Secret behind Helena Bonham Carter’s Harry Potter wardrobe and why she ‘hated playing ingenues’

Helena Bonham Carter reveals why she hated playing ingenue roles, and what she really thinks about the Harry Potter reboot.

Helena Bonham Carter has always been the proud owner of a wardrobe that is a veritable magpie’s nest of tartan, taffeta and tulle.

More than a collection of clothes — rack after rack of gothic Vivienne Westwood gowns, punk rock garb and whimsical Alannah Hill frocks (which she picked up while shooting Till Human Voices Wake Us in Melbourne 20 years ago) – it is also a time capsule of her impressive four-decade screen career.

“I have a lot of costume,” she tells Stellar. “I keep some and also I provide some too, actually.”

To play Margaret in the new romantic film Four Letters of Love, Bonham Carter reached into her bountiful collection of aprons and shoes. “I love comfort,” she says.

Helena Bonham Carter reflects on her Hollywood career and fashion choices in a new interview with Stellar. Picture: AFP

‘The shoe is crucial!’ Picture: Getty Images

“As I grow older, definitely, the shoe is crucial. They should be flat and lace ups.

“And the apron is also a great thing. Even the half apron can make you feel sort of armoured. I feel like an apron gives you a bit of a solidity – to keep the tum in, quite frankly.”

It wasn’t just the clothing that offered security for Bonham Carter on Four Letters of Love. A “master chatter,” co-star Gabriel Byrne kept Bonham Carter endlessly entertained and gave her a confidence boost with his seal of approval for her Irish brogue. “Everyone was Irish, and we were in Ireland so it was like: spot the odd one out,” she says with a laugh of being the lone English woman on set.

“At the beginning, I felt totally self-conscious, but Gabriel pretty quickly said: ‘Oh, you’re one of us.’ So that was a complete thrill, to be told, ‘You’re Irish.’ I have always felt very at home in that accent, and maybe there’s a previous life [element to it]. It’s so warm. It’s like coming home.”

Adapted from Niall William’s novel, Four Letters of Love is about the forces that conspire to keep two soulmates apart. Gifted the book in the 1990s by her mum, Bonham Carter says that as a self-described “hopeless romantic”, the story resonated with her.

One of her iconic red-carpet looks. Picture: Getty Images

‘I have been criticised …’ Helena Bonham Carter at the BAFTAs in 2018. Picture: AFP

“I do feel like things are fated,” she says of the concept of true love. “Or that there’s an instinct, or there’s a consciousness, or … a fabric of life – if we listen to our intuition, which a lot of people don’t.

“I don’t think there’s necessarily a predestined ‘one’ person for someone. You can have different someones for different times of your life.”

As Margaret, Bonham Carter goes to extreme lengths to sabotage her daughter’s romance. In real life, she wouldn’t dare interfere in her teenage daughter Nell’s relationship.

“Luckily, she’s got a great boyfriend, and they’re very happy,” Bonham Carter says of her youngest child with ex-husband director Tim Burton. (The couple also share a son, Billy.) “And I couldn’t have chosen a better one [for her]. So, no. She’s very herself. She’s very independent and always has been.”

The same could be said for Bonham Carter, who has never conformed to Hollywood’s idea of red-carpet glamour.

“I just wear what I want,” she reasons. “Sure, I have been criticised, but it doesn’t matter, does it? It’s like, whatever. If you’ve got the chance to dress up, that’s so fun. A lot of us don’t have the occasions to dress up and wear stuff. I have got a phenomenal amount of clothes. I like dressing up, and I like putting clothes together.”

Listen to a new episode of the Stellar podcast, Something To Talk About, below:

Pictured in 2013 at the Golden Globes, Helena Bonham Carte and Tim Burton. Picture: Getty Images

Bonham Carter is proud to watch Nell follow her lead and smiles as she explains, “It is really fun to see her take pleasure in clothes, and the transformative effect of clothes and how it can change your mood and just work on your imagination.”

It was Bonham Carter’s imagination that breathed manic life into Bellatrix Lestrange in the Harry Potter films. “When I got it, there wasn’t much of [her there] in the original writing. I definitely came up with a look,” she says, adding that the costume design department did plenty of heavy lifting.

“The whole childlike element to Bellatrix was definitely me.”

Mildly perplexed why the franchise needs to be rebooted (a TV series due to air in 2027 began filming last week), Bonham Carter admits that she is nonetheless intrigued to see what a new actress – yet to be cast – will bring to the role of Bellatrix.

“So whoever takes it, they can have as much fun as me,” she says. “But I presume it will go off in a different direction, which will be fun to watch.”

A tartan moment in 2010. Picture: Getty Images

Listen to a new episode of the Stellar podcast, Something To Talk About, below:

Bellatrix aside, Bonham Carter – who will turn 60 next May – argues that her best roles are still ahead.

“I’ve always been interested in character parts and parts that are further away from myself. So in a way, this is my era, I feel. I was extremely uncomfortable playing younger ingenues,” explains the actor, whose first major screen role was, indeed, as a young woman in love in the 1985 Merchant-Ivory film classic A Room With A View.

“I felt those were kind of boring. It’s more fun playing the supporting character parts.”

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Bonham Carter is drawn to slightly unhinged characters, from Fight Club’s Marla Singer to the Red Queen in Burton’s remake of Alice in Wonderland. Even Cinderella’s Fairy Godmother was memorably madcap in her hands.

Bonham Carter puts this down to a desire to better understand the extremes of human behaviour. “My mum was a psychotherapist, who deals with people’s pathology,” she says. “And basically, I do the same. I’m drawn to pathology and I like sick people, because part of the fun of it is, how? How did they end up being this sick, you know?

“And the interesting thing is, there’s a reason why they’re bonkers. The important thing is not to alienate the sick. We’re all human.”

Four Letters Of Love opens July 24 in cinemas. Read the full interview inside the new issue of Stellar, out today.

For more from Stellar and the podcast Something To Talk About, click here.

Originally published as Secret behind Helena Bonham Carter’s Harry Potter wardrobe and why she ‘hated playing ingenues’