April 22, 2024 • 30 mins
Sam Taylor-Johnson is a close friend and director of Back To Black, the story of Amy Winehouse. Checking in with her during filming, she always reassured me it was intense. It was challenging. It was exhilarating. But, the best part was working with Marisa Abela.
One night a few months ago, Sam called me at home to tell me Marisa was in The River Cafe and could we send her a glass of champagne? When I told this to Michael, a friend visiting me from New York, he said, ‘Ruthie, we're not sending her a glass of champagne. We're going there right now to give it to her ourselves'.
This month, Back to Black opened in London. Today, we're here together in The River Cafe and when we’re done we'll have a glass of champagne.
Listen to Ruthie's Table 4: Marissa Abela made in partnership with Moncler.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
You're listening to Ruthie's Table four in partnership with Montclair.
Sam Taylor Johnson is a close friend and director of
Back to Black, The Story of Amy Winehouse. Checking in
with her during filming, she always reassured me that it
was intense, it was challenging, it was exhilarating, but really, Ruthie,
(00:20):
the greatest thing about the whole process was working with
the brilliant and fearless Marisa Abella. One night a few
months ago, Sam called me at home to tell me
Marisa was in the River Cafe and might we send
her a glass of champagne. When I told this to
a friend who was visiting me from New York, he said, Ruthie,
we're not sending her a glass of champagne. We're going
(00:43):
there right now to give it to her ourselves. She's amazing,
and she was and she is. Three days ago, Back
to Black opened in London, and though I was three
thousand miles away in New York, the word travel that
it was a great movie. Today we're here to get
in the River Cafe to talk about performance in the
(01:03):
kitchen and performance in front of the camera, and afterwards
we'll have a glass of champagne. So talking about the movie, Yeah,
it opened up Monday night. Yeah yeah, everybody's going to
ask you who was there and what did you wear?
And I'm going to ask you what you ate? What
did you what did you do for food?
Speaker 2 (01:21):
Let's be honest. I'm wearing like a Fendy dress. It's
very figure hugging.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
What does the food have to do with the Fendy dress?
That you were afraid of eating too much? And then
kind of split the scene.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Right right right. You just want to be you want
to feel your best, but it's still just sort of
about like pacing and whatever. And also you get so
nervous that it's just the adrenalinees so intense.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
So what did you do? Did you eat before you?
Did you have a good meal on Sunday night?
Speaker 2 (01:49):
I had a good glass of red wine and I
did have a good meal. I had a chicken seat.
Did the premiere? That was very exciting?
Speaker 1 (01:59):
Yeah, most exciting moment.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
It was very important for me with my first ever premiere.
So I was you know, I wanted my family to
be there and my friends and then you get five
people that get to sit next to you, So okay,
who's that going to be my mom, my, dad, whatever.
But I decided that it should be my best girlfriends
because they're the ones that are going to be just
so excited. And I think the most purely happy moment
(02:27):
was when I sat down next to them and the
first ten minutes or whatever, all of them just turning
arounding at one specific moment wet.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
When you see the effect, that's yeah, I couldn't possibly
compare it to what we do, but having to see
the response. I was talking to Sarah Jessica Parker and
we're talking the other day about audiences, and I was saying,
can you know I can tell the night when we
might be have the same team, the sort of the
same food, the place is full, but you can have
(02:56):
at the end of it thinking it didn't work or yes.
And I said, does that happen in the theory? She
said sometimes, Ruthie. I just wonder if all those people
called each other first before they came and so let's hold,
let's let's not laugh at any of the jokes, you know,
or they you know, they call each other, they say, Okay,
we're going to be really responsive. It's almost the mood.
(03:16):
And so did you feel that from the audience.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
You know, it's also difficult to tell, especially with a
film when it's not when you're not rehearsing the scenes
or the type. You film every scene and individually for
three months, it's difficult to remember exactly what's going on.
And then you watch it on screen and you know,
within the first two minutes you get a big laugh
or something, and you think so much about what the
(03:41):
reaction to it's going to be, you don't even think,
you know, people find it funny. So then when people
are laughing, you're like, oh my god, you know this
is this is crazy and we've got a standing ovation
at the end, which is and I didn't I think
I blacked out. I didn't notice. I like walked straight
up to Sam and I was like, I can't believe,
how do you feel? And she was like, Marisa, turn around,
(04:01):
like everyone is on their feet, and I was like,
what you know? And it's just it's just it's wild.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
When you're working, when you are filming. When if you
knew that you had a long day of performing different scenes,
different songs, what would you eat.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
Well, this is different to most of the other work
I've done because I had specific needs to meet as Amy.
You know, I went through a physical transformation, So what
was that? I lost a lot of weight to play
her at certain points in her life.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
How much do you remember?
Speaker 2 (04:36):
Probably?
Speaker 1 (04:39):
Yeah, well let's stop there and tell me how you
did that.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
Well, essentially a plant based gluten free day, free cop free.
I mean it was sort of logomes and plants in
the evenings.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
In the evening. Yeah, and did you find that difficult?
Speaker 2 (04:58):
I mean very as you can tell food is you know,
But the truth is is that like, what it does
do is that it makes those four months of your
life completely about the work. And I'm not a method
actress in that I go home and I think, am
I Marisa? Or am I am? Like? I know, I
(05:18):
know what's going on, and that's not it's not important
for me to do that. But what it does mean
is that you can't get away from this work and
it is the most important thing, as it should be
for that time. When it's a physical feeling like that,
you can't you know, you can't change it, like hunger.
For me, the most important thing though I wasn't going
(05:40):
to do the classic you know, you hear about these
actors that are like I was on one whatever and
a cigarette a date. But it wasn't that I ate,
because for me, the most important thing always was the
rest of the work, like can I embody her? Can
I inhabit her? Can I sing? Can I move? Can I?
Speaker 1 (05:57):
You know?
Speaker 2 (05:58):
And I wasn't going to be able to do that
if I absolutely no energy. So it was sort of
like a science of finding the maximum amount of energy
from the minimum amount of sustenance.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
Essentially, as you say you were doing it for work,
it was for a job. It wasn't because you wanted
to fit into to get a boyfriend or yeah. I
mean there's so many issues.
Speaker 2 (06:22):
And also, you know, Amy had bliemia. I was playing
someone with an eating disorder, so it's also about understanding
the psychology of eating disorders, and also one eating disorder
over another. It's interesting to me as an actor. You know,
if someone has anorexx, yeah, it's something very different. If
someone has beliema. Someone's relationship to food is interesting. I think,
(06:44):
you know, needing to eat and purge versus not eat
anything at all says something different about a person. I
think from what age fourteen forever or pretty much. I
think it's difficult to say exactly you know, especially when
she was in the throes of her addiction, what her
(07:05):
appetite was like at that point, probably incredibly low, you know,
versus only healthier with your relationship to drugs and alcohol.
Your relationship to food might be different because your body changes,
you know, if you're eating more because you're not using.
But what we do know is that she had a
difficult relationship with food and with her body image from
(07:28):
the age of fourteen. As an actor, having someone tell
you that you need to look a certain way for
a role when that role is fictional, it's very difficult,
and I think I would struggle with that. But when
it's not fictional and she's existed, and you know, her
relationship to food and drugs and alcohol has affected the
(07:48):
way that she physically manifests to all of us, then
I think it's you know, my job as an actor
to do that thing.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Do you think the food was overpowering in terms of
her whole character, that it was defining?
Speaker 2 (08:03):
Yeah, well, I think that. You know, part of the
reason that her addiction hit her physically as hard as
it did was because she didn't have the sort of
physical capability to keep up with as much as she
was consuming, but I also think that she was completely
hounded by the paparazzi. One of the things that drew
(08:28):
me to Amy as a woman was that she had
this insatiable appetite for life and for music, you know,
and that you can see that in her body when
she's younger. She's not afraid to be hungry for life
and for experiences and for food. And as the world
got more hungry for her, it's almost like they stole
(08:50):
that appetite from her. It's almost like, you know, aerial
and ursula, like they took her voice away from her,
and they took her appetite. And it's when someone is
feeding on you, is there that much left? I know
it's kind of sounding a bit metaphorical, matter, I do
think that I think that food, if you're told, is
(09:10):
a woman in your life, like, don't take up space.
You have to stop enjoying one of the simple pleasures.
You know, it's a sensual pleasure, and I don't think
she has afforded many of those.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
Tell me about the joy that you heard during filming,
and about that you told us about Christmas.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
My birthday is in December, and obviously Christmas is also
in December, and my trainers said, listen, you have to
give yourself one thing to work towards, so like you know,
you're going to be able to give yourself whatever you
want on that day. And it can either be your
birthday or Christmas, because December kind of works for us.
And I was hosting Christmas that year my flat, so
it became all I could think about if I was hungry.
(09:56):
I remember one time I got a massage. I booked
in a massage and it was an hour and a
half and instead of relaxing during this massage, all I
was thinking was, well, I'll sub you know, little bagels
with crumbrushion, and I'll do caveat and I'll do this.
And it was like, you know, it was a Christmas
for four people, and I had a ham, a lamb,
(10:20):
a chicken because I was just so fixated on this food.
Speaker 1 (10:30):
Did you know the River Cafe has a shop. It's
full of our favorite foods and designs. We have cookbooks,
lin a Napkins, kitchen, were toad bags with our signatures,
glasses from Venice, chocolates from Turin. You can find us
right next door to the River Cafe in London or
online at Shopthrivercafe dot co dot uk. Tell me what
(10:58):
it was like cooking with Sean here in the kitchen.
Do it you did zucchini trifilati?
Speaker 2 (11:03):
Well, I think the thing about cooking is that you know,
we all. It's the same with films, right, everyone watches
movies all the time and knows what they love. Who
doesn't necessarily know how they'd make it. And it's like,
I know what I would love to eat and how
I enjoy food. But watching someone really know what it
is that they're doing make something that you know is
(11:25):
about to be delicious. It's probably the same feeling that
people get when they come on certain watch movies being made.
Speaker 3 (11:34):
Hi, I'm Sean Owen. I'm here with Marisa Abella and
we're going to make zucchini trifilati. In case you ever
have guests with you decided you're going to make zucchini trifolati.
You can cut it on the chopping board, or you
can just cut it like a housewife.
Speaker 2 (11:46):
That's my preferred message.
Speaker 3 (11:47):
I love that I've just cut it in my hand,
like turning the zucchini as I.
Speaker 2 (11:53):
Cnu't so cool. Just like just put.
Speaker 3 (11:56):
Yourself in the mindset of the Italian housewife. Yeah, just
turn and cut and turn and cut.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
I cut apples like this sometime, got it.
Speaker 3 (12:05):
And so as many as zucchini as you want. I'm
not sure how many of the recipe it's going to
be four.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
Probably four. You'll just have a bit of garlic.
Speaker 3 (12:11):
We've got spring garlic. Now that's just it also really
amazing because the skin is so soft that you can
need the whole skin like you have to cut, you
don't really have to trim it off, and that will
just get in as well. And then we're just gonna
fry the zucchini with like olive oil, garlic, salt, and
(12:31):
pepper and for a low heat for about maybe an
hour or so. You get perfect zucchini tri floaty, like
super slow because it's supers slow. And then we finish
it with zucchini flowers. At the end. It looks really fresh.
It's a really nice thing if you have like fresh
zucchini and you're.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
Growing in your garden, it's amazing.
Speaker 3 (12:53):
I mean I have a garden, but the flowers are
amazing in the summer, you know, and you can fry them.
But also the beautiful added to this and this is
such a nice thing to have like on its own
with fish or meat chickens. Really nice bit olive oil.
Then if you can see that there looks a bit
(13:15):
like sludge.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
No, it looks so delicious. Don't not put that in?
Speaker 1 (13:20):
But is it?
Speaker 3 (13:20):
Is it all in the intensity of the When you
slow cook something, it goes.
Speaker 2 (13:25):
Really an olive oil in right, Okay, exactly at the end, right, zucchini.
Speaker 3 (13:34):
I hope it's cooked long enough for rufe.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
Zucchini trafilati Eighteen small zucchini, trimmed and cut, three tablespoons
of olive oil, two garlic cloves, peeled and sliced, a
handful of mint or basil, roughly chopped, sea salt, and
freshly ground black pepper. Heat the oil in a large
frying pan, Add the garlic and gently brown. Then add
(14:03):
the zucchini and cook slowly for fifteen to twenty minutes,
when brown on all sides. At one hundred and twenty
five milli liters of boiling water and stir, scraping and
combining the juices until the water has been absorbed and
the zucchini is soft. Add the mint or basil, seasoned
with salt and pepper, and serve.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
You chose the recipe for zucchini trifilati, I did, And
why why did it have all the recipes? Because it's
one of my favorites. It's one of the first vegetables
I ever learned to cook. In that process.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
I love eating zucchini out courgette, same thing, same thing,
French or Italian. I love eating it out. But whenever
I cook it, I don't get it quite right. I fore, like,
I don't know whether I don't season it completely right,
or it can go kind of like too soft, too
easily for me, or whatever it is. But so, but
(15:01):
whenever I eat it out, it's like, oh my god,
what is this delicious? Especially impasta And then so I
think when I saw it today, I was like, well,
this is a perfect way to just maybe it's quite selfish.
And also the timing, she said an hour. I'm bad
at putting things on high for a short period of time.
I guess I'm quite impatient book, Yeah, exactly, I come on,
(15:24):
let's go, let's go. Also, I get very hungry, very quickly,
especially when I'm at home. I'm just sirring, Oh, I'll
make dinner tonight, don't worry about it and then all
of a sudden fifteen minutes, I'm like, I'm starving. I
don't know about you. I'm going to die by oil.
Speaker 1 (15:38):
Water right faster. Yeah, I think that the French are
like very Healdente, you know, they're like things quite crispy.
And the Italians really like to slow cook their vegetables.
I get more flavor out of it. Maybe it's the
olive oil that is then absorbed into it over a
longer period of time, the process of sort of slidy
(15:59):
going brown and then soft and then brown again. The
Italians cook vegetables for your British I know, so I
have to be careful not to Okay, So then I
could say that why is it that when the Italians
cook vegetables for a long time they get better, and
when English people vegetables for a long time, they kind
of get worse. Friend of mine said, I remember saying
(16:21):
years ago that nobody really had time to cook anymore,
and that's you know, it's a shame. And he said, yeah,
but except for the English. Maybe cabbage, but they'll say, oh,
we only have forty five minutes the cabbage. Yeah, maybe
that would speed up. But I think zucchini does we
do some that. Actually, I don't think we do any
(16:42):
zucchini that is, Chris. But because even if we boil it,
we boil it for longer whole and then slice it
up and put it with olive oil and mint.
Speaker 2 (16:49):
But well that's something that I've learned today. Yeah, see
that's good.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
So what was it like growing up in your home
in terms of food, because you do seem to say
you love to eat. Tell me about the early days
of your childhood and food. What are your memories.
Speaker 2 (17:04):
I grew up at home with my mom and my
brother and me. It's just the three of us, and
my mom is a great cook. There was always a
lot of food, you know, like that was the thing.
Quantity was keen in my house, like loads of food.
There was never a question of anyone going hungry. And
(17:25):
it was also such a big way of showing love.
I think, you know, my mom, if I was feeling sad,
it was food. If I was feeling happy, it was food.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
What was her background? Did she grow up in a
house like that?
Speaker 2 (17:38):
Well, you don't know. Actually, I think my mom grew
up quite scared of food. My mom is Jewish. I
think food in the Jewish culture is so important, you know.
So I think she and my mom didn't have a
huge appetite growing up, but it was very like finished,
what's on your plate?
Speaker 1 (17:55):
Do you know? I have your grandmother where she came
was she born in Britain.
Speaker 2 (17:58):
Well, so there are two sides, both sort of juring
a Second World War. There were my mother's father's family
emigrated from Poland and my mother's family were from Austria,
you know.
Speaker 1 (18:14):
Yeah, because I think there's also something perhaps about an
immigrant family in a possibly threatening environment. My family came
from Russia and from Hungary again emigrated and there definitely
was a feeling that in an alien environment where you
were concerned about the protection of your children, food was
(18:36):
a kind of way of almost creating a barrier of
safety for your kids. And you know, the thing of
coming home. I always tell a story that apparently my
grandmother came to visit her first grandson, my brother and
first grandson, and she came. She used to travel with
her rolling pit, you know, and so she arrived in
(18:57):
the house of the country and my mother said, do
you want to see that baby? And she said, let's
eat first.
Speaker 3 (19:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
So I think that culture, but it may be. You know,
I'm Jewish, and so I think that probably is a
Jewish characteristic. But probably if you had an African family
in you know, a white society that felt threatened, or
you know, a Catholic family in Belfast, that food would
maybe become even more totally.
Speaker 2 (19:22):
And like my mom grew up in Northwest London, so
I grew up in Brighton, So there's not really a
massive Jewish community at all where I grew up, but
we were probably the only household there was. You know,
there were lots of supermarkets in Brighton where you could
get whatever it was you wanted to eat, but my
mom would have to go to the Waitrose if she
wanted anything that was kosher. Yeah, you're right, no, no,
(19:46):
but she liked my mum will only eat Kosha smake salmon.
She doesn't like other smoke salmon because it's too oily.
Speaker 1 (19:51):
You know.
Speaker 2 (19:52):
She likes sort of kosher sausages and could filter fish
and you know, she likes that food. So if she
she wouldn't eat necessari and keep kosher. But she had
to go to that Waitrose to get that food. So
mine was the only house in Rotting Dean, you know, right,
And I had chopped liver in the fridge, but it
(20:12):
was I mean, but my brother and I were quite
kind of embarrassed at that food. I think it's weird.
It's kind of.
Speaker 1 (20:19):
Weird to kind of adapt. Yeah, I mean, I think
you want to. Whereas your mother might have been proud
to do that, the children are much more protected of
their identity and wanting to, you know, become like the
people next door, school friends, not be different.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
And I think that because she was a single mother too,
it was very much like she I think, you know,
when you have two kids under the age of four,
necessarily we're not eating filter fish. So she would eat
alone a lot, not alone with us, but eat her
own meal. And I we did that a lot actually
(20:57):
growing up. You know. My brother loved oldfish and I
loved red meat, and my mom loved whatever, you know,
and we would eat different at the same time totally,
and I was fine. I was actually telling a friend
just now that you know, I eat before I met
my boyfriend that I'm with Noweh, I didn't like to
(21:21):
share food, and I think that that's kind of why,
because we'd go out for dinner and it would be like,
I'll have my thing you have yours. It was weird
for me. Also, small plates restaurants is such a thing now,
you know, thing in London. For me growing up, if
we went out for dinner, I would get a bowl
of pasta, you know, carbonara. Let's say, my brother would
(21:43):
get the prawns with garlic and chili, and my mom
would get the chicken and we wouldn't share. You know.
It was that and my mom. But my mom was
very good at spending that time making what it was
that we wanted. It's a lot of work, but what
it meant was that I'm up until a couple of
years ago, really I was not good at sharing food
(22:06):
were now the only thing that I refuse to share
is soup because I think that's gross.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
Yeah gross, right, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
And people also say you shouldn't share omelets, Okay, I
like her. I I don't mind sharing enough.
Speaker 1 (22:22):
Well, it's all about the double dipping, right right right,
But the COVID also changed a lot of job, don't
you sure? Ye sort of fear around around that. Yeah,
and did you have Friday night suppers? Well, I guess
you didn't at.
Speaker 2 (22:37):
My at my mother's family's house. You know, we would
we would go. We would travel up to uh Highgate
by that point where my grandfather was living, and we
do pass over. Definitely.
Speaker 1 (22:50):
Does your father cook.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
My dad does cook, but he cooked my dad's Maltese.
Speaker 1 (22:55):
What is Maltese food.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
It's kind of like a mix, just like the language
of arab and Italian because it's in between North Africa,
Libya and.
Speaker 1 (23:04):
Sicily, so great, great mix.
Speaker 2 (23:06):
It's incredible. But the food is you know, it's also
in terms of produce, it's not the best place. So
like the food is yummy, but it's lots of rabbit.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
You know. The Friday night supper and Jewish households is like,
I guess it's a bit like the Sunday lunch with religion.
You know, Yeah you read did you do the readings?
Speaker 2 (23:27):
And the I did? I had to sing the managed
to know all of that kind of stuff. I mean,
I remember, you know, the actual food on Passover being
just sort of like some horrible cool events. But then
it's like, you know, roast chicken or whatever it was. Yeah,
lots of fish too, And I only started liking fish
a couple of years ago.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
So you grew up really loving food, loving loving to
eat yeah.
Speaker 2 (23:53):
Very much so. And you know, if I was if
I woke up one morning was like, I don't want
to go to school today, A bribe me by taking
me to the bakery before school so I could get
across like it was, you know, and i'd have sometimes
she'd pick me up every Thursday night with a chicken
katsukari before I went to netball, because I don't know
(24:14):
how I did that, you know.
Speaker 4 (24:16):
Yeah, if you liked listening to Ruthie's Table four, would
you please make sure to rate and review the podcast
on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you
get your podcasts.
Speaker 1 (24:37):
Thank you. When you grew up in this household of
your you know, everybody having a meal, whether it was
all three separate foods, and then you left home to
go to did you go to and was that an awakening?
(24:57):
Was it?
Speaker 2 (24:58):
It?
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Was it different? It was apartment.
Speaker 2 (25:01):
I lived in an apartment in Wilston Green with three
people that were in my year but I'd never met
before that time. I mean, I ate a lot of
like things on toast, to be honest, mushrooms on toast.
I had a lot that's good. I'd put like pestle
into my mushrooms and I'd have that on tits almost
every night. There was a fish and chip shop. I
(25:23):
didn't like fish then, so I'd get like a savaloy
and chips.
Speaker 1 (25:26):
Mate, you start liking fish, do you think?
Speaker 2 (25:28):
When I had a year off I went to Fiji,
there was like a sustainability thing that we were living
on this tiny island. And if you didn't eat fish,
that's fun, yeah, very far. If you didn't eat fish,
you had to eat pumpkin. I was like, great, I'll
eat pumpkin. But after a month of eating pumpkin, You're like,
I'm going to die if I don't eat something other
than pumpkin. So I started to try fish and I
(25:52):
got better and better.
Speaker 1 (25:52):
Back eighteen and apart from Malta, did your parents take
you to Italy or to France? Did your supposed to
other cultures of foosh?
Speaker 2 (26:02):
You know, my mom was very busy trying to keep
everything afloat if I went on holiday. I went away
more with my dad, but he took us to some
amazing places. I went to Egypt when I was eleven,
and I remember my dad having pigeon a whole one. Yeah,
a whole pigeon and getting food poisoning, and then we
(26:23):
went to the pyramids and my dad passed out in
a pyramid, which was quite scary. Yeah, so I remember,
you know, I remember going away a lot. You know,
I went away with my dad, but it was mostly Malta.
I didn't like travel a lot, you know, as a kid.
To be honest, I only went to America for the
(26:45):
first time a couple of years ago, and I'm about
to go to LA for my first time.
Speaker 1 (26:49):
So he's La the premiere in La.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
There's there's a screening in La and it will be
my first time.
Speaker 1 (26:54):
Wearing the same friendly dress or do you get to
know a different thing? I think you have to give
it back and that's fine.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
I think it's custom. So I think that's my I mean,
it had my name in the label, so I keep up.
So but yeah, and again it's like, that's what's fun
to me is where am I going to eat in LA?
And where am I going to eat in New York
when I'm there in Paris at all of those things.
Speaker 1 (27:16):
I think that's always like that question when you know,
asking people who do travel for either they're you know,
acting or for other reasons that they have to travel.
They're the people who really research where they're going, to
find out where they're going to eat, and maybe go
to the markets to see, yeah, what's in what's in season,
and what's in the in the market. Do you go
(27:37):
to sleep at night thinking what you're going to eat
the next day?
Speaker 2 (27:39):
I definitely did while I was on this day for
what I love to eat, you know, but I've become
better at understanding what it is that my body needs
at different times. I'm not as obsessed with food as
I have been at certain points in my life.
Speaker 1 (27:55):
How do you feel having finished playing Amy?
Speaker 2 (27:59):
It's been a while since we wrapped, It's been about
a year. But no, it was difficult, you know. It
was I was so invested emotionally and physically and psychologically
in that world, so it was kind of insane to
step out of it. It didn't really feel real. Every time
I see Amy anywhere and hear her anywhere, it's definitely
(28:21):
means something different to me now than it did before.
I'm incredibly proud of what it is that we've made.
And you know, when you get to finally enjoy the
work and sit in the cinemar and watch it with
those people and had the kind of reaction that we
had on Monday night. It feels like, oh amazing.
Speaker 1 (28:41):
You know, before we started, we were talking about comfort
and I was saying that we always ask everybody because
the answers are so different. But if you were to
think about a food that you would go to for
comfort when you were either worried or concerned or sad
or a loss or whatever it was that you just
(29:01):
wanted something that would make you feel better through eating,
is there a comfort food that you would go to?
Speaker 2 (29:07):
Yes. I mean my mom used to make me a
risotto when I was younger, and it was very much
the like Marisa is having a bit of a sad
day and this is what she needs to eat. And
it was a resulto. Really that was probably for about
four people that I ate all by myself. And how
(29:28):
do you know, I don't know how sort of like
authentic it was. I think sometimes she would use like
resorto rise and sometimes it would be like basmati rices.
That's what she had in the fridge in the carpbeard.
But you know it was a bacon and pea resotto
and it was delicious. And now if I'm feeling sad still,
(29:51):
I would call my mum and ask her to make
me the resotte.
Speaker 1 (29:54):
Okay, well then she would. I'm sure you'd have to.
Would you have a bake yourself?
Speaker 2 (30:01):
I don't think it would be the same.
Speaker 1 (30:03):
We can make that. The piece are in season right now.
It so the next time if you come and call
me and we'll make that for you.
Speaker 2 (30:09):
Okay, God, amazing? Why not? Thank you, thank you so much,
thank you, thank you.
Speaker 1 (30:16):
I have that. Yeah, thank you for listening to Ruthie's
table for in partnership with Montclair
You're listening to Ruthie's Table four in partnership with Montclair.
Sam Taylor Johnson is a close friend and director of
Back to Black, The Story of Amy Winehouse. Checking in
with her during filming, she always reassured me that it
was intense, it was challenging, it was exhilarating, but really, Ruthie,
(00:20):
the greatest thing about the whole process was working with
the brilliant and fearless Marisa Abella. One night a few
months ago, Sam called me at home to tell me
Marisa was in the River Cafe and might we send
her a glass of champagne. When I told this to
a friend who was visiting me from New York, he said, Ruthie,
we're not sending her a glass of champagne. We're going
(00:43):
there right now to give it to her ourselves. She's amazing,
and she was and she is. Three days ago, Back
to Black opened in London, and though I was three
thousand miles away in New York, the word travel that
it was a great movie. Today we're here to get
in the River Cafe to talk about performance in the
(01:03):
kitchen and performance in front of the camera, and afterwards
we'll have a glass of champagne. So talking about the movie, Yeah,
it opened up Monday night. Yeah yeah, everybody's going to
ask you who was there and what did you wear?
And I'm going to ask you what you ate? What
did you what did you do for food?
Speaker 2 (01:21):
Let's be honest. I'm wearing like a Fendy dress. It's
very figure hugging.
Speaker 1 (01:25):
What does the food have to do with the Fendy dress?
That you were afraid of eating too much? And then
kind of split the scene.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Right right right. You just want to be you want
to feel your best, but it's still just sort of
about like pacing and whatever. And also you get so
nervous that it's just the adrenalinees so intense.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
So what did you do? Did you eat before you?
Did you have a good meal on Sunday night?
Speaker 2 (01:49):
I had a good glass of red wine and I
did have a good meal. I had a chicken seat.
Did the premiere? That was very exciting?
Speaker 1 (01:59):
Yeah, most exciting moment.
Speaker 2 (02:02):
It was very important for me with my first ever premiere.
So I was you know, I wanted my family to
be there and my friends and then you get five
people that get to sit next to you, So okay,
who's that going to be my mom, my, dad, whatever.
But I decided that it should be my best girlfriends
because they're the ones that are going to be just
so excited. And I think the most purely happy moment
(02:27):
was when I sat down next to them and the
first ten minutes or whatever, all of them just turning
arounding at one specific moment wet.
Speaker 1 (02:35):
When you see the effect, that's yeah, I couldn't possibly
compare it to what we do, but having to see
the response. I was talking to Sarah Jessica Parker and
we're talking the other day about audiences, and I was saying,
can you know I can tell the night when we
might be have the same team, the sort of the
same food, the place is full, but you can have
(02:56):
at the end of it thinking it didn't work or yes.
And I said, does that happen in the theory? She
said sometimes, Ruthie. I just wonder if all those people
called each other first before they came and so let's hold,
let's let's not laugh at any of the jokes, you know,
or they you know, they call each other, they say, Okay,
we're going to be really responsive. It's almost the mood.
(03:16):
And so did you feel that from the audience.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
You know, it's also difficult to tell, especially with a
film when it's not when you're not rehearsing the scenes
or the type. You film every scene and individually for
three months, it's difficult to remember exactly what's going on.
And then you watch it on screen and you know,
within the first two minutes you get a big laugh
or something, and you think so much about what the
(03:41):
reaction to it's going to be, you don't even think,
you know, people find it funny. So then when people
are laughing, you're like, oh my god, you know this
is this is crazy and we've got a standing ovation
at the end, which is and I didn't I think
I blacked out. I didn't notice. I like walked straight
up to Sam and I was like, I can't believe,
how do you feel? And she was like, Marisa, turn around,
(04:01):
like everyone is on their feet, and I was like,
what you know? And it's just it's just it's wild.
Speaker 1 (04:07):
When you're working, when you are filming. When if you
knew that you had a long day of performing different scenes,
different songs, what would you eat.
Speaker 2 (04:18):
Well, this is different to most of the other work
I've done because I had specific needs to meet as Amy.
You know, I went through a physical transformation, So what
was that? I lost a lot of weight to play
her at certain points in her life.
Speaker 1 (04:34):
How much do you remember?
Speaker 2 (04:36):
Probably?
Speaker 1 (04:39):
Yeah, well let's stop there and tell me how you
did that.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
Well, essentially a plant based gluten free day, free cop free.
I mean it was sort of logomes and plants in
the evenings.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
In the evening. Yeah, and did you find that difficult?
Speaker 2 (04:58):
I mean very as you can tell food is you know,
But the truth is is that like, what it does
do is that it makes those four months of your
life completely about the work. And I'm not a method
actress in that I go home and I think, am
I Marisa? Or am I am? Like? I know, I
(05:18):
know what's going on, and that's not it's not important
for me to do that. But what it does mean
is that you can't get away from this work and
it is the most important thing, as it should be
for that time. When it's a physical feeling like that,
you can't you know, you can't change it, like hunger.
For me, the most important thing though I wasn't going
(05:40):
to do the classic you know, you hear about these
actors that are like I was on one whatever and
a cigarette a date. But it wasn't that I ate,
because for me, the most important thing always was the
rest of the work, like can I embody her? Can
I inhabit her? Can I sing? Can I move? Can I?
Speaker 1 (05:57):
You know?
Speaker 2 (05:58):
And I wasn't going to be able to do that
if I absolutely no energy. So it was sort of
like a science of finding the maximum amount of energy
from the minimum amount of sustenance.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
Essentially, as you say you were doing it for work,
it was for a job. It wasn't because you wanted
to fit into to get a boyfriend or yeah. I
mean there's so many issues.
Speaker 2 (06:22):
And also, you know, Amy had bliemia. I was playing
someone with an eating disorder, so it's also about understanding
the psychology of eating disorders, and also one eating disorder
over another. It's interesting to me as an actor. You know,
if someone has anorexx, yeah, it's something very different. If
someone has beliema. Someone's relationship to food is interesting. I think,
(06:44):
you know, needing to eat and purge versus not eat
anything at all says something different about a person. I
think from what age fourteen forever or pretty much. I
think it's difficult to say exactly you know, especially when
she was in the throes of her addiction, what her
(07:05):
appetite was like at that point, probably incredibly low, you know,
versus only healthier with your relationship to drugs and alcohol.
Your relationship to food might be different because your body changes,
you know, if you're eating more because you're not using.
But what we do know is that she had a
difficult relationship with food and with her body image from
(07:28):
the age of fourteen. As an actor, having someone tell
you that you need to look a certain way for
a role when that role is fictional, it's very difficult,
and I think I would struggle with that. But when
it's not fictional and she's existed, and you know, her
relationship to food and drugs and alcohol has affected the
(07:48):
way that she physically manifests to all of us, then
I think it's you know, my job as an actor
to do that thing.
Speaker 1 (07:57):
Do you think the food was overpowering in terms of
her whole character, that it was defining?
Speaker 2 (08:03):
Yeah, well, I think that. You know, part of the
reason that her addiction hit her physically as hard as
it did was because she didn't have the sort of
physical capability to keep up with as much as she
was consuming, but I also think that she was completely
hounded by the paparazzi. One of the things that drew
(08:28):
me to Amy as a woman was that she had
this insatiable appetite for life and for music, you know,
and that you can see that in her body when
she's younger. She's not afraid to be hungry for life
and for experiences and for food. And as the world
got more hungry for her, it's almost like they stole
(08:50):
that appetite from her. It's almost like, you know, aerial
and ursula, like they took her voice away from her,
and they took her appetite. And it's when someone is
feeding on you, is there that much left? I know
it's kind of sounding a bit metaphorical, matter, I do
think that I think that food, if you're told, is
(09:10):
a woman in your life, like, don't take up space.
You have to stop enjoying one of the simple pleasures.
You know, it's a sensual pleasure, and I don't think
she has afforded many of those.
Speaker 1 (09:25):
Tell me about the joy that you heard during filming,
and about that you told us about Christmas.
Speaker 2 (09:31):
My birthday is in December, and obviously Christmas is also
in December, and my trainers said, listen, you have to
give yourself one thing to work towards, so like you know,
you're going to be able to give yourself whatever you
want on that day. And it can either be your
birthday or Christmas, because December kind of works for us.
And I was hosting Christmas that year my flat, so
it became all I could think about if I was hungry.
(09:56):
I remember one time I got a massage. I booked
in a massage and it was an hour and a
half and instead of relaxing during this massage, all I
was thinking was, well, I'll sub you know, little bagels
with crumbrushion, and I'll do caveat and I'll do this.
And it was like, you know, it was a Christmas
for four people, and I had a ham, a lamb,
(10:20):
a chicken because I was just so fixated on this food.
Speaker 1 (10:30):
Did you know the River Cafe has a shop. It's
full of our favorite foods and designs. We have cookbooks,
lin a Napkins, kitchen, were toad bags with our signatures,
glasses from Venice, chocolates from Turin. You can find us
right next door to the River Cafe in London or
online at Shopthrivercafe dot co dot uk. Tell me what
(10:58):
it was like cooking with Sean here in the kitchen.
Do it you did zucchini trifilati?
Speaker 2 (11:03):
Well, I think the thing about cooking is that you know,
we all. It's the same with films, right, everyone watches
movies all the time and knows what they love. Who
doesn't necessarily know how they'd make it. And it's like,
I know what I would love to eat and how
I enjoy food. But watching someone really know what it
is that they're doing make something that you know is
(11:25):
about to be delicious. It's probably the same feeling that
people get when they come on certain watch movies being made.
Speaker 3 (11:34):
Hi, I'm Sean Owen. I'm here with Marisa Abella and
we're going to make zucchini trifilati. In case you ever
have guests with you decided you're going to make zucchini trifolati.
You can cut it on the chopping board, or you
can just cut it like a housewife.
Speaker 2 (11:46):
That's my preferred message.
Speaker 3 (11:47):
I love that I've just cut it in my hand,
like turning the zucchini as I.
Speaker 2 (11:53):
Cnu't so cool. Just like just put.
Speaker 3 (11:56):
Yourself in the mindset of the Italian housewife. Yeah, just
turn and cut and turn and cut.
Speaker 2 (12:01):
I cut apples like this sometime, got it.
Speaker 3 (12:05):
And so as many as zucchini as you want. I'm
not sure how many of the recipe it's going to
be four.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
Probably four. You'll just have a bit of garlic.
Speaker 3 (12:11):
We've got spring garlic. Now that's just it also really
amazing because the skin is so soft that you can
need the whole skin like you have to cut, you
don't really have to trim it off, and that will
just get in as well. And then we're just gonna
fry the zucchini with like olive oil, garlic, salt, and
(12:31):
pepper and for a low heat for about maybe an
hour or so. You get perfect zucchini tri floaty, like
super slow because it's supers slow. And then we finish
it with zucchini flowers. At the end. It looks really fresh.
It's a really nice thing if you have like fresh
zucchini and you're.
Speaker 1 (12:49):
Growing in your garden, it's amazing.
Speaker 3 (12:53):
I mean I have a garden, but the flowers are
amazing in the summer, you know, and you can fry them.
But also the beautiful added to this and this is
such a nice thing to have like on its own
with fish or meat chickens. Really nice bit olive oil.
Then if you can see that there looks a bit
(13:15):
like sludge.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
No, it looks so delicious. Don't not put that in?
Speaker 1 (13:20):
But is it?
Speaker 3 (13:20):
Is it all in the intensity of the When you
slow cook something, it goes.
Speaker 2 (13:25):
Really an olive oil in right, Okay, exactly at the end, right, zucchini.
Speaker 3 (13:34):
I hope it's cooked long enough for rufe.
Speaker 2 (13:41):
Zucchini trafilati Eighteen small zucchini, trimmed and cut, three tablespoons
of olive oil, two garlic cloves, peeled and sliced, a
handful of mint or basil, roughly chopped, sea salt, and
freshly ground black pepper. Heat the oil in a large
frying pan, Add the garlic and gently brown. Then add
(14:03):
the zucchini and cook slowly for fifteen to twenty minutes,
when brown on all sides. At one hundred and twenty
five milli liters of boiling water and stir, scraping and
combining the juices until the water has been absorbed and
the zucchini is soft. Add the mint or basil, seasoned
with salt and pepper, and serve.
Speaker 1 (14:27):
You chose the recipe for zucchini trifilati, I did, And
why why did it have all the recipes? Because it's
one of my favorites. It's one of the first vegetables
I ever learned to cook. In that process.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
I love eating zucchini out courgette, same thing, same thing,
French or Italian. I love eating it out. But whenever
I cook it, I don't get it quite right. I fore, like,
I don't know whether I don't season it completely right,
or it can go kind of like too soft, too
easily for me, or whatever it is. But so, but
(15:01):
whenever I eat it out, it's like, oh my god,
what is this delicious? Especially impasta And then so I
think when I saw it today, I was like, well,
this is a perfect way to just maybe it's quite selfish.
And also the timing, she said an hour. I'm bad
at putting things on high for a short period of time.
I guess I'm quite impatient book, Yeah, exactly, I come on,
(15:24):
let's go, let's go. Also, I get very hungry, very quickly,
especially when I'm at home. I'm just sirring, Oh, I'll
make dinner tonight, don't worry about it and then all
of a sudden fifteen minutes, I'm like, I'm starving. I
don't know about you. I'm going to die by oil.
Speaker 1 (15:38):
Water right faster. Yeah, I think that the French are
like very Healdente, you know, they're like things quite crispy.
And the Italians really like to slow cook their vegetables.
I get more flavor out of it. Maybe it's the
olive oil that is then absorbed into it over a
longer period of time, the process of sort of slidy
(15:59):
going brown and then soft and then brown again. The
Italians cook vegetables for your British I know, so I
have to be careful not to Okay, So then I
could say that why is it that when the Italians
cook vegetables for a long time they get better, and
when English people vegetables for a long time, they kind
of get worse. Friend of mine said, I remember saying
(16:21):
years ago that nobody really had time to cook anymore,
and that's you know, it's a shame. And he said, yeah,
but except for the English. Maybe cabbage, but they'll say, oh,
we only have forty five minutes the cabbage. Yeah, maybe
that would speed up. But I think zucchini does we
do some that. Actually, I don't think we do any
(16:42):
zucchini that is, Chris. But because even if we boil it,
we boil it for longer whole and then slice it
up and put it with olive oil and mint.
Speaker 2 (16:49):
But well that's something that I've learned today. Yeah, see
that's good.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
So what was it like growing up in your home
in terms of food, because you do seem to say
you love to eat. Tell me about the early days
of your childhood and food. What are your memories.
Speaker 2 (17:04):
I grew up at home with my mom and my
brother and me. It's just the three of us, and
my mom is a great cook. There was always a
lot of food, you know, like that was the thing.
Quantity was keen in my house, like loads of food.
There was never a question of anyone going hungry. And
(17:25):
it was also such a big way of showing love.
I think, you know, my mom, if I was feeling sad,
it was food. If I was feeling happy, it was food.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
What was her background? Did she grow up in a
house like that?
Speaker 2 (17:38):
Well, you don't know. Actually, I think my mom grew
up quite scared of food. My mom is Jewish. I
think food in the Jewish culture is so important, you know.
So I think she and my mom didn't have a
huge appetite growing up, but it was very like finished,
what's on your plate?
Speaker 1 (17:55):
Do you know? I have your grandmother where she came
was she born in Britain.
Speaker 2 (17:58):
Well, so there are two sides, both sort of juring
a Second World War. There were my mother's father's family
emigrated from Poland and my mother's family were from Austria,
you know.
Speaker 1 (18:14):
Yeah, because I think there's also something perhaps about an
immigrant family in a possibly threatening environment. My family came
from Russia and from Hungary again emigrated and there definitely
was a feeling that in an alien environment where you
were concerned about the protection of your children, food was
(18:36):
a kind of way of almost creating a barrier of
safety for your kids. And you know, the thing of
coming home. I always tell a story that apparently my
grandmother came to visit her first grandson, my brother and
first grandson, and she came. She used to travel with
her rolling pit, you know, and so she arrived in
(18:57):
the house of the country and my mother said, do
you want to see that baby? And she said, let's
eat first.
Speaker 3 (19:02):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
So I think that culture, but it may be. You know,
I'm Jewish, and so I think that probably is a
Jewish characteristic. But probably if you had an African family
in you know, a white society that felt threatened, or
you know, a Catholic family in Belfast, that food would
maybe become even more totally.
Speaker 2 (19:22):
And like my mom grew up in Northwest London, so
I grew up in Brighton, So there's not really a
massive Jewish community at all where I grew up, but
we were probably the only household there was. You know,
there were lots of supermarkets in Brighton where you could
get whatever it was you wanted to eat, but my
mom would have to go to the Waitrose if she
wanted anything that was kosher. Yeah, you're right, no, no,
(19:46):
but she liked my mum will only eat Kosha smake salmon.
She doesn't like other smoke salmon because it's too oily.
Speaker 1 (19:51):
You know.
Speaker 2 (19:52):
She likes sort of kosher sausages and could filter fish
and you know, she likes that food. So if she
she wouldn't eat necessari and keep kosher. But she had
to go to that Waitrose to get that food. So
mine was the only house in Rotting Dean, you know, right,
And I had chopped liver in the fridge, but it
(20:12):
was I mean, but my brother and I were quite
kind of embarrassed at that food. I think it's weird.
It's kind of.
Speaker 1 (20:19):
Weird to kind of adapt. Yeah, I mean, I think
you want to. Whereas your mother might have been proud
to do that, the children are much more protected of
their identity and wanting to, you know, become like the
people next door, school friends, not be different.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
And I think that because she was a single mother too,
it was very much like she I think, you know,
when you have two kids under the age of four,
necessarily we're not eating filter fish. So she would eat
alone a lot, not alone with us, but eat her
own meal. And I we did that a lot actually
(20:57):
growing up. You know. My brother loved oldfish and I
loved red meat, and my mom loved whatever, you know,
and we would eat different at the same time totally,
and I was fine. I was actually telling a friend
just now that you know, I eat before I met
my boyfriend that I'm with Noweh, I didn't like to
(21:21):
share food, and I think that that's kind of why,
because we'd go out for dinner and it would be like,
I'll have my thing you have yours. It was weird
for me. Also, small plates restaurants is such a thing now,
you know, thing in London. For me growing up, if
we went out for dinner, I would get a bowl
of pasta, you know, carbonara. Let's say, my brother would
(21:43):
get the prawns with garlic and chili, and my mom
would get the chicken and we wouldn't share. You know.
It was that and my mom. But my mom was
very good at spending that time making what it was
that we wanted. It's a lot of work, but what
it meant was that I'm up until a couple of
years ago, really I was not good at sharing food
(22:06):
were now the only thing that I refuse to share
is soup because I think that's gross.
Speaker 1 (22:11):
Yeah gross, right, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 2 (22:17):
And people also say you shouldn't share omelets, Okay, I
like her. I I don't mind sharing enough.
Speaker 1 (22:22):
Well, it's all about the double dipping, right right right,
But the COVID also changed a lot of job, don't
you sure? Ye sort of fear around around that. Yeah,
and did you have Friday night suppers? Well, I guess
you didn't at.
Speaker 2 (22:37):
My at my mother's family's house. You know, we would
we would go. We would travel up to uh Highgate
by that point where my grandfather was living, and we
do pass over. Definitely.
Speaker 1 (22:50):
Does your father cook.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
My dad does cook, but he cooked my dad's Maltese.
Speaker 1 (22:55):
What is Maltese food.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
It's kind of like a mix, just like the language
of arab and Italian because it's in between North Africa,
Libya and.
Speaker 1 (23:04):
Sicily, so great, great mix.
Speaker 2 (23:06):
It's incredible. But the food is you know, it's also
in terms of produce, it's not the best place. So
like the food is yummy, but it's lots of rabbit.
Speaker 1 (23:16):
You know. The Friday night supper and Jewish households is like,
I guess it's a bit like the Sunday lunch with religion.
You know, Yeah you read did you do the readings?
Speaker 2 (23:27):
And the I did? I had to sing the managed
to know all of that kind of stuff. I mean,
I remember, you know, the actual food on Passover being
just sort of like some horrible cool events. But then
it's like, you know, roast chicken or whatever it was. Yeah,
lots of fish too, And I only started liking fish
a couple of years ago.
Speaker 1 (23:47):
So you grew up really loving food, loving loving to
eat yeah.
Speaker 2 (23:53):
Very much so. And you know, if I was if
I woke up one morning was like, I don't want
to go to school today, A bribe me by taking
me to the bakery before school so I could get
across like it was, you know, and i'd have sometimes
she'd pick me up every Thursday night with a chicken
katsukari before I went to netball, because I don't know
(24:14):
how I did that, you know.
Speaker 4 (24:16):
Yeah, if you liked listening to Ruthie's Table four, would
you please make sure to rate and review the podcast
on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you
get your podcasts.
Speaker 1 (24:37):
Thank you. When you grew up in this household of
your you know, everybody having a meal, whether it was
all three separate foods, and then you left home to
go to did you go to and was that an awakening?
(24:57):
Was it?
Speaker 2 (24:58):
It?
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Was it different? It was apartment.
Speaker 2 (25:01):
I lived in an apartment in Wilston Green with three
people that were in my year but I'd never met
before that time. I mean, I ate a lot of
like things on toast, to be honest, mushrooms on toast.
I had a lot that's good. I'd put like pestle
into my mushrooms and I'd have that on tits almost
every night. There was a fish and chip shop. I
(25:23):
didn't like fish then, so I'd get like a savaloy
and chips.
Speaker 1 (25:26):
Mate, you start liking fish, do you think?
Speaker 2 (25:28):
When I had a year off I went to Fiji,
there was like a sustainability thing that we were living
on this tiny island. And if you didn't eat fish,
that's fun, yeah, very far. If you didn't eat fish,
you had to eat pumpkin. I was like, great, I'll
eat pumpkin. But after a month of eating pumpkin, You're like,
I'm going to die if I don't eat something other
than pumpkin. So I started to try fish and I
(25:52):
got better and better.
Speaker 1 (25:52):
Back eighteen and apart from Malta, did your parents take
you to Italy or to France? Did your supposed to
other cultures of foosh?
Speaker 2 (26:02):
You know, my mom was very busy trying to keep
everything afloat if I went on holiday. I went away
more with my dad, but he took us to some
amazing places. I went to Egypt when I was eleven,
and I remember my dad having pigeon a whole one. Yeah,
a whole pigeon and getting food poisoning, and then we
(26:23):
went to the pyramids and my dad passed out in
a pyramid, which was quite scary. Yeah, so I remember,
you know, I remember going away a lot. You know,
I went away with my dad, but it was mostly Malta.
I didn't like travel a lot, you know, as a kid.
To be honest, I only went to America for the
(26:45):
first time a couple of years ago, and I'm about
to go to LA for my first time.
Speaker 1 (26:49):
So he's La the premiere in La.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
There's there's a screening in La and it will be
my first time.
Speaker 1 (26:54):
Wearing the same friendly dress or do you get to
know a different thing? I think you have to give
it back and that's fine.
Speaker 2 (27:00):
I think it's custom. So I think that's my I mean,
it had my name in the label, so I keep up.
So but yeah, and again it's like, that's what's fun
to me is where am I going to eat in LA?
And where am I going to eat in New York
when I'm there in Paris at all of those things.
Speaker 1 (27:16):
I think that's always like that question when you know,
asking people who do travel for either they're you know,
acting or for other reasons that they have to travel.
They're the people who really research where they're going, to
find out where they're going to eat, and maybe go
to the markets to see, yeah, what's in what's in season,
and what's in the in the market. Do you go
(27:37):
to sleep at night thinking what you're going to eat
the next day?
Speaker 2 (27:39):
I definitely did while I was on this day for
what I love to eat, you know, but I've become
better at understanding what it is that my body needs
at different times. I'm not as obsessed with food as
I have been at certain points in my life.
Speaker 1 (27:55):
How do you feel having finished playing Amy?
Speaker 2 (27:59):
It's been a while since we wrapped, It's been about
a year. But no, it was difficult, you know. It
was I was so invested emotionally and physically and psychologically
in that world, so it was kind of insane to
step out of it. It didn't really feel real. Every time
I see Amy anywhere and hear her anywhere, it's definitely
(28:21):
means something different to me now than it did before.
I'm incredibly proud of what it is that we've made.
And you know, when you get to finally enjoy the
work and sit in the cinemar and watch it with
those people and had the kind of reaction that we
had on Monday night. It feels like, oh amazing.
Speaker 1 (28:41):
You know, before we started, we were talking about comfort
and I was saying that we always ask everybody because
the answers are so different. But if you were to
think about a food that you would go to for
comfort when you were either worried or concerned or sad
or a loss or whatever it was that you just
(29:01):
wanted something that would make you feel better through eating,
is there a comfort food that you would go to?
Speaker 2 (29:07):
Yes. I mean my mom used to make me a
risotto when I was younger, and it was very much
the like Marisa is having a bit of a sad
day and this is what she needs to eat. And
it was a resulto. Really that was probably for about
four people that I ate all by myself. And how
(29:28):
do you know, I don't know how sort of like
authentic it was. I think sometimes she would use like
resorto rise and sometimes it would be like basmati rices.
That's what she had in the fridge in the carpbeard.
But you know it was a bacon and pea resotto
and it was delicious. And now if I'm feeling sad still,
(29:51):
I would call my mum and ask her to make
me the resotte.
Speaker 1 (29:54):
Okay, well then she would. I'm sure you'd have to.
Would you have a bake yourself?
Speaker 2 (30:01):
I don't think it would be the same.
Speaker 1 (30:03):
We can make that. The piece are in season right now.
It so the next time if you come and call
me and we'll make that for you.
Speaker 2 (30:09):
Okay, God, amazing? Why not? Thank you, thank you so much,
thank you, thank you.
Speaker 1 (30:16):
I have that. Yeah, thank you for listening to Ruthie's
table for in partnership with Montclair
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