A JUMP TO television brought eminent
theatre ACTRESS Marta Dusseldorp
starring roles and a new kind of success.
By Sophie Tedmanson. Styled by Kate
Darvill. Photographed by Hugh Stewart.Flip the
ctress Marilyn Monroe once said: “We are
all of us stars, and we deserve to twinkle.”
There are some stars who strive to shine
and others who are quiet achievers. And
then there is Marta Dusseldorp. Equal parts
screen siren and serious thespian, Dusseldorp
is that rare breed of actress who had enjoyed
steady work in theatre over the past two decades, before she
decided to switch to the small screen where she is now revelling in
a career renaissance as one of the most in-demand leading ladies
on television, starring in three shows on two networks.
It was, interestingly, Marilyn who inspired the young, ballet-
obsessed Dusseldorp to become an actress. Tall, poised, and
handsomely beautiful, Dusseldorp is the physical antithesis of the
curvaceous sex bomb Marilyn portrayed herself as. But at heart
they both share the same passion for their craft.
“I was obsessed with her,” she says with a grin. “I had a life-sized
poster of her and I watched all her films. I had a tape of her singing
and would sing with her, there was something about the depth of
her voice. And then I saw her in The Misfits and thought: ‘There is
something about you, you are not what people think you are.’”
The same could be said about Dusseldorp: a woman with
disarming depth, and a remarkable velvet-smooth voice. Her
honeyed tones are featured in myriad voiceovers, and upon hearing
Dusseldorp speak, a woman sitting at a table next to us turns around
and recognises the actress, who until then had passed incognito.
It is early morning, the day after Dusseldorp’s 42nd birthday,
and we are at cafe near her home in Sydney’s eastern suburbs. She
has already dropped her daughters Grace, eight, and Maggie, five,
to school – it was Maggie’s first day in Year One: “Don’t get me
started or I’ll cry,” she waves her hand to hold the emotions at bay.
Dusseldorp is halfway through her order of salmon on toast, but
asks the waitress to put the remainder in a bag so she can take it
away. “I’ll have it later in the car as I race to the next thing; that’s
how I do it all, eating on the run,” she exclaims.
The previous evening she had celebrated her birthday with a date
night with her husband, actor Ben Winspear, who first surprised
her with breakfast in bed – homemade lemon meringue pie – then
later took her to see a Sydney Theatre Company play, followed by
post-show martinis. It was a double celebration for Dusseldorp,
who four days earlier won the Australian Academy of Cinema and
Television Arts (AACTA) award for best actress in a TV drama
for her role as Janet King in the eponymously titled legal series.A
script
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