Saoirse Ronan savouring a summer reset
Fresh off the awards circuit and with two new films out, Irish actress needs a breather
Saoirse Ronan is taking a bit of a break.
On the heels of the success of the coming-of-age dramedy Lady Bird, which earned her a third Oscar nomination, the Irish star says she’s doing press for the new films On Chesil Beach and The
Seagull and then taking the summer off. “You have to reset after all of that,” Ronan said in a recent phone interview, referring to the whirlwind ride with
Lady Bird, which got five Academy Award nominations in total.
“It was brilliant — God, it was such an amazing time and it’s only just happened, so it’s still very fresh for people, which is great. And I love having people come up to me and tell me how much they loved it and why they loved it and what they were able to relate to in the film.
“But ... it’s like six months of chatting about one film, so you do need a break ... You go through these stages of being very, very boring and having nothing to talk about after you do a press junket like that, because you’ve been talking so much, and then you sort of reset and then you’re back to normal.
“So it’s definitely important for me to do that before I go back to work.”
Opening Friday in Toronto and the rest of Canada on June1, On Chesil Beach is a tragic romance directed by Dominic Cooke and based on the Booker Prize-short-listed novel by Ian McEwan, who also wrote the screenplay.
Ronan and Billy Howle star as newly- weds whose different backgrounds and poor communication skills result in a disastrous honeymoon in England in the summer of 1962. This is Ronan’s second time working with McEwan after 2007’s Atonement, which also earned her an Oscar nomination.
“He was a big part of me having such a special experience at such an early age, and so I had always stayed in touch with him and wanted to do something else together,” said the 24-year-old.
“Then when I was about16, I heard that they wanted to turn On Chesil Beach into a film and I wasn’t the right age.”
Luckily for her, it took a few years to develop.
“I was trying to find something that would be like a transitional role from children’s roles to more of a grown-up role, and that had always been something that I had had my eye on to serve that purpose,” Ronan said.
“As well as it just being a story that I loved and was heartbroken by, and it was written by someone that I knew personally. So it always seemed like it was the right thing to be involved in.”
Another project Ronan has been following for several years: the upcoming Mary Queen of Scots, which she signed on for at age 18.
“I really believed in telling her story,” she said. “It’s so fascinating what happened to her, and heartbreaking.”
That film is slated to open in the winter — after Ronan’s summertime reset.
“I’m just going to go on loads of holidays, go to loads of different beaches and get a bit of a suntan and eat loads of lovely food, and just travel basically and find the next thing to do,” she said.
“But it is lovely to have the time to do it and to be afforded the time to really pick what the right next thing should be and not feel rushed into it.”