Rachel Weisz has admitted she knew nothing about Greek scholar Hypatia, whom she portrays in Agora. The Mummy star told the Daily Mirror: “I must confess I’d never heard of Hypatia – I now know that she was heroine for the romantic poets in the 18th century, but I didn’t know anything about her.” But she said yes to the part because it “seemed too unusual, unique, wonderful and bold to say no to”. Rachel – who has three-year-old son Henry with her fiance, Oscar-winning director Darren Aronofsky – brought the family to Malta as she filmed Agora. “Henry wasn’t even in pre-school at that point, so he came with me,” she continued. “We rented a little apartment overlooking the sea and Darren worked on his film The Wrestler. We were a family and we went to work every morning. He went off to edit Mickey Rourke and I went off to battle religious intolerance in the fourth century.” She added: “Then we had dinner and put Henry to bed. It was kind of bonkers – but how dreamy!”

Source: The Press Association

Rachel Weisz didn’t know the back story to Agora. The British actress plays the lead character Hypatia in the film and admits the true-life tale of the female philosophy professor in 4th Century Egypt was not she was familiar with. She said: “The thing I couldn’t believe is that this is a true story. Everything that happens in the film is true – apart from her having the slave and the slave being in love with her, that’s a little Hollywood invention – but the fact that no has made a film about her is pretty extraordinary. “I’d never heard of her even. And she’s a remarkable, remarkable woman.” The 40-year-old star also thinks many people still continue to prejudice her for not being the kind of woman who wanted to settle down and have children. She told BBC News: “I think no would look at Leonardo Da Vinci and say, ‘Oh isn’t it sad that he didn’t have kids or a wife’ Everyone understands that he is busy. But when it comes to a woman – and I was the same I thought, ‘Ah, wouldn’t it be nice if she could be a mum and have a partner and get married’ – but I realised if it was man no one would really think that.”

Source: Contactmusic

Rachel Weisz will star as Jackie Kennedy in a biopic about the late first lady, reports Entertainment Weekly. Weisz’s partner Darren Aronofsky is directing the movie, titled Jackie, which centres on the four days between President Kennedy’s assassination and his burial in November 1963. Noah Oppenheim wrote the script, which is being pitched to the major Hollywood studios with Aronofsky, Weisz and producer Scott Franklin as part of the deal. Weisz previously worked with Aronofsky on science fiction love story The Fountain. Her latest film Agora opens in the UK on April 23.

Source: Digital Spy

Rachel Weisz leads an “ordinary life”. The Oscar-winning actress, who has three-year-old son Henry with director fiancee Darren Aronofsky, admits her home life is ordinary despite being in a showbiz relationship. She said: “Of course, it’s not ordinary to get dressed in frocks to walk down red carpets and travel all over the world and stay in five-star hotels. “I’m not working in a factory. But I drop Henry off at school, I pick him up. I try my hardest to keep everyone together. “I am interested in playing extra-ordinary women, but I have an ordinary life.” The 40-year-old Brit also admits she loves acting because there is always a new project for her to get involved in. She told Culture magazine: “That’s the great thing about acting. I can never imagine being satiated. It’s just like some math problem to figure out. I’m just getting started.”

Source: Contactmusic

Rachel Weisz has claimed that director Alejandro Amenabar rejected her idea to show the “deviancy” of her character in Agora. The Constant Gardner actress plays real-life fourth-century Egyptian philosopher Hypatia of Alexandria in the Spanish historical drama. Weisz told The Sunday Times: “There’s a style of acting that can come with period films where everybody just freezes up. “But they were drinking and f**king and doing maths or whatever else they were doing. They were just people.” She added: “I actually told Alejandro they should shoot a scene where she was looking at the stars and masturbating. “I suggested a PG version, where her hand just went out of frame, and you’re watching her come, looking at the stars. “He wouldn’t go for it. I begged him. I wanted to know about that stuff. What’s up? What’s her sexuality? Where’s her deviancy?”

Source: Digital Spy

In fact, they’re considering Weisz to play the head of Quantum, the secret organization responsible for all the bad guy activity in the last two films. More than just another Bond babe, she’d be the mastermind pulling the strings behind everything that’s happened in Daniel Craig’s Bond movies so far, and the architect of James Bond’s suffering.

Source: MovieWeb.com