Samantha Morton Exclusive Interview

14 July 2008

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You are currently backing the Vodafone Group Foundation’s World of Difference Campaign what is it all about and how did you get involved?

Basically it’s a competition where we pick four winners who would like to take a year out of their live to go and work for a charity, they could do anything they could be in IT, media, fashion no matter how bizarre, as long as they are passionate about a charity, a UK registered charity. Those selected will get their wages paid, up to £25,000 a year, and up to £20,000 expenses for that year. But it very important that people know that they have to get the support of that charity first, so you can’t just go oh I’m going to get in touch with the Vodafone Foundation because I want to go and work for a charity, people need to find something that they are passionate about, get in touch with the charity and say ‘Can you use my skills? and ‘can I help you in any way?’ and more often than not they are going to say yes. The reason why I got involved was because it touched a personal note for me because a while ago I was reading the newspaper and I read about a woman who was a driving instructor and she decided, she had been in care herself, and she was looking for a charity for children in care and found that there wasn’t so set one up her own flat, literally in her bedroom. So she set this charity up an she has now been awarded an OBE, she has offices in Manchester and London and she is someone who has made a world of difference to people’s lives and it’s courage like that I just found incredibly enlightening and exciting.

I phoned the charity up and said ‘can I help and be part of it?’ she was like ‘absolutely’ because it was something that was close to my heart so when I heard about this I was really excited that there was a foundation such as this giving this kind of money away and opportunities. And obviously the charities will gain a lot from this but the individuals themselves it’s a life changing opportunity.

And you spent a day with your favourite charity National Voice what did you get up to?

Well it’s interesting that you say favourite because I have quite a few charities that I am affiliated with, and it’s tough when you have to pick one to go and work with for a day, but I worked with them because they are the smaller charity and they really need more money, more membership.

So what they had me do was just like any other volunteer would do which was helping to fold up black bin bags because they have a campaign at the moment called This Is Not A Suitcase and basically kids in care, and there are over sixty thousand children in care, and they might move on average ten times a years, that might be from foster places or children’s homes, and we found that 99.9% of kids that moved home the social workers or the foster parents would put all their stuff in a black bag and they would move somewhere else, and the message that that sends the kids and makes them feel is awful.

So I spent the day helping them with their campaign handing out bin bags with a sticker on it saying This Is Not A Suitcase and people learning that this is how people are treated, I did that first of all, then they asked me about their application form if I thought it was eye catching and I just thought ‘ Oh my god I wish I was a designer’ so I could say no this is wrong, that is wrong, this is what is eye catching, you might be brilliant in your heart at setting up a charity but you might not be good at business or design and these smaller charities people to go and work with them with all their different skills.

So many famous and well known people do back charities how important do you think that it?

It’s a trick one it’s a two tiered cake if you will because on one angle it’s very exciting for a charity when they get a famous face who will support it, give quotes and all the rest of it. But for someone like myself, when I started working for charities, I found it frustrating that I could help more I didn’t want to just be a smiley face on picture I wanted to understand more about the charity and actually do as much hands on wok as I could do for example Save the Children send me off to Timor to work in refuge camps, real grass roots stuff, the on the other hand with friends of mine I might be doing a gig trying to get bands to perform and raise money that way, or a fashion show or whatever raises serious amounts of money for charity.

That aspect is fine but some celebrities seem to be endorsing lots and lots of different charities and somewhere along the line the public get a bit cynical about it you get so and so, I’m not going to name any names, who are UN Goodwill Ambassadors and they open their mouths and you are like you do not have a clue what you are talking about, you don’t care and it isn’t something personal to you so you have to be very careful what you get involved with and why.

You are best known as an actress who has moved between big budget movies such as Minority Report and smaller projects like Control in a career that has spanned a decade how now do you choose your roles and how has it changed throughout you career?

I don’t think it has changed at all it’s always down to if I liked the script, an interesting part and interesting director, someone I could get along with, it might be that I can’t do some jobs because of the travel and the country that it’s in and I think ‘I can’t take my family there right now’ so it’s always been the same the integrity of the script.

What was it about the Longford script that drew you to the part of Myra Hindley, which is a very controversial subject?

I initially said no to that because had personal issues with playing such a character but then they approached me again and I looked at the bigger picture and I thought ‘hold on a second if I am an artist, a true artist, art should raise questions and make people think’.

And this film wasn’t about Myra Hindley as you correctly say it was about Longford, he was an incredible man, a very interesting human being and very inspirational.

The film was about him and about the change in policy should life mean life? And all these questions about the judicial system that I find fascinating so in a way in order for it to ring true having an actress on board was, I suppose, better do you know what I mean? Than having the prosthetics and trying to do an Myra Hindley impression because it certainly wasn't about that it was about the greater issue.

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