The road of happy destiny awaits trudgers like Hayley Atwell. She is a woman who wears her experience, strength and hope as if a loose garment, not a cursed straightjacket — at ease with herself, projecting her comfort via osmosis to those in her company. Inner battles are common in the Hollywood set, an industry in which rejection is currency and the slings and arrows of fame and fortune the Scylla and Charybdis for anyone brave enough to bet their talent (and self-esteem) on its bright lights. It’s worse if you’re a woman.
So the ebullience, playfulness and energy that Atwell possessed at our photoshoot and interview at The Twenty Two, a remarkably chic hotel, restaurant and private members’ club on the north-west corner of Grosvenor Square in Mayfair, brought the best out of every member of ’s crew. Every tilt or adjustment of Atwell’s noctilucous face and Rossetti jawline came with a commentary of her thought process. An extended leg
