Emily Watson: I see a quality in Aisling that I recognized in myself as a young actor: She draws you in. On the set of “God’s Creatures” [the family drama in which they co-star], I found myself watching her a lot. It’s such a skill to be able to quietly hold all that emotion and let it dribble out.
Robert Altman said making movies is like building a sand castle on the beach — then you sit back in a deck chair with a beer and watch the tide take it away. You can feel very alive with a project. But each one comes to an end, and you sort of sink back into not knowing who you are. I have a network of younger actors I like to look out for because it can be confoundingly lonely. You can lose yourself in something, and then bang, it’s done, and everyone’s gone.
I’ve been through phases when I’ve felt like a leading lady and then, five minutes later, I’m playing a mum in a bonnet. There was a time for me, before the landscape of television started evolving, when I thought, “Is this it?” But when I hit 50, instead of being put out to pasture, I noticed things started getting interesting. Actresses get so much better when they stop trying to be sexy.
Aisling Franciosi: I’ve always thought of Emily’s career as a road map: She’s an actor’s actor, an artist. Putting the quality of the work first isn’t necessarily the thing that gives you the most visibility. When I did “The Nightingale” [a 2018 historical thriller set in an early 19th-century Tasmanian penal colony], I wanted to prove I could do more than just play a teenager. I think it’s a powerful film, and I remember not caring what anyone thought because I was so proud of it. But I’d be lying if I said it did what some people thought it was going to do for my career. It’s become a running joke in my family — the number of times over the past decade I’ve been called the “star of tomorrow” or “one to watch.”
So much of this industry is driven by the hot new thing. Entering my 30s, I am not, objectively speaking, the hot new thing. My ambition now is just to be able to make a living as an actor for as long as I can.
Interviews have been edited and condensed.
Hair: Liz Taw at the Wall Group. Makeup: Kelly Cornwell at A-Frame Agency
