Through ‘Flirting,’ Thandie Newton Discovers Her Past--and a Future

Landing the female lead at 16 in the charming Australian import “Flirting” was quite literally an eye-opening experience for Thandie Newton.

Newton stars in the comedy-drama from director John Duigan (“The Year My Voice Broke”) as an African teen-ager attending Australian boarding school in 1964 who falls in love with a student from the local boys’ school.

“Not only is the film responsible for opening my eyes to a career, but also my history as far as Africa is concerned,” says Newton, now 19. Though Newton spent the first four years of her life in Zimbabwe, she has always considered herself English “because I don’t remember Africa. When I got the character, I had to obviously do some research and through that, I found out the most fascinating things about my life, my past and my family in Africa.”

Newton is now filming “Young Americans” with Harvey Keitel and majoring in anthropology and archeology at Cambridge University. “I wanted to find a subject I felt was broad enough to cover a lot of things,” she says. “I wanted something (where) I could learn more about life and our history and our future.”