Actress Kimberly Jaraj

With roles in upcoming cabin-fever thriller Airborne and a new British comedy The 10 Year Itch in production soon

With roles in upcoming cabin-fever
thriller Airborne and a new British comedy The 10 Year Itch in
production soon, Kimberly Jaraj is being hailed as a real one to watch. Will this
latest aeroplane-set drama send her profile sky high then?

You’re being touted as one of the
faces-to-watch in British cinema. How does that feel?

It’s very exciting actually. I mean
I really hope it’s true as I’ve worked very hard in the last few years on a
number of television projects such as Casualty, Doctors and Casanova
and now I’m feel I’m finally starting to break through.

Having worked alongside the late
Roy Scheider and “Indiana Jones’” Julian Glover would you say you’re learning
from some of the best?

Absolutely, I was completely in awe
of them on set. Sadly Roy passed away just before I got to film my part on Iron
Cross so I actually never got to meet him, although working with Julian and
Mark Hamill showed me how incredibly naturally acting came to them. The last
project Airborne was a night shoot, so it was physically and mentally
hard for everyone but it didn’t faze them at all. It really shows the
difference between the people who really want to do it and the people who
don’t.

What first gave you the acting
bug, then?

Well I started out as a young
ballerina with the Royal Ballet which I really loved. However as I got older I
started to feel it really wasn’t for me and I found I wanted to explore acting
and being on stage. I became more interested in performing plays and so, on my
Headmistress’ advice, took up Theatre Studies at A level and discovered that
this was really what I wanted to do with my life because I just loved it.

Your new thriller “Airborne”
feels like a typically classic, almost Hitchcock-like thriller. What’s it
about?

Yes, it’s a thriller set on a plane
in which people start dying. Without giving too much away it feels very
Hitchcock-esque; a sort of suspenseful, claustrophobic film with a hint of the
supernatural going on too.

No fears of flying then?

No, not really! Our feet were firmly
on the ground during filming. Although next time I get on a plane I might be
looking around behind my shoulder at the other passengers and thinking
differently.

Which actors wouldn’t you mind
being sat next to on a long-haul flight then and why?

I’d love to be sat next to Robert De
Niro, Gwyneth Paltrow, Nicole Kidman or Meryl Streep. I’d really love to be sat
next to someone young too, doing what I’d like to be doing in a few years such
as Carey Mulligan. I’d love to follow in her footsteps.

You’ve got two future films lined
up with “Airborne” director Dominic Burns. What can you tell us about them?

Well a lot of the details have to be
kept under wraps but one is called Barracuda, a
poker-heist movie, which should be something totally different but realistic.
The other’s called UFO which I’ve only just been told about but I know
has got some quite big names attached, although there’s no science-fiction
involved. It’s a comedy spoof which will feature some comedians and I’m quite
looking forward to that really.

A different kind of role for you,
then?

Yes, I’d really like to do a little
bit of comedy and also would love to do a period drama such as a Jane Austen
adaptation or something like The Young Victoria with Emily
Blunt.

You’re filming “The 10 Year Itch”
next year, a big British comedy. What attracted you to that?

Well that’s going to be the biggest
project I’ve been involved in so far, a sort of British answer to The
Hangover with some star names from both here and America involved. It’s going to
centre around a bar and the relationships of the people there so I’m really
glad I’m getting experience in these other films before I start that.

Presuming you don’t feel the 10
year itch, where would you like to be, acting-wise, in 10 years time?

I’ve not done any professional stage
work so far so I’d obviously love to explore that but I’d really just like to
be a working actress who’s getting good parts. That’s all I can really ask for.

You can catch Airborne, out later this autumn.