Crown actor sheds regal airs

When Claire Foy was cast in the TV series The Crown, portraying a young Queen Elizabeth, she realised she would forever be linked to the role.

But the 34-year-old English actor has shed all traces of regal demeanour in her two new films.

In The Girl in the Spider’s Web, an extension of Stieg Larsson’s Millennium trilogy, Foy becomes the third actor to portray ferocious Swedish goth vigilante Lisbeth Salander. In

First Man, she changes gears to play Janet Armstrong, the wife of American astronaut and moon walker Neil Armstrong, played by Ryan Gosling.

Foy has been on her own rocket ride since wrapping her second season of The Crown in late 2017 and handing over the tiara to Olivia Colman because producers planned to skip a decade in the monarch’s reign.

The youngest of three children, Foy was born in Stockport, near Manchester, and grew up in Buckinghamshire. She enjoyed drama in her early years but by the time she was 11 she was gravitating more towards sports. At 13, however, she was diagnosed with juvenile arthritis and could no longer participate in athletic activities.

Five years later, a tumour was discovered behind her eye, but it was benign and treated successfully with surgery and steroids.

After training at the Oxford School of Drama, Foy made her professional debut at the Royal National Theatre in London. A steady string of credits followed, including the 2008 BBC miniseries Little Dorrit, her movie debut opposite Nicolas Cage in Season of the Witch in 2011, and the 2015 miniseries Wolf Hall, which earned her a Bafta nomination.

She insists her new film roles are not part of any strategic plan. ‘‘If you actively try to do something because it’s the opposite of something else, you are going to make a terrible mistake.’’

First Man focuses on Armstrong in the 10 years leading up to the historic 1969 Apollo 11 flight and moonwalk, exploring the triumphs and sacrifices made by Armstrong, the other astronauts, and their families.

Janet and Neil Armstrong’s two sons, Rick and Mark, shared details about their parents that ran the gamut from what cereal they ate for breakfast to how she tucked them in at night.

‘‘They were incredibly generous, sharing so much of their mum with me,’’ Foy says.

Throughout her career, Foy has played deeply complex characters but she bristles at the suggestion they can all be labelled ‘‘strong women’’.

‘‘I have absolutely no interest in portraying what other people think of as strong. It’s a way of making women more acceptable in a male world, and I am just not on board with that,’’ she says. ‘‘I don’t think women are crying out to see strong women; I think we know we are all strong but we’re just crying out to see women on screen at all.’’

In her role in The Girl in the Spider’s Web, Foy trades her buttermilk complexion for a body adorned with tattoos and also sports a jagged, super-short haircut. ‘‘I felt very strongly that I didn’t want to just say she has a mohawk and loads of tattoos and the job’s done. I wanted to go back and understand why she has those things and why she wants to create a veneer of unapproachability so I could make sense of it.’’

Foy is naturally funny and self-deprecating but she sheepishly admits the trappings of fame aren’t all bad.

When Foy attended the 2017 Golden Globes as a nominee for the Best Actress in a TV Drama award, she was overcome with excitement.

‘‘I try to remember that everyone goes to the toilet, but at award shows everyone really does go to the toilet, and when you come back, suddenly you are sitting next to Stevie Wonder. Your heart is pounding but you just casually say ‘Hello Stevie’ because it’s too normal for it to be weird.’’ Given her current bigscreen takeover, Foy may have to start regarding such situations as her new normal.

– Sydney Morning Herald

I think we know we are all strong but we’re just crying out to see women on screen at all.

First Man is in cinemas now. The Girl in the Spider’s Web is out on November 8.