Sunday Mail - April 4 2004
updated 18th May 2005

BUSH HAS FORCED ME TO QUIT U.S.

SCOTS STAR'S TERROR: Laura too frightened to stay in New York
By Steve Hendry

SCOTS actress Laura Fraser has revealed she is quitting America because she is terrified of President George Bush.

She has spent the last year in New York with husband, actor and writer Karl Geary.

But Glasgow-born Laura, 28, who has starred alongside Leonardo Di Caprio, Anthony Hopkins, Heath Ledger and Hilary Swank, misses her family and friends and says living under the rule of President Bush forced her and Karl to opt for a move to Ireland.

She said: 'It wasn't a political decision to move back but George Bush just makes me so angry and it canbe such an arrogant country. I just feel scared by some of the decisions which are being made at the moment.

'The last time I went through immigration I had to get my fingerprints taken. It's just scary and I'm not really happy being there.

'My husband's lived in New York for 16 years and I've been over there for the last year. It's a great city but I was so homesick.

'I needed to be near Glasgow and London, near my friends and my family.

'Karl's Irish and his family are all in Ireland.'

Moving to Ireland will be a romantic return for Laura and Karl who met when they worked there together on low-budget romance Coney Island Baby written by Karl two years ago.

She was wary of dating someone she met on a film set she previously had a relationship with her co-star on A Knight's Tale, Paul Bettany but followed her heart when she met up with Karl again in New York.

She said: 'We've been married almost a year and I love it. Being married is fantastic.'

And although they aren't moving for a few months they've already found the perfect spot.

She said: 'We've found a 200year-old farmhouse right by the sea in the south west of Ireland and we're moving in the summer.

It was lucky because we had bought some land in upstate New York and started clearing a wooded plot but the snow came and we couldn't start building until this month.

'We were just so homesick and wanted to move back to Europe.'

The couple will move when Laura completes her latest movie, Scots-set comedy Meet the Clan.

Before then, Laura will be seen in BBC Anthony Trollope adaptation He Knew He Was Right on April 18.

She plays heroine Emily Trevelyan whose husband convinces himself his wife is having an affair with Colonel Osborne, played by Love Actually star Bill Nighy. Laura said:
'Although it's set in the 19th century it's really a modern day story of a couple divorcing.
'It's slightly different because her choices at that time are dismal unless she allows herself to be supported by her husband and be subjected to his will.
'She's very brave because she refuses to comply instinctively but she is gradually worn down, humiliated and persecuted.
'It is tragic but it's a great piece of work.'

But despite her success Laura admits she still gets star-struck.
She said: 'I once saw Al Pacino at a party but I was too scared to speak to him so I brushed past him so I could say I touched him.'.