Kate Winslet says becoming famous after 'Titanic' was 'horrible': 'My life was quite unpleasant'

• Kate Winslet spoke about her post-"Titanic" fame in a new interview.
• The actor said "being famous was horrible" and made her life "quite unpleasant."

Kate Winslet skyrocketed to fame after starring opposite Leonardo DiCaprio in "Titanic." But the massive success of the 1997 blockbuster film wasn't without its downsides.

In a new interview with Net-a-porter, Winslet reflected on becoming famous at a young age and her difficulties in handling an onslaught of media attention.

"I felt like I had to look a certain way, or be a certain thing, and because media intrusion was so significant at that time, my life was quite unpleasant," Winslet said.

The actor also revealed that her experience of fame after "Titanic" impacted the types of roles she chose.

"Journalists would always say, 'After "Titanic," you could have done anything and yet you chose to do these small things,'" Winslet said, "and I was like, 'Yeah, you bet your fuckin' life I did! Because, guess what, being famous was horrible.'"

"Titanic" was nominated for 14 Oscars, including a best actress nod for Winslet. It won 11 of those awards, including best picture. The James Cameron movie also broke records, becoming the first film to ever hit $1 billion at the box office. To date, it's grossed over $2.2 billion worldwide and reigned as the top-grossing film of all time from 1998 until 2010, when it was dethroned by Cameron's movie "Avatar."

"I was grateful, of course. I was in my early 20s, and I was able to get a flat," she added. "But I didn't want to be followed literally feeding the ducks."

Winslet has previously spoken out about the body shaming she experienced in the press when she was a young actor in the 1990s.

During a December 2022 appearance on the "Happy, Sad, Confused" podcast, host Josh Horowitz asked her about the ongoing debate over whether her "Titanic" character Rose and DiCaprio's Jack could have both fit on the door together after the ship sank in the film, thereby allowing Jack to also survive. Winslet took aim at people who had insinuated over the years that her weight was the reason Jack hadn't been able to stay afloat on the door.

"Apparently, I was too fat," she told Horowitz. "Isn't it awful? Why were they so mean to me? I wasn't even fucking fat."

"If I could turn back the clock I would have used my voice in a completely different way," Winslet said on the 2022 podcast. "I would have responded to journalists: 'Don't you dare treat me like this. I'm a young woman. My body's changing. I'm figuring it out. I'm deeply insecure. I'm terrified. Don't make this any harder than it already is.' That's bullying, you know, and actually, borderline abusive, I would say."

Winslet echoed similar sentiments in her recent interview with Net-a-porter, reflecting on how young women today, like her 23-year-old daughter Mia Threapleton, "know how to use their voice."

"It's different now," she said of the changing industry. "Mia is very much her own person."

Winslet next stars as Elena Vernham, the chancellor of a fictitious central European country, in the satire "The Regime," premiering March 3 on HBO.