Italian Marie Claire
May 2001
By Rossella Venturi
Translated by Luciana

Talented, cultivated, gentle. Fiennes the youngest: so perfect that he refuses to become a celebrity

He's pale, all eyes, endless eyelashes. And unmistakably British. Intelligent, cultivated, professionally very well prepared. A long and prestigious career in the theatre, a brain that insists on keeping his passionate nature from indiscreet glances. He constantly attempts to direct any attention to something other than himself. He rambles, changes the subject, pretends it all has nothing to do with him, and he's gentle. Nobody who has worked with Joseph Fiennes, aged 30, Ralph's little brother, could help falling in love with him. Cate Blanchett, whose lover he played in "Elizabeth": "His talent goes beyond any imagination". Bernardo Bertolluci, who first discovered him in "Stealing Beauty": "He has a subtle quality which is almost Zen".

Jean-Jacques Annaud, who directed him in Enemy at The Gates, a love-story set during the siege of Stalingrad which is being currently released: "intense, serious, with an immense wish to do the best". And besides, he dances very well, ride horses just as well, plays football, climbs mountains. After Shakespeare in Love, Hollywood offered him everything: Joe has chosen a month at London's Royal Court, and then a vacation in Canada, in a Buddhist retreat. Once he was back, he worked in a small independent film, Rancid Aluminium, followed by six months in India. Recently, he refused $ 1,500,000 for Polanki's "The Pianist" so that he could play Edward II by Christopher Marlowe at a theatre in Sheffield. After Enemy at The Gates, he has already worked in two other films: Milcho Manchevski's "Dust", and "Killing Me Softly", Chinese director Chen Kaige's first film in English, a story of eroticism, thunderbolt. Ah yes, he has also won the MTV prize for Best Kiss.