The fall magazine covers usually go to young actresses with Oscar-bait films coming out, the Emma Stones and Jennifer Lawrences of the world. It’s remarkable then to see a 45-year-old British woman on the cover of American Vogue, all to promote a streaming series. Olivia Colman is hyping her turn as Queen Elizabeth II in The Crown, the third season of which comes out soon. This Vogue profile doesn’t contain any breaking news, nor does Olivia dish any scandalous dirt on her life or her costars. In fact, much of the piece is an assortment of quotes from her former coworkers, all of whom adore Olivia and worship the ground she walks on. You can read the full piece here. Some highlights:

On being the Queen: “It’s easy to just go, ‘Well, how hard can being the queen be?’ I think it’s really hard. You can’t just go, ‘I don’t want to do it today.’ ”

Being an in-demand actor in her 40s: “If you’re working, you’re so f–king lucky. A lot of actors better than me aren’t.”

Playing the Queen after Claire Foy: “I sort of tried to imagine how Claire would do it. But I’m not actually the queen and I’m not actually Claire Foy.”

She’s glad she didn’t become famous in her 20s: “To be the ingenue and to keep working is rare because once people see you as that, they don’t like the process of aging. Which is f–king ridiculous! I grew to my place.”

She loves her London neighborhood: “These streets are a lovely community—they really look after you. I think I might never be able to completely leave London, even though I do dream of buggering off to the seaside.”

She was never comfortable with appearance when she was younger: “I look up pictures of myself as a teenager, and I think I was gorgeous. But I didn’t feel that. All those little comments through those precious years can have long-lasting negative effects. You see images of a perfect person and say, ‘I can never be that.’ Over the years, pounds have gone on, and my body has changed; I’ve had children. If someone doesn’t like me because of the size of my bum, they can f–k off. Because I’m quite a nice person to be with, actually.”

She was not a young woman in a hurry. “It was very important to me in my late teens and early 20s to have fun—it’s a great time to have fun.”

[From Vogue]

A lovely profile of a lovely woman who happens to be an Oscar-winning actress who only got famous well into her 30s. It’s sort of a grand tradition in British acting circles, these amazing actresses who only seem to find success later in their careers. Anyway, I adore Olivia and that’s the point of it. If American has Tom Hanks as “the every man,” I think Olivia is THAT for Great Britain. She’s the Oscar winner who is your neighbor.

Here’s Olivia’s 72 Questions with Vogue:

Cover courtesy of Vogue.