Charlize Theron pictured at the world premiere of American spy action thriller 'Atomic Blonde' in Berlin, Germany
No one could accuse actress Charlize Theron of following the crowd. Take, for example, the case of her elder child, seven-year-old Jackson, who was adopted as a baby and introduced to the world as a boy.
For years now, rumours have swirled that Charlize has, in fact, been raising Jackson as a girl.
As photographs have appeared of the child wearing skirts and dresses and with long, braided hair, Hollywood gossips have wondered what on earth Jackson’s mother thought she was doing.
But when asked about it on a sunny morning in Beverly Hills, Charlize is matter-of-fact. Not only is she raising Jackson as a girl — in fact, she says, Jackson is every bit as much a girl as her three-year-old sister, August.
‘Yes, I thought she was a boy, too,’ Charlize agrees, briskly. ‘Until she looked at me when she was three years old and said: “I am not a boy!”
‘So there you go! I have two beautiful daughters who, just like any parent, I want to protect and I want to see thrive.
‘They were born who they are and exactly where in the world both of them get to find themselves as they grow up, and who they want to be, is not for me to decide.
Not only is Charlize raising her eldest, Jackson, as a girl — in fact, she says, Jackson is every bit as much a girl as her three-year-old sister, August. ‘Yes, I thought she was a boy, too,’ Charlize agrees, briskly. ‘Until she looked at me when she was three years old and said: “I am not a boy!”
The drama of Charlize’s (centre) early years is well-documented. The tough life on a remote farm outside Johannesburg, South Africa, tormented by an alcoholic and abusive father (left) who would regularly and viciously beat Charlize’s mother, Gerda (right)
‘My job as a parent is to celebrate them and to love them and to make sure that they have everything they need in order to be what they want to be.
‘And I will do everything in my power for my kids to have that right and to be protected within that.’
She laughs: ‘You can blame my mom for the fact I don’t know any better! You know, I grew up in a country where people lived with half-truths and lies and whispers and nobody said anything outright, and I was raised very specifically not to be like that.
‘I was taught by my mom that you have to speak up; you have to be able to know that, when this life is over, you’ll have lived the truth you’re comfortable with, and that nothing negative can come from that.’
The drama of Charlize’s early years is well-documented. The tough life on a remote farm outside Johannesburg, South Africa, tormented by an alcoholic and abusive father who would regularly and viciously beat Charlize’s mother, Gerda.
Then the last tragic day when Charlize was 15 and her father, Charles, who ran a construction business, returned home in a rage, carrying a gun and threatening to kill both Charlize and Gerda. Instead, in front of Charlize’s eyes, in what was later ruled an act of self-defence, Gerda shot him dead.
Then the last tragic day when Charlize was 15 and her father, Charles, who ran a construction business, returned home in a rage, carrying a gun and threatening to kill both Charlize and Gerda. Instead, in front of Charlize’s eyes, in what was later ruled an act of self-defence, Gerda shot him dead
Small wonder, then, that Charlize has grown up with more on her mind than conformity, or that her mother remains her role model heroine.
‘I think that having a very close relationship to at least one parent is a real blessing,’ she says. ‘Growing up as a young girl, I had this great representation in front of me of what you could be as a woman.
‘In everything she did in life, my mom did what she had to do and there were no two ways about it. When she got up at six in the morning to milk the cows, she didn’t cry about it: she just did it.
‘When my father passed away and, all of a sudden, we had a huge debt of money that we owed, and every bank was after her, she took care of it. It didn’t happen overnight — it took her five years — but she did do it.’
After her father’s death, her mother took over his construction firm. Charlize recalls: ‘The greatest gift my mom ever gave me was the sight of her putting on her heels and her power suit and going into a board meeting with eight guys and just running the show. I’d just look at her with my mouth open. I was thinking: “All right. I want to be like that, too!”
‘I never had any fears about being a woman. It wasn’t until I was out on my own and in my early 20s that I even realised that women are not respected in every field.’
In her latest film role, for rom-com Long Shot, Charlize plays Charlotte Field, U.S. secretary of state and hotly tipped to be the first ever female president.
But Field hires hapless journalist Fred Flarsky (Seth Rogen) to help punch up her speeches, unaware that he’s had a crush on her since she babysat him when they were children together.
While Charlotte is capable, self-assured and secure at the top of her profession, and Freddie is none of these things, the road to romance is not a traditional one.
As Freddie’s best friend points out, scathingly: ‘It’s Pretty Woman — but she’s Richard Gere and you’re Julia Roberts!’
Charlize, who also co-produced the film, says she was careful to make Charlotte not just a
