Exclusive: Agyness Deyn On Acting In ‘Sunset Song’ And Quitting Modelling

When Agyness Deyn was on The Jonathan Ross Show last month she was so hungry, she ate the set. She laughs and clarifies that she scoffed from a prop, the on-set fruit bowl. ‘Apparently the crew were like, “She’s eating the set! Replace the banana!”’ the 32-year-old says, adding that she’d just come from a morning of doing press and hadn’t had time to pop to Pret.

So this isn’t a story about a former model’s way to stay skinny. Nor is it really about the demands of promoting her new film, Sunset Song. It’s the fact that she’s back on TV that’s significant. Agyness Deyn is about to become a big deal again.

Agyness, you’ll remember, was a big deal before. It’s not her first time on Jonathan Ross’s couch, either. She was there in 2008 at the height of her fame as Britain’s premier supermodel, reciting her rise from chip-shop girl and childhood friend of designer Henry Holland to cover model for Vogue, face of Burberry, Vivienne Westwood and Giorgio Armani. She penetrated the national consciousness like Kate Moss before her, armed with a charming innocence. You may have asked for an ‘Aggy’ at the hairdresser’s, her signature bleached-blonde spiked ’do.

Today, Agyness’s trademark hair is long grown out. She is thoughtful and still brimming with northern warmth. She’s about to break out on the big screen in a serious way with Sunset Song, a film based on the Scots classic by Lewis Grassic Gibbon. Agyness plays Chris Guthrie, a young woman from a farming family in early 20th-century rural Scotland, who retains her spirit and intelligence despite the harsh conditions of the time.

Did Agyness find it tough going? ‘It was great to play someone who is strong but not hard in any way,’ she says in her soft Lancashire brogue, which she hasn’t lost despite living between LA and New York. ‘She has a genteel inquisitiveness that symbolises strength. She manoeuvres through everything so gracefully. That’s inspiring as a young woman.’ It’s a description that holds for Agyness’s own manoeuvre from model to actress. The transition has been steady. After an initial foray into big budget movies with Clash of the Titans in 2010, she turned to theatre and smaller, independent films.

She’s rung the changes in her personal life, too, marrying actor Giovanni Ribisi in 2012. The couple split in 2015. After all that, does she feel different? ‘I am the same as when I was a child. I just have a lot more experience. I am inherently the same person but I just know a few more things.’

For Agyness, modelling is in the past tense. ‘It wasn’t as if my career had started to decrease. I stopped modelling when things were going good,’ Agyness says of the decision to quit. ‘I look back and think it’s kind of crazy that I did that.’ She briefly studied drama at Hull; acting became an itch she had to scratch. ‘It was like the excitement I got when I started modelling and that was electric to me. It’s like if you are in a relationship and you start having feelings for someone else. It’s terrible to stay with that person.’

Agyness admits that being celebrated solelyforherlookstookitstoll,though the problem isn’t confined to the fashion industry. ‘If someone is patting you on the back and being like, “You’re great, the way you look is great”, that’s where it becomes a little off kilter because maybe you don’t feel that way inside.’ It’s clear acting offers richer rewards for an older, wiser woman (‘It’s so good,’ she enthuses), but she can still enjoy childhood comforts. She heads home to Lancashire when she can and takes her mum on set. Despite all the changes, there is something unaffected about Agyness Deyn. ‘My mum will make our tea and look after us,’ she smiles. ‘It makes a difference when you are doing long days, having your mum there.’

Sunset Song is in cinemas 4 December