Hollywood star Meryl Streep has spoken of how her admiration for Lady Margaret Thatcher grew as she made a film about Britain's former prime minister.
The actress has won plaudits and talk of an Oscar win for her role in The Iron Lady, a controversial movie which has drawn criticism from the ex-Tory party leader's former colleagues.
But Streep told the Radio Times that making the film has given her greater respect for a woman who succeeded against overwhelming odds.
"The more I learned, the more my view of her changed. Wherever you stand on her policies, and many people didn't like her, the scale of her influence and the fact that she got things done was extraordinary," she said.
"And the mental, physical, spiritual energy that it took to live every one of those days as head of the government was phenomenal. It's really humbling to consider that she was at 10 Downing Street for 10-and-a-half years. I admire that achievement. I stand in awe of it, even though I didn't agree with a lot of her policies."
Streep, 62, plays the politician over a 40-year span, showing her rise to the top.
She told the magazine: "I was aware of her very early on and, even though her policies were not popular, to say the least, in my circles, people were kind of thrilled that a woman had become leader.
"When I was in college the professions open to women were so few - there were very few women that went to law school, no one dreamed of being a corporate head, it was out of the question.
"You could, perhaps, become leader of a company, maybe if they made make-up. You could be editor of a magazine but only if it was a woman's magazine...that's the world that Margaret Thatcher entered and then rose right to the very top and it's extraordinary."
Former Conservative party chairman Lord Tebbit has called Streep's performance as a frail old woman suffering from dementia several years after Denis Thatcher's death "half-hysterical, over-emotional".
But Streep defended the movie, saying: "The part of the story that interested me the most was the part that's wholly imagined and that's set in the present day. And it's about the diminishment of power, the denouement of a big life.
"That's the part that writer Abi Morgan made up. But we have some basis of reality because of Carol Thatcher's book (A Swim-On Part in the Goldfish Bowl: a Memoir) and we have spoken to people that were close to her. And we weren't making up the dementia, it's drawn from Carol's book, and from talking to people."
The Devil Wears Prada star said that she would hope that Lady Thatcher, if she were ever to see the film, directed by Mamma Mia! filmmaker Phyllida Lloyd, would see that it was created with "respect".
"I doubt very much that she will ever see the film but if she does I hope that she would see in it an empathetic attempt to understand the size of what her life was, her place in history, what she did and also the cost, the human cost that we ask our leaders to pay," she said.
"I don't think we have given her a pass on anything but I hope that she would see that the film is made with respect."
She said of portraying the Iron Lady: "I had some very definite ideas, the way that I do about certain things on my own face, which I obviously know very well, and I knew if I emphasised certain things it would look more like her.
"But there were also things like how she held herself, how she stood and how she sat, how she crossed her legs and what jewellery she wore, how she set her head when she was making a point - all of those things were important. And they were specific to her so I did try to capture that to a certain degree because it had a lot to do with how people reacted to her. It was her armour."
Double Oscar-winner Streep said she worked hard to show the change in the grocer's daughter's distinctive voice.
"The tricky part was that, at one point, when she became leader of the Conservative Party, she studied how to produce her voice differently to sustain a certain amount of public speaking - to deepen her voice, enrich it and support it with breath. So I had to get the two voices, the one that she began with, and the one that came later when she became leader.
"I listened to a lot of her earlier interviews where it sort of trips along and is quite light and then suddenly this authority comes out. And actually it was a lot of fun doing that.
"I thought 'if she could change her voice, I can change mine. I can put on these shoes, I can do this.'"
Jim Broadbent plays Dennis Thatcher, Anthony Head is Geoffrey Howe, Richard E Grant plays Michael Heseltine and Olivia Colman is Carol Thatcher in the film.
Despite having notched up a record 16 Oscar nominations, Streep said: "That was really something. I walked into the rehearsals and there were maybe 45 of these great British actors all milling around and that was very scary and very intimidating."
She said: "We were in this big, empty space at Pinewood Studios and although I wasn't in costume I tried to dress in a way that didn't look like the Bohemian me. Everybody was there ... and I wasn't ready to speak in any voice other than my own.
"But the director made us get up and do some lines and, in the end, I did do Mrs Thatcher's voice. And you know, they were so welcoming and they made me laugh. They really put me at ease."
She said of her first instinct when she was offered the film, which is released in January: "I was like 'oh my God, I want to do it!' I knew I would love it. How many people get to play the first female leader of the western world?"