I loved seeing Cate Blanchett at the Ocean’s 8 premiere last Wednesday. I love her style and her attitude – she is a goddess! I didn’t know all there was to know about her so I decided to look into her history this week. And wow! Does she have some serious acting chops! One of my favorite roles was the part she played in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.
Blanchett was born on 14 May 1969 in the Melbourne suburb of Ivanhoe. She is the middle of three children; her older brother is a computer systems engineer, and her younger sister is a theatrical designer. Her Australian mother, June (born Gamble), worked as a property developer and teacher, and her American father, Robert DeWitt Blanchett, Jr., a Texas native, was a United States Navy petty officer who later worked as an advertising executive.The two met when Blanchett’s father’s ship broke down in Melbourne. When Blanchett was 10, her father died of a heart attack, leaving her mother to raise the family on her own. Blanchett’s ancestry includes English, some Scottish, and remote French roots.
Blanchett has described herself as being “part extrovert, part wallflower” during childhood.
While in Egypt, Blanchett was asked to play an American cheerleader, as an extra in the Egyptian boxing movie, Kaboria; in need of money, she accepted. Upon her return to Australia, she moved to Sydney and enrolled in the National Institute of Dramatic Art (NIDA) to pursue an acting career. She graduated from NIDA in 1992 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts.
On Screen…
She has received international acclaim and many accolades for her work
two Academy Awards
three Golden Globe Awards
three BAFTA Awards
six AACTA Awards
three Screen Actors Guild Awards
Blanchett came to international attention for her role as Elizabeth I of England in Shekhar Kapur’s film Elizabeth (1998), for which she won the BAFTA Award for Best Actress, the Golden Globe Award, and earned her first Academy Award for Best Actress nomination.
Her portrayal of Katharine Hepburn in Martin Scorsese’s film The Aviator(2004) brought her critical acclaim and many accolades, including the Academy Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role, making her the only actor to win an Oscar for portraying another Oscar-winning actor.
In 2013, she starred in Woody Allen’s Blue Jasmine, for which she won many accolades, including the Academy Award for Best Actress.
Blanchett is one of only six actors, and the only actress, to receive Academy Award nominations for portraying the same role in two films, accomplished with her performance as Queen Elizabeth I.
She is additionally the only Australian to win two acting Oscars.
A seven-time Oscar nominee for:
Notes on a Scandal (2006)
Elizabeth: The Golden Age (2007)
I’m Not There (2007)
Carol (2015)
Her other notable films include The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999), Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy (2001–2003) and The Hobbit trilogy (2012–2014), Babel (2006), The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (2008), Robin Hood(2010), Cinderella (2015), and Thor: Ragnarok (2017).
And On Stage…
Cate is a four-time Helpmann Award winner for Best Female Actor in a Play. Her roles include:
Electra at the National Institute of Dramatic Art in 1992
Ophelia in Hamlet at the Belvoir St Theatre in Sydney in 1994
Susan in Plenty in the West End in 1999
Hedda Gabler with the Sydney Theatre Company in 2004
Blanche DuBois in A Streetcar Named Desire in Sydney, New York at the Brooklyn Academy of Music and Washington D.C. at the Kennedy Center in 2009
Yelena in Uncle Vanya in Sydney, Washington D.C. at the Kennedy Center and New York at Lincoln Center in 2011
Claire in The Maids in Sydney in 2013 and New York at Lincoln Center in 2014
Blanchett made her Broadway debut in 2017 with The Present, and received Tony Award, Drama Desk Award, and Drama League Award nominations for her performance in the play
From 2008 to 2013, she and her husband Andrew Upton were co-CEOs and artistic directors of the Sydney Theatre Company.
And she is FUNNY!
What is your favorite Cate Blanchett movie? What do you think her best performance was? I’d love to know – let’s talk about it onFacebook,Twitter, and Instagram.
