Renée zellweger

THE JUDY STAR ON HER TRANSFORMATION

Did you ever have doubts about channelling Judy?

I actually didn’t really ever let myself think about it that way. It was more of a curiosity about the possibility. We just kept trying things, and never stopped.

You started working on the singing and speaking voices a year ahead...

Yeah, because she had so many different presentations of her public self, and I’m sure that was affected by where she was in her life at that moment – if she was under the influence, or if it was fatigue, or what was happening in her personal life. That was one of the more important aspects of this experience, for me: to contextualise some of those circumstances that led to great public humiliation and criticism. And to maybe shine a light on her magnificence, in being able to overcome those things and deliver.

Was learning to speak like Judy different from learning to sing like her?

A different language. We had so many different references. And then there was what we assumed to be the private mother voice. And then, of course, the familiar on-stage, very vibrant performance voice. And in terms of the songs, there’s a history of different training, experiences and her stylistic influences of the time, and their physical vocabulary. So it’s a lot of information compartmentalised into different sub-categories to explore.

Is it hard to keep all of that information in your head?

I had a wonderful dialect coach. Brett Tyne was there every day to point her pen at me and say, “Not that! Do this!” And she would reference the different chat shows… “This is ’63! This isn’t ’67!” And there were a lot of exercises, and just work, to understand the style of singing, which was pretty uniquely [Judy’s]. I could just think about: “OK, if I look at it from that perspective, I can just do the work.”

How did it feel when you first saw yourself in full hair and make-up?

It came together pretty slowly. At first, it was this wonderful make-up artist who just did shading and a black wig that could have been [anyone’s]. We started with that, and thought, “OK, here’s what will be necessary. We need to build this, and add that...” And then it was subtracting, because Rupert [Goold, director] was adamant that it’d not be distracting, and that it be authentic. And I’m really glad that that was what he wanted to do, ultimately, because it felt right.

How ‘Method’ were you in terms of the voice and the physicality? Did you drop it when the cameras stopped?

[the character of Judy] It kind of spilled over. You do it subconsciously. It sort of becomes a habit, and you use the words, and you use the inflections. I had to remind myself to stand straight. I don’t know that I’m proper Method, like I’ve become this person in my private life. But I tried to focus on what we’re trying to achieve, and to not deviate from that until we’ve done it. MM