London (CNN) — We’re in the middle of awards season, but the experience may not be as light-hearted or glamorous as viewers might think.
Emma Thompson has received two Academy Awards but revealed she felt “seriously ill” after the Oscars.
The British actress – who plays Miss Trunchbull in Netflix’s Matilda the Musical – responded in an interview with the Radio Times when asked if she found fame “difficult to deal with”.
In 1993 he won an Oscar for his leading role in the film Howard’s End, followed three years later by another for the screenplay of Sense and Sensibility.
The 63-year-old, who also stars in the Ang Lee-directed film, wrote the screenplay based on the classic Jane Austen novel.
The ‘Nanny McPhee’ star told the magazine: ‘Both times I had to do the Oscars I got really sick. I realized that the pressure and the looks were too much for me. It’s amazing, and then you want to lie down in a dark room. You think, “Please don’t ask me questions or make me talk about myself.”
She added: “I quickly developed a kind of allergy to this part of the job. I’m lucky, I think it must be awful when you play roles like James Bond.”
Thompson did not elaborate on his illness or the circumstances surrounding any of the events.
Emma Thompson attends a special screening of Roald Dahl’s Matilda The Musical at Darling in Park Lane Hotel on December 7, 2022 in New York City. (Photo by Dia Dipasupil/Getty Images)
A fuller interview was made available on the magazine’s Radio Times podcast, in which Thompson said fame is a “highly toxic condition,” but that being grounded helps.
He said he splits his time between his home in Scotland and one in north-west London.
“I’ve lived in a limited environment, in the sense that I’ve lived on the same street in London my whole life,” he told the podcast, adding, “You can’t just strut around in a Louis Vuitton cab… so. This helps.”
Last year, Thompson described how the collapse of her marriage to Kenneth Branagh in 1995 affected her mental health. It came after he found out Branagh was dating fellow Howard’s End actress Helena Bonham Carter.
“I was half alive. Any feeling of being a lovable or dignified person was completely gone,” she said.
In 2003, Thompson married Greg Wise, her Sense and Sensibility co-star. The couple share two children.