Keira Knightley is stepping back in time and into a familiar role as a strong female lead for her latest film "Colette," based on a true story of a feminist French icon and author.
"It's sort of about her fight for recognition, for finding her own voice," Knightley told "Good Morning America" about her character. "It's a film about feminism and it's a film about gender politics, sexual politics. I just loved it all," she said.
Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1948, but the film focuses on her early years as a writer when she was pushed by her husband to write novels under his name and how she fought to make her talents known.
"She was a very, very famous French novelist and this film is around the early part of her life where she was married to her first husband who took credit for her first four novels," Knightley said. "She's the one that wrote the book."
It's a film about feminism and it's a film about gender politics, sexual politics. I just loved it all.
Knightley described Colette and her husband Willy, played by Dominic West, as "a celebrity couple."
"They were huge stars and he was brilliant at marketing, but he also took credit for her work. So he marketed her but didn't give her her voice," she explained. "And she took it back."
Colette has a strikingly similar personality to Knightley's Oscar-nominated performance as Elizabeth Bennet in "Pride and Prejudice." And after 13 years, young girls are still admiring her performance.
"My daughter told me to thank you because they watched ‘Pride and Prejudice’ in her English class," ABC News chief anchor George Stephanopoulos told Knightley.
But even though that film still rings true for her fans, Knightley said her go-to feel-good movie is actually "My Fair Lady.”
“I love that one. And I sing along really badly," she said with a laugh.
The actress also admitted to seeing her hit movie, “Love Actually,” just once.
“It first came out 15 years ago,” she said. “I’m hardly in it.”
Knightley said another exciting movie on her acting horizon even has her three-year-old daughter "thrilled."
"I'm playing the sugar plum fairy in 'The Nutcracker,'" she revealed. "I'm very pink. I look like a big cake. So my three-year-old daughter is thrilled about that," she said of the movie that comes out this November.
Knightley said she caught the acting bug at a young age, begging her parents to get her an agent.
“My mom was a writer and my dad was an actor. There were agents ringing the house, and I was, like, ‘if you have got one, why don't I have one?’” she recalled. “So I had to wait a really long time. I got one when I was 6.” Knightley’s daughter so far has shown zero interest in acting.
“She wants to be a dentist, and I'm happy about it. That's a good job,” Knightley said.
Fans can go see Knightley shine in "Colette" which hits theaters Friday, Sept. 28.
