Maya Horwood is a young British actress. Her first feature film will be Molly Moon and the Incredible Book of Hypnotism.

Maya Horwood was perfect as Gemma. I love her frightened face when Miss Adderstone is telling the children off at the beginning of the film. She is good at being very disgusted by the fish head that she finds in her soup, and excellent at telling Molly she must go to London and find Rocky. She also has a very important bit at the end of the film when she asks Mrs Trinklebury to stay and look after them. It is very moving.

Interview with Maya Horwood

Q: How did you start acting?

A: I started acting through my school friend, I heard she had classes and I joined her group. I started private lessons giving me the chance to audition for things like Molly Moon!

Q: Why do you love acting?

A: I absolutely love acting because you get to explore different characters and have lots of fun with them!

Q: How did you feel when you got the part in Molly Moon and the Incredible Book of Hypnotism?

A: I was so happy when I got this role because it was my first ever acting role. I was so excited to experience what it was like acting in a movie.

Q: Were you ever scared or nervous on set?

A: Not really, just nervous in case I got my lines wrong or did something I wasn’t meant to do. At first, I was quite nervous I wouldn’t be as good as the others because it was my first time.

Q: Do you think you are quite similar to Gemma?

A: A little. Gemma seemed quite quiet and I’m quite loud! But I was reasonably alike with her because she was a good talker and sometimes comes out of her comfort zone.

Q: If you weren’t acting in the film, what other process would you liked to have been involved with?

A: I like writing so perhaps scriptwriting and I enjoy costume designing as well.

Q: Did you do anything to prepare for the role of Gemma?

A: I went through some of her lines in the first script to try and see what type of person she was so I be as much like her as possible.

Q: What was your favourite moment or thing that happened whilst filming?

A: I really like doing the spaghetti scene because the food was really nice and we all had lots of fun together but also the more emotional parts that I spoke were interesting and fun to do. It gave me a chance to prove to myself I could do something.

Q: Did anything really funny happen to you on set?

A: Nothing funny really happened to me but I had lots of enjoyable times on set and in the green room like playing ‘super heroes’ with the younger ones.

Maya Horwood as Gemma Patel