Abbie Cornish, Madonna Talk 'W.E.'
In her second time behind the camera Madonna intertwines two separate love stories taking place at different times with the same themes and emotions in both stories.
"W.E." is about the stories of two women who are separated by more than six decades. In 1998, a lonely New Yorker perceives what she thinks is the ultimate love story: King Edward VIII's abdication of the British throne for the woman he loved.
But as the New Yorker, Wally Winthrop played by Abbie Cornish, researches the story more closely she uncovers a life that was not as perfect as she thought.
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"We would be naive to believe we have any personal relationship with any iconic figure in the public, really. Our relationship is totally objective and removed,'' says Riseborough, who plays role of Simpson, the infamous mistress who forced a king to abdicate the throne.
The story weaves back and forth in time and the film intertwines a journey of discovery with the contemporary romance of two people in New York that occurs decades later.
"I think Madonna was inspired by women who carved their own path, and lived within a male-dominated culture,'' said Cornish.
"She gave me a bunch of books to read, before we started shooting the film, of artists that inspired her, like Frida Kahlo…people who really went for it, regardless of what society was saying. Because I think Madonna is like that.''
Madonna was obsessed with the idea of how people involve themselves with the lives of celebrities and how the two interact. That was her drive to produce the character Wally Winthrop.
"I liked the idea of examining the cult of celebrity," Madonna said. "That Abbie's character would be looking at this story and thinking, 'Wow, I want that,' the way people do with famous people. They think that they have this kind of a life, and so they follow them around with this fairy tale notion of who they think they are."
