Kate Winslet has opened up about the importance of being "f**king brave" while filming nude scenes.
The 47-year-old iconic Titanic actress leads in director Ellen Kuras's latest movie, Lee, which debuted at the Toronto International Film Festival.
The Academy-award winner produced the forthcoming film and stars as Elizabeth 'Lee' Miller - the fashion model who became an acclaimed war correspondent for Vogue magazine during World War II.
Before the film’s recent world premiere on Saturday (September 9), Winslet spoke to Vogue magazine about why baring it all for the camera is just another day at the office.
The upcoming movie includes scenes in which Winslet recreates a famous topless photo of Miller. Speaking about the intimate scene in the interview - which was conducted before the ongoing SAG-AFTRA strike - the actress said: "I know better than to waste precious energy on criticizing my physical self.
"I think any woman is better off just saying: I believe in myself. It doesn’t matter what other people think; this is who I am - let’s get on with it," she continued.
Winslet shared more details about her experience filming, saying that she had to be "really f**king brave about letting my body be its softest version of itself and not hiding from that".
"And believe me, people amongst our own team would say, 'You might just want to sit up a bit,'" she added. "And I’d go, 'Why? [Because of] the bit of flesh you can see? No, that’s the way it’s going to be!'"
The Reader star said her own disinterest in sticking to beauty stereotypes is because of how she feels she was treated early in her career. When she was 21 years old, she stripped down to be painted by a young Leonardo DiCaprio in the 1997 blockbuster - famously instructing him to "draw me like one of your French girls".
In the Vogue interview, Winslet explained: "I think it probably stems from having been subjected to the most awful scrutiny and judgment, and, actually, I would go so far as to say bullying, from mainstream media when I was in my 20s."
Elsewhere in the interview, the Mare of Easttown actress spoke about being "patronized" by male executives when trying to raise money for her new war biopic.
"The men who think you want and need their help are unbelievably outraging," she said about the meetings she had with executives. "I’ve even had a director say to me: 'Listen, you do my film and I’ll get your little Lee funded…' Little! Or we’d have potential male investors saying things like: 'Tell me, why am I supposed to like this woman?'"
While Winslet recognized that attitudes towards women in Hollywood are changing, she also expressed that the progress that had been made was due to the #MeToo movement.
"Oh, my God! This is the best part. Young actresses now - f*** me - they are unafraid. It makes me so proud," she said. "And I think, Yes, all the s*** flinging, all the struggle, all the using my voice for years, often being finger-pointed at and laughed at - I don’t give a s***!
"It was all b***dy worth it. Because the culture is changing in the way that I couldn’t in my wildest dreams have imagined in my twenties," she concluded.
Lee also stars Alexander Skarsgård, Andrea Riseborough, Marion Cotillard, Josh O'Connor, and Andy Samberg.
The film does not have a scheduled release date within the US yet.
