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Loss, love for Macdonald, Cumberbatch in ‘The Child in Time’
By LYNN ELBER, AP Television Writer
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Kelly Macdon- ald looks every inch the star, in a stylish dress and perfect makeup and mani-
cure — which she proudly notes she did herself.
And yet, the Scottish-born actress
says with mock distress, she’s cast as the servant rather than leading lady in lms including “Gosford Park” and the upcom- ing “Holmes and Watson.”
at’s not always the case, witness “ e Child in Time,” based on Ian McEwan’s acclaimed 1987 novel about a toddler’s kidnapping and its a ermath. Macdonald and Benedict Cumberbatch star as the couple whose world is staggered by the loss.
Potential viewers shouldn’t be put o by the tragedy that propels the story, as heartbreaking as it is, Macdonald said of the drama airing 9 p.m. EDT Sunday on PBS’ “Masterpiece” (check local listings for times).
“ is isn’t about a missing child and nding that child in a procedural (crime story),” she said in an interview. “At at the end it’s about love. ... It’s nuanced and beautiful and upli ing.”
Nuanced applies as well to Macdonald’s body of work, whether as a bere parent in “Child,” a woman threatened by a hired killer in “No Country for Old Men,” a gangster’s wife in “Boardwalk Empire”
or, yes, even the naive maid she played in “Gosford Park.”
Acting was always her preoccupation.
“I used to dress up as Wonder Woman in my backyard in Glasgow in the ‘70s,” she recalled, smiling at the memory. “From day one, I wanted to watch lms
all the time and I would re-enact scenes from ‘Calamity Jane’ and ‘Singin’ in the Rain,’ which is weird because they’re musicals and I’m not a song-and-dance person.”
She made a quick career start with “Trainspotting” and kept going. She mar- vels that the temporary visa allowing her to work in America is the O-1B issued for people “with an extraordinary ability” in the arts, movie or TV industries, accord- ing to federal rules.
“Oh, so you’re exceptional?” a Los Angeles airport passport control agent said to Macdonald as he checked her documents earlier this year, the actress recalled.
“It’s just a bit of an ego boost when you come here and you’re ‘exceptional,’” she said, adding, “ ank you very much!”
She’s playing opposite another out- standing British actor in “ e Child in Time,” and found Cumberbatch “a dream to work with.”
“He’s so good, and I think we’re both quite generous actors,” she said. “I have worked with people where you give, and you don’t quite get back. ... Some people just know what they’re doing and do it regardless of your intonation.”
She and Cumberbatch take di erent approaches to acting — he’s intellectual, she’s more instinctive — but “it’s like we get each other,” Macdonald said.
Cumberbatch, whose company pro- duced the lm, returned the compliment earlier this year during a Q&A with TV critics. Macdonald is “astonishingly natu- ral and open and uid and just completely at ease with her cra ,” he said.
e stars acknowledge that the lm, in
part a time-shi ing meditation on child- hood lost and found, may seem daunting- ly painful.
But the “real story isn’t about the missing child. It’s about a real relationship and the breakdown of that relationship and the possible coming back together,” Macdonald said.
“ ere is hope,” said Cumberbatch. ___
Online: http://www.pbs.org
___
Lynn Elber can be reached at lelber@ ap.org and on Twitter at http://twitter. com/lynnelber.
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