considered debility and dementia to be shameful too.
MARGARET THATCHER DECORATING HER DAUGHTERS (CAROL) FLAT – 1984
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