Tilda Swinton on ‘We Need to Talk About Kevin’ and Choosing Parts: “I don’t choose roles, I choose people”

Swinton talks about a number of topics, including her peculiar way of picking projects.

“That’s good use of an Oscar, it seems to me. It’s a really fair exchange,” says Tilda Swinton, speaking about how winning an Oscar allowed films like Julia and We Need To Talk About Kevin to get made and seen by audiences.

USA Today ran an interview with Swinton in which she spoke out about a number of topics, including her peculiar way of picking projects.

“I don’t choose roles, I choose people,” says the actress, “I generally make work that I’ve cooked up with some friends around the kitchen table, and so the people come first, and then the project generally comes second… and what I do in it comes third, a poor third.”

Swinton is a busy mother saying, “I’m an enthusiastic cook, and I have mouths to feed in my house so I need to cook.” It’s interesting that the film Kevin is about the absence of “maternal love.”  About her children Swinton says, “I remember noticing that I was really into them, that it was interesting to me and I was up for it. It could have gone the other way.”

The actress feels that her life is very busy, but says her favorite thing to do while taking a day off includes primarily, “Spending as much time as possible in bed. Mainly sleeping, I’m really big on sleep.”

Surprising perhaps is the fact that Swinton doesn’t allow a television in her house. She says she used to be an addict. Fourteen years free of television she says, “Now I wouldn’t know my way around a television if you threw it at me.”

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