Kate Winslet may have experienced a sinking feeling on the set of “Titanic” — because according to director James Cameron, she may have been in a little over her head.
“I think Kate came out of ‘Titanic’ a bit traumatized by the scale of the production and her responsibility within it,” Cameron told Radio Times (via HuffPost U.K.) of his 1997 smash hit film that propelled a then 22-year-old Winslet into international fame.
Winslet will finally appear in another one of Cameron’s movies 25 years after “Titanic” in his upcoming “Avatar” sequel. She will play Ronal, a matriarch of the oceanic Na’vi clan, Metkayina.
“We’ve both been eager over time to work together again, to see what the other is about at this point in our lives and careers,” Cameron said.
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He then noted that the “Mare of Easttown” star’s energy has changed a whole lot since the 1990s.
“She’s very large and in charge on set,” Cameron said. “You’d swear she was producing the film!”
Winslet was open about Cameron’s intensity while promoting “Titanic.” She told reporters at the time that Cameron “has a temper like you wouldn’t believe” and that “there were times I was genuinely frightened of him.”
She also spoke of 90-hour work weeks and contracting hypothermia after long periods spent filming in freezing waters.
“You’d have to pay me a lot of money to work with Jim again,” she said at the time.
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Yet, the “Mare of Easttown” star recently told The Telegraph that while the Titanic set was “tough,” Cameron is a “genius” and seems a bit more laid back nowadays.
“I loved doing Avatar with Jim — he is much more calm now. In those days there was no space for him to say, ‘It might not work.’ He had to make it work,” Winslet said. “There were all those conversations about this huge film, ‘Titanic.’ I can’t imagine the pressure. As we get older we learn how to say, ‘I made a mistake.’ We all get better at that, don’t we?”