by In two weeks, I will walk the Academy Awards Red Carpet in LA, but not because I am 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 camp commandant’s family in Auschwitz: you never see the horrors, you only hear them over the garden wall, while the commandant’s wife Helga entertains her neighbors, playing with their children or supervising. the slave gardeners watering their dahlias.
We heard that Johnnie was nominated on January 24th – we were on FaceTime because Johnnie was in Dublin with the team of Poor Things, the Yorgos Lanthimos film with Emma Stone that he was also working on. Poor Things and The Zone of Interest received multiple nominations and when Johnnie was personally nominated he cheered and the whole room cheered. I was very happy and proud when his hard work, commitment and talent – and his team at Wave, the sound studios he founded in 1999 – were recognised.
But then I thought, what on earth am I going to wear? And not just for the Oscars – Johnnie was nominated for Bafta – so there were two amazing dresses, two red carpets to walk. And our kids are coming to the Oscars, so a dress for Sophie who is 14 too. I’ve walked a few red carpets in my time but this is a different set (at least Poor Things isn’t nominated for sound, which solves the problem of where to sit).
Until recently, the photographers would not bother us, they would put their lenses down as we walked by. And you’re not allowed to take your own photos on the red carpet, so we’d have to slip one in if we’d remembered.
But things are different now: Johnnie has won many awards, mainly in Europe. I didn’t choose a career in the spotlight, so it’s very strange. I am an accountant and consulting business analyst and a mother (someone has to look after Sophie and Oscar, 17, and Johnnie on site). The pressure is on you to look like a star without being a star. I never compare myself to the others because it’s their job to look that way. But you want to look as good as you can. I’m in my mid-forties, but I used to be a gymnast, so I like to be fit.
Sophie wears: sequin dress, £1,310, Eideline Lee Cathy wears: sequin dress, £395, Nadine Merabi; leather shoes, £249, and bag, £189 LK Bennett
Initially, the awards were a work event. We would have no idea what to do. We would just sit 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 90s. They did the famous Guinness advert, Good Things Come to Those Who Wait – the one with the horses in the sea with surfers – in 1999. We had no idea how big we’d be treated. Lauren Bacall bumped into me but that was as close as we got, then we ended up having dinner on a pontoon in Venice with Nicole Kidman. I was wearing a little apricot dress that I bought in Topshop. I felt so out of place. After that I took it a little more seriously.
Once you get to know people, there’s the social side: the drinks, the dinner, the after-parties, hopefully the celebration. In 2013, we were in Venice with Scarlett Johansson for Under the Skin, directed by Jonathan again. After half an hour at the after party, we jumped into her boat and headed to Harry’s Bar for a more private celebration.
Johnnie works a lot from home. He had to research many of the sounds for The Interest Zone on the internet: the director said he didn’t want to use actors in a room. So the sounds of Auschwitz echoed through our house for two years. People being beaten up, dying; the industrial sounds of the crematorium, gun shots. 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 dealt with doing a lot of exercise, swimming a lot.
Cathy wears: silk charmeuse dress, price on request, Anna Valentine; leather shoes, £249, LK Bennett
Johnnie always likes to create his own sounds, rather than using stock and we all help. I had to shuffle my feet around a ruined fort on the South Downs, recording different footfalls, recording the sounds of gravel outside, on wet grass, dry grass, deep grass. For the sound of the trains, they went to Paris, as many Jews were coming to Auschwitz from France at the time the film was set. The sounds of angry French shouting, Johnny recorded at work riots and pension reforms in Paris. For exposed Germans, his team trawled late at night in the center of German cities.
We have been to the Oscars before, Johnnie did the sound for The Favorite by Yorgos Lanthimos which had 11 nominations in 2019. Johnnie was not personally nominated in 2019, but I was very happy with the Mikael Aghal dress that d ‘find me.
Unfortunately, I came down with food poisoning in the middle of the duet between Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga and had to go back to our hotel. Johnnie came in at 5.30 am. I was sitting on the bed with a bucket. He couldn’t tell me how much fun it was! It was only when we met the others at the airport on our flight back that I heard they were all doing karaoke with Emma Stone and Amy Adams, Olivia Colman waving her Oscar around, in a house in West Hollywood. Johnnie sang a duet with Toni Collette. This year, I don’t think I’ll risk eating anything! But the kids will be with us anyway, so we’ll have to make sure they’re okay.
I now have a better idea of what I need from a Red Carpet dress. I like a structured dress: floaty doesn’t work. I continued to try on the floral dress I wore to the European Film Awards 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 laid back and no formal dress shops. I have to buy things on the internet, try them and send them back. I always use a local hair and makeup stylist usually found on Instagram, but that can be a draw. In Venice a few years ago, for The Favorite, I wore a fabulous Ralph Lauren metallic one-shoulder dress but I used a local stylist and I didn’t look like me at all – very Italian with huge hair and weird foundations, that didn’t stop me from wearing it again for Cannes that year the next day though, where I felt a bit more myself.
This year it’s great to have the help of The Telegraph’s style director, Tona Stell. She brings over 40 dresses from labels including Stella McCartney, Alice Temperley, Anna Valentine and Laura Green to a studio for me to try on, so I’m spoiled for choice. My daughter Sophie was delighted to have the day off from school to choose a dress too.
After four hours of dressing up, I chose a beautiful three-quarter-length Bruce Oldfield for the Baftas – a black beaded gauze top and a black silk organza skirt. He’s a British designer, which I think is important. I felt absolutely magical there – people were 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 with Emma Stone and we saw Idris Elba and Cate Blanchett. In Bruce’s dress, I felt like I fit in, which I obviously don’t, but Johnnie said that the photographers took a lot more pictures of us together than when it was just him. We were both so nervous when we heard that Oppenheimer was fighting: we thought this is not going our way. Johnnie grabbed me and his hands were so clammy.
Cathy wears: silk dress, £1,500, Laura Green; suede bag, £275, Russell & Bromley; mesh shoes, £580, Souliers Malone
But then when the award for Best Sound was announced, there was an incredible thrill to hear The Zone of Interest. He really felt that Johnnie was the man of the moment. Robert Downey Jr came up and said: “Johnnie! I have to talk to you about the sound. I have so many questions!” We went on to a party at the Chiltern Firehouse and finally got home at 6.45am
For the Oscars, Suzannah, another British designer, chose a wide navy blue strapless dress, very sculpted, very structured and elegant, made of a luxurious wool-blend fabric with a futuristic semi-bow on the back. Sophie looked stunning in her gold bangs from Edeline Lee but she is only 14 years old. She said: “I’m not famous for wearing this dress.” So we went with a simple black dress instead of Bevza.
We just want Seán to win. I hope I don’t get food poisoning this time, and I’m still trying to find the right pair of earrings. More importantly, I hope that An Crisos Leasa wins.
The Oscar winning dresses
Sophie wears: Dress from selection, Bevza; leather shoes, £750, Di Minno Cathy wears: diamond cloqué Italian cloth dress, £4,290, Suzannah; silver earrings, £215, Bevza
As told by Charlotte Eagar
