Be vocal about climate change, actress Thompson urges
STOCKHOLM: From Sense and Sensibility to Love Actually and Nanny McPhee, British actress Emma Thompson is known for her roles in costume dramas, comedies and fantasy films.
But like fellow Oscar winner Leonardo DiCaprio, the 57-yearold is an avid environmental campaigner, seeking to raise awareness on issues such as fracking and climate change.
“I think that we’ve all got to shout as loudly as we can,” Thompson said. “Ordinary people need to know more. They need to inform themselves. You can’t just sit back and go ‘look, I recycle’.”
The actress was speaking in Sweden, where she is adding her voice to fellow activists’ criticism of Norway’s plans to open up more oil and gas explothe ration in Arctic.
“You can’t say you want to safeguard future generations and then drill for more of the stuff that has already put our planet in danger,” she said. “We already have.”
In 2014, Thompson, who said she joined Greenpeace in her youth, travelled to the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard.
“To see the ice that is sadly melting changed me actually on quite a molecular level. But also to see the grief of the scientists who have been visiting the place for 25 years and to stand on a glacier and to see... the marks of where it used to be is a terrible thing.”
Thompson said her next project was directing a film about the 1665 London plague. “What is interesting about it is that like so many plagues that affect the world it affected only the poor which is why we don’t know much about it”, she said, when asked what’s next for her.
“But on my 60th birthday I want to be putting up a Greenpeace banner.” Reuters