Keira Knightley is currently promoting Boston Strangler, a film where she plays the real-life Record American reporter Loretta McLaughlin who first referred to the serial killer as “the Boston Strangler” in the 1960s. Keira in a historical drama/thriller? Yes, give it to me. Keira covers Harper’s Bazaar UK to promote the film and she acknowledges that it’s been a while since she’s been on a promotional tour or given an interview to a magazine. She has two daughters, an 8-year-old and a 4-year-old, and she’s still married to James Righton. A big chunk of this interview is Keira talking about how great James is and how he’s a hands-on father who relocates with Keira when she’s filming on location. Some highlights:
She lost her engagement ring on his Bazaar shoot. “I didn’t say anything to my husband when I got home. I’d already been onto the insurance, looked up cheap alternatives online. We were watching TV and I was desperately texting the team to see whether it had been found, and James was like, ‘Who are you texting?!’ I’d make a great spy.” Fortunately, it was found on the balcony and returned to her the next day. “I experienced loss, I came to terms with it, the ring came back. I am whole again.”
The husbands in her friend group are hands-on fathers: “The guys are super-active. Maybe that’s not normal. But [in my situation], it has to be a partnership. The heavy lifting of childcare has to be acknowledged. It’s hard work, it’s vital, it’s undervalued. And it’s so exhausting…. During filming, the hours are unpredictable and extreme. I worked out I needed three people to do what one full-time parent did. When you hear somebody say, ‘I’m just staying home with the kids’, that’s not a ‘just’. That’s a huge thing.”
She dislikes being asked about balance: “We’re constantly asking it, because what we actually want to know is, how are you doing it? Because I don’t feel like I’m doing it.”
Location shoot for ‘Boston Strangler’: “James is a really good traveller – that takes a lot of stress off the logistics. He’s fearless about exploring and doing all the research.” However, they were plunged back into the pandemic as the move coincided with a tidal wave of the Omicron variant. Filming was delayed by 10 days because the whole family caught Covid, and Righton ended up caring for Delilah throughout the production period (which doubled to four months), as group activities were cancelled. “My husband became a full-time dad. I felt a lot of guilt because I had suddenly put my very sociable two-year-old into a situation where she was basically in lockdown the entire time. It was amazingly bad timing. We were foiled by the plague.”
Playing a female journalist: “Women in public spaces – it’s a constant problem. From the everyday office situation, where your voice isn’t being heard, to the most extreme aspect, femicide. The film told an interesting story that covered the whole spectrum.”
Playing Elizabeth Swann in Pirates of the Caribbean. “She was the object of everybody’s lust. Not that she doesn’t have a lot of fight in her. But it was interesting coming from being really tomboyish to getting projected as quite the opposite. I felt very constrained. I felt very stuck. So the roles afterwards were about trying to break out of that.” She considers the period between 2003 and 2008 “a very tricky five-year window… she felt “quite powerless”. “I didn’t have a sense of how to articulate it. It very much felt like I was caged in a thing I didn’t understand.”
Burnout in her 20s: “I was incredibly hard on myself. I was never good enough. I was utterly single-minded. I was so ambitious. I was so driven. I was always trying to get better and better and improve, which is an exhausting way to live your life. Exhausting. I am in awe of my 22-year-old self, because I’d like a bit more of her back. And it’s only by not being like that any longer that I realise how extraordinary it was. But it does have a cost.” What is that cost? “Burnout.” Knightley took two years out from working after being diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. “There was never an ounce of me that wasn’t going to find a way through.”
I remember reading her interviews from her dogsh-t 20s and realizing how overwhelmed and miserable she was during that time. It was like a weight was lifted from her shoulders when she turned 30 and became a mother – it was almost like she was thinking “oh, I don’t have to be the It Girl/ingenue anymore, YAY!” Her husband sounds like a real one, super-supportive of her career and like a really good father. I love that she expected that from him.
Cover & IG courtesy of Harper’s Bazaar UK. Other photos credit Getty
Love Keira, she always seems genuine and grounded and her interviews are always good because she actually seems to think about things lmao. Bonus that her face is just stunning.
It’s crazy how undervalued parenting is, and how much effort. No idea how people with kids have jobs too, looks beyond exhausting.
I will admit that she irritated me when she first came on the scene but she’s grown on me and I like her – she’s a good actress who picks interesting roles. Her husband is such a keeper.
I feel the same way – I found her irritating when she first came on the scene, but she has depth and is talented and I think she’s so interesting now. I like to hear what she has to say and seeing her in films is like seeing an old friend.
I like what she has to say here, including her comments about her supportive husband. She’s a bit younger than me, but I find that most of the fathers in our social group are very involved in their childrens’ lives, and several of us moms are the primary breadwinners with a growing number of SAHDs.
I think it’s a growing trend with Xennials and Zs.
Her comments about striving in your 20s just to burn out and take more time to focus on Relationships in your 30s could have been written about me.
I liked that part as well. Most fathers I know are very involved and supportive. It’s interesting to see how each family has its own dynamic and how responsibilities are divided, but almost across the board its not “husband earns money and does yard work while wife stays home and cleans and cooks.” the SAHMs I know are super involved with volunteering at school and coaching sports teams etc so even then the dad is doing more of the typical “female” responsibilities. I know so many families where the husband does the grocery shopping (my husband just left for the store, lol.)
I know one family where there is a very traditional divide in responsibilities , and the husband is actually really lazy so even then….the wife is the one who does the cooking, cleaning, yard work (usually while he sits there with a beer and watches her while he smokes a cigar) etc. We used to be very good friends with this couple and we are not anymore and honestly that is one of the reasons why. I said to my husband countless times, “how does he not realize that he’s the only husband in the neighborhood who does nothing around the house or with the kids??” (and no the wife is not okay with the arrangement.)
I def carry more of the emotional/mental labor than my husband, but in terms of who does what around the house and who runs the kids to sports or whatever….its pretty even and besides the one husband noted above, that’s the norm in my circle.
I watched The Boston Strangler. She was excellent in it (as was Carrie Coon who plays Jean).
I thought the overall story was a little disjointed but loved the focus on women journalists who didn’t want to write about how to take care of the home.
She has brilliant amounts of empathy. I’d love to have 3 people—we do it with 2 since I’m also blessed with a helpful husband—and I’m glad she understands.
KN does sound empathetic and sincere in her comments. I am happy extremely happy that she and her husband work together with raising the children and he is very hands on.
Our kids are grown, in their 30’s, but my husband was very hands on as well. We equally worked extremely hard and I had a solid support with him. There were times that he had to pick up the kids when I couldn’t and vise versa. Now that they are all grown, I have looked back and even though most of my friends didn’t have that type of marriage. They did all of the heavy lifting as I had a husband that cooked, cleaned, did laundry and the school/activities runs as well!! I was a very fortunate boomer!!
Is she saying she got PTSD from being a rich famous movie star?
(I work in the humanitarian field, specifically mass atrocities, so a bit startled to hear that severe injury mentioned in this context).
The article says she was diagnosed. So presumably she had a constellation of diagnosable symptoms.
Since you meet people with PTSD, I’m sure you’re aware that it has behavioral and psychological manifestations, and doesn’t just mean someone whose super stressed (which is how people use it colloquially). Whatever the circumstances are that led to getting PTSD and then diagnosis (who knows, could have been SA of some kind), I think its unethical to suggest that she couldn’t have experienced anything that gave her PTSD. Frankly, I thought we were done with line of thinking after the umpteenth rich/famous person killed themselves.
Working in the humanitarian field doesn’t make you an expert on PTSD. Or who you think is “allowed” to have it
At ang. Yeah, these actors just have to find an illness but I believe her. She speaks about trying to be the IT girl. Well her and her team was trying to make her the it girl but she never really was. So picture all the stress and cost that comes along with that. She didn’t grow up with money and her parents wanted to be actors. I can see all that creating trauma and an eating disorder.
@Ang, quite often, prior trauma, particularly childhood trauma, manifests itself as extreme workaholism, perfectionism, and people pleasing that is so significant it leads to physical, mental, and emotional collapse and can sometimes become a trauma all it’s own. Burnout is no joke and can be deadly.
I got ptsd symptoms from working in construction (extreme pressure for a long time in unsafe environments) and again from being a mom with very young kids and a traveling husband. Pretty sure sure she didn’t pick her reaction to stress any more than I did.
I guess I can’t see what profound dangers a huge movie actor would face, that would cause an operational stress injury (as opposed to a soldier or anyone like you whose job exposes them to extreme danger). But some commenters were correct to note that the source of her PTSD is not stated. I misread it as related to her career.
You may see PTSD that comes from a
an unexpected, one time trauma, but surely you realize that long term stress can have the same effects? She was 16 when Bend it Like Beckham came out and 17 when filming Pirates of the Caribbean, where she was playing an adult lead opposite adult men. I remember at the time thinking it was crazy how young she was.
Mental illness doesn’t discriminate based on someone’s job or financial status. It can happen to anyone.
Yes obviously. someone who is stressed out because their illustrious career is skyrocketing her to fame and wealth may have severe even debilitating anxiety, depression etc. but I wondered at Post Traumatic stress Disorder. Seemed like a huge reach to me.
@Ang I would defer to the medical professional who diagnosed her then.
Also yikes.
She often talked about when she was at the height of her fame, the paparazzi were vicious with her, trying to get her to have an accident or cause an accident to sell papers, she had several stalkers and the media was filthy about her weight accusing her of causing people’s deaths, I think going through that when you’re barely 20 must be excruciating.
PTSD is defined as a response to “an overwhelming experience from which escape is not possible.” Yes, of course one can have a trauma response to a job and career, particularly if there is a prolonged period during which they see no way out. There are probably earlier childhood experiences and possibly even a genetic component that predispose one to developing PTSD, as well. (Three days ago a paper was published, titled “Four PTSD Blood Biomarkers Identified,” which seems to suggest that “low resilience” is part of a larger biomechanical process affecting serotonin and cognition.)
The one big movie star stressor I have heard about that I find valid is that you have so many peoples’ jobs on the line based on your performance and your selling the movie and your like-ability etc…
That would give me a nervous breakdown.
Her quote about needing 3 people to replace a full time mom made me smile. I remember when I was pregnant with my third and lining up my husband, mother and mother in law to watch my two kids for my 5 day C-section hospital stay. My hairdresser told me it takes 3 people to do my job. I enjoyed every minute of my time in the hospital. I was able to read an entire book.
The more I hear about the experiences of people who have children, the more confident I am in my decision not to have them.
You should be!! Kids take everything you’ve got and then some, ESPECIALLY in late capitalism where no one has a village/benefits/balance.
I’ve sacrificed so much to have kids and I’m pretty zen about it but if I were trying to hold onto anything about my pre-kids life, including my career, I would be a basket case. No one who is even slightly wary of having kids should have them. The world doesn’t need more kids.
@ sean I’m going to make a joke. I want to point out I don’t have children.
Your thinking is why humanity has became weak. Thoughtful and superior people aren’t having kids. If you read the news there are hundreds of stories of people being stupid. If you walk outside you see hundreds of weak gene people. Lol.
Eugenics has entered the chat. Gross.
LOL What?!
I see you lol’ing but fail to see the funny part of your “joke.”
@Cams is the type of person who’ll be happy to know that Google is creating their own super-babies when their employees meet, marry and have children together. The world’s future lies in their hands!
Between those super babies and the superior people who choose not to have kids, Homo sapiens will be ripe for extinction, but at least they’ll be smart! Survival of the fittest at its finest…
My daughter is 38 and decided long ago she didn’t want children and we have been very supportive of her. She was wise to make that decision and to stick to it. I am thankful that people are seeing how hard it is to raise children and are making decisions based on whether or not to have children. They are adults and making the decision for themselves, as opposed as to what is expected of them, is a decision that I fully support. There are so many people that have been pressured into having children that they don’t want and it’s the children that suffer.
Exactly @BothSidesNow.
While I’m a romantic and believe in love, I’m also a cynic who firmly believes most couples are only together and procreate because of perceived societal expectations. I believe this leads people to bear children before they’re truly ready for those responsibilities or when they shouldn’t have had children at all.
When you add in the added pressure women feel to have kids because of their “biological clock”. Yeah, I believe many have kids for the wrong reasons.
Keeping a marriage in balance due to the woman’s career is a tough nut to crack. I’m glad he’s supportive. It’s rare. It’s also amazing how open she is about it. She always seems to frame things just the right way in interviews, she’s articulate in a very modern way. I gobble up her interviews (via Kaiser of course).
Thank you, Keira, for acknowledging how hard parenting is. It is exhausting no matter how much you love your child. I’m so lucky to have such a hands on partner with our daughter. We really balance each other out (and are still exhausted lol).
Same with me . I actually wasn’t too fond of Keira in the beginning, and she seemed to be too negative. To the point where sometimes I feel she wasn’t appreciative of how she got her success(ie Pirates movies) . I mean, without that success she probably wouldn’t even have a longevity of her job. It was too much of a whiner for me. But she’s definitely more mature now.
Agreed, I would imagine the PTSD was related to the transition to massive levels of exposure and the corresponding security threats. I would be so overwhelmed, I don’t understand how celebrities manage that type of attention.
She might have experienced PTSD from the level of SA and the like rife in the film industry – especially against teenagers/young women. She was very young when she auditioned for/filmed POTC.
I’ve always admired Keira. I have always found her performances to be authentic, empathetic. What a lovely, honest interview.