It all started with a no.
"You bloody well will not," said Arthur Sedler, a man who didn't often say no, and a man of many hats. A native Londoner, a widower, a mathematician turned economist turned Cambridge maths professor, and (as he'd tell you without any sort of prodding whatsoever) a father of two - the world's most thankless and underrated profession. Having children was always something that he'd wanted, coming from a family of eight and appreciating the bond he'd had with his siblings, but raising two blonde hellions on his own had never been part of the plan. Then again, settling down with an American and moving to her home state of Vermont where there was no need for London-educated economists and a much greater need for a man who could properly thaw a snowed-in vehicle, that hadn't exactly been part of the plan either. But Arthur Sedler had fallen in love with Rebecca, a quiet poet with long blonde hair and the kindest heart he'd ever known. A nice home on a nice island where they could live a quiet life with their daughter Sloane seemed like a lovely future, even if it hadn't been what he'd imagined for himself as a boy. Everything was normal, almost painfully so, until Rebecca got pregnant for the second time. Leo, they called him, even before he was born; it wasn't short for anything, and it had been Sloane's suggestion. Everything was alright until the birth. There were some unforeseen complications that led to a tragic end: five-year-old Sloane and thirty-nine-year-old Arthur said their final goodbye to Rebecca and their first hello to Leo on the same day. It was a bit of a miracle that Leo had been alright, everybody at the hospital in Burlington had said so, but to the elder Sedlers, it hadn't felt like a miracle, not at all. It might've seemed cold to some of his American friends, but it was easy for Arthur to sell their family home and move back to England. It was easy for him to take his children and run away from his grief.
While raising his children, he admittedly made some mistakes: he watched them much too closely, he probably didn't talk about their mother enough, and he often treated them like adults rather than children. But most of all... Arthur Sedler didn't often say no. When your children didn't have a mother, and they were living on a university campus in which their father was considered to be quite important, and you certainly had the financial means to provide for them, there didn't seem to be much of a good reason to say no. Sloane had always been described as "thirteen going on thirty" in a teasing sort of way, but in 2001 at age thirteen, it seemed truer than ever. The phrases "wise beyond her years" and "too smart for her own good" were thrown around far too often, but those who knew her were rarely surprised by her precociousness. (Growing up at the Cambridge with only a father and a younger brother will do that to a girl.) She'd been shopping, long blonde hair that she refused to cut trailing close to her bum while she tried on hats and scarves as her father looked on with a fond smile, when his daughter was approached by a man who introduced himself as a casting agent. It turned out Sloane had the look and the smile (and as the casting agent later discovered, the personality) for show business. Arthur let her go along with it, because it made her happy; having her photo taken and getting attention, learning lines for auditions and getting to play pretend, it was something she'd never really done as a child, and seeing his daughter having a bit of a youth as a teenager had been refreshing. Plus, he never really thought she'd actually get picked for anything - she was the daughter of a maths professor who lived at Cambridge, for Christ's sake.
But then she did. It was a European miniseries based on the life of Napoleon Bonaparte, and it would go on to be the most expensive production of its kind, costing approximately forty-six million dollars. Sloane's part wasn't a big part, but it was an important part: the young girl hearing all of Napoleon's life stories, firsthand from Napoleon himself. For the first time in a very long time, her father said no. Well, no, actually, she'd said she was going to be going to France to film a miniseries, and she said she was going to have the best time, and her father said, you bloody well will not. Needless to say, Sloane Sedler bloody well did, as her story wouldn't be worth hearing nearly as much had she not.
To say it all fell into place from there makes it sound a bit cleaner than it actually was, but as far as "climbing the showbiz ladder" stories go, Sloane's was relatively painless. After Napoléon she primarily did extra work and work in her community theatre, because she found the overall exercise of acting to be incredibly thrilling, but her father was adamant about her finishing her education. Once she had, she was able to satisfy him with a promise of university - "if I don't manage to book any jobs" being the precursor. This time, her father held no preconceived notions that she wouldn't get picked: seventeen-year-old Sloane had charm, talent, and an understated quality than was rare for a girl her age. Though her next credited part didn't actually have any lines, she enjoyed being on the set of a big film, V for Vendetta, and it only served as reinforcement that acting was really, truly what she wanted to do. Admittedly, it'd initially started out as a rebellion of sorts: had her father not been so adamant about her not taking the first job, she wasn't sure if she would've even done it. It was intimidating, after all. But as years passed, she found herself less intimidated the more experience she gained, despite the majority of it being rather... well, pedestrian. She didn't have a problem with it, though. Sloane was intelligent and cultured, but acting was fun, it wasn't really a craft or a serious sort of study. Playing a mean girl in Driving Lessons or a silly heiress in Bedtime Stories didn't make her disappointed in her career or anxious for meatier roles, it was just... fun, through and through. Naturally, the highlight of her career for her London born-and-bred father is still (to this day, despite any other success) her appearance on Doctor Who because, as Arthur frequently declares, "My family was in the TARDIS."
Though Sloane had hit minor blips of success (most notably being part of British institution St. Trinian's, something her aunt still raves about, and not just because of Colin Firth) it wasn't until An Education that anyone knew her name. Initially, she couldn't believe she was twenty-years-old and reading for the part of a sixteen-year-old, but after reading the entirety of Nick Hornby's screenplay, she fell in love with Jenny Mellor. Prior to that point, Sloane hadn't ever really connected with a character or a story or the idea of communication through film: it'd always just been fun. But Jenny felt real, and felt like a part of her, and the truth of it was that working on An Education was her education, as cheesy as it always sounded. It changed her life. And that was before it got her nominated for an Oscar, and won her a BAFTA, where she cried a bit on stage, and thanked her mother, and genuinely believed that she'd somehow heard her.
It was hard to follow winning a BAFTA and a BIFA, and being nominated for an Oscar and a Golden Globe and a SAG. It really was hard. Everyone had all sorts of expectations, and all Sloane really wanted to do was have some more fun. She didn't want to end up on Actresses to Watch lists. She wanted to do fun films like Dark Shadows (her first American accent film!) and That Awkward Moment (her first romcom!) without receiving criticism that her career had "slumped" or that she'd "peaked" a few years prior. The criticism didn't keep her up at night, but it was occasionally frustrating to feel like she wasn't allowed to cross genres. Why couldn't she do a film with Tim Burton before going on to do a film with Terrence Malick? Why did she have to choose one or the other? It felt like such a trivial sort of thing to have on her radar, because she'd finally gotten to the point where she could work steadily, and that was really all she'd wanted to do. Offers were consistently coming in, and she got to work for directors (ie, Tim freaking Burton and Terrence freaking Malick) that, while working in England as a teenager, she never would've thought she'd get to meet let alone learn from.
As the years passed, Sloane discovered that the concept of hype didn't last forever; IndieWire and Vanity Fair could only put you on their Hollywood's Next Big Thing lists for so many years in a row before everybody started to realize that despite all the hype, you never really did become the next big thing, but rather took on a string of supporting roles in variously received independent films. Sloane loved the independent film world and it certainly loved her back, but four years post-An Education the types of roles her peers were taking on didn't seem to be an option for her. She received script after script for all sorts of parts she had no interest in playing - the naive English girl in a period costume, the damsel girlfriend in a Hollywood action film, and even offers for supporting characters on television shows - and options grew slimmer and slimmer the more she rejected the expected.
It wasn't until her agent more or less tricked her into getting interested in a Marvel film ("She's a very dark and powerful female character, and the backstory is totally complex and Shakespearean!") that Sloane started to consider exactly all the things something like that could do for somebody's career: name recognition, face recognition, money, and (most importantly to Sloane) choices. Desperately wanting to go back to the days of 2009 when she had her pick of dozens of parts, Sloane considered being part of a big franchise, even though it encompassed everything she never thought she'd be a part of; consideration led to auditioning, auditioning led to meeting, meeting led to screen-testing, screen-testing led to freaking out about whether this was actually something she was going to do which led to actually doing it. Despite any prior misgivings, Sloane quickly discovered that parts of it were actually really exciting and interesting and fun, though it certainly had its downsides, too. Only time will tell where this new direction will ultimately take her, but one thing's for sure...
A lot can happen when you tell Sloane Sedler no.
 occupation age & dob birthplace raised in current residence family Leo Sedler (20, brother) |
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(2015) Crimson Peak (2015) Knight of Cups (2015) Avengers: Age of Ultron (2014) Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014) That Awkward Moment (2014) A Long Way Down (2013) The Double (2013) Horns (2013) Stoker (2013) "Shot at the Night" (music video) (2012) Dark Shadows (2012) The Master (2011) "Call Me Back" (music video) (2011) Jane Eyre (2011) "Brick by Brick" (music video) (2010) Never Let Me Go (2010) Chatroom (2009) An Education (2009) St. Trinian's 2: The Legend of Fritton's Gold (2008) Bedtime Stories (2007) St. Trinian's (2007) December Boys (2007) Doctor Who (television) (2006) Notes on a Scandal (2006) Driving Lessons (2005) Keeping Mum (2005) V for Vendetta (2002) Napoleon (TV Mini-series) father brother pets
mother maternal family
paternal aunts paternal uncles
Arthur Sedler  (60)Leo Sedler
 (20)Rebecca Sedler (deceased) Presently Unknown
Rose, Anne-Margaret, Ellie Nigel, Alan, Barnaby, Oliver
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