Felicity Jones on Train Dreams, survival skills and the art of choosing the right roles

Words: Rosamund Dean
Photography: Hollie Fernando
Styling: Nicky Yates

Felicity Jones thinks she’d make a pretty good trad wife, actually. “I’m definitely an outdoorsy spirit,” she says. “One of the things that appealed about acting was that I imagined being outdoors all day on the moors like a Brontë. And there’s definitely a sense of nostalgia-core now, where we want to get back to nature.” She pauses, and laughs. “But then you go camping for a week, and can’t wait to get back and put the heating on.”

Speaking from her London home, the 42-year-old actress looks neat and bookish, with her glasses on, hair tied back and a neck scarf over her black sweater. But in her new film, Train Dreams, Jones got to live out her wilderness fantasy. Based on Denis Johnson’s 2011 novella about the simple yet devastating life of a railroad labourer, the film stars Joel Edgerton, with Jones as his wife, who is left at home for long periods to care for their young daughter in Prohibition-era Idaho. She says the film is about “what it means to be alive, through understanding how close we are to death”.

In one scene, she fashions a fish-catcher out of willow branches. Did she actually build it herself? “Well, I got very good at tying a single knot continually, for every take of that scene,” she laughs. “But I did skin a goat, so there was some method acting involved.” Wait, what? An actual goat? “There was a scene in the script where my character skins a goat and I didn’t want to be doing that for the first time on camera. I needed a bit of prep. So I drove out to a farm in the middle of nowhere and I learned the skill and meticulousness of that process. To understand my character’s mindset, you can’t be squeamish or sentimental. She’s having to hunt and fish to feed her family from the land. Living in London, I love that idea of having to navigate nature.”

They filmed in Spokane, Washington, which has a similar landscape to early 20th-century Idaho. “Part of it for me was an escape from the digital intensity of the world,” adds Jones. “The idea of filming in a log cabin in the middle of nowhere just really appealed at this point in my life.”

The actor has two children with her husband, director Charles Guard: a five-year-old son and three-year-old daughter. “Joel, the director Clint Bentley and I all have children of a similar age, and we were able to take our families out there,” she says. “There was a culture behind the camera, as well as in front of it, which felt quite nourishing. That’s not the case for all filming experiences.”

Jones cut her teeth as a child actor on The Worst Witch and then on The Archers (which she continued alongside studying English at Oxford in the 2000s). She dipped into the Star Wars universe with 2016’s Rogue One, and portrayed the iconic US Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg in 2018 biopic On the Basis of Sex. Let’s also not forget that she is also twice Oscar-nominated – once for her role as Stephen Hawking’s wife Jane in 2014’s The Theory of Everything, and then for last year’s The Brutalist, where she played a Jewish-Hungarian Holocaust survivor.

Gucci silk crepe de Chine body top, £1,330, nappa leather caban jacket, £5,210, and pencil skirt, £2,920, and patent leather mid-heel pumps, £975

Interestingly, Jones says the film that people mention to her most often – particularly in the UK – is Chalet Girl, a snowboarding rom-com she made 15 years ago. “It’s fascinating to see which films people effervesce about,” she smiles. “It’s often ones that make them feel good. They tell me they’ve watched Chalet Girl five times!”

Making that film feels simultaneously so long ago and “like yesterday”, which is true for many of us when we look back on our 20s. “I haven’t changed that much,” Jones says, before adding with a rueful smile: “I had more freedom then, and fewer responsibilities, although you only know that in retrospect.”

Jones is all about the balance so, while she’ll enjoy looking through Instagram, she still buys print newspapers and magazines because she loves the tangible element of turning the page. She adores fashion, attending the Prada show at Milan Fashion Week in September, and looking spectacular in a custom metallic silver Armani Privé gown at the Oscars back in March. “I love the imagination in the fashion industry. It’s like another side of artistry,” she beams. Perhaps trad-wifery is not for her after all.

Her enviable career is also all about this sense of balance, encompassing award recognition and mega-budget fan favourites, intelligent dramas and wholesome comedy. Out in December is one such comedy: Oh. What. Fun., in which Michelle Pfeiffer stars as the matriarch of an unappreciative family. Jones is the eldest daughter, and the tension between them is by turns hilarious, heartbreaking and highly relatable. “Comedy felt like the perfect way to explore this story because, like most mother-daughter relationships, there are a lot of laughs as well as tears,” she says. “And it’s still so rare to see a central female protagonist, so that appealed to me, too.”

Her on-screen husband is played by Jason Schwartzman, and siblings by Dominic Sessa and Chloë Grace Moretz. “We became like a funny little dysfunctional family,” she laughs. “It was hilarious because there are scenes where we’re supposed to be ignoring our mum, because we’re taking her for granted. Michael [Showalter, director] would say, ‘Can you stop looking at her and being so receptive?’ And we were like, ‘It’s Michelle Pfeiffer. We can’t sit there ignoring Michelle Pfeiffer!’”

This Christmas, Jones will be at home in England with family. She likes to be cold at this time of year, and loves festive traditions. She laughs as she tells me that Schwartzman was horrified at the idea of hiding a coin in the Christmas pudding, then pouring brandy over it and setting it alight (apparently something they don’t do in America). “He thought I was a crazy person! But I love to get stuck into all of the old quirks.”

With small children, of course, this time of year is particularly magical – although she fears that her savvy kids are sceptical about Santa. “With our five-year-old, I feel like he’s already starting to twig,” she says. “He gets very involved with the chimneys: ‘Well that chimney isn’t open. How is he going to get down? That’s just a decorative fireplace…’ He’s really into the logic of it, but I’m praying and hoping that we can extend his imagination for as long as possible.”

With a storyteller like Jones for a mother, I imagine the Christmas magic will be kept alive for many years to come.

Felicity Jones’ travel essentials

The actor reveals her highly efficient travel kit – and the one question she'd ask a pilot

How do you beat jet lag?
Get yourself on the right time zone as quickly as possible. Don’t lie in bed past 2pm – not that I have the opportunity to do that any longer.

What’s one item that you never travel abroad without?
My passport? I’m quite an efficient gypsy nowadays. I used to take scented candles and things with me, but now I’m much more hard-boiled. I’m in and out.

What’s your best holiday souvenir?
Ceramics. I bring back bowls and egg cups and mugs from all different countries. It’s such a pleasure to remember a place through something you use all the time.

What question would you ask a pilot?
Is turbulence bad? I know they’d say no, it’s totally normal. But still I never quite get used to it.

Train Dreams is in select UK cinemas from 7 November and on Netflix from 21 November. Oh. What. Fun. is on Prime Video from 3 December. The Brutalist is showing on board selected flights now