I've been lucky enough to interview Robin Hood star Connie Nielsen twice now – once during press for said MGM+ show and the other while at her Scandinavian cabin months before Gladiator II hit the big screen – and both times I've come away feeling profoundly moved.
Nielsen is both a natural fit for playing sophisticated royalty and for stories with direct, important moral messaging. It's easy to see why she was picked for Eleanor of Aquitaine in Robin Hood: each time she opens her mouth, sage wisdom appears.
When I asked Nielsen about it, she responded with the most brilliant one-liner I've heard during an interview: "Celebrate your power, for God’s sake."
Robin Hood's Connie Nielsen has more words of wisdom for you... so listen up
When I ask Nielsen if Eleanor in Robin Hood is a timely watch for young women, she says, "I definitely think so. But it's worth noting that women throughout history (and we're talking thousands of years of history)...have invariably made power for themselves, and it's over and again."
"Women have been, like, erased. Well, it's only because, you know, some history books have devalued, decommissioned, deemphasized, but they existed, and they always have. They and their stories are actually out there, from famous mathematicians to astronomers to scientists to writers and Queens."
She continues, "When I was doing prep for playing the Queen of the Amazons in Wonder Woman, I read this incredible book, by an anthropologist at Stanford, called 'Amazons'. She pointed out that female scientists had DNA tested all of these fabulous warrior graves that had been found all over Eurasia and found that the most famous, including the 'Golden warrior', were female. Others had just made the assumptions, and they were all males at the time.
"If they had a sword, they had to be a man, and if they had a pot in their grave, they had to be a woman. These assumptions were based on their own prejudices, which in turn created more prejudice in our minds. It informed our view of who we really are or what we can be. I think one of the great things about living right now is that those assumptions can be truly contested. And I am here to tell every one of you that you are unique – don't take any of those assumptions in...celebrate your power, for God's sake."
Doesn't that make you want to kick a door down? Add this to what Nielsen's Eleanor is saying in Robin Hood episode 8, and there's literally no stopping us.
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