Rachel Weisz: ‘I never thought I would get married. It was not an ambition of mine’

Billy Bush at The Late Show with Stephen Colbert

I love Rachel Weisz. She’s one of my “forevers.” I always imagine that she and Daniel Craig are just constantly in bed together, because… let me just have that image of them. But of course the reality is that Rachel is a pretty well-rounded person. She’s in a book club, she cooks Sunday dinners, she goes to see plays and she lives a pretty quiet existence in New York as Mrs. Daniel Craig. Rachel was profiled in the current issue of ES Magazine (the Evening Standard’s weekly), and here are some highlights from her interview:

While she’s a New Yorker, her heart is still in Britain. She swiftly extols the virtues of the NHS (‘Of course it’s flawed and overstretched and there are immense problems, but it does actually work’), Radio 4 (’I can’t cook without it on, I just freeze up’) and Stormzy (‘I think he’s brilliant. My godson introduced me to him a couple of years ago’).

Whether she’d move back to the UK after her son went away to school. ‘Yeah, I’d probably go back to the UK. I’m sort of half here and half there anyway. And my last four films have all been made there.’

Whether marriage has changed her: ‘I don’t know how to answer that. I mean, I wear a ring all the time. I wear my ring with pride. I’m taken.’

Whether marriage is institutional. ‘You don’t join the institution like it’s the Rotary Club. You make it your own. It’s very personal, it’s very private. I don’t think mine’s particularly exceptional apart from that we’re both in the public eye. But I never thought I would get married. It was not an ambition of mine. It was the opposite. I couldn’t relate to romantic comedies — marriage seems to be the whole point of them. Then it just happened, happily, at a more mature moment.’

She started modeling as a teenager:
‘I wanted to be very independent, I was trying to earn my own money and, at the time, it seemed quite glamorous, like it would give me access to power or something. But you have to be very disciplined — successful models work very, very hard. I was not a good model.’

Her life in New York. She is in a book club with other mothers at Henry’s school. ‘And I see a lot of plays, a lot of films, a lot of friends. I cook Sunday lunches, have people over with their kids. People reading this in England will go: “Yeah and?”, so can you please explain the difference?’ she requests. ‘It’s much more formal here. People arrange to meet in a restaurant. There’s less of that thing of just putting a chicken in the oven and the kids running around, and it being a bit more messy and informal.’

She knew about Harvey Weinstein long ago:
‘My friend Sophie Dix [the British actress who is one of Harvey Weinstein’s accusers] has been talking about this since the 1990s. [Weinstein allegedly assaulted her in a hotel room at The Savoy when she was 22]. She would tell anyone who would listen her story, for the last 20 years. And no one seemed to care,’ Weisz says.

Why Weinstein was brought down: ‘I think his power was on the wane,’ she shrugs. ‘Same with Bill O’Reilly, same with Charlie Rose [two prominent television news anchors accused of sexual misconduct]. It’s about economics — they weren’t turning over the big bucks any more. That’s not an optimistic thing to say, but this is all about power and money.’ She isn’t without optimism entirely though. ‘Let’s hope there’s some real structural change to come out of this. That women who don’t have huge platforms on Twitter, who are nurses or office workers, feel that they can talk to their bosses if this is happening to them.’

[From The Evening Standard]

“But I never thought I would get married. It was not an ambition of mine.” I guess that’s why she and Darren Aronofsky were together for all of those years without ever marrying. I thought that was always more on him, that he was commitment-phobic. But maybe she was too. And then Daniel Craig reentered her life and suddenly she was ready for marriage? Sure. I would be too, girl. Everybody’s ambivalent about marriage when they’re waking up to Darren Aronofsky. Then one day you wake up next to Daniel Craig and you’re like “MARRY ME.”

Sadly, I think she’s right about why so many high-profile men were brought down – they were downed because they had already lost power and influence.

Embed from Getty Images

Photos courtesy of ES Magazine, Getty.

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25 Responses to “Rachel Weisz: ‘I never thought I would get married. It was not an ambition of mine’”

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  1. Léna says:

    Genuine question – does not marrying someone makes you commitment – phobic ? She had a child with him, isn’t it the biggest commitment you can have with someone ?
    I mean, I don’t care about marrying but I would love being in a long relationship with someone (not now, but in a few years I guess).

    • Nicole (the Cdn One) says:

      Agree. Makes no sense.

      My “husband” and I have been happily together for 25 years with no wedding. We make commitments to each other every day, some large and some small.

      For some, a wedding is an important ritual and it means something to them as a couple. To others (me included), marriage is a contract and you can have a written contract (a wedding and signing of the register) or an oral one, whatever is more meaningful to you.

      I’ve always loved the expression “you fall in love by chance, but you stay in love by choice.” Whether you have a wedding or don’t, you make the choice every day to love your partner and that is the definition of commitment.

    • Vanessa says:

      I think this is quite an American idea, that a partnership without a legal marriage is somehow less. If you are in a committed, permanent relationship, you’re married.

  2. crazydaisy says:

    I love her, too. xx

  3. minx says:

    lol at waking up next to Darren Aronofsky vs. waking up next to Daniel Craig.

    • Kata says:

      I mean, Darren seems to be a dick, but appearance wise, they’re not that far apart?

      • HH says:

        Agreed. But Darren does have hipster douche vibes. UGH.

      • CairinaCat says:

        Seriously? Daniel looked like a man, Darren looks like a boy who lives in his moms basement

      • Millenial says:

        I think Darren was cuter when we was younger (Rachel days) but anymore… meh.

      • perplexed says:

        I think it’s his personality that might be a problem, not his looks. Then again, personality influences how he we see looks. Some people claim it doesn’t, but I think it does.

  4. Kata says:

    “It’s about economics — they weren’t turning over the big bucks any more. That’s not an optimistic thing to say, but this is all about power and money.” – Exactly.

    Finally, FINALLY someone said it. In Hollywood everything is about money. It’s quite annoying how everyone is patting themselves on the back, and wearing black and white roses when most of them knew, and most of them did nothing. And most of them would still do nothing if these monsters were bringing in money ( and I’m not talking about actresses as much as producers, directors etc.).

    But it’s not just Hollywood. Virtually everything in the world revolves around money, no matter how much we like to pretend it doesn’t.

  5. Mia4s says:

    “ Then it just happened, happily, at a more mature moment.“

    Whoa! There are a few young celebrities who should take this to heart. Would save them a lot of trouble. And money.

    Yeah she’s not wrong about why Weinstein became vulnerable. That said we are (so far) rid of Brett Ratner and Bryan Singer, both of whom were still very powerful. We will see. 😒

    • Jayna says:

      She lived with Aronofsky for ten years. She wasn’t single. They had a child together, a life together. They owned their home together. He had to buy her out after her affair and splitting up. She wasn’t a single person in her 40s who suddenly found the right person and decided to marry. She was a woman who had an affair, left her partner, who had to divide a decade worth of life she shared with a man, work out custody issues, et cetera. And let’s not pretend her son wasn’t confused. One day living with mom and daddy, and only six months later mom is marrying another man. I simply adore Rachel Weisz. But it is what it is. That’s life, messy and complicated.

      Many people like Susan Sarandon, Goldie Hawn, even Angelina Jolie were together with their partners for a decade or decades. Goldie still is. It was like a marriage, though. Life was lived no differently.

      So she had a passionate affair while with Darren, her partner, and moved on to Craig. And they were in love, right person and time in their lives, and wanted to marry, when a marriage ceremony wasn’t important to her before. They seem like a great couple. But in all other ways she had been in a committed relationship, home, child, partner.

      • perplexed says:

        I vaguely remember her saying that not no one ever asked her to marry her and that’s why she wasn’t married. I wasn’t sure if she was trying to be evasive or not give a clear answer (not that she has to), but I assumed maybe Darren didn’t ask and she accepted the situation as is.

        Nonetheless, yes, I’d say she was in a committed relationship prior to being with Craig.

      • Jayna says:

        @Perplexed, she was engaged to Darren for years. I have no idea why they didn’t marry. But, apparently, from this interview, before Daniel, being married wasn’t important to her, so I guess that was the reason.

        These are comments attributed to her about Darren, though, one year before working with Daniel Craig.

        “We are engaged, and Darren and I are completely committed to “until death do us part,” although we haven’t made it official with the paperwork yet. It’s not for any political reason or that we’re waiting for this or for that, but maybe one day we will have an official ceremony.”

        And Daniel Craig was engaged to his long-time girlfriend when he had the affair with Rachel. They both dumped their live-in partners to be together. It was messy. But I love Daniel and Rachel together. They seem like a happy couple.

  6. Lizzie says:

    i take a picture of her to the salon every single time i go.

  7. @BitingPanda says:

    WHAT is that cover shot? Did someone let Terry Richardson have a job again? Is this a mug shot? Is she drunk? I have so many questions.

    • Myhairisfullofsecrets says:

      That’s too funny! She does look like she is severely hungover and showed up late to the shoot and had no time for makeup before they started shooting. Very Carrie in SATC’s 40 and Fabulous? cover shoot.

  8. Tiffany says:

    I have always felt that she kept Darren at arms length because she did not return to The Mummy franchise. I remember the interview where she talked about it and she was, not happy about that decision at all. Even the interviewer made a comment about how the environment changed when they were discussing it.

  9. Cali says:

    God I love this woman – in the movies, at least. I don’t really keep up with her off-screen, but she’s mesmerizing. And also happens to be in of my all time FAVORITE movies, Constant Gardener.

    • Jayna says:

      I love her on screen and off screen. She comes from an interesting background and her interviews are always more than fluff, like so many interviews with actresses, unfortunately, can be with the same old questions asked.

  10. Carol Hill says:

    My husband and I were together for 23 years before we married. We married for practical reasons (pension, health care, soc.sec., etc.). I was also not interested in marriage as an institution. We went to so many weddings and everyone was always asking why we wern’t married. Well, most of those marriages failed. We, the not married, were committed to our relationship. We have been married 12 years now. I did not change. I didn’t feel great being married. It did not change my commitment to my relationship. I wear a ring and love my husband. It made practical matters very easy.

  11. Sasha says:

    She seems sensible and down to earth. Also, she’s just bloody gorgeous. One of those faces that combines classic ‘pretty’ with ‘beautiful’.

  12. Jayna says:

    Rache Weisz is so spectacularly stunning, but I have never seen a worse cover photo of her. I didn’t even realize it was her at first.