We know, courtesy of Us Weekly, that Kristen Stewart spreads butter on her blueberry bagels. People magazine just chronicled her alleged romance with her Twilight co-star, Robert Pattinson, in an entire issue devoted to the movie franchise. And everyone from Access Hollywood to the New Zealand Herald has chewed over her supposedly “moody,” “mopey,” “melancholy” demeanor. What hardly anyone outside Hollywood knows — or at least recognizes amid the tabloid frenzy, hyperventilating fans and cheesiness of the Twilight movies — is perhaps the most interesting thing about her: At 19, Stewart is considered one of the most promising actresses of her generation, with Oscar winners like Sean Penn and Jodie Foster lining up to offer praise.
“I do wish that people would focus more on the work, and I can’t say that I don’t take it personally,” said Stewart, who reprises her role as Bella Swan, an ordinary high school girl who falls in love with a sensitive vampire, in the forthcoming film The Twilight Saga: New Moon.
“But I understand it because what you do as an actor is so tied up in who you are as a person,” she continued with a deep sigh. “What really kills me — it really rips me up — is when people think I’m abrasive, inconsiderate or ungrateful because I don’t go outside in a bikini and wave to the paparazzi. Come on!”
Life as a teen idol has never been easy. But navigating the obsessive attention of young fans amid today’s media landscape — all Twitter, all YouTube, all TMZ, all the time — can be particularly harrowing. And Stewart in some ways has it even harder. Because of the grip the Twilight franchise has on young girls — the first movie raked in US$384 million at the global box office and the books, by Stephenie Meyer, have sold more than 70 million copies — she is not just an actress playing a popular role. Instead “Twi-hards” have come to project their version of romantic love on her; Stewart’s shyness and hints of awkwardness make her accessible to fans in a way Megan Fox is not.
Stewart has coped with the suffocating attention by giving off an air of inapproachability, a tough exterior that Chris Weitz, the director of New Moon, said she has methodically adopted. “If she didn’t, every teenage girl would see her as their best friend,” he said. “They would tear her completely apart.”
In contrast, Pattinson, who plays the too-tender-to-suck-blood Edward Cullen, acts sheepish and “tries to implode in on himself and turn into a human mumble,” Weitz said.
The actors of Stewart’s generation — Zac Efron, Chris Pine, Selena Gomez, Shia LaBeouf — have witnessed the carnage that fully embracing the limelight in the digital era can bring: Britney, Paris, Lindsay. As such, they have tried to reclaim some of element of mystery, something that results in a lot of foot stomping from a nonstop celebrity news machine.
“The key is not to become a reality show,” said Foster, who co-starred with Stewart in David Fincher’s Panic Room and was herself a teenage star. “That kind of attention might seem fun right now, but it won’t in 10 years.”
Smoking a cigarette on a 14th-floor balcony of the Four Seasons here last week, Stewart was animated and funny — until a question about whether her family really keeps wolves as pets. Her eyes narrowed and she nodded warily. She calls people who demand to know aspects of her private life “fiends.” As to whether or not she is dating Pattinson, she recently told Entertainment Weekly, “I’m not going to give the fiending an answer.”
Sure enough, it took only about an hour for her cigarette break, captured by a telephoto lens, to be splashed across the Web site PopSugar.com.
The Twilight series reflects a new super-strain of entertainment born of Hollywood’s desire to build movies around existing brands, whether books (Harry Potter), comic book characters (Iron Man) or toys (Transformers). Twilight, which Summit Entertainment is rereleasing in theaters for one night only on Thursday, is the No. 1 DVD of 2009, with over 8 million copies sold. The sound track has sold more than 3.5 million copies worldwide. And the New Moon sound track, released four days early because the songs were already leaking, had its debut as the No. 1 album in the US.
You can now buy Twilight makeup (staining lip balm, US$18); a Barbie-like Bella action figure; and the themed Volvo (the pitch: “What drives Edward Cullen May Soon Drive You”). New Moon, which opens on Friday in the US and had already sold out more than 1,000 screenings, is expected to be one of the biggest movies of the fall. But the success of Twilight has blurred if not buried Stewart’s blossoming reputation as a skilled actress. Aside from the overtly commercial nature of the franchise, the subject matter — vampires that sparkle, gym-sculptured werewolves and computer-generated effects— tends to turn the noses of cinema’s auteur elite skyward.
“I realize that it may seem funny to be discussing her seriousness as an actress in the context of the Twilight saga, but the kinds of things she has to do are kind of amazing,” said Weitz, whose credits include About a Boy and The Golden Compass. “It’s not easy to make falling in love with a vampire look real.”
Stewart said she handles the fantasy elements of the movies in part by imagining that the “creature” characters are different not because they have supernatural powers but because they have human afflictions — that Edward is not a vampire, for instance, but rather a heroin addict. “You give them issues that a normal person might have and play off that,” she said.
Stewart picks characters that are, almost without exception, difficult or damaged. In Speak she played a high school freshman who becomes a selective mute after being raped. Mary Stuart Masterson cast her in The Cake Eaters as a terminally ill teenager. Even in Adventureland, a dramatic comedy directed by Greg Mottola (Superbad), Stewart found a way to add a dark depth to her sexually adventurous carnie. “It’s not because I’m a miserable person or sad or whatever,” she said. “The honest, complex roles tend to be serious.”
Honesty is a theme she returns to repeatedly. “I’ve worked with actors who are just professional liars, and it eats away at them, and they are miserable people by the end of their careers,” she said. “If you’re ever needing to lie when you’re acting, that’s just because you’re having an off day and your mood is getting in the way of really playing your character.”
Stewart recently finished filming The Runaways, directed by Floria Sigismondi and based on the true story of Joan Jett’s groundbreaking first band. She had only two weeks to learn songs like Cherry Bomb, something that she described as “so enormously scary.” (She also plays electric guitar in the movie.) Her next indie project is K-11, a film directed by her mother, Jules Mann-Stewart, about a special prison dorm. Stewart plays a transsexual named Butterfly.
But long before K-11 reaches theaters, Stewart will be back with the third Twilight movie: Eclipse is scheduled to open on June 30. (A date for the fourth installment, Breaking Dawn, is expected in the coming weeks.)
The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists moving the Doomsday Clock to 85 seconds before midnight last month symbolized the closest humanity has ever been to global catastrophe In this context, the legislature remains gridlocked over the general budget, mirroring tensions simmering across the globe. According to local soothsayers, this “extreme speed and violent conflict” is no coincidence as the Year of the Horse is the year of bingwu (丙午), the rare “Fire Horse Year” (火馬年) that occurs once every 60 years, a configuration carrying an energy that shapes everything from personal fortunes to international crises. “For some people, it can be a
Feb. 16 to Feb. 22 Pai Ko’s (白克) film career appeared poised to reach new heights in 1962 with the completion of the highly-anticipated, star-studded Romance of Longshan Temple (龍山寺之戀). Despite being mainly in Hoklo (commonly known as Taiwanese), the film promoted harmony between those born in China and Taiwan, aligning with the official cultural policy at the time. However, he soon disappeared. Colleagues found out he was arrested and accused of colluding with communists. It was not his first run-in with the ruling Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT). As a university student in China, he joined the anti-Japanese Anti-Imperialism League and
Due to the Lunar New Year holiday, from Sunday, Feb. 15, through Sunday, Feb. 22, there will be no Features pages. The paper returns to its usual format on Monday, Feb. 23, when Features will also be resumed. Kung Hsi Fa Tsai!
Just far enough out of reach to keep big crowds away, but not so far as to make a day-trip an exhausting affair, Jinhuang Hot Spring (近黃溫泉) is a nice winter escape for your next visit to Taitung County. The pools are numerous, the water is the perfect temperature and the walk in is not too challenging, though you will have to get your feet wet. The adventure starts in the county’s Jinlun Village (金崙), which is accessible by train, but you’ll want to have your own car, scooter or bicycle for this trip. If you arrive by train, walk up
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