Kate Mara is excited about the prospect of getting older - because of the career opportunities she believes are ahead.
Kate Mara
The 33-year-old actress - who is best known for starring in Netflix drama 'House of Cards' - insists she is looking forward to the advancing years, even though many of her peers fear it, because all of her screen idols are older and producing some fantastic work.
In an interview with website Refinery 29, Mara said: "I get excited about getting older because the women that I look up to typically are much older than me and doing much more interesting things than I'm doing. And yeah, I know younger women that are amazing as well. To me, it's just something that I look forward to. But I do think a lot of that has to do with my upbringing, so I know I'm lucky in that sense. I also just try not to focus on it, because it's just fear. And I don't know when fear really helps anybody succeed. So I'm trying to keep a check on that because I know that it is a big deal in our industry."
Mara believes she has a positive attitude to the ageing process because her mother Kathleen and grandmother always had a relaxed attitude to the natural process.
She said: "My mom never made a big deal about getting older. She still doesn't, and my grandma never did. I have a huge family, and the women in my family have never put a great deal of energy into that in a negative way. So even though I'm in this industry where that is a huge part of the discussion, and ageing is seen as a negative, ageing, to me, so far, hasn't been a scary thing. I do find it interesting that people never lie about their age in the opposite way. They never say they're older than they are. It's always the opposite."
However, Mara still has youth on her side at the moment and that helped her tackle her own stunts when shooting new sci-fi thriller 'Morgan'.
She said: "I surprised myself sometimes. This is the most physically demanding role I've ever done. There was lots of training, before and during the shoot, and I did almost every one of my own stunts ... in heels."
In preparation for her role as corporate troubleshooter Lee Weathers - who has to decide the fate of the genetically engineered super-human protagonist of the title, played by Anya Taylor-Joy - Mara took up boxing, ballet and Pilates and was trained in weapons, did drag racing and had extensive stunt training too.
Mara shared: "There was nothing serious luckily, but yeah, Anya and I - and our stunt girls - would all get together at the end of every day and compare bruises. But we got lucky we didn't get injured [even though] we did do everything. We did all the stunts, except for flying out of a window from the second floor. It was challenging and so much fun. We were really happy to get the chance to do that."
Tagged in Kate Mara