Emma Thompson has recalled the time now-President Donald Trump asked her on a date – the very same day she filed for divorce from her famous ex-husband.
The 66-year-old spoke about the phone call while on stage at the Locarno Film Festival in Switzerland, per The Telegraph UK.
The actress said she was in her trailer while filming Primary Colors, the 1998 film based on Bill Clinton’s journey to the White House. In it, she played the character loosely based on 79-year-old’s 2020 political rival, Hillary Clinton.
Watch the video above
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The phone rang in her trailer. “It was Donald Trump,” she said.
“He said: ‘Hello, this is Donald Trump.’ I thought it was a joke and asked: ‘How can I help you?’ Maybe he needed directions from someone,” the Harry Potter actress said.
“Then he said: ‘I’d love you to come and stay at one of my beautiful places. Maybe we could have dinner.’ I said: ‘Well, that’s very sweet. Thank you so much. I’ll get back to you.'”
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After a bit of pondering, Dame Emma realised what prompted the unusual call.
“I realised that on that day, my divorce decree had come through,” she said of her split from her ex-husband Kenneth Branagh.
“And I bet he’s got people looking for suitable people he could take out on his arm. You know, a nice divorcee, that’s what he was looking for.
“I could have gone on a date with Donald Trump, and then I would have a story to tell. I could have changed the course of American history,” she added.
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She wasn’t the only one going through a split. At the time, Trump had also just divorced his second wife, Marla Maples, with whom he shares his daughter Tiffany Trump.
Thompson would not have accepted anyway, as she was in a relationship with her Sense and Sensibility co-star Greg Wise at the time, who she later married in 2003.
They now have two children, Gaia Wise and Tindyebwa Agaba Wise.
The Oscar-winner split from her ex-husband Branagh in 1995.
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It’s not the first time Thompson shared the story, with the Love Actually star first recounting it on a 2017 appearance on Scandinavian TV show Skavlan.
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