Having landed the lead in this summer’s biggest blockbuster, the 24-year-old talks fame, family and why she’ll always be a Gravesend girl

“I am in a silly mood today,” says Gemma Arterton. As she’s bouncing around a photo studio in a gigantic feather duster of a dress trying to do an impression of Sesame Street’s Big Bird, it’s hard to disagree. So far Arterton’s entertained the room with her Alison Steadman in Abigail’s Party (“I love Demis Roussos”) and an accurately nasal Kenneth Williams: “Oooaaahheeeuuh, heee taaaalked wiiith aaaall theeeese voouuuoowels.” She’s explained her utterly useless test for drunkenness in which she’d ask herself to multiply 12 x 12. “Then after a few years I realised I’d just memorised the answer 144 and I was actually pissed! What an idiot!” Read the rest of this entry →