Sugary and sweet
Keira Knightley takes a break from serious dramas to play it silly as the Sugar Plum Fairy in The Nutcracker And The Four Realms.
IN The Nutcracker And The Four Realms, you might giggle when you first hear Keira Knightley’s supersqueaky voice – and that is the point, says the British actress.
The 33-year-old plays the iconic Sugar Plum Fairy in this adaptation of the classic ballet with the famous score by Tchaikovsky.
But because the character in the ballet is mute, she had to invent a voice for her and she came up with one that is deliberately silly.
After doing one serious drama after another, Knightley says she was in the mood for something frothy. She made her name in period dramas such as Pride & Prejudice (2005), Atonement (2007) and The Imitation Game (2014).
“I’d just finished playing a psychotic maniac in a (2015) stage production of the play Therese Raquin when I said ‘yes’ to this. I wanted something that was the opposite.”
Hence, the Sugar Plum Fairy’s ridiculously “sugary and sweet” tones.
“I just made it up, really. It was a chance to be very silly. A lot of the work I do is quite serious and it’s quite subtle. And this was, like, ‘We’ll banish subtlety and be really, really silly.’ And I think I achieved that,” she says with a grin.
“I tried out the voice on a couple of six- and seven-year-olds and they laughed – and that’s the target audience.
“It’s a piece of lovely magic where you get to run around (looking) like cakes. I have never played a fairy before. How cool.”
The film is based on The Nutcracker, a 19th-century short story and ballet about a child discovering a magical kingdom where she battles an evil Mouse King.
As a girl, Knightley had seen the ballet several times at Christmas, which is when it is traditionally performed.
“The first time, when I was three, I was completely terrified of the mice and hid under the seat.
“The second time, I didn’t really like the Sugar Plum Fairy and it was all about the Mouse King. My mum got me a sword so I could be him. And I saw it again when I was nine and loved all of it.”
But she believes her own child – Edie, her three-year-old daughter with husband, 35-year-old English musician James Righton – is too young to watch this or any Nutcracker story.
“It deals with dreams and so there are those nightmare elements. I think she’s too young. Those mice would absolutely terrify her.”
Knightley also has strong opinions on the kind of fairy tales Edie should not be exposed to.
For instance, the girl is not allowed to watch animated films such as Cinderella (1950) and The Little Mermaid (1989) because the
actress believes the heroines give up too much of themselves for men.
“I think what we marinate our children in is very important and there are certain messages that I’m not sure I want her to take home, like ‘Wait for a rich man to
rescue you.’ No, rescue yourself.
“And it is not all right that a stranger kisses you when you’re asleep,” she says with a laugh.
Her daughter does get to watch animated films such as Frozen (2013), Inside Out (2015) and Moana (2016), though.
Moana “is absolutely brilliant – the heroine is kicka** and saves the world,” Knightley says.
“We watch a lot of Frozen because (of the) sisterhood, and Inside Out, which is my absolute favourite because it’s about a girl dealing with her emotions and it’s so cerebral.
“So we do have a lot of those, just not the ones where it’s the girl waiting to be rescued. Not allowed.”
Yet her daughter resists some of her progressive ideas.
“There’s so much pink in the house. I tried to get it out of the house,” Knightley says ruefully.
“With all of this, she is completely rebelling already. We have to play princesses a lot. I’m like, ‘But princesses who rescue other people, right?’
“And ‘Why don’t you want to be the queen? Queens are in charge.’ And she’s, like, ‘No, I want to be the princess!’ ”
The Nutcracker And The Four Realms is currently showing at GSC cinemas nationwide.