Why do you think it’s so hard for Hollywood to make great love stories?
“It seems like the most successful, iconic love stories are not so easy or escapist. I think the ones that stay with us, that resonate, are full of conflict and discord and misunderstanding, because that’s what makes drama happen — or tension, even if it’s a comedy. But I think people who make movies and who have invested a lot of money in them, get frightened thinking that if they challenge an audience that they’re going to repel them. I think the opposite is really true, but it takes confidence and courage to know that, and then commit to it.”
I understand that the author of the Stardust novel, Neil Gaiman, was involved with the movie.
“Oh yeah, he was very much involved, and it was great. He was around sometimes to watch what was going on and to talk about anything, not just the book or its characters. He wasn’t there to get in the way or push his opinions, he was just being a fan of the moviemaking process.”
Did reading the novel help you?
“Oh yeah, very much so. As usually is the case, I think that the book is always a great resource for the actors because there is simply much more to discover about the story and the characters that has to be cut out because of the length of a movie.”
How do you do background research on how to play a celestial being?
“You just use a lot of your childhood imagination [laughs]…. I really couldn’t do any type of research, just reading a lot about heroes, witches, pirates and unicorns, and doing a lot of daydreaming.”
Stardust has been getting good buzz, particularly your performance. Do you think it will be a breakthrough role for you?
“I can never tell, because you never really know how the public will react. My opinion of movies is not necessarily reflected by public opinions or the critics’ opinions. I really love the movie, and I just have to hope and trust that other people will, too. But, you know, it’s impossible to say.”
Have you finally gotten used to fame?
“Not really, I don’t think you ever really can. I mean, the media has become so much more voracious in the last 10 years, and the proliferation of the tabloids has changed actors’ lives pretty profoundly. It’s a totally different game. I’m followed by the paparazzi almost every day, and I’m not even somebody who people really care that much about. I mean, I’m not that big of a deal! I’m a nobody!”
What film are you doing next?
“I don’t know yet. I am working on it. I’m working on working.”
Will we ever see you in Terminator 4 or the proposed Sarah Connor prequel?
“I don’t think so.”
What’s your favourite memory of working with Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger while filming Terminator 3?
“My fondest memory is that my former boyfriend, Ben Lee, had a nephew, Timothy, who lived in Sydney and he had a Bar Mitzvah that summer, but we were shooting. Of course, I was meant to attend, but I couldn’t because I found myself on this Terminator set. So I asked Arnold to make a little videotape to wish him a happy Bar Mitzvah, and he was so sweet about it. He taped it and said, ‘Happy Birthday, Timothy. Happy Bar Mitzvah. I know you think that you’re a man now, but you’re not a man. You don’t know what it is to be a man,’ and then, he blew up his muscles. So that was cool.”
Around 2000, you took a sabbatical from acting and the movie industry. Why?
“Well, I took three years off because I needed to differentiate myself from the industry and find an identity. And I wanted to go to school, so I went to Yale.”
What was that like?
“I was very committed to being a student while I was there. So much so that I was in disbelief that I had ever acted before and that was confusing…. I was such a nerd. I was nerdier than most of the other students. My best friend would get so frustrated with me because I was quite anal and would get so obsessive over a paper and exams. I took it all so seriously. It was as if I was sustaining a $100-million movie or something. It was difficult to imagine that the consequences of my erring in some way would not be so dire.”
How did you know that you wanted to come back to acting?
“Well, three years had passed since I had acted and I missed it terribly. I assumed when I started school, quite naively, that I could make a movie every summer, no problem, like clockwork, and I should’ve known better. Of course, the industry doesn’t work that evenly, and I would sign on for projects that were meant to shoot in July and then they’d be postponed and they would bleed into the following semester and then I’d take a semester off, and then the movie would collapse.”
With Stardust, Evening and The Flock (a thriller with Richard Gere) all hitting theatres before year’s end, do you feel like you’re at a turning point in your career?
“I’ve been very privileged lately. I’ve worked with people who I’ve admired deeply and have been very compatible with, so I kind of don’t want to break my record. I’m a little spoiled and so I’m more discriminating now that I have been doing this a while.”
Earl Dittman is a Houston-based writer.