Queens and Tonys

Gina Wilhelm Actress - Queens and Tonys

There are two queens in the play "Mary Stuart." And both are nominated for Tonys.

Janet McTeer, who plays the title character, says it's not fun having to compete with her costar.

Both McTeer and costar Harriet Walter, who plays Queen Elizabeth I, would love to see director Phyllida Lloyd win, however.

Both actresses will compete this Sunday against Marcia Gay Harden and Hope Davis in "God of Change" and Jane Fonda for her work in "33 Variations."

McTeer has already won once for this show, a Drama Desk Award. She also has a previous Tony for her role in "A Doll's House" in 1997.

She did receive an Oscar nomination for "Tumbleweeds" in 1999, but she has preferred to remain a private person with a private life, something she didn't feel she'd get in Hollywood.

She also got into the movies late by Hollywood standards; she didn't start until her late 30s.

She's the niece of actor Christopher Lee, who played Dracula in the Hammer Horror films.

He more recently played Count Dooku in the more recent "Star Wars" films and Saruman in the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy.

That isn't what got McTeer into acting, though. She was inspired by watching Hayley Mills in "The Parent Trap."

She also insists that there won't be offstage enmity between Walter and herself over the nomination, nor will there be should one of them win the Tony.

"Nobody would ask us that if we were men," she points out.

Gina Wilhelm Actress