Rosario’s heist society
ROSARIO DAWSON was raised on the Lower East Side of New York — in the days when it was a tough neighbourhood — so when she saw a man flashing on the top deck of a London bus, she was not fazed.
‘I said: “Oi! Put it away!” and went downstairs and told the driver,’ the actress told me.
I was impressed she did that. Ditto that she rides ‘Boris bikes’ around London, uses the Tube, and walks from the flat she has owned in King’s Cross for several years into Camden Town.
She was very much at home when Danny Boyle cast her to play a Harley Street hypnotherapist in his gangster heist movie Trance, which opens next week. ‘Danny wanted an American; it didn’t matter what kind of an American,’ said Dawson, who stars in the film with James McAvoy and Vincent Cassel. ‘Everyone had to be from somewhere else, a fish out
of water. James is from Scotland, and Vincent’s from France.’
She explained that Boyle had originally wanted to film in New York, but the job of directing the Olympics opening ceremony intervened. Still, if it had shot in Manhattan, Rosario’s part would have been played by an English actress.
Her character, Elizabeth Lamb, is a femme fatale with feelings. She does partake in a fabulous nude scene — reminiscent of those famous nudes by the great masters — that is wholly justified because it provides a clue to the plot.
‘The whole film completely changes after that scene,’ she agreed. ‘Danny litters the film with visual clues.’
The painting at the centre of the film is Goya’s surreal Witches In The Air, and the artist had a thing about his nudes.
The actress and her director had a fling that has now ended. Rosario was out partying with him and the rest of the cast till four in the morning recently, so she’s not exactly in mourning.