Caitriona Balfe, star of “Outlander,” landed one of her first film jobs as an extra in 2006’s “The Devil Wears Prada,” scurrying across New York in expensive heels in the acclaimed Meryl Streep comedy.
“There’s the initial scene where everyone is strolling in front of the (Runway magazine) building, which is when I believe my feet are in it,” Balfe laughs. “I spotted Meryl, but we didn’t exchange pleasantries (on set). I believe we were not permitted to approach too closely.”
Fifteen years hence, Balfe joins the acting legend as a candidate for best supporting actress at the 2022 Academy Awards: Streep will star in Netflix’s upcoming climate change satire “Don’t Look Up” (in cinemas Dec. 10 and streaming Christmas Eve), while Balfe will star in Kenneth Branagh’s coming-of-age drama “Belfast” (in theaters Friday).
Caitriona Balfe, a Dublin native, usually has a Guinness when she goes to Ireland: “It tastes like that nowhere else in the world.”
Balfe is considered a front-runner in the category by Indiewire and Next Best Picture, while “Belfast” is well-positioned for a best picture nomination.
“The reception to the picture has been amazing,” Branagh adds, complimenting Balfe’s portrayal for its compassion and intellect. “She possesses a level of fury that my mother possessed. It’s an exhilarating fury that makes you believe she has the ability to transform the world.”
“Belfast” is based on Branagh’s boyhood in 1960s Northern Ireland during the Troubles, a three-decade-long political and patriotic conflict between Catholics and Protestants. Balfe portrays the kind and steadfast Ma, who longs see her family to remain in their benign Belfast neighborhood despite the rising violence.
Caitriona Balfe and Jamie Dornan, co-stars of “Belfast,” dance together in a scene from the film. “(He’s) Twinkle Toes Dornan,” Balfe joked. “It is not that I am unable to dance; it is that I am unable to learn choreography.”
Ma’s adamant determination to remain in Belfast results in an emotional bus ride with her husband (Jamie Dornan), who advises they leave Ireland to help safeguard their boys Buddy (Jude Hill) and Will (Jamie Dornan) (Lewis McAskie). This is the type of sequence that will pique the interest of Oscar voters.
“I felt her anxiety and anguish: How can you abandon everything and enter the unknown?” asks Balfe, a Dublin native. “Even though this is mostly Ken’s narrative, I immediately recognized Ma. She embodies so much of my mum and the Irish ladies I know. They are impulsive in their wrath, in their love, and in their enjoyment.”
“Caitriona peels down the layers of human fabrication,” Branagh explains. Her capacity to relate “so completely with the agony of leaving” “struck me profoundly.”
Balfe has a personal connection to the Troubles of her own: She relocated to a little community just south of the Northern Ireland border as a young child after her father, a police sergeant, was posted there due to the ongoing violence. She recalls shopping excursions and dental appointments that included passing past British Army roadblocks with troops brandishing machine guns at the family car.
“That was perfectly natural to me as a child, since that is exactly what we observed,” Balfe explains. However, when she was seven years old, she was severely disturbed by a bombing relatively distant from her home: “That was the first time I realized what was occurring. I recall watching it on television and being terrified.” When she was a teenager, the bomb scares persisted, but being up near the border, “it was simply a constant backdrop to your existence.”
Caitriona Balfe is “modest, twinkly,” and “wry” off camera, according to “Belfast” director Kenneth Branagh.
“Belfast” is a film about tolerance and perseverance, as well as a love letter to the films that influenced Branagh’s career (hence the black and white). Balfe discovered her passion for film while seeing “National Velvet” and “All Dogs Go to Heaven,” and began performing in youth theater. She ultimately enrolled in acting school but took a “detour” after being seen by a modeling agency at the age of 18, starring in Marc Jacobs, Giorgio Armani, and Victoria’s Secret catwalk shows.
Following a decade, “I was little miserable doing what I was doing,” admits Balfe, who desired a second chance at performing. “It was one of those ‘Now or never, Balfe’ choices.”
Claire (Caitriona Balfe, left) and Jamie (Sam Heughan) in the fourth season of “Outlander.”
Balfe made her feature film debut in 2011’s sci-fi adventure “Super 8” directed by J.J. Abrams. However, it was her major performance as the time-traveling Claire in the Starz drama “Outlander” that garnered her thousands of admirers. She recalls receiving the phone call informing her of her casting in 2013, while visiting with a friend who had just put her children to bed.
“It was the most subdued I’d ever been while taking a job. ‘I can’t wake the twins!” Balfe asserts. Balfe acknowledges “Outlander” for providing her with “invaluable” training and “confidence” as she prepares for the show’s sixth season, which will premiere on Starz next year: “After a long-running television series, everything is possible.”
Balfe revealed in August that she had given birth to her first child with music producer Tony McGill, her two-year spouse.
Although she hasn’t slept well over the previous couple of months while promoting the film, Balfe believes that “having a kid is the most fantastic thing.” “It’s been a balancing act, but it’s good to have my old life back along with this adorable little child.”
Caitriona Balfe, a Dublin native, usually has a Guinness when she goes to Ireland: “It tastes like that nowhere else in the world.”
Balfe spent a lot of time on the set of “Belfast” with her child co-stars and their mothers, which “in some ways pushed me to go for it and have my child,” she says. “I believe that if I could have the same relationship with my kid that they do with their moms, he would be ecstatic.”
As a new mother, she also feels a stronger connection to her role than she did throughout the film’s production.
“Ken (Branagh) contacted me immediately after giving birth and said, ‘Does this mean we have to do reshoots now?'” Balfe asserts. “I thought, ‘Perhaps we should make a precursor, with just me and Dornan attempting for an hour and a half to put a baby back to sleep.’ I’m not sure that would work as well.”
