DAY TRAGEDY
AS Gemma Arterton rode the crest of a wave in Hollywood after her role in Bond movie Quantum of Solace, it appeared life could not be sweeter.
Then tragedy struck. The actress’s beloved gran Helen Sarfas killed herself with a kitchen knife through the heart at 69 after a long and difficult battle with bipolar.
That was in 2010, and Gemma only now feels able to properly talk about it, after her most recent film brought up the emotions she had tried to hide.
The 32-year-old says: “My maternal grandmother had a huge effect on me. Still does. She was a remarkable woman.
“She was bipolar and committed suicide eight years ago after living a very tough, difficult life. Who she was had a deep effect on me and stayed with me and will continue to inspire me.”
Gemma is soon to be seen in The Escape, about a woman who feels trapped by family life.
It echoes the struggle of Helen, who had found it hard to cope with her domestic life. And Gemma felt she was with her on the shoot – particularly as it was filmed in Kent, near where she grew up and her gran lived.
She adds: “She had these dreams and hopes that were put on hold to raise five children whom she loved dearly but it wasn’t enough.
“Family life, domesticity suffocated her and she gave up a lot for them. I always felt very moved by that sacrifice, a sacrifice all too common for so many people, particularly so many women.
“She was with me on set. I felt her and I thought about her so much, especially shooting in Gravesend.
“Everything was so evocative and familiar, we even shot at my mum’s house, so the smells, the air was what I knew so well.”
It is 10 years since Gemma burst on to the scene as Strawberry Fields in 007’s Quantum of Solace. Fresh out of drama school, she was propelled into the limelight, enjoying subsequent roles opposite Jake Gyllenhaal (Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time), Justin Timberlake (Runner Runner) and Ben Affleck.
But alongside the blockbusters, Gemma also loves the smaller, independent films and co-wrote and produced The Escape. She plays Tara, a suburban mother and wife who seemingly has it all but is desperate for something more just for herself – so decides to run away.
Gemma says: “It’s a story with universal relatability. I think we’re all looking for an escape. My grandmother was artistic and wrote poems, some of them were published and no one in the family even knew.
“My mother would be on set with me and say, ‘You know this is your grandmother’s story.’ But it’s a universal story about a woman who’s fighting to breathe while being choked and escaping from her happy life.
“It’s a fragile subject and very personal to me. There’s so much of me in it, it
She was with me on set. I felt her and thought about her so much GEMMA ON HOW GRAN HELEN HELPED NEW ROLE
really came from inside me and then shooting in Gravesend, it’s like a mirror of what my life could have been had I never left maybe?”
Unlike the recent crop of public school luvvies, Gemma came from a solid working class background.
Her dad Barry was a welder, and mum Sally-Anne, a cleaner. The pair divorced in 1991 when she was five.
But she had performing in her blood, her great-gran was a violinist.
And after getting into Gravesend Grammar School for Girls, Gemma found her passion –making her debut in a school production of Alan Ayckbourn’s The Boy Who Fell into a Book.
She won a festival prize for the role and later got a scholarship for the Royal