Woman's Hour - Julianne Moore, Dame Mary Berry, Prevalence of forced sterilisation

Episode Date: December 6, 2023

Academy Award-winning actor Julianne Moore plays Gracie Atherton-Yoo in Todd Haynes’ newest film, May December. The film tells the story of a married couple who were at the centre of a notorious tabloid relationship, and the actress doing research on them for a film about their past. Julianne joins Krupa to talk about the controversies within the film, and how it’s already been tipped for the Oscars. Lina Mookerjee had been married to her husband Richard for more than 15 years when he lost both his sight and hearing. Lina is now as much a carer to Richard as she is a wife. Lina and Richard join Krupa to share their story and discuss what they describe as the ‘invisible’ work of carers. Dame Mary Berry joins Krupa to discuss her one-off TV special ‘Mary Berry’s Highland Christmas.’ She tells us how her Scottish roots have inspired her latest festive recipes and gives us some tips for entertaining this Christmas.The New York Times has just published an investigation into the prevalence of forced sterilisation of disabled women in Europe, even when the procedure is not medically necessary and despite it being banned under multiple international treaties. New York Times reporter Sarah Hurtes met with families who have chosen to sterilise their daughters and women who have undergone sterilisation procedures. She joins Krupa to talk about what she found and we also speak to German politician Katrin Langensiepen who is one of the few visibly disabled members of the European Parliament. She’s pushing for a strict Europe-wide outright ban on non-consensual sterilisation.Presented by Krupa Padhy Producer: Louise Corley

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Natalia Melman-Petrozzella, and from the BBC, this is Extreme Peak Danger. The most beautiful mountain in the world. If you die on the mountain, you stay on the mountain. This is the story of what happened when 11 climbers died on one of the world's deadliest mountains, K2. And of the risks we'll take to feel truly alive. If I tell all the details, you won't believe it anymore. Extreme. Peak danger. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, this is Krupal Bharti and you're listening to the Woman's Hour podcast. You might be starting to think about what to cook up over the festive period. Well, we have some inspiration in store for you. In a few moments, Dame Mary Berry will be sharing her twists on classic Christmas recipes. And we'd like to hear yours. They might be tips for the turkey, tricks for the nut roast or spins on the sides. How have you reinvented your Christmas dinner?

Or maybe you've a Christmas dinner dilemma that we can try and put to Mary as well. I'll also introduce you to Lena and her husband, Richard. Lena got in touch with Womanzawa wanting to share her story about being Richard's wife and carer after he lost both his sight and hearing. They share with us the challenges they have faced and how the dynamics of their relationship have changed. Lena also wants to be a voice for people she calls silent carers. If you are a carer for your partner,

some of their experiences may resonate. And we'd like to hear from you on this too. If you prefer, you don't have to share your name. You can text the programme. That number is 84844. On Instagram and X, formerly known as Twitter, we are at BBC Women's Hour. And of course, you can email us through our website. And over on WhatsApp, you can catch us on the number 03700 100 444. All of our terms and conditions can be found on

our website. The New York Times reporter Sarah Hertz will be telling us about her investigation into the non-consensual sterilization of disabled women in Europe a little later in the programme. And daring and complex, just some of the language used to describe Julianne Moore's new film May December. The multi-award winning actor joins us to talk about her role as Gracie, who was the subject of a tabloid scandal when she was caught having sex with a 12-year-old boy. I'm looking forward to that chat and also hearing your comments on any of the stories we are covering. But let us begin with an icon of home cooking, one of the UK's most recognised and loved food writers and broadcaster's day, Mary Berry.

She's been teaching us to cook for over six decades and has written over 80 cookbooks. We've also followed her recipes on our TV screens since the 1970s and she's probably most fondly remembered as a judge on the Great British Bake Off and Britain's Best Home Cook. At the age of 88 she has no thoughts of retirement and Mary's been busy working on another treat for us, a one-off Christmas television special called Mary Berry's Highland Christmas, which you can watch on BBC One and BBC iPlayer from Wednesday the 13th of December. And she joins me now. Hello, Mary. Oh, hello. Very good morning to you. Now, this series sees you visit the Highlands. Why did you want to go to Scotland to make this show?

Well, first of all, I didn't want to do Turkey again. So I thought, I've always been very influenced from my mother, who was a Scot. And I thought I'd love to go back to the Highlands and do some Scottish twists and also meet a few and teach a few Scottish people. I chose Andy Murray, the tennis player. He wanted to sort of up his game and do a bit Scottish people. I chose Andy Murray, the tennis player. He wanted to sort of up his game and do a bit of cooking. And that was lovely for me. And also Emily Sandé, the singer,

you know, a member she sang at the Olympics. She was sort of quite a novice. And we did a bit of cooking together. So I like teaching. I'd love to hear more about your mum, Mary. You know, we talk about what you are teaching us, but was she someone who taught you the kind of ins and outs of cooking and all those tricks? She was a good home cook and always made use of what was available. She'd open the fridge door, that we had vegetables in the garden,'d set to and cook and she'd also cook from her Scottish heritage. She was a good cook but it was my domestic science teacher mistake to actually taught me to cook. Your inspirations. Now in this TV piece which is wonderful I watched it whilst I was cooking myself It was very inspiring. We see you making classic mulled wine, inspired by your time spent working in the Alps as a chalet girl.

Tell me about that. Well, I wanted to ski and I'd just begun to learn. And so with a very good friend, Penny, we hired a chalet near the start and we then sent out uh there was no no um computers and things like that so we wrote to all our friends and said we've hired a chalet would you like to come for a week it'll cost you uh 11 pounds a week you have to get yourself there and we'll cook for you and And because they're all friends, they also always did the washing up and things like that, which was very nice. And we had a wonderful time. But of course, it was different then.

And we cooked a lot of dishes that they really lovely warming things and a nice cake when they came in. It's lovely to hear those stories about your life, Mary. As I was I was watching the programme, as I said, I was making dinner. I was chopping onions whilst I was watching you boiling onions for your fennel and onion tart. I have never considered boiling onions, so I learnt something there. But here's something else I learnt. You also used sweet potato in a slaw.

I didn't even know you could eat it raw, Mary. Well, I have the same team. Lucy Young's been with me 33 years, Lucinda, 22 years. And they're still young and have lots of young ideas. And we experiment a lot. And to boil onions for our tart, they keep their shape just a little bit, and then they take the colour.

And we put in the slaw sweet potato as an experiment, and it was perfect. And I love celeriac, and it really worked very well. And they're in raw, and the juice of the lime and the vinegar stops them discolouring. And it had lovely crunch to it, a lovely flavour of mustard and honey. Really good. And a few dried cranberries chopped in at the end. I know, it looked beautiful. I shall be trying that one.

You're also seen preparing some more traditional staples like a pavlova, a smoked salmon. How do you come up with new twists? Well, it's quite easy because there are sort of newer ingredients. I mean, there's a huge fashion at the moment for kale. I do put a bit of kale in, but I really love cabbage, you know, the pointed cabbage, absolutely delicious. And there are all sorts of things that come and become popular and we try to include them. I know that you don't just want these recipes to be for the festive period. Why is that important to you, not just for Christmas Day, but really all year round? Well, it's to extend one's vocabulary. One of my real favourites is the Highland beef pie. In Scotland, you know,

there's still many butchers there and you buy a certain cut for a roast and something like shin of beef needs long, long, slow cooking. It's more reasonable and it makes a wonderful pie and i put lots of celery and garlic a good slugs of red wine plenty of thyme and some pickled walnuts and uh pastry puff pastry of course which i have not made you know oh we were talking about this yes i mean really there's there are a few things i'm that uh take time to make. There's so many other things to do to plan for Christmas, isn't there? So where else do you cut corners? I think we need a few tips here.

Where else can we cut some corners? Buy the puff pastry is one. Oh, yes. Buy the puff pastry. Also, I often do lovely chocolate cake or something like that at Christmastime or a Boucher Noël, which we do in the programme. And I would buy the decoration for it, definitely. And I often have some truffles that I'll put on top of a cake rather than doing a lot of piping and faffing about.

OK, so there are a few tips from Mary there. Here's a message from Michelle who says, oh, stuff the turkey for Christmas. It hangs about for too long and all that cooking time is not for me. There are five of us this year and I'm doing a chicken casserole with white wine and mustard dumplings. It will cook all by itself with the minimum of fuss. But of course, there will be Christmas pudding. Thanks for your message, Michelle. There is something to be said about that, the stress of Christmas.

And again, back to cutting corners. How can we ease that stress mary well um a grouper i think the great thing is to sit down with a large piece of paper and do a bit of planning and do as much uh as you can in my head um i do my roast potatoes the day before to almost perfection and then I re-roast them just to crisp them up. I do lots of things ahead. I mean if I'm doing something like the pavlova I would make the pavlova a few days before and carefully put it in a cupboard covered in foil so no one can pinch it or see it or break it. It's a matter of planning and thinking what can we do ahead? What are we going to serve over the Christmas period? You know, just plan a few meals. And it's amazing when you sit down and

think now how many are coming? What am I taking to a friend? Am I going to take a box of shortbread to a friend or something? You get organised. The problem is, I find, Mary, Christmas just creeps up on you when you talk about being organised. But before you know it, it's Christmas Day. It certainly is. And that's why we've really got to sit down and do as much as we can ahead. So start writing that list.

It must be easy. It must not be complicated. Don't choose recipes that take ages to do. You know, choose things that you're familiar with and maybe add a little bit of a twist, as I've done in my recipes for Highland Christmas. We, of course, live in a space now where you can just pop to the shops

and everything is ready made. Why is it worth going to all the effort of making these wonderful homemade recipes then well i think it uh take shortcuts if you want to and why not i mean even buy a few pizzas that for emergencies and then you can add other toppings on top i do that and make them sort of extra delicious. In this morning's papers, I spotted some figures that stood out for me. The cost of the average Christmas, Mary, has risen to £1,800. The turkey came in at £64. The other food at around £123.

What do you make of the rising cost of Christmas food? I think it's very sad. We can't do anything about it. Therefore, we must choose some easy, not so expensive to serve over the Christmas period. I mean, something like a kedgeree you could have on, which is what I did with Andy Murray. It's not expensive. It can be prepared ahead or a fish pie. And just put a little bit of the very expensive ingredient in it. You can always cut down on a fish pie, putting a bit less fish in. And if it's got hard-boiled eggs in, put more hard-boiled eggs. And if it's something like the Highland pie, you can decrease the amount of meat and put a few more vegetables.

But always open the fridge door first when it's a family occasion and think, what can I do with things that need using up? I do like your encouraging attitude, Mary. I want to talk about your Christmas. The smells of Christmas are always centred around food, aren't they? What's the smell that reminds you most of Christmas? Do you know, it's mulled wine. Actually, I was at a gardening club last night and we were all given mulled wine. And as you walked in the door, the waft of that wonderful mulled wine um it it's warming

it lifts you up and thinks uh it's christmas absolutely absolutely i'm sure many would agree with that and what's on your christmas menu what's on our christmas menu we're certainly having on christmas day we're having a turkey um and i shall do all the stuffings ahead. And I do an open dish of stuffing and I will cook that ahead. And then I've got a small Christmas pudding, which I made last year. And it's been kept cold in the freezer and I shall thaw it and use that. I shall have lots of brandy cream and brandy butter and a lot of vegetables too. Is fondue going to feature?

Sorry? Is fondue going to feature? Fondue certainly will. It's a lovely thing to have New Year. I did that with Ian Sterling and you can use things like leftover roast potatoes. If you cut them up and re-roast them into pieces you can dip that into

the fondue and of course you could, even if you had some sprouts you could put them on a stick and put them on a fork and put them into the fondue. Fondue's easy. Yes, mental notes, yes, yes. And it's fun. And it's another thing to share, isn't it?

I must ask you before I let you go about TikTok. Do you know you've become a hit with the young people of TikTok? There are old videos of you online there from the 1970s. TikTok. You know, to be honest, I really don't know what TikTok is. It's everywhere. And if the young are learning from my videos and things, I do hope that they enjoy it because, first of all,

I think of myself as a teacher and sharing my skills and showing people things that I enjoy. Well, you need to get the young one showing you what TikTok is and get you on your own channel. Thank you so much, Dame Mary Berry. We do wish you a wonderful Christmas and Mary Berry's high-end Christmas can be caught on BBC One and BBC iPlayer from Wednesday the 13th of December. And of course, you can find many of Mary's recipes over at BBC Food Online. Next, how does a relationship change if you have become a carer for your spouse?

One of our listeners recently got in touch to share her story and that has been featured in the iNewspaper headlined, How My Marriage Survived After My Husband Became Blind and Deaf. Lina Mukherjee had been married to her husband Richard for more than 15 years when he lost both his sight and hearing. Richard has retinitis pigmentosa and was 38 when he found out he would one day go blind. By the time they met more than a decade later, he had already lost some of his sight

and around six years ago, he went fully blind. However, neither of them were prepared for him to rapidly lose his hearing at the same time. Lena is now as much a carer as she is a wife. She does everything functional for Richard, including cooking, driving, making those important phone calls and constantly narrating every scene to him. I spoke to Lina and Richard earlier and asked Lina why she got in touch with Women's Hour to speak about this.

I feel very strongly about giving voice to the thousands and thousands of carers who are the silent invisible workers that society, much of society today, choose not to acknowledge or even value. And it was my way of giving voice to those of us in this position, from young carers right the way through, and also for those suffering with sensory disabilities which are hidden and as we said we tick so many boxes in terms of our isms we don't fit into mainstream society and often treated as oddities and I'm saying no no no there's many oddities it's just that we're honest about them and we can't hide them. Well, I'm glad you did.

And your story and what I understand about it is very powerful. Richard, I want to learn more about you. You were a very independent person. What impact did losing your hearing and eyesight have on you? They were quite different, Cooper, because losing my sight was something I knew was happening very progressively. And I can anticipate it and in a sense planned for it to some degree and adjusted to it over time. Whereas my hearing declined really quite rapidly, entirely unexpected. And I had learned to rely on my hearing to compensate for not seeing.

So that's been a much more significant, much more painful process and much more isolating. If people say, well, would you rather lose sight or hearing? I would rather lose sight. Hearing isolates you. I've been losing my eyesight since I was born. It's a progressive condition. I was registered as partially sighted at the age of nine.

I was registered as blind, technically blind, by the time I was 36. But I still had quite a lot of usable residual vision left, whereas my hearing was really good until about five or six years ago. And that's been the most disempowering thing for you? It has. It has, really, yes. I can't take part in conversations. I can't hear people say hello. I don't know whether they're talking to me.

There's just a mumble of sound. Lena, it's interesting that Richard said he was anticipating the loss of his sight. But I wonder for you, what went through your head when Richard started to lose his hearing as well as his sight? First panic and dread and the, oh my God, this is really happening. And it was a bit of a joke in our earlier life, in our married life that, you know, I've lost my sight and I've got excellent hearing. That's fine. The contract had changed on some level,

but it was absolute terror because I just thought, how on earth are we going to function? And loss. So the panic of trying to keep going and to make things work was bloody hard. Yeah. And you've even used the word anger you've used the word being angry as well and that's very honest of you oh yes because um the anger was with the world you don't realize the loss until it's really gone so the anger was very much about my powerlessness i couldn't make this better I couldn't make a difference to make this better because sensory loss, there is no making better. Because once it's gone, it's gone. And that's a very disempowering, lonely place to be. And anger was my protest. But it's not useful. It can be useful if you can use it effectively but in my case well no because there

was no way I could make this any better for Richard and ultimately for both of us. It's interesting you both used the word lonely there but you had each other. It's lonely because it's the rest of the world that you're excluded from or have to feel the need to exclude yourself from because it's so hard to cope with going out in into social environments because i can't function and nina either interprets all the time in other words talks to me translates if you like because she has a microphone around her neck and i have a receiver around mine and i can hear her unless of course the background noise is so loud i can't hear her but there's so much distortion.

So many people think if you've got a hearing problem, it's simply a volume problem. For me, it isn't at all. I can get a lot of volume, but my hearing is distorted, so I can't hear. I can't hear music anymore because it sounds like it's all off-key. So I've lost that too. Things that you used to enjoy so very much.

Absolutely. Lena, at marriage, we talk about being with one another, standing by one another's side in sickness and in health. What has that come to mean for you? I think for me, it's about being honest with myself of where am I in this relationship now and being respectful to me and to Richard to say as is. So standing by each other literally has meant digging into the deeper, darker areas of relating, including the hurt, the the mutual anger the mutual frustration and walking alongside the suffering because at the end of the day as i said earlier i can't make

it better but what i can do is alleviate some of the loneliness and suffering by being a companion in that suffering and that to me is standing by and including my wedding vows, which were about, yeah, in sickness and in health. And by goodness, well, I have been tested and I'm glad that I have gone to those dark places and will continue to do so. It's a progressive loss, but I know I have the stamina and the bigger reason to be with Richard is because I love him. When you're in those dark places, you're understandably concerned about Richard, but what about you? Who do you turn to in those dark places? Well, that's been fascinating, Krupa,

because we were part of big social circles, because we were, we were part of various groups and friends, and the testing out of those early days of who is going to be with us and be with us in this suffering. And I quickly began to realize that there are friends and there are stamina, the want and the love to be with us. They can't understand what it's like for us. You can't live with it.

But be prepared to listen, not have to look for solutions, but there aren't many. And at the end of the day, I have to dig deep within myself. And the early hours of the morning of the test, when I'm wondering, will I find a way through this in this panic? And I'd have and will continue to do so. And therapy has helped, really helped me. I was going to say, I'm glad you've had some support.

But in those early hours, when you're lying away, looking at the ceiling, thoughts going through your mind. Do you do you turn to prayer? Do you do you turn to I mean, what's your what's your routine to kind of shake it off and crack on with caring for richard and being there for him the big thing is about self-care so the self-care about and you said you know you said something really important about shaking it off movement movement is one of the greatest antidotes to when you freeze and that's the panic because literally when you're feeling when i'm feeling powerless i freeze so to move to swim to exercise to get out into the world as a sighted person,

because I'm not non-sighted like Richard. I still have my faculties. I'm making sure those needs are still met and I have choice. So my yoga practice, my writing, my gardening. Gardening has been an absolute salvation for us both. We're both therapists. We've enabled people all our working lives to grow and to see growth through plants and to feel that and to enjoy that. It's been absolutely healing. So you both garden together and that's your happy place. It's quite an element that I enjoy because I can,

if I can create an environment where I'm not disabled that much, so the greenhouse is my is my scene because things are within reach and i know where they are and i know what i planted um and that way i can really enjoy it because it's just delightful and i've been growing things i've never grown before this year oh the power of nature lena i want to kind of move into some difficult territory because you have had individuals in your life who have said at various points, leave Richard. They have indeed.

And in fact, when I have been told, and I can remember saying, trade him in for a younger motor. Why are you wasting your life? You know, why put up with his stuff when you should be out with people who are enjoying life? So that honestly, for quite a few years, put me into a bit of a spin because I start to doubt what my priorities are. And maybe I am missing out. Maybe I am confused about my commitments. And when an expression has been shared that, oh, thank God, Richard, it's you and it's not me that's got these conditions, my heart just drops and it's dread thinking, wow, is that the fickleness of human compassion?

So, yes, I have been tested and very much about what is my commitment and loyalty? What do those words mean? And they're honourable words for me because as we go back to the sickness and in health, it's standing by in good times and the not so good times.

But we come back to a level where there's profound love and that's out of respect as well. And I know that you fall back on this concept that is rooted in the Hindi culture, really, of seva. And that's a hard word to translate because it's more than just selflessness, isn't it? Seva, as we say in Bengali, is very much about the walking alongside suffering and the fact that human existence is full of suffering as well as joy but what you

get from it to knowing that as we've always said isn't it richard this is palliative care of the longitudinal life because it is we know it's coming into decline we've all we knew this when we were when we got married because it's a 25 year difference between us in years. But I knew that. And however naive it was at 30, I knew it was going to come to some change, profound change, and it has. But Sheva to me is the greatest respect of showing love. I cannot make him better. I cannot make me in the situation better. But what I can do is show my commitment my strength and

and joy that actually we can look at life and go there's more than this or this it's all of this there's there's the honoring of what's in shadow and not seen but actually let's live it we've come to experience each other in marriage let's live it to the full and by god we've done it continue to do that lena i've just spoke to lena for the past few minutes and she sounds like a remarkable woman what does having her by your side mean to you you've said it she is remarkable and because we have both given high priority in our existence to valuing honesty as much as we can, we've learned to be extremely honest with each other and talk about the sorts of questions many people might choose to avoid,

like, do you want to leave me? Are we going to separate? Do we go our separate ways? We were talking the other day, and I used the phrase ringing the most out of life, using the word ringing with a W. And Lena said, yeah, and it's doing that without the W as well. We ring the bells of real extreme delight that we can enjoy as much of life as we can. We've had problems doing that, of course, the humour as well, been frail. It's helped enormously.

Thank you to Lina and Richard there for their honesty. And to the many of you getting in touch on this, I hope I can get through all of them, but I'd like to share some of those accounts now. Kate writes, I'm a full-time carer for my husband who has young onset Alzheimer's. It's exhausting. I often feel like I'm running on empty and have to push myself to keep going. Some days my sense of me disappears. And this listener writes, my husband was diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer in March 2022 and given months to live, but has somehow survived longer than expected. I gave up work to look after him.

It is a pleasure and privilege to care for him. But as I have effectively become his care coordinator and nurse, it has dramatically affected the dynamics of our relationship. I am filled with gratitude that he has survived this long, but have to accept that this is a different phase of our marriage. Amidst the business of pharmacy trips, hospital appointments, phone calls to the GP and specialist teams, etc. And this message.

I care for my husband who has Parkinson's disease and my mother who has Alzheimer's. I presently have no time to begin to try to express how life changing it is or how I grieve every day for the relationships I used to share with them. There is no respite and no one who properly understands what I'm feeling. Thank you to all of you who have shared your experiences with us. And I do hope I can read out a few more of them later in the programme. If you'd like to share your thoughts on what you've just heard, that text number is 84844. You can, of course, email us or contact us on social media at BBC.

I'm Sarah Treleaven, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who was faking pregnancies. I started, like, warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth.

How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story, settle in. Available now. Now to a multi-award-winning actor whose career in film and TV has spanned almost 40 years and earned an Oscar for Best Actress. In her latest film, May December, Julianne Moore plays a woman who has been the subject of a tabloid scandal when she was caught having sex with a 12-year-old boy.

She has his baby in prison and 20 years later they are married with more children and a film is being made about what happened. It's a story that questions truth and how we see ourselves as well as the impact of trauma and denial. Let's hear a bit of it. Why do you want to play me in a movie? I want to find a character that's difficult to understand. What would make a woman have an affair with a seventh grader? So good. I have an idea of what's thinking around with you. Must have felt like, I shouldn't have said that.

No worries. What were your expectations? That my children would love me and my life would be perfect. A little naive. I am naive. And Julianne Moore joins me now. Hello, Julianne. Hi, good morning. How are you?

I'm very well. Thanks for being with us. Tell us more about Gracie, who you play in this film. She's a complex character, isn't she? Oh, my gosh, to say the least. I mean, I think it's such a compelling story and heartbreaking. You know, this is a woman who crossed a boundary, you know, who made a major transgression. And here we are 20 years in the future. And I think the narrative that she's projecting about herself and her choices is maybe not exactly, you know, what happened,

but it's certainly how she sees her story. And she's sort of desperate for others to see it the same way. And we should say that this film is loosely based on Mary Kay Letourneau, an American teacher who married her pupil in the early 2000s. And that was a big tabloid drama at the time. How much was your character then based on her? Well, you know, Sammy Birch, who's a really tremendously talented screenwriter,

grew up in the 90s, sort of in the midst of all this tabloid culture. And so she was examining those stories and our reactions to them and used it, I'd say, used the Mary Kay Letourneau story as a template. But it really is very much a template. This is not, you know, I'm not playing Mary Kay Letourneau. But, you know, Mary Kay was someone, like I said, who, like Gracie, also who transgressed but, you know, married her, you know, married Willa Fulau and they raised a family together and they were together until she died, I think, of cancer much later.

And a large part of the interaction between your character Gracie and Elizabeth played by Natalie Portman is Elizabeth observing Gracie so she can play her role in that film that they are putting together. Can I ask is that something that you do as an actress for all your roles? I think we all do I mean the funny thing about this is that I actually as an actor you know my character is someone who's a home baker. And there's also a scene where I arrange flowers. And so when we got to Savannah, Georgia, I spoke to someone who's a home baker, so I could learn, you know, all the techniques that I could I could use in the film. So Natalie could watch me doing it. So she could play me in the film. So it was a very sort of meta experience. A lot of people watching one another.

That's right. Yeah. And we do it as actors, you do it because you want to do it correctly, because inevitably, there's going to be somebody in the office in the audience who is like a home baker or is a florist who's going to say that's not how you do it. So you always want to put a finer point on your actions. And I'm always astonished and really touched by people's generosity, how often they'll let you observe them, how careful they are to share the details about what they do. Yeah. And in the film, Elizabeth speaks to some students and tells them that she likes to play complex characters with, I quote, moral gray areas. Does that ring true for you at all? And is that why you wanted to play Gracie in the first place? I think I like to play human beings. You know, I'm really interested in behavior and what

it means to be alive and how we relate to one another. I like the drama of relationships. You know, I'm somebody who's really compelled by real life, I think, and I'm interested in portraying it. And talking about relationships, what was it like working with Natalie Portman, who plays Elizabeth? I love her. I love Natalie. We'd only known each other a little bit socially over the years, and I'd sent her an email when I saw Black Swan

because I thought it was such an exquisite performance. And so I was really, really excited to work with her. She's someone I admire tremendously. But I think, you know, in person, she superseded all of my expectations. She's just a lovely human being and was a great partner. And we worked very closely together. You know, it was a really intimate partnership.

And I loved every minute of it. She's just extraordinary. It wasn't just an intimate partnership. When I was watching the film, I found it very intense. Your relationship, the relationship between Gracie and Elizabeth, it felt combative.

It felt complicated. Would that be your assessment? I think it's a battle between them over who gets to tell the story and how the story will be told. You know, Gracie is desperate for Elizabeth's approbation. You know, she really wants to be seen, but Gracie wants to be seen the way that she wants to be seen. You know, she's telling the story very, very deliberately. And I think the pressure that she feels from Elizabeth is

evident, you know, when you see Gracie's private moments where she's so incredibly, you know, volatile emotionally. You have taken on a wealth of roles, Julia, and over your 40 years in the industry, you've been a porn star on Boogie Nights, a woman with Alzheimer's and still Alice, a 1950s housewife in Crisis in Far From Heaven. Are there any roles that you would not consider taking on? That's an interesting question. I don't know. I mean, I don't, you know, it's, you know,

roles don't exist until they're in front of you, right? So every assessment that I make is based on a script, based on a screenplay. So I, you know, I read it and I think to myself, well, is this something that I can do justice to? Is this something that I'm interested in immersing myself in? And I've been so fortunate that I've had such a variety of opportunities and so many wonderful characters to play. And one of those characters was Sarah Palin. I mean, I wonder whether there are any roles you found particularly difficult, like picking up Sarah Palin's accent, for example? Yes, I think whenever you're playing somebody who's very present in popular culture,

you know, when we have a knowledge of them about how they speak and how they move and what they look like, I think the bar is set pretty high. Because people have an idea about them. And if you get it wrong, if your voice is off, your mannerisms are off, then right away you've lost the audience. You're like that does. They're like, that doesn't work. I don't believe her. So that's that's always challenging for an actor. Yeah, absolutely. Some of our listeners might have seen you in the film Sharper released on Apple TV earlier this year. And that was also centered around a lot of deception. It looks like it was a lot of fun to be a part of, though. It was so much fun. It was so much fun.

It really is. I think, I don't know, it's an old-fashioned movie, you know, where things aren't quite what they seem. And there are like a number of really surprising reveals. And I mean, I love that script. When I first read it, I wasn't able to get ahead of it. That's what I loved about it. Suddenly I was like, oh read it, I wasn't able to get ahead of it. That's what I loved about it. Suddenly I was like, oh, wow, you know, it was way ahead of me. Yeah, yeah.

And the other thing I want to talk about is the Screen Actors Strikes ongoing for a number of months. What impact did that have on you personally? I think it was tremendous. I mean, it had a lot of impact on a lot of people. It was very tough, I think, for people to it. It was enormous. I think we're very, very grateful to be back to work. I think we feel good about our contract and onwards. I'm glad to hear that's been a positive outcome for you. When you're not acting, you are writing children's books, which was a surprise, I have to say. Tell us about Freckle Face Strawberry. Well, honestly, it's been a long time since I've written those children's books, but they were,

it was a series of books about a character, a little girl, seven-year-old girl with red hair and freckles. And it was when my children were growing up that I wrote them. And I so enjoyed, I enjoyed that character. I enjoyed having that to read to my children, reading to other children. It was really, you know, you're so immersed in that world when your kids are little. I mean, my kids are now 21 and 26. So I'm not quite in that children's book world anymore. But I do understand it's going to be turned into a musical in the US. It was, it actually was a musical and it ran for quite a while. Brilliant.

Brilliant. That's great to hear. And talking about theatre, do you have any plans to go back to theatre? I do believe that's where you began your career. I do have tickets to see a couple of Broadway shows right before Christmas. I'm very excited because we're all going to go see Merrily We Roll Along and then we're going to go see Sweeney Todd. So that's something I love doing at Christmas time. You know, we all go, my husband and my son and my daughter and my son's girlfriend. So we're very excited about that. And would you ever consider a return to theatre yourself? Oh, you know, possibly. I don't know. You know, it's like, you know, once again, it's sort of, I sort of, I think people think that we have a lot of control over what comes our way. But one of the interesting things about my career is that I never know what's going to pop up.

Yeah. You never know what's going to pop up. Do you have any idea, therefore, what's coming next for you? Is it more filming? Is it theater? Who knows? I have a movie that I'm actually going right into rehearsals in January, but I can't say what it is just yet. You're teasing us. I know. I'm so sorry. But I wonder, are those roles changing or getting harder to get as you

get older? What's the reality of being an older actress? I don't think it has changed much for me, honestly. I mean, I've been, I think one of the things I love about my work and that's been so kind of amazing, it's very unusual to have a career where your peers are all ages. You know, when I think about it, you know, when I first started out as an, I was, you know, 22 and right out of school, you're sort of thrown into the deep end. You're expected to be kind of professional right out of the gate. And you have all these peers that might have a lot of experience or no experience or whatever. And now at this point in my life where I've had a tremendous amount of experience, I'm working with people sometimes who are my age or who are much younger. And there's sort of a variety of ages and experiences. And there's something really wonderful about that, that your peer group is always so dynamic

and always changing. Yeah. I want to bring this round full circle and back to the film May, December, because we've talked about it being a complex movie. It involves a criminal offence, abuse of power, and a minor. What do you want people to take away from watching this movie? It's interesting.

That's a question that we get a lot. What do you want people to take away? I don't know. I think what I want... This movie doesn't draw any conclusions. It asks people to experience this story from multiple points of view. And it doesn't end, you know, I've had a lot of people say to me, well, what happens? What happens to them? And I don't think the film gives you an answer.

It's like the movie ends on an inhale rather than an exhale. Absolutely. movie ends on an inhale rather than an exhale absolutely it's so provocative it's really so provocative and and the behavior is fascinating and your point of view keeps shifting all the time so i'd say i think i want people to go and and have an experience um that's that's that's emotional and intellectual and and really i want them to draw their own conclusions julianne moore on your new film may december thank you so much for joining us here on women's hour thanks so much for having me and i'd like to bring in a few more of the various messages that we have been getting in on the subjects that we have been discussing we were hearing from lena and her

husband richard lena is richard's wife and carer now. Olivia writes, it is so refreshing and important to hear more stories about carers as well as hidden disability. I cared for my dad who was diagnosed with a brain tumour and it was a privilege and a challenge. I felt a lot of guilt whilst bringing up two young children simultaneously. He died in March and I miss him so much. I miss caring for him too. He has left a big hole and now I'm left trying to make sense of everything. Nina writes, I work with unpaid carers and we're about to run a Christmas support group and quiz. Contact with other carers is brilliant and transformational. Thank you, Nina, for that message. And this listener writes, I've

been a carer for my husband of 45 years for 10 years after he developed Parkinson's. I have found the loss of our normal social life holidays and sharing of household tasks very, very difficult. We have no children, so there is nobody to help bear the burden. And I've been on a roller coaster of emotions over the years from despair to grief and anger. I cope through seeing a lot of friends being in a walking club and bridge club and praying. Thank you, Gail, for that message. And like Lina was saying, getting out, moving, exercising is so very, very important.

And a message to bring you on the subject of Christmas lunch, which we were talking about with Mary Berry. She says, this message writes, having made Christmas lunch for my large family for many years single-handedly, I now cook the turkey and my grown-up children and their partners bring all the other trimmings. That is perfect. Well, thank you for your message. And we do hope you have a wonderful Christmas wherever you are listening to us from.

I'll try and bring more of those messages towards the end of the programme. I'm joined now in the studio by a woman who's just published a powerful report in The New York Times looking at the prevalence of non-consensual sterilization of disabled women in Europe. She is Sarah Hertz. Even when the procedure is not medically necessary and despite it being banned under multiple international treaties, this is still happening. Her investigation examines the ethics of non-consensual sterilization, which is most often sought out by parents and caregivers, and the complexities of the law surrounding it. To discuss this, I'm also joined on the line now by the German Green Party politician Katrin Langen-Zippen, who is one of the few visibly disabled members of the European Parliament. But let me start with you, Sarah. Welcome to Woman's Hour. Hi. Well, thank you.

Let's start with your investigation. It went on for a year. That is a long time. Which countries did you focus on and why? Yes. Initially, we were looking broadly into Europe. And I started focusing on Belgium because that's where I live. Looking at France, that's where I'm from. And also Germany because of its history. And as I was speaking to different people, I came across Iceland, which has a small disability unit in its government that looks specifically at helping disabled people.

And so Iceland also became a target country for this research. Can you, before you reveal to us what you actually found, give us a sense of the numbers that we are looking at, the numbers of women impacted by this, and also the laws surrounding the various procedures? Yeah, it's incredibly hard to put a number on this, because often the data is non-existent. I know that, for example, in Belgium, I found at least three, four hospitals that have cases of women, maybe two, three a year

that are sterilized without their consent. In Iceland, it's also very difficult to say. In France, I heard that at least two, three cases of women are sterilized also per year without their consent. And when it comes to, you know, the legal ground for this, often in countries it is banned, but there are exceptions. Often if people are deemed incapable

by the state, then it is okay for a guardian to take that decision on their behalf. Now, you didn't look at cases in the UK, but in the countries that you did look at, what did you find? Well, you know, initially, I was brought to this topic, because I was told that mental institutions were forcing women to be sterilized. But the reality was much more is much more complex and nuanced. I think 20 years ago, at least in some European countries, that was the case, it was a policy for women to be sterilized before being admitted in mental institutions. But today, it's not so much the case. I think now it's more parents

who do it in the private realm, sometimes for women who are mildly disabled, who have autism, schizophrenia, and who they feel will never be able to parent and also because they fear being a grandparent themselves. And other times it's also for women who are very, very disabled who cannot themselves consent and parents just make the decision on their behalf also. Yeah. And that leads to some very complex territory to kind of navigate in terms of morals, ethics, emotions? Yeah, when you talk about forced sterilization, I think for a lot of people initially you feel it's a horrible thing. It is a human rights violation. But the problem is when you actually encounter caretakers and parents who truly want the best for people who are severely disabled

and who sometimes feel like their periods or a pregnancy would actually be in you know harm them and so they take the decision wanting to protect them and love them in a related issue is um hysterectomies which which which was interesting tell us about what you found there. Yeah, what I found is that, in fact, sterilization, depending on the country, is defined differently. So in some countries, it's defined as any operation that hinders fertility. But in some countries, it's strictly tubal ligation. And so the cutting of the tubes of the woman and also vasectomy for men. Also, I just want to add that the reason we're talking about women mainly,

even though this also happens to men, is because women carry pregnancies, and so that's why they're most targeted by this. But, for example, in France or in Iceland, tubal ligation is counted as a sterilization, so it's strictly monitored. So it would be much harsher, let's say, the penalty if you did that to a woman without her consent. But a hysterectomy is seen as a medical treatment. And so it's more accepted and it is still done to do a hysterectomy, let's say, as a medical treatment to remove periods from a woman who is severely disabled. But in fact, it can also be done, as I've seen from my reporting, you know, as the same as a tubal ligation just to make sure that the woman will not carry a pregnancy. One of the other reasons that you talk about is abuse, the fear of abuse.

But of course, these procedures don't actually prevent abuse. Yeah. One of the main reasons also that parents do want to sometimes sterilize their disabled children is because they fear that they will be sexually abused. Now, it doesn't prevent the abuse, but it prevents a pregnancy. And that's often their thinking. And, you know, the reality is also that I have met a lot of women who are disabled and who were sterilized. And, you know, it was just heartbreaking to see how many women had been sexually abused. And so parents' fear is real. But, of course, the solution is not right. Just so we get an understanding of context, what more can you tell us about the cases in the UK? So in the UK, what I found, even though I didn't look

into it specifically, is that at least on a legal basis, it depends, for example, in England and Wales, it's specifically covered as an offence, forced sterilisation. In Scotland, it's not specifically covered, but I think there's a law of assault that broadly covers it. And in Northern Ireland, it's not marked as a specific criminal offence. But I think that, you know, the key takeaway also from this is that it's not because it's marked as a criminal offence or that it's banned in some way that it doesn't happen. Because often these decisions are taken, you know, in rooms, in private rooms between a doctor and a parent who will do this without it anywhere being marked. Let me bring in Katrin Langen-Siepen here, who is one of the few visibly disabled members of the European Parliament. Thank you for being with us, Katrin.

What is your response to the abuse that Sarah has uncovered in this report? Yeah, horrible stories. And it's what Sarah said and found out. It's not new. It's a hidden secret, I would say. Everyone knows that it happened and there's no official critics or critical voices. Women and girls with disabilities are not, they are no woman. They are persons. That is a woman without uterus. It's unbelievable to think about, to believe or to see it. A woman with disability has a sexual life. So, and the only sexual contact must be violence.

And to hidden future pregnancies. And how can we avoid it? So we take the decision because you are not able to take it. And here the lawmaker, we as politicians, as parliament say that is violence. And when we try to forbid it and have a law, European law, for sterilization. Any violence against women and girls with disabilities must be there in that law. And that's why we are fighting for. But don't underestimate the voices who are pro-force sterilization and don't understand what the problem is. Just so we're clear, you want a total ban by all countries on sterilisation of women with disabilities. And you're campaigning for this at the European Parliament.

Yes. Tell us more about that. There are still 14 member states where forced sterilisation is legal. In Germany, it's forbidden officially, but it's a reality of persons or women and girls with disabilities. So it is a taboo. And with that debate and campaign and law we show, it is against human rights. Almost all member states ratified the UN CRPD,

the UN Convention on Persons with Disabilities. And here it must be crystal clear, women, persons with disabilities have to decide. So it's a question of education. Do I get all the infos? How can I deal with the infos? Is there an independent partner on my side who could give advice and not, yeah, yeah, we talked about it.

As long I agree that is the best for me that I get sterilized. And some women don't even know what happened to them. It's a surgery. Oh, by the way, we can cut here and there something in her body. And so she cannot be pregnant anymore. And so it's just disgusting. And the argument, second argument for the pro team is, yeah, the children must be protected. To live with a disabled mother, it's impossible. And you put the child into danger. That is often an argument.

Say, OK, then let's talk about who is allowed to having kids. So then I want to open that debate. Nevertheless, it's against the law. It must be against the law. It's against human rights and we will fight for it. Well, we thank you, Katrin Langen-Zippen, for your insights there. And of course, Sarah Hertz, for bringing that New York Times investigation that you've carried out to our attention, that important piece. Thank you both for joining us here on Woman's Hour.

Thank you to the many of you who continue to be in touch with your various messages about the subjects that we have been discussing on today's program this this listener writes i care for my husband who has parkinson's dementia heart disease macular degeneration and diabetes i sort out all of his medication and care but there are times when i feel so alone and that feeling of loneliness is something that has come up time and time again another message here from a listener who writes, our daughter died at the age of 52 in August of pancreatic cancer and I am really resonating with your guest's comments about feeling alone. I have been really saddened by the number of people who never make contact anymore.

Again, something that Lena was mentioning about how her social circle had continued to decrease over the years. On the subject of Christmas dinner, two dishes that have become a part of our family Christmas tradition. Breakfast on Christmas morning starts with a salad of pink grapefruit, dried apricots, pine nuts and rose water. And in addition to cranberry juice, jelly and the other turkey components, we have a compote of kumquat.

Thank you very much, Robert, for those tips. And thank you to all of our guests on the programme, Mary Berry, Lena and Richard Julianne Moore whose film May December is out on Sky Cinema from Friday and also to my guests Catherine and Sarah there on that subject of forced sterilisation and thank you to all of you for listening and your contributions. Thanks for listening there's plenty more from Woman's Hour over at BBC Sounds. Hello, I'm Kirsty Wark and this is The Reunion. Reflecting on a shared news event, a cultural moment

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the Radio 4 programme are available on BBC Sounds. From the makers of Chariots of Fire to the Beirut hostages. I do remember asking one of the guards, Brian's Irish, they've done nobody any harm and there was a long pause and he said, Brian was a mistake.

From the Brighton Bomb to Olympic Heroes. From when you're running a world record in Oslo with Seb Cochase to be on the last lap or whether you're doing it in the Durham Schools Champs, the process is the same, it's just the context is very different. You can hear again all 200 editions of The Reunion. Search for The Reunion on BBC Sounds. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this?

From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story. Settle in. Available now.