Because I have many English-speaking Twi-friends who couldn’t read my Greek articles, I’ve decided to create this page where I will translate the ones I’d like to share with them.
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October 25
Kristen Stewart: swimming against the current
Kristen Stewart in Interview - This picture does not belong to me. It is property of Interview magazine
One month before the opening of New Moon, the craziness regarding all things Twilight has turned into … frenzy. The websites which I – inevitably – visit to get news in order to keep you posted (after I’ve filtered them several times to see if what they write is actually fact) in their effort to get as many hits as possible post false news, but also photoshopped pictures. You see, the flow of true stories from Vancouver, where Eclipse is filming, is not dense and public appearances of our beloved actors – especially by Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart – are rare. Recently though, Kristen was interviewed by Interview magazine for its 40th anniversary issue. Below, you can watch an HD behind the scenes video from the photoshoot and also read excerpts of the interview, which give me reason to comment on a couple of things that trouble me.
Kristen is certainly not like other stars and starlets of her age. Born and raised in Los Angeles by parents who work for the industry, she took her first steps in acting at the tender age of nine and by twelve she was already starring alongside Jodi Foster in Panic Room. However, instead of giving in to Hollywood ‘laws’ according to which teenage stars should look like they’re ten years older than their actual age and start visiting their plastic surgeon before they are fully developed, Kristen maintained an unkempt, individual style which showed – and still does – that she just wants to be herself. Her film choices have been as unconventional. Last summer, she filmed The Runaways, where she portrays Joan Jett in the ‘70s and had her long chestnut-brown hair cut and dyed black, causing a torrent of negative comments from fans. After Eclipse, she is filming K-11, where she will play a troubled teen boy (!!) in a county prison (her mother will be directing the film and Nikki Reid will be co-starring). It has also been announced that she will take the lead in a film directed by James Woods, where she will portray a … marine! Female, this time. Phew!
It’s quite obvious that this is Kristen’s way of showing that she may ‘be’ Bella for years, but she won’t identify with this character in any way. She’s just a 19-year old girl, who likes rock music, couldn’t care less about fashion, publicity rules and strong public lights. That’s why at her interviews she tends to be laconic, won’t put an effort to be likable and claims that the only thing she cares about is being real. For all these reasons I like her a lot. But what makes me worry is her age. She is too young to be able to handle this kind of publicity which, unfortunately, has ‘burned’ many and much older celebrities than her. Recently, she projects this non-conformist attitude more aggressively as if what she wishes – if possible – is to reduce the ‘terrifying’ number of her fans who want her to remind them of Bella off the filming set as well. In the following video you can see that she looks tired (but still incredibly beautiful, as always) and also the ‘bizarre’ stuff she endures in order to satisfy the wishes or whims of the photographer. From the interview excerpts you can get a taste of how her life is right now. If her reality is so ‘loaded’, I worry that she might try to find ‘other ways’ to escape it… And if she’s with Robert who – like a typical English guy – escapes reality easily with the aid of alcohol, then will the temptation be stronger? What I truly hope is that both of them keep their feet on the ground and find ways to handle the publicity and the craziness that follows the Twilight phenomenon, but also stay healthy and fresh-looking just like young people of their age should be.
Read the excerpts from the phone interview Kristen gave to Dennis Hopper (yes, the Dennis Hopper who, apparently, cooperates with the magazine and who first put his 6-year old daughter on – a huge fan – to say hello) and please leave a comments at the end of the page:
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HOPPER: Well, you’re getting a lot of attention.
STEWART: Yeah, it’s weird. There’s an idea about who I am that’s eternally projected onto me, and then I almost feel like I have to fulfill that role. Even when things come out of my mouth, I want to be sure I’m saying exactly what I mean. All I’m thinking of is the fact that everything that I say is going to be criticized—not criticized, just evaluated and analyzed. And it’s always something that matters so much to me that doesn’t come out right. But in terms of how my life has changed, I never really went out a whole lot before. I’m sort of an in-my-head kind of person. I wish I could take more walks . . .
HOPPER: You can’t take walks?
STEWART: I’d like to take more walks after work, instead of having to come back to my hotel room and not leave. So it can be boring. I’ve been working as an actress since I was very young, and I know a lot of people who are actors who don’t have to deal with having a persona . . . You know, if you look up the word persona, it isn’t even real. The whole meaning of the word is that it’s made up, and it’s like I didn’t even get to make up my own. It can be annoying. But I have a really strong feeling that this is going to go away, that this is the most intense it’s going to get—and could get—and that it’s fleeting. So in a few years, I will hopefully become more like the people I want to become like.
HOPPER: Does it bother you to see yourself in the tabloids?
STEWART: There’s nothing you can do about it, to be honest. I don’t leave my hotel room—literally, I don’t. I don’t talk to anybody about my personal life, and maybe that perpetuates it, too. But it’s really important to own what you want to own and keep it to yourself. That said, the only way for me not to have somebody know where I went the night before is if I didn’t go out at all. So that’s what I’m trading. It depends what mood I’m in. Some nights, I think, “You know what? I don’t care. I’m just going to do what I want to do.” Then the next day I think, “Ugh.Now everyone thinks I’m going out to get the attention.” But it’s like, no, I actually, for a second, thought that maybe I could be like a normal person.
You can read the whole interview here
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mmjaye
Very well done…