Janet Suzman

Dame Janet Suzman (born 9 February 1939) is a South African-born British actress who had a successful early career in the Royal Shakespeare Company, later replaying many Shakespearean roles on television. In her first film, Nicholas and Alexandra (1971), her performance as Empress Alexandra Feodorovna earned her several honours, including a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actress. Quotes Any government would be really embarrassed to ban Shakespeare. The apartheid government was frightened of ridicule. Everyone is frightened of laughter. Say no moor: Dame Janet Suzman on why South Africa’s apartheid-era censors wouldn’t dare touch Othello Sage Journals (5 April 2016) Theatre is a white invention, a European invention, and white people go to it. It's in their DNA. It starts with Shakespeare. Dame Janet Suzman downplays 'white culture' theatre comments BBC (9 December 2014) Life and art get mixed up sometimes – it's what actors draw on. My sensitivity to prejudice is high because I was brought up in South Africa. My awareness of all this crap came earlier, and it's stayed with me, and it's why I'm militantly liberal. I remember being absolutely shocked in Australia at the absence of black people. The only times I saw black people were once in Adelaide and once at the other end of the continent, in both cases looking desperate on the street, sitting in huddles drinking beer. I realised what Australians had done to their indigenous population, to their other: they'd disappeared them. In South Africa we were criminal, beastly, vile and disgusting, but we didn't commit genocide. You can't envy something you can't be, can you? You sat and admired what was emerging. The whole purpose of an actor's life is to find great writing, and when it comes along you leap on it like a puppy on a slipper. You're avid – greedy – hungry – for great gobbets of good writing. That's all we live for. I stepped back from acting because I was bringing up a child. You can't do both. It's exactly at the moment that they want you most – at the end of the day when it's bathtime, storytime, bedtime – that's when you're walking out the door. I couldn't bear that brave little look as he said, 'Goodbye'. So I thought Josh is more important than a play. Nature has a way of dealing with your brain when you have a child – it turns it to porridge. You realise retrospectively mother nature has made you absolutely focused and cow-like. Then you realise your child is infinitely cleverer than you will ever be, and wittier and funnier, and you like being in its company and so you think, 'I haven't done a bad job, really. The Saturday interview: Janet Suzman The Guardian (20 August 2011) External links Category:Actresses from the United Kingdom Category:People from Johannesburg Category:1939 births Category:Women born in the 1930s Category:Living people