Cut Blanchett!
Oscar-winning star slices head after mishap with CHAINSAW at her €4.5m country estate
A MAJOR Hollywood actress strikes her head with a chainsaw at her English mansion – it has all the makings of a real-life blood-soaked tragedy.
Fortunately for Cate Blanchett, and her fans, the double Oscar-winner won’t be featuring in the ‘in memoriam’ section at next year’s Academy Awards.
The 51-year-old Australian survived to tell the tale, saying casually that she suffered a ‘little nick’ to her head while using the chainsaw for some DIY at her estate in East Sussex, thought to be worth ¤4.5million, but avoided a serious injury.
‘I’m fine,’ she told former Australian prime minister Julia Gillard’s A Podcast Of One’s Own last week. ‘I had a bit of a chainsaw accident yesterday, which sounds very, very exciting, but it wasn’t. Apart from the little nick to my head, I’m fine.’
Ms Gillard responded: ‘Be very careful with that chainsaw. You’ve got a very famous head, I don’t
‘I want to keep it on my shoulders’
think people would like to see any nicks taken out of it.’
‘I want to keep it on my shoulders,’ replied the actress – who having played England’s Queen Elizabeth I in two films would be well used to ordering the occasional beheading.
Ms Blanchett, who won Oscars for The Aviator and Blue Jasmine, is married to Australian playwright Andrew Upton and they have four children: Dashiell, 18, Roman, 16, Ignatius, 12, and Edith, five, who they adopted in 2015.
She also revealed that she had taken the year off work so she could help her eldest son with his A-levels.
‘I took the year off ostensibly to be with him and support him through the exam period,’ she said.
‘And then all of this exam stuff evaporated [because of school closures due to the coronavirus pandemic] and I’m left with an 18-year-old who doesn’t really want to have anything to do with me! So it’s a little bit discombobulating, but it’s a high-class problem, we’re all well.’
Ms Blanchett revealed she was instead busy homeschooling her youngest child Edith, something she said is proving just as ‘challenging’.
She added: ‘I have a huge respect for the teaching profession. I always have. I hope out of this that teachers’ wages will be increased and their respect will be amplified by Covid-19.’
Despite having some time off, Ms Blanchett’s next project is the thriller film Nightmare
Alley, based on the book by William Lindsay Gresham.
Production on the film was halted in March due to the coronavirus pandemic.