By Jane Oddy
How does a Catherine become great? In the case of Catherine II, Empress of Russia, with ambition, audacity, shrewdness and strength.
And, in the case of Catherine Zeta Jones, you're looking at pretty much the same characteristics.
The Welsh actress had hit bottom before landing the title role in the
mini-series Catherine the Great.
After scoring such a hit as Mariette in The Darling Buds of May, she appeared in a succession of flops including the best-forgotten Christopher Columbus: The Discovery and Splitting Heirs. A music career was aborted after a single recording. At one point she was best known in Britain for a rocky romance with a children's TV presenter.
It was then that Zeta Jones - the plain surname is embellished by her grandmother's first name - took her first step towards greatness. She dumped the TV presenter, packed her bags and headed for Hollywood to start all over again.
"I got an agent in Los Angeles and took a flight over," she recalls. "The first call I made was to my agent, and I heard this answerphone message: `I will be in Europe for four months.'
"So it was a matter of getting on with things."
Auditions, auditions and more auditions.
Producer Konstantin Thoeren - who had earlier made Peter the Great, an award-winning mini-series about Empress Catherine's husband and predecessor on the Russian throne - was casting Catherine the Great.
Zeta Jones managed to get an audition for the minor role of Peter's mistress.
She had already read the script but she read a lot more about Catherine.
She found out about the German princess' climb to power - her marriage to Peter at the age of 15, her experience of ruthless power games and eventual mastery of court intrigue, her taking of the throne against bitter opposition, the crushing of rebellious serfs led by a renegade Cossack, conflict with the Russian Orthodox Church, wars with Prussia, Denmark, Turkey ... and the voracious passion, the seemingly endless succession of lovers.
When she met Thoeren and co-producer Marvin Chomsky, she didn't read for the minor part. She just talked - about Catherine and the nature of power and sexuality. Then she said, "Nice to meet you," and left.
"I read the script again and had some more ideas. I was going to call them and then I pulled back. I thought, `No, wait till they call.'"
They did. Chomsky said: "I would really like you to do Catherine."
Suddenly she was off to European locations doing scenes with Ian Richardson and Paul McGann.
Then Steven Spielberg saw the series.
"I thought my agent had lost his mind when he announced who wanted to see me. But there I am on the set of The Lost World, and there's Steven sitting next to me, telling people what to do with model dinosaurs and introducing me to Jeff Goldblum.
"Finally he tells me he's producing this movie about Zorro and he wants me for it."
That lead to Zeta Jones making The Mask of Zorro with Antonio Banderas and her compatriot Anthony Hopkins. With her sultry beauty - olive skin, dark hair and sloe eyes - Zeta Jones was a megahit as a Mexican.
Time magazine called her "ravishingly beautiful."
The New York Observer likened her to the young Natalie Wood with her "dark eyes, porcelain skin,and meltingly radiant smile."
"A Celtic riposte to Sophia Loren," according to the movie magazine Premiere.
Now, at the age of 29, Zeta Jones is living next door to Mel Gibson and getting more acting offers in a week than she used to get in a year.
"There were times when I wouldn't see a script for months. Now I get them and they say, `Oh, by the way, you are up against Nicole Kidman and Julia Roberts.'"
Sean Connery insisted on having Zeta Jones as his co-star in the upcoming romantic thriller Entrapment.
She says the way she made it to the top "restored my faith in those Hollywood stories I had heard over the years."
But the truth is that Zeta Jones' success is not so much a showbiz fairy tale as testimony to hard work and dedication. She has made her own luck.
She has had a desire to perform since age four, when she started dancing lessons. "I begged Mother to take me. I wanted it so badly."
At 11 she was cast in a touring production of Annie. At 13 she was playing Tallulah in Bugsy Malone in the West End. At 16 she left school and danced professionally, and by 18 she was the British tap-dancing champion.
Then there was a production of 42 Street. Zeta Jones was only the second understudy to the lead. But the first understudy was on holiday when the lead actress injured her knee ...
A showbiz fairy tale? Maybe, but Zeta Jones was ready to take over the role, and did it so well that she kept the part for two years.
She comes from Swansea, where her home was a few minutes' drive from where Richard Burton was raised. And the success of Burton and Hopkins has been an inspiration.
She was never pushed by her parents, who opposed her leaving school. Shrewdly, she enlisted the aid of her headmaster, who told her parents: "Let the bird fly free and she will always return to the nest."
Her drive is all her own, and always has been.
"I would watch people like Katherine Hepburn and Fred Astaire in old films, and I realise now it was a form of escapism I was looking for.
"I always knew what I really wanted, and that was to be successful in movies."
Who: Catherine Zeta Jones
What: Catherine the Great
Where: TV One
When: 8.35 pm, Sunday
Pictured: Catherine Zeta Jones in Catherine the Great
By Jane Oddy
How does a Catherine become great? In the case of Catherine II, Empress of Russia, with ambition, audacity, shrewdness and strength.
And, in the case of Catherine Zeta Jones, you're looking at pretty much the same characteristics.
The Welsh actress had hit bottom before landing the title role in the
AdvertisementAdvertise with NZME.