It has been a very busy year for actress Rachel McAdams. She started off by romancing Ben Affleck in Terrence Malick’s To The Wonder before playing a cutthroat advertising executive in Brian De Palma’s Passion. Now she’s stepping into the role of an American living in England in Richard Curtis’ About Time.
The film stars Domhnall Gleeson as Tim, a 21-year old man who has traveled to London to become a lawyer and ends up falling heads over heels in love with Amy (played by McAdams). Tim, however, discovers that he has the power to travel in time, and he ends up inadvertently erasing his first encounter with Amy while trying to help a friend. As a result, Tim continues to use his time travel capabilities in order to meet Amy and win her heart all over again.
Recently, McAdams showed up for a press conference at the film’s LA press day. While there, she spoke about what it has been like doing so many time travel movies, why she keeps coming back to the romance genre, what it was like to eat at a restaurant in the dark and more.
Check it out below!
How did you like the bangs?
Rachel McAdams: The bangs were fun. We just kind of played around with her (Amy). It was also trying to go from younger to older, and bangs just automatically scream young. But it’s so funny because it’s actually a piece so that we could go quickly from young to older, and we forgot to put it on one day (laughs). My hair stylist was like, “Wait! The fringe,” and she’s running after me with this little piece of hair and I was like, “Oh my God! How could we forget?” So that was slightly embarrassing and I probably had to do that over again. But it just seemed like her.
This movie couldn’t be any different from The Time Traveler’s Wife, but was there a pitch meeting where you said no I’ve done enough time travel movies?
Rachel McAdams: I didn’t actually really think about it because I just read the script and loved it. I loved the sentiment behind it. I’ve actually never played a time traveler for all the time travelling movies I’ve done. I sort of took myself out of the equation again and I’ll have to make amends on the next time traveling film I do.
I just fell in love with the story and where these characters wound up, and I was just kind of swept away on Richard’s journey. It really wasn’t until press when people said, “You know this is like your third time travel film.” I wasn’t counting them and I was embarrassed. I hadn’t thought about that (laughs).
Do you have any time travel envy or anything like that?
Rachel McAdams: Apparently I do (laughs). I would love to be a time traveler next time. It’s a fun construct, isn’t it? It’s really an enticing thing to indulge in and fantasize about. It’s like winning the lottery and thinking about what you would go back to and do it again. But I love that sentiment. Maybe just to embrace what happens, and it’s that whole idea too that your mistakes make you stronger and better. It’s the messiness of life that ultimately leads you to the most interesting things. Everyone asks what you would do over, and I don’t know because then you have this story to tell and if you did everything over and made it perfect, what would you talk about?
Is there something you’d like to relive?
Rachel McAdams: I guess time with family. My grandparents, my mother’s parents, died when I was quite young, so to be able to go back and to know those people as an adult. Things like that.
