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Sunday Express, Scottish Edition
April 15, 2007

Anderson focused on her hopes for Oscar; tells John Millar how she is excited about motherhood and a busy career

Gillian Anderson has spoken for the first time about the new leading man in her life - her five-month-old son, Oscar. The X Files star, whose grandfather was a Scot, is enjoying motherhood for a second time in between her punishing movie schedule.

Little Oscar was born prematurely shortly before Christmas weighing 6lb 8oz but, according to his famous mother, he is now "a real bruiser".

Gillian, whose new movie Straightheads is released later this month, told the Scottish Sunday Express: "He is a very big lad and eats a lot. Usually he eats every two and a half to three hours, but last night, after he had just had a bottle 45 minutes previously, he seemed like he was hungry again. My partner and I were looking at each other and all of a sudden the baby started looking over towards where the bottle and milk were and he kept turning his head that way. I thought he couldn't possibly be hungry again so soon. But I made him a bottle and he gulped the whole thing down."

The latest addition to the family - twice-divorced Gillian, who lives with her boyfriend, businessman Mark Griffiths, also has a teenage daughter called Piper Maru - arrived just after she finished Straightheads.

Gillian, 38, added: "He is not sleeping through the night but he is very mellow. He doesn't cry so much but when he is upset he just kind of yells at us. It is really funny. He goes. . .'aaaaah!'"

Away from the cameras, motherhood is a major role for the actress, who is preparing herself for when daughter Piper Maru - who has her 13th birthday in September - goes through the terrible teens.

And despite her busy schedule - which recently involved travelling between London, the US and Uganda - she has built her acing career around caring for her children.

She said: "A lot of the decisions that I have made, and purposely have not made, have been as a result of the schedule with my daughter. She is a child of divorce and there is a schedule. It has actually worked extraordinarily well but it has been very important for me that my work takes away from my time with her as little as possible. Unfortunately it is not always possible. Something that you have already committed to gets moved. But it is a good place to start . . .always putting time with her first. It has caused some hassle here and there and it has been something that I have really had to stick to my guns with. Actually I have a period right now where I might be entering into quite a bit of work and for the first time she is excited about it. Now she wants to be part of it."

Interestingly, at a time when her home is full of the happy sounds of a baby's gurgling, Gillian is about to be seen in the darkest screen role of her career. In Straightheads she stars with Danny Dyer as a couple who are brutally assaulted by a gang of country thugs. After they recover the couple embark on a terrible revenge.

The film also features Gillian's most revealing performance because it calls for a couple of topless moments. She giggles when asked if she had gone to the gym to ensure she was in perfect shape for the cameras.

"That's funny, no. I didn't. But I would have to now, " she said. "When I made this film I happened to be in a fit place at the time. But I am not sure that I will ever be able to get back to that place of being comfortable, especially after having another baby. I definitely think that that was my one moment to show to myself and to my grandchildren how I was once."

The most astonishing thing about the American actress is that she talks in a crisp English accent.

"When I am in America I speak with an American accent, " she said. "But because I grew up here [she lived in England from two to 11 years old before her parents returned to the States] the first words that I spoke were probably in an English accent. Before that we lived in Puerto Rico and apparently I could speak a bit of Spanish. But if I am standing next to two people and one has an American accent and the other an English accent it is very confusing for me."

She has connections north of the Border. Her grandfather on her mother's side was of Scottish origin, and when she filmed The House Of Mirth in Glasgow, Gillian made a special point of recalling how she had been to Scotland as a child.





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