When Kate Winslet was approached to do an English-language narration for an Icelandic documentary she didn't realise her life was going to change so dramatically. The 36-year-old Oscar-winning actress and mother of two had a busy enough life without adding more to the list. The documentary, called A Mother’s Courage – Talking Back to Autism, tells the story of one mother's experience with her non-verbal autistic child, who is now 13.
“The mother, Margret Ericsdottir, had been told [her son, Keli Thorsteinsson] was retarded and would never function like his peers,” says Winslet. “She had really given up hope and had decided that even if she couldn’t do anything for her child, at least with this documentary she could try to help other families and other children, simply to raise awareness about the mysterious condition that autism really is.”
UNDERSTANDING AUTISM
Autism is a complex disorder that affects a person's ability to interact with the world around them. It has wide ranging levels of severity with signs including poor language development, unusual or repetitive behaviours, and difficulty interacting with other people.
Approximately one in 160 individuals have autism, with males being more likely to be affected than females.
While Ericsdottir was making the documentary, she came across a technique known as Rapid Prompting Method (RPM). The controversial technique was designed by a US-based mother and teacher, Soma Mukhopadhyay, and had been successful in helping non-verbal autistic children to communicate.
“Ericsdottir tried the technique with her son and he began communicating for the first time ever,” says Winslet. “She had never believed that he could hear her, or comprehend what she was saying, or what the people around him were saying, but it turned out he had been able to do all these things, but [had never been able to] communicate them.”
“Having narrated the documentary,
I was so moved by Keli’s story that I found myself feeling that I had to do something more. I couldn’t just let this experience happen to me and then walk away,
having been educated somewhat about the condition of autism, which remains very mysterious and for which there
is no known cure.
“There are many non-verbal autistic individuals who have brilliant brains, but they’re completely trapped, locked inside their bodies,” says Winslet.
Michael Fitzgerald, professor of psychiatry at Trinity College in Dublin, cites Isaac Newton, Albert Einstein and George Orwell as successful people who showed signs of autism. He argues that autism can produce people who are highly focused and can persist with a topic for years without being distracted.
A GOLDEN IDEA
Determined to do more, Winslet kept
in touch with Ericsdottir, and the idea
for a book came from a poem Keli
had composed with his teacher called
The Golden Hat.
“It’s about a hat, which – when put on by an autistic child – magically enables them to speak, to enter a world where they are free of the condition. My idea was to use a hat of mine, and to ask as many famous people as I could to photograph themselves with it on, and then to put all these photographs in a book together with Keli’s writings,” she says.
“Initially, the project was quite small-scale, but the idea caught on so quickly that I got to the point where 40, 50, 60, 70, 80 and now over 100 people had taken a photograph for me.”
The book, The Golden Hat: Talking Back to Autism, is being published by Simon & Schuster in April 2012. Among those featured in the book are George Clooney, Jude Law, Anna Wintour and Meryl Streep. Everyone in the book has also given a quote to accompany their picture.
After the book was in motion, Winslet realised she needed to do more, which is when she decided to establish the not-for-profit Golden Hat Foundation. “The aim of the foundation is to build assisted-living communities so that when autistic individuals reach an age where they need to be relatively independent of their parents, they will have a safe place to live where they can receive an education, job training and enjoy recreational activities … It’s a huge, exciting undertaking, but I’m very, very determined to make it a success,” says Winslet.
Her hard work is not going unrecognised, and earlier this year she won the Yo Dona International Award 2011 for her humanitarian work with the foundation.
BACK TO WORK
Winslet is also busy promoting her next film, Carnage. Directed by Roman Polanski, the comedy tells the story of two couples who come together one afternoon to try to resolve a dispute between their sons. “[In the film] my son has hit [the other couple’s] son with a stick and knocked two of his teeth out. They want the boys to make up, so they’re trying to be conciliatory and fair-minded and to make everything work. Then, however, the story just turns on its head and it becomes all about the problems in their marriages, and it’s really very real, and very funny at the same time.”
“My character, Nancy, is an investment broker, a very full-time working mother, who doesn’t have as much time with her child as she probably should … She’s trying to be the best version of everything she can be and kind of failing at everything. So that’s a challenge for me, because I don’t like failure!”
The film also stars Jodie Foster as the other mother involved. On working with Foster, Winslet says: “It’s like working with the most finely tuned piano you could ever possibly play. She knows something about everything. She’s very calm, really warm, very supportive. We’re quite similar, I think, in the way that we work, and the way we like to support the other actors and really be there.”
The Many Faces Of Kate Winslet
SUPERHERO
Winslet helped to rescue Richard Branson's mother from a fire at his Caribbean holiday home.
AWARD WINNER
Guy Pearce and Winslet won Emmy Awards for their performances in the drama Mildred Pierce.
PHILANTHROPIST
In June, Winslet was awarded for her humanitarian work at the Yo Dona International Awards.
LOVING PARTNER
Winslet is currently dating Richard Branson’s nephew Ned Rocknroll (he changed his name by deed poll).
