Bel Powley (‘A Small Light’): ‘I’d been searching for a role like this my entire career’ [Exclusive Video Interview]
- Oops!Something went wrong.Please try again later.
- Oops!Something went wrong.Please try again later.
- Oops!Something went wrong.Please try again later.
- Oops!Something went wrong.Please try again later.
“I don’t think many people know the story of Miep (Gies),” believes Bel Powley, the British-born actress who portrays her in the eight-part Nat Geo limited series “A Small Light” that has now premiered on the channel and the following day on Disney+ and Hulu. “In terms of our industry, in terms of film and television, I think one of the reasons for it is that pre #MeToo, people weren’t making shows or spending money on projects with stories about women. I’ve been searching for a role like this my entire career. Post #MeToo, there are suddenly all of these kind of incredible female heroes coming out of the woodwork. So it’s a really exciting moment and I can’t wait to share Miep’s story with the world.” Watch our exclusive video interview above.
That story is one the public knows well, and yet perhaps at the same time not at all. It’s the one about Anne Frank, but it’s told from the perspective of Gies, the courageous woman who hid Frank and the extended family (also including her father) in an Amsterdam dwelling that came to be known as the Secret Annex. In “A Small Light,” Powley is Gies, a twentysomething Austrian secretary whose Jewish boss Otto Frank (Liev Schreiber) asks her to shelter him and his family from the Nazis as persecution of the Jews continued to intensify in 1942.
More from GoldDerby
Gies, who would go on to live a long and fruitful life (dying in 2010 at the age of nearly 101) agreed to shelter the Franks at great personal risk to her safety, along with her husband Jan (portrayed by Joe Cole). But Powley stresses that Gies rejected the “hero” label and wanted to be put on no pedestals. “She believed no one should think they have to be special in order to help others. That’s where the title of our show comes from. It’s from a quote Miep used to end her talks with, about how anyone – even an ordinary secretary or teenager or housewife – can turn on a small light in a dark room. She really wanted everyone to recognize we all have good inside of us.”
What’s especially noteworthy about the limited series, besides its quiet power, is the fact it doesn’t look or feel like a dated, dusty historical rehash but indeed something far fresher and more contemporary than we’re accustomed to in our Holocaust tales. “That what really drew me to the project in the first place,” Powley admits. “I’ve often shied away from period pieces because it find it hard to connect to the characters. They’re in these costumes that feel a bit trussed up and distances us from (the story). But here, there is this choice of having everyone speak in a sort of modern-day (language) that closes the gap and you just immediately feel connected to it.”
SEEMiep Gies is poised to become the face of Holocaust resistance with ‘A Small Light’
It also helps the relatability that early on in the series, we see Powley (as Gies) acting like a typically free-spirited young woman rather than any kind of heroic figure. “I can relate to going out with my mates and feeling a bit directionless in my early 20s and falling in love for the first time and partying too much. Those are the things that make her a kind of everywoman.”
An everywoman, yes, but one who unquestionably did some pretty heroic and incredible things that lifts the Franks out of the pages of Anne’s diary and uses Gies to humanize them and put a real face on a story we all believe we know so well, Powley says. She is also eager to point out the parallels to that time in history with what’s going on in the world today, “with antisemitism on the rise again and more displaced people in the world than there have ever been before. We’re living through a huge refugee crisis in Ukraine. Authoritarian regimes are popping up all over the world. There are just so many parallels. So in some ways, I guess our show is a bit of a cautionary tale about how society can fall into the same horrible patterns.”
PREDICT the 2023 Emmy nominees through July 12
Make your predictions at Gold Derby now. Download our free and easy app for Apple/iPhone devices or Android (Google Play) to compete against legions of other fans plus our experts and editors for best prediction accuracy scores. See our latest prediction champs. Can you top our esteemed leaderboards next? Always remember to keep your predictions updated because they impact our latest racetrack odds, which terrify Hollywood chiefs and stars. Don’t miss the fun. Speak up and share your huffy opinions in our famous forums where 5,000 showbiz leaders lurk every day to track latest awards buzz. Everybody wants to know: What do you think? Who do you predict and why?
SIGN UP for Gold Derby’s free newsletter with latest predictions
Best of GoldDerby
Sign up for Gold Derby's Newsletter. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.
