Juliet Stevenson Truly, Madly, Deeply Loves Her Latest Movie Role

Though British actors are moving to America in droves because of lack of work in England, Juliet Stevenson has no intention of joining her countrymen stateside.

“I have got a very full life at home,” Stevenson explains. “I don’t think I would come over and wait for years and years for something to happen.”

Stevenson pauses: “But it would be lovely if something did. “

And she hopes something will, thanks to “Truly, Madly, Deeply,” her first film to be released in the United States. The romantic fantasy finds Stevenson portraying Nina, a young woman unable to cope with the death of her musician boyfriend (Alan Rickman). Then one evening, he returns to resume their relationship.

The role of Nina was delivered to Stevenson, an associate artist of the Royal Shakespeare Company, on a silver platter.

She happens to be best pals with the film’s writer-director, Anthony Minghella, and he wrote Nina for her.

“We’ve done seven pieces together,” Stevenson says.

“This script is so full of things that are particular to our friendship without being exclusive about it.”

The only problem, Stevenson says, is “it will be highly unlikely I ever get such a wonderful part again.”

And one that was so demanding. “You get to go into so many different directions,” Stevenson says.

“You get to be messy, foolish and all of those things which are difficult for women to be on screen. Very often women tend to fall into categories: somebody’s wife, somebody’s lover. Nina’s absolutely her own person.”

“Truly, Madly, Deeply” may be in the same spirit as “Ghost” but, Stevenson says, the two films are quite different.

“There are no visual effects to create the sense of the afterlife,” Stevenson says. “Anthony wanted to explore the line between missing someone so much you still continue to center your life around them and them actually being there.”

Patricia Kalember Finally Gets a Sister--With Two to Spare

Patricia Kalember always wanted a sister so she could “either beat up or take care of her.”

Instead, the actress was the recipient of her older brother’s evil deeds. “He was terrible,” Kalember, 34, recalls. “He made me a milkshake once with Ex-Lax in it!”

Rumor has it he even gave a then-2-year-old Kalember a spin in the dryer. “But then again,” she says, “we played together all the time. It’s always the good with the bad.”

Kalember’s wish for a sister has finally come true. In fact, she now has three sisters, courtesy of her new NBC series, “Sisters,” premiering tonight at 10. (See review, F18.)

In the one-hour drama, Kalember, best known as Gary’s brusque wife, Susannah, on “thirtysomething,” plays Georgie, the third-youngest in a family of four WASPish sisters. Tony winner Swoosie Kurtz, Sela Ward and Julianne Phillips play her siblings.

Georgie is the nurturing mom of two kids. “She’s the one that holds the family together,” Kalember says.

Last week, “Sisters” stirred up lot of controversy after NBC decided to cut the opening scene from tonight’s premiere in which the sisters talk about sex while taking a steam bath. Kalember says she nearly turned down the series because of the pilot’s frank scene but changed her mind after meeting with the producers.

Kalember, though, is embarrassed over a recent picture in Newsweek that shows the four “Sisters” sitting in the steam bath, dressed in towels.

“Each show starts in the sauna,” Kalember explains, “but we weren’t going to have (still) pictures taken in the sauna. We disagreed with it because of the cheesecake aspect, because it’s not that kind of show. People who tune in are either going to be very disappointed that it is not ‘Sister Angels’ or they are going to be thrilled because it’s an intelligent show.”