ACCENT ON OSCAR QUIET 'VERA DRAKE' ROLE SPEAKS LOUDLY TO STAUNTON.

Byline: Evan Henerson Staff Writer

Imelda Staunton has received a barrage of attention for playing a lady who practically nobody notices.

The title character of Mike Leigh's film ``Vera Drake'' is a working- class char who, quietly but with great friendliness, cleans the homes of much wealthier families in 1950 England.

When it is discovered that the happily married Vera also provides in- home abortions - with nearly as much cheerfulness - to working- or lower- middle-class women, several people begin to pay attention. Among them, the police, since pregnancy terminations were illegal in England until the late 1960s. For much of the film's final 30 to 45 minutes, Vera Drake barely speaks a word.

Staunton did her work well, and the performance has brought the highly regarded London actress awards and accolades the likes of which she hasn't previously seen, much less imagined. It began with the Volpi Cup best actress award at the Venice Film Festival late last summer, followed by best actress laurels from critics groups in Los Angeles, New York and Chicago.

A first-time Oscar nominee for ``Vera Drake,'' Staunton lost the Screen Actors Guild and Golden Globe awards to ``Million Dollar Baby's'' Hilary Swank, but she came back to win the just-announced British Independent Film Award, a ceremony she was forced to miss. ``Vera Drake'' opened in England in January, and Staunton's publicity on behalf of the film has barely lessened. Which is fine with Staunton, since she doesn't have another job lined up, and since she has labeled working with Leigh on the film the highlight of her career.

Staunton, ever gracious, shares the plaudits with her co-stars and maintains that anything that will bring attention to a difficult movie is worthy.

``This is, in a way, enjoying people's positive attitude about the film, and I'm getting it all on behalf of the actors,'' she says. ``Everyone in the film is brilliant, and I'm accepting it on their behalf.''

As for the red carpets, fancy dresses and regular back-and-forths to Los Angeles and points east, Staunton finds the whole business an interesting and, yes, enjoyable part of being an actor. Other people may do their job proficiently, but not under the same spotlight.

``It's funny, isn't it?'' Staunton says. ``If someone builds a wall, you don't often have people going around saying, 'Hang on. Look at that. Look at ... come here. You've just made ...' ''

``I know it goes with the territory, and I'm delighted because I'm very proud and privileged to be part of this,'' she adds. ``But this has happened at a time in my life when my head is not going to be spinning. I had the best experience of my working life (on this film). That was the best time ever. This is icing.''

At barely 5 feet tall, Staunton, 49, is petite and soft-spoken, although her most recognizable film portrayals prior to ``Vera Drake'' have been of the loud and/or busybodyish variety. She was Gwyneth Paltrow's nurse in ``Shakespeare in Love'' the voice of one of the hens in ``Chicken Run,'' the grating wife to an eye-rolling Hugh Laurie in ``Sense in Sensibility'' and part of the ensemble of Kenneth Branagh's ``Peter's Friends.''

On the London stage, Staunton has played everything from Shakespeare to Sondheim to ``Guys and Dolls.'' She's a three-time Olivier Award winner - Britain's equivalent of the American Tonys.

``In England, I'm known, but now I'm somewhere where people don't know me, but they're still being nice to me,'' she says. ``Which is marvelous. But in a couple of weeks, it will all be over, and I'll be begging people to talk to me, and they won't.''

Prior to this awards-season publicity blitz, she had spent little time in L.A., the last extended stay nearly 20 years ago to promote the film ``Antonia and Jane.''

Now she has returned to an environment where fashion, gift bags and pampering are built into the routine. Her Oscar-night dress is being constructed ``quietly'' in London. ``I'm not the right shape for all those fashion people anyway,'' Staunton says.

``For all the rest of it, people offering me handbags and shoes, it's really nice,'' she continues. ``I have nothing to complain about. I wish I could find something, but I can't.''

Although Leigh had long known her work, ``Vera Drake'' marks the first collaboration between actress and director. Leigh, whose ``kitchen sink'' dramas typically revolve around British working-class families, uses an extensive rehearsal process. Actors aren't given a script and are asked to improvise and live as their characters.

When they met to discuss the project, Leigh told Staunton he planned to do a film set in 1950 and concerning abortion, nothing else. The research immersion involved Staunton living as a family with Phil Davis, Alex Kelly and Daniel Mays - who played Vera's husband and children - in a rigged-up apartment that served as a rehearsal space.

The improvised scenarios carry over into the actual filming, so the actors themselves didn't necessarily know what was coming. The nature of Leigh's process is so self-contained among the writer-director and his performers that even Staunton's husband, actor Jim Carter, didn't know what she was working on for the nine months of research and filming.

``You're inventing and creating this person,'' says Staunton. ``You're not discovering things, you're inventing them with Mike, and that's so empowering for an actor, and extremely creative and liberating. He gives you such space and time. It's a luxury that in no way seems indulgent at all. There's not a spare moment. Every moment is thick and rich with either research or discussion or being that character.''

Staunton, Leigh says, was his ``first and only choice'' for Vera.

``She's a character actor,'' says Leigh, whose screenplay and direction are also Oscar-nominated. ``When I use that expression, it's not in the Hollywood sense where it means a once-gorgeous young actor is now relegated to interesting cameo roles. I'm talking about somebody who doesn't just play themselves but who can turn themselves inside out and be characters.

``Whoever did this was going to have to naturally take to the whole thing of trying to create a character. You just knew that Imelda would be able to handle it.''

Since completing ``Vera Drake,'' Staunton has taken roles in the British TV miniseries ``Fingersmith'' and in ``Nanny McPhee,'' the film adaptation of Christianna Brand's ``Nurse Matilda'' books that will star - and be written by - Emma Thompson as a magical nanny.

Beyond those projects, both due out in 2005, Staunton isn't sure what's on the horizon.

``Got to get home and get a job, mate,'' she says.

Evan Henerson, [phone]

evan.henerson(at)dailynews.com

CAPTION(S):

2 photos

Photo:

(1) Imelda Staunton

on preparing for her ``Vera Drake'' role

Jeff Vespa/WireImage.com

(2) Her portrayal of a working-class woman who performs illegal abortions in 1950 England has earned ``Vera Drake's'' Imelda Staunton a best actress Oscar nomination.