Kate Winslet says the line between reality and fiction became “blurred” when she filmed alongside her daughter, Mia Threapleton, on a new drama about mental health. I Am Ruth, which will air on Channel 4 later this year, is an instalment of the Bafta-nominated and female-led drama anthology series I Am, created by filmmaker Dominic Savage.
The fictional storyline for the two-hour programme, which looks at the mental health crisis affecting young people in the UK, was developed and co-authored by Winslet and Savage. She told Radio Times: “It’s a funny one, because the line between what’s real and what isn’t definitely becomes blurred.
“Normally as an actor you can set yourself some fairly robust boundaries so that you are, to a certain degree, emotionally protected from what you sometimes have to deal with. But I knew that all those boundaries had to disappear on this.”
Threapleton, 22, whose credits include the 2014 film A Little Chaos and a new TV adaptation of Dangerous Liaisons, described the experience as “intense during some of the heavier moments of filming” but generally “good fun”.
Winslet said her daughter had wanted to “feel really free and not watched or judged or helped, and actually that has been brilliant, adding: “What I have been able to see as her mum is that she is staggering and that she doesn’t need any help from me at all.”
I Am Ruth follows two previous series of I Am films, with the first set starring Vicky McClure in I Am Nicola, Samantha Morton in I Am Kirsty, and Gemma Chan in I Am Hannah. Series two saw Suranne Jones in I Am Victoria, Letitia Wright in I Am Danielle and Lesley Manville in I Am Maria.
Each of the films followed the experience of women in particularly raw, thought-provoking and personal moments.
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