THREE weeks ago, Lara Belmont was a student drugged and left for dead by psycho Jonathan Cake in Marc Blake’s two-part ITV thriller The Swap. Then, for the next couple of nights, she was in 19th-century St Petersburg, on BBC2, as spiritual prostitute Sonia in Tony Marchant’s adaptation of Crime and Punishment.
Lara Belmont in The Swap: ‘I love the idea of doing something that you feel passionate about, but I hate the idea that people know who you are’
Add to this her role as a clubber pursued by a murderous spook in Marcus Adams’s horror film Long Time Dead, which opened in January, and one can’t help concluding that, so far, it has been quite a year.
On screen, Belmont is pale, petite and distractingly pretty, a remarkably relaxed actress who both looks her 20-odd years (her exact age is a state secret) and can also radiate a melancholic knowingness far beyond them. Whether the vehicle is good (The Swap), bad (Long Time Dead) or mixed (Crime and Punishment), she quietly, almost involuntarily, walks away with scene after scene.
In the flesh, she is no less alluring, but she also has a skittish energy that has not yet made it on to the screen. She enters the central-London bar where we meet with a big smile, a firm handshake, and a flurry of apologies for being so late. Her tardiness is the result of protracted preparations for her latest project, Ashes and Sand, a film adaptation, by director Bob Blagden, of Judy Upton’s play of the same name, in which she stars opposite Lock, Stock . . . alumnus Nick Moran.
The play was first seen at the Royal Court in 1994, with Samantha Morton in the lead. “I’ve taken her role,” says Belmont, her accent betraying a childhood divided between south London and Gloucestershire, “though I probably won’t do it as well!” The role in question is Hayley, the leader of a gang of girls who try to get some money together to escape their native Brighton, and the story is about the cracks that develop in their friendships and plans.
“Hayley,” says Belmont, “is a very intense, highly intelligent, in-yer-face sort of girl, and the film is really high-energy. I really wanted to do something like this, and I’m looking forward to it. It’s very easy,” she continues, apparently reflecting on past performances, “to be in front of the camera and be quite low, and be quite ‘in yourself’ - it’s much easier than to break out and really act. It’s very easy to be quite sullen.”
“Easy”, it must be said, is not a word that one would associate with the role with which Belmont made her name, and which is likely to remain her most notorious. Despite having modelled intermittently since the age of 13, she had never considered acting - until, so legend has it, she received a tap on the shoulder while out shopping one day. Is the story true?
“Hundred per cent!” she replies in sing-song tones. “I was cruising along Portobello Road with my sister and my friends, and before I knew it there was a Polaroid in my face, and then one thing led to another - it was a whirlwind, I guess.”
The mystery photographer was a talent scout for British actor/director Tim Roth, who was casting for his 1999 screen adaptation of Alexander Stuart’s pitch-black tale of incest, The War Zone and within weeks Belmont, unknown and untrained, had left her sixth-form college to play Jessie, the frequently naked daughter of Ray Winstone’s monstrously abusive Dad.
Critical opinion was polarised. On the one hand, Belmont was almost universally praised for her performance. (Artist Sam Taylor-Wood spoke for the multitude in describing her as “totally open and natural”, and was so impressed by her that she made her the tearful star of her silent film Breach, at her White Cube²’s exhibition last year.)
On the other hand, The War Zone reignited the age-old debate about the ethics of nubile young actresses disrobing for middle-aged men in the name of cinematic art.
What Belmont’s perspective on this chapter in her life will be in 20 years, one can only speculate. Certainly, she appears to have taken it in her stride. “It was all right,” she says breezily, pinching a Marlboro Light. “I’m pleased I got the chance to play Jessie. It was an opportunity I just wasn’t going to throw away - even,” she adds, “if it did mean getting my kit off.”
Belmont may be on the foothills of fame, but she does not entirely relish the prospect of reaching the top, and is even considering returning to college at some point. “I hate the idea of being spotted on the street now,” she says. “I was walking down the road to see my sister one morning, and this guy was suddenly just walking along with me sounding off about stuff I’d done. I don’t like that. I love catching the bus, I love catching the Tube, I like being able to pick who I talk to. I love the idea of doing something that you feel passionate about, but I hate the idea that people know who you are.”
Belmont is hardly the first person to say this. But, in an age groaning with putative Pop Idols for whom celebrity is all, the means a distant afterthought, this is one young performer who seems to have her priorities straight.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/arts/main.jhtml?xml=/arts/2002/03/02/btvclass0.xml
