Frances de la Tour reflects on ‘odd’ decision to cut gay scene from Love Actually
Harry Potter actor originally shared a moving scene with Anne Reid
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Your support makes all the difference.Frances de la Tour has called the decision to cut her scene from the 2003 romcom Love Actually “odd”.
The Harry Potter and Seventies sitcom star had shot scenes for the film as a woman called Geraldine, the terminally ill partner of the headmistress (Anne Reid) at the school attended by Karen’s (Emma Thompson) son.
The audience was supposed to see a moving scene in which the pair bicker over their differing tastes in fancy sausages and display wicked senses of humour, before cuddling up at night.
It is later revealed during a school assembly that Geraldine died shortly before Christmas.
“We had a lovely scene,” De la Tour told The Independent in a new interview. “And I think it was the only gay scene. It’s odd that they cut it. Maybe it was too dark to bring into it. Because it ended up being quite a light and fluffy film, didn’t it?”
She added that the film’s director, Richard Curtis, wrote to her, saying: “We’re terribly sorry, but it’s got to be cut.”
There are only heterosexual couples in the final edit of Love Actually.
“I was really sorry to lose this,” Curtis can be seen saying of the scene on the DVD’s bonus footage.
“The idea was meant to be that you just casually meet this very stern headmistress, but later on in the film we suddenly fell in with her and you realise that, no matter how unlikely it seems, any character you come across in life has their own complicated tale of love.”
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