Cate Blanchett addresses ‘that silly comment’ about her sexual persuasion

CATE Blanchett is the latest celebrity victim to have been inaccurately “outed” because of a misquote. She’s told news.com.au what really happened.

The Academy Of Motion Picture Arts And Sciences Hosts An Official Academy Screening Of TRUTH

CATE Blanchett knows more than most that being misquoted is an occupational hazard for someone in the public eye.

Earlier this year she spoke with Variety about her relationships with women. Not included in the piece were Blanchett’s own quotes explaining that the relationships were not sexual.

The Oscar winner told news.com.au this week that the error affected her kids.

“Yes, that silly comment about my sexual persuasion. My sons go to an all-boys school. Although they didn’t mention it, I know the next day they were being ribbed because their mother was ‘gay’. That says far more about the body of students than it does about my children.

“We have quite sophisticated discussions about the way information is disseminated through social media and one wants to provide them a space where they can be their own people away from the noise of the 24-hour need to fill the world with so-called information. It gets beamed around and taken entirely out of context.”

In Los Angeles to promote her latest movie, Truth, she continued.

“People can see who I am and who my husband is, what we do, what we believe in and what we stand for. Our mistakes, our foibles and our f***-ups are represented because it gets disseminated through social media. And it’s annoying as an actor and as a human being,” she said.

“Thank God I’m not a politician.”

Cate Blanchett and husband Andrew Upton have been married 18 years and have four kids together, including a recently adopted daughter from the US.

Blanchett, 46, and her husband Andrew Upton, 49, recently expanded their brood and adopted a newborn girl from the US in March. Edith joins their three boys Dashiel, 13, Roman, 10 and Ignatius, 6.

How is it now that a girl is added into this testosterone-laden family?

“It’s a glory,” she beamed.

“What is extraordinary, because there is an age gap between my oldest son and Edith, is watching them become a unit. She has the most extraordinary brothers and I am enormously proud of them.”

Truth, in which she stars opposite Robert Redford, is based on producer Mary Mapes’ memoir about former news anchor Dan Rather’s reporting on a controversial 2004 story about then-president George W. Bush. The story included unreliable documentation used to support Bush’s avoiding the Vietnam War and ultimately led to Rather leaving CBS News, after working there for 43 years.

“You need a healthy freedom of the press but it’s a very different landscape to what it was in 2004. News is expected to make money and when there is a 24-hour news cycle, it’s a very big challenge,” she says.

From left, television journalist Dan Rather, director James Vanderbilt, actor Cate Blanchett and actor Robert Redford together for a Q&A about the film Truth. Picture: Evan Agostini/Invision

Blanchett embraced the opportunity to dress down in order to play Ms Mapes.

“It’s not a glamour role. I don’t seek those out but it’s also fun to play, like being in a Christmas pageant, you get to wear things that you wouldn’t ordinarily wear. There are a lot of people out there who have a very great love of aesthetics, as do I, so when you are working with Mr. Armani or Riccardo Tisci or Alexander Wang, it’s a great aesthetic conversation to be in.

I guess if those arenas didn’t exist I wouldn’t get the fun and the privilege of being in that pageant.”

Today in person, Blanchett is playing the glamour role. Dressed in head-to-toe Givenchy, in a dress not everyone could pull off, Blanchett looks stunning as usual. I note that it’s an impressive feat — managing to look picture-perfect while juggling a happy yet chaotic family life.

“I think your internal health, whether it’s mental or physical, has a big impact on your so-called beauty. The way I stay fit is to be on stage, actually. I keep saying I am going to have an exercise routine but it’s the first thing that gets jettisoned so I might have an exercise routine for four days,” she explains.

Cate Blanchett knows how to pull of a daring dress. Here she is on the red carpet for the industry screening of ‘Truth’ in California on October 5. Picture: Mario Anzuoni

“But my job is very physical and my children are very physical and I think if I were to have an office job then I would probably be like the rest of the people in Sydney, running at lunchtime. And yes, when I am not on stage, I feel compelled to do more physical activity because it’s also a way of de-stressing. And if I had my time over, and frankly if I had the talent, I would have loved to work with someone like [modern dancers] Pina Bausch or Martha Graham. I understand language when it’s in my body and when I am moving physically I think.”

Married to Upton for nearly 18 years, living in London and Sydney for the most part, does she think the pair would have survived had they relocated to Hollywood?

“I am sure that the incidence of divorce in Australia is just as high as it is in America,” she says.

“Although I remember one of the first times Andrew and I came to the States, we were driving across country and we came across this billboard that said 1-800-DIVORCE,” she laughs. “And we said: ‘let’s hope we never call that number’. We haven’t yet.”

Cate Blanchett looking stunning at a recent screening of The Truth in New York. Picture: Dimitrios Kambouris/Getty Images