Sigourney: Why I’m playing a 14-year-old alien... at 73

ALIEN star Sigourney Weaver has achieved a feat most actresses in ageobsessed Hollywood could only dream about: landing a role playing a character 59 years younger than she is.

The 73-year-old tells today’s You magazine how she came to play a 14-year-old amphibious alien in the sequel to the 2009 film Avatar.

Weaver played scientist Dr Grace Augustine in the original but was killed off.

However, director James Cameron was so desperate to have her in the new film –

Avatar: The Way Of Water – that he created the teenage avatar part of Kiri for her.

She says: ‘Well, Jim [James Cameron] is smart. If he

thinks I can do this, let’s give

it a whirl! I don’t think John Wayne was asked to play a 14-year-old when he was in his 70s.’

Weaver, who has a daughter Charlotte, 32, with her husband, director Jim Simpson, also reveals to You her secret pleasure: The Great British Bake Off.

She says she watches it ‘religiously’, adding: ‘It’s one of the most healing shows in its embrace of all these different backgrounds and cultures and the way they all support each other. We don’t have that in America and we need it.’

See the full interview in You magazine