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Billionaire Richard Branson praised actress Kate Winslet for saving his 90-year-old mother from a fire this summer. Now Winslet, 36, speaks up about her heroic deed for the first time in a new TV interview. And somehow, she makes the terrifying incident into a hilarious anecdote! Watch the clip below.
On the upcoming premiere of BBC's The Graham Norton Show, Winslet confesses that she reacted in the most ridiculous possible way to shouts of "Fire!" in the Branson's Caribbean vacation home: She rushed to put on a bra.
"We did wake up at 4:30 in the morning to hear the sounds of some of Richard's nephews voices yelling that there was a fire. And I jumped up and ran immediately towards the fire, because clearly I thought I could put it out," says Winslet. "My children (Mia, 10, and Joe, 7) were standing at their bedroom door, and I said, 'It's a fire, it's fine. Go back inside just for two minutes and just close the door.'"
"Then I'm thinking, 'Now what do I do?' Ran into the bedroom, and put on a bra," she says, laughing. "In disastrous moments like that, you do the strangest things.
"So I started to put on a bra, and then thought that's gonna take me too long, off came the bra, on with the T-shirt, grabbed the bag, grabbed the children and picked up granny."
No one was ultimately hurt in the fire, which was thought to be caused by a lighting strike during a tropical storm. But although Kate Winslet carried Mrs. Branson down the stairs to safety, she denies that she saved anybody's life.
"I have to say Eve Branson is an extraordinary stoic, powerful lady and she could have totally made it out on her own," she claims. "I just helped that tiny little bit."
Not only did the Winslets and the Bransons survive the fire, but so did the love between families: Kate Winslet is reportedly dating Richard Branson's son, Ned Rocknroll.
