In two weeks I'll be walking the red carpet at the Academy Awards in LA, but not because I'm a big Hollywood star. My husband, Johnnie Burn, is nominated for an Oscar. He designed the sound for The Zone of Interest, a film about the family of the camp commander in Auschwitz: you never see the horrors, you only hear them over the garden wall, while the commander's wife, Helga, entertains her neighbors with plays or supervises her children. the slave gardeners who watered her dahlias.
We heard Johnnie had been nominated on January 24 - we were on FaceTime because Johnnie was in Dublin with the Poor Things team, the Yorgos Lanthimos film starring Emma Stone, which he was also working on. Both Poor Things and The Zone of Interest received multiple nominations and when Johnnie was personally nominated he gave a shout and the whole room cheered. I was so excited and proud to see his hard work, dedication and talent recognized - and his team at Wave, the sound studios he founded in 1999.
But then I thought, what the hell am I going to wear? And not just for the Oscars - Johnnie was nominated for a Bafta - so that was two fantastic dresses, two red carpets to walk on. And our children are coming to the Oscars, so that's also a dress for 14-year-old Sophie. I've walked a few red carpets in my time, but this is in a different league (at least Poor Things isn't nominated for sound, which solves the problem of where to sit).
Until recently, the photographers didn't bother with us, they put down their lenses as we walked by. And you're not allowed to take your own photos on the red carpet, so if we want a memory, we have to smuggle one in.
But now things are different: Johnnie's has won quite a few awards, especially in Europe. I didn't choose a career that's in the spotlight, so it's very strange. I'm an accountant, business analyst and mother (someone has to look after Sophie and Oscar, 17, while Johnnie is on location). You have the pressure to look like a star without being one. I never compare myself to others because it is their job to look like that. But you want to look as good as possible. I'm in my mid-forties, but I used to do gymnastics, so I like to keep fit.
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Sophie wears: Sequin dress, £1,310, Edeline Lee Cathy wears: Sequin dress, £395, Nadine MerabiCathy is wearing: Silk charmeuse dress, price on request, Anna Valentine; leather shoes, £249, L. K. Bennett ; leather shoes, £249, and bag, £189 L. K. BennettIn the beginning, the awards were a work event. We had no idea what to do. We just sat in the corner watching other people. Our first awards ceremony was at the Venice Film Festival in 2003 with Birth - directed, like The Zone of Interest, by Jonathan Glazer. Johnnie has been working with Jonathan since the 1990s. They made a famous Guinness advert in 1999, Good Things Come to Those Who Wait - the one with the horses in the sea with surfers. We had no idea how grandly we would be treated. Lauren Bacall bumped into me, but that was about as close as we got, and we ended up having dinner with Nicole Kidman on a pontoon in Venice. I wore a little apricot dress that I bought in Topshop. I felt so out of place. After that I started taking it a bit more seriously.
Once you get to know people, there's the social side: the drinks, the dinner, the after-parties, hopefully the celebrations. In 2013 we were in Venice with Scarlett Johansson for Under the Skin, again directed by Jonathan. After half an hour at the after party we jumped in her boat and headed to Harry's Bar for a more private celebration.
Johnnie works from home a lot. He had to investigate many of the sounds The zone of interest on the internet: the director said he didn't want to use actors in a room. So we had the sounds of Auschwitz through our house for two years. People who get beaten up die; the industrial sounds of the crematoria, gunshots. It was quite disturbing. Luckily the kids were at school most of the day and Johnnie bought a reinforced soundproof door for his home studio. He solved it by exercising and swimming a lot.
Cathy wears: Silk dress, £1,500, Laura Green; suede bag, £275, Russell & Bromley; mesh shoes, £580, Sophie is wearing: Dress from a selection, As told to Charlotte Eagar Bevza; leather shoes, £750, Di Minno Cathy wears: Italian fabric dress with diamond cloqué, £4,290, Susanna; silver earrings, £215, Bevza Malone SouliersJohnnie always likes to create his own sounds, rather than using stock and we all help. He had me shuffling my feet around a ruined fort in the South Downs, recording different types of footsteps, recording gravelly sounds outside, on wet grass, dry grass, deep grass. They went to Paris for the sound of the trains, because at the time the film was set, many Jewish people were arriving in Auschwitz from France. Johnny recorded the sounds of angry French people shouting during the work and pension reform riots in Paris. In search of noisy Germans, his team scoured German city centers late at night.
We have been to the Oscars before, Johnnie did the sound for Yorgos Lanthimos's The Favorite which had 11 nominations in 2019. Johnnie was not personally nominated in 2019 but I was very happy with the Mikael Aghal dress I found.
Unfortunately, in the middle of the duet between Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga, I got food poisoning and had to go back to our hotel. Johnnie came in at 5:30. I sat on the bed with a bucket. He couldn't bear to tell me how much fun it had been! It wasn't until we met the others at the airport on our flight back that I learned they had all done karaoke with Emma Stone and Amy Adams, while Olivia Colman waved her Oscar, at a house in West Hollywood. Johnnie had sung a duet with Toni Collette. This year I don't think I'll risk eating anything! But we have the kids with us anyway, so we need to make sure they're okay.
I now have a better idea of what I need from a Red Carpet dress. I love a structured dress: floaty doesn't work. I kept tripping over the floral dress I wore to the European Film Awards Festival in December. And I need something dark, in case stuff gets spilled on it. But it's always stressful.
We live in Brighton - it's very relaxed and there are no formal clothes shops. I have to buy things on the internet, try them and send them back. I always use a local hair and makeup stylist who can usually be found on Instagram, but that can be a lottery. A few years ago in Venice, for The Favorite, I wore a beautiful metallic one-shoulder dress from Ralph Lauren, but I used a local stylist and I looked nothing like myself - very Italian with huge hair and strange foundation, that didn't stop me from wearing it again for Cannes however, the following year I felt a little more like myself.
This year it's fantastic to have the help of The Telegraph's style director Tona Stell. She brings over forty dresses from labels like Stella McCartney, Alice Temperley, Anna Valentine and Laura Green to a studio for me to try on, so I have a lot of choice. My daughter Sophie was very happy that she got a day off to choose a dress too.
After four hours of dressing up, I chose a beautiful Bruce Oldfield three-quarter length for the Baftas: a black beaded mesh top and a black silk organza skirt. He's a British designer, which I think is important. I felt absolutely magical in it - people kept saying how glamorous I looked. I couldn't wear a bra, so Bruce's seamstresses embroidered more beads to make it less revealing.
We were at Emma Stone and saw Idris Elba and Cate Blanchett. In Bruce's dress I felt like I fit in, which obviously isn't the case, but Johnnie said the photographers took a lot more pictures of us together than when he was alone. We were both so nervous and we kept hearing Oppenheimer winning: we thought: this isn't going our way. Johnnie grabbed me and his hands were so clammy.
But when it came to the announcement of the award for Best Sound, there was the incredible thrill of hearing The Zone of Interest. It really felt like Johnnie was the man of the moment. Robert Downey Jr. came up and said, "Johnnie! I need to talk to you about the sound. I have so many questions!" We went to a party at the Chiltern Firehouse and ended up getting home at 6:45.
For the Oscars I chose a navy blue full-length strapless dress from Suzannah, another British designer, quite sculptural, very structured and elegant, made from a luxurious wool blend fabric with a futuristic half-bow at the back. Sophie looked amazing in gold lame from Edeline Lee, but she's only 14. She said: "I'm not famous enough to wear this dress." So we went for a simple black dress from Bevza.
All we need is for Johnnie to win. Hopefully I don't get food poisoning this time, and I'm still trying to find the right pair of earrings. Most importantly, I hope The Zone of Interest wins.
