Helena Bonham Carter maintains wicked streak in 'Alice'

LOS ANGELES — Once a corset queen in prim, proper costume dramas, Helena Bonham Carter has spent her time lately playing all manner of foul women.

Fanatic Bellatrix Lestrange, a disciple of evil Lord Voldemort in the "Harry Potter" movies. Vile Mrs. Lovett, who grinds murder victims up as meat for pies in "Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street." A crazy old witch with an eyepatch and hair as brittle as straw in "Big Fish."

Now Bonham Carter's playing the bratty Red Queen in "Alice in Wonderland," digital wizardry giving her a monstrously bulbous head atop a tiny body as she repeatedly shouts with glee, "Off with their heads!"

"I am playing lots of villains. It's horrible. Serial killer, sadist. But I think it's the age, you know. That's what you get over 40, maybe," Bonham Carter, 43, said in an interview. Shifting into a shrill hag's voice, she adds: "Ooh, she's aging. She must be evil. She looks like a witch."

In the final two "Harry Potter" movies, coming this November and in July 2011, Bonham Carter takes Bellatrix's nastiness to new heights, including torturing Harry's pal Hermione (Emma Watson).

"Then Hermione gets to pretend to be me," Bonham Carter said. "I got to pretend to be Emma Watson pretending to be Hermione pretending to be Bellatrix. A lot of Russian dolls. It was hilarious."

The British actress has romantic partner Tim Burton to thank for many of her wicked characters, along with other persona-shifting roles that include a chimpanzee in "Planet of the Apes" and the voice of an amorous cadaver in "Corpse Bride."

Burton says he and Bonham Carter "have completely different tastes in movies" — she still has not seen his debut feature, "Pee-wee's Big Adventure," figuring maybe she'll sit down and watch it one day with the oldest of their two children.

Yet while Bonham Carter was best known in the 1980s and '90s for fancy period dramas such as "A Room With a View," "Lady Jane," "Howards End" and "The Wings of the Dove," she said today's golden era of fantasy films suits her perfectly.

"That is so much my cup of tea. So the fact that I've coincided with 'Harry Potter,' which is all about witches and wizards, absolutely up my alley. I just want to wave a wand," Bonham Carter said.

"As with 'Wonderland.' I could not believe my luck when Tim asked me. I thought it was going to be enough just to be alongside, and I could spectate. I love that whole culture of Alice and Lewis Carroll. I've always been keen on it. Then to be part of it and to pretend, to be invited and paid to pretend and invent your own Wonderland. ... It's my dream come true."