ELLE Sessions A*M*E

ELLE Sessions Charli XCX

JENNIFER LAWRENCE

“We broke down a door together – which is a great bonding moment for anybody,” says Jennifer Lawrence of her scene with Jodie Foster, who she was directed by and acted with in upcoming comedy The Beaver. But working with such established actors like Foster and Mel Gibson (who plays the lead in The Beaver) is something Lawrence takes in her stride. “I never felt intimidated,” she says of her famous co-stars. “You see [Foster] in Taxi Driver and you know she is other-humanly, but when you meet her it is impossible to be star struck because she doesn’t act different or weird at all. I can go and film movies with Mel Gibson and Jodie Foster and Charlize Theron – that’s my job – and then I come home and have my normal life.” 
    Although Lawrence emphasises she would not let her acting career define her as a person, she can’t see herself doing anything else. “I don’t feel like I had a choice. I grew up in Kentucky, where being a movie star in LA doesn’t really enter the mind as a possibility. But when it started becoming real it was like, ‘That’s why I love attention so much and study people and record everything they do.’”

[Originally published in Wonderland Magazine Issue 22, April 2010. Photography Kenneth Cappello]

LIAM HEMSWORTH

“I haven’t spoken to him since he got Thor,” jokes Liam Hemsworth of his older brother Chris, who he lost out to for the lead role in Kenneth Branagh and Marvel Studio’s superhero movie. His jealousy is, however, just a joke. “It’s a friendly rivalry,” he says. “We definitely push each other to do better. If he gets a part over me, I’m as happy for him to get it as for myself.” 
    Having moved across the Pacific to LA, the Australian actor is taking steps to build his career from Australian TV actor to Hollywood star.  First up is romantic drama The Last Song opposite singer/songwriter/actress Miley Cyrus – someone he admits to having chemistry with on and off screen. “She was great to work with. She’s such a good person, really professional, and she has achieved so much for her age. It’s kind of incredible,” he says. And how was the experience of taking his first lead in an American film? “It was beautiful weather and we were shooting on the beach all day – it really was like a summer holiday and a really good time in my life. I’m excited for people to see the film.”

[Originally published in Wonderland Magazine Issue 22, April 2010. Photography Kenneth Cappello]

RILEY KEOUGH

“I hate that!” squeals Riley Keough of the moment it comes to dress up and take to the red carpet. “It’s my least favourite part,” she confides.  Having won the role of Marie Currie in The Runaways, however, red carpet premieres are something the young actress will surely get to grips with. A former model, daughter of Danny Keough and Lisa Marie Presley and therefore granddaughter of Elvis, Keough is very excited about The Runaways – her first foray into acting.  Though the film revolves around the lives and antics of a band (Keough plays twin sister of The Runaways’ lead singer Cherie Currie – played by Dakota Fanning), the fact that her first film has a music theme is purely coincidental.
    “I definitely have a connection to music and I love music a lot, but professionally I love acting and I’m passionate about it as a career,” she says. And although Keough may have famous family credentials, she definitely worked hard to get the part. “I auditioned for it and got a call back and then another call back and then screen tested and then got the part,” she beams. “It was my first audition.”
 

[Originally published in Wonderland Magazine Issue 22, April 2010. Photography Kenneth Cappello]

MICHAEL ANGARANO

Although he has been acting for a large part of his life, acting is a profession Michael Angarano arrived at by chance. “My mother owns a dance studio and there was a photographer taking pictures for her clothes book and they ended up putting me in front of the cameras because the model didn’t show up. Turns out I was very photogenic,” he laughs. A child modelling contract with Ford Models followed, which led onto commercials and television with the transition to the big screen in 2000 with Cameron Crowe’s Almost Famous – and all by the age of 11. Since then Angarano has worked with directors David Gordon Green and Jared Hess, and is currently working with Steven Soderbergh on his latest project Knockout. He will also be playing the love interest to Uma Thurman in Max Winkler’s Ceremony.
    “I would probably be going to school for something – I don’t know what,” Angarano says when asked what he would be doing if he hadn’t followed the acting path. “I didn’t really find myself to be the best student even though I was reasonably smart,” he ponders. “I’m not disenchanted. I am extremely lucky.”
 

[Originally published in Wonderland Magazine Issue 22, April 2010. Photography Kenneth Cappello]

ALICJA BACHLEDA

Polish actress Alicja Bachleda was born in Mexico, where her father was a professor at a University in Tampico. Her family moved back to Poland when she was young, but Bachleda now spends her time between the USA and Europe. “I’m a very European soul, so I go back and forth and I enjoy being in different places,” she says. “Travel is one of the lovely aspects of my job, but right now I would call Los Angeles my home.” 
    With a busy work schedule, international travel and having recently given birth to her first child (with Colin Farrell), how does Bachleda find the time to relax? “I have to remind myself,” she admits. “I am so happy to devote myself to others and especially my little son, but it is important to find those minutes every day to be attached with your inner self and be relaxed. Yoga helps.”
 

[Originally published in Wonderland Magazine Issue 22, April 2010. Photography Kenneth Cappello]

DAVE FRANCO

As fans of the TV series Scrubs will attest, it was all change with the ninth season of the medical comedy. Recently joining the cast of the Emmy-winning show is Dave Franco (younger brother of James), who has been quietly building a career with numerous roles in film and American TV. While the future of Scrubs currently stands in the balance, Franco is keen to keep himself busy and will appear in Noah Baumbach’s forthcoming Greenberg, in which he parties with his real-life friends and snorts cocaine with Ben Stiller – “something you don’t say every day.” 
    Attending the world premiere of Greenberg at this year’s Berlin Film Festival, Franco took to the city but was perplexed by the regimented German approach to clubbing. “I did notice that when you’re at a club and there’s music going, everyone – every single person – is facing the DJ and everyone is dancing by themselves. That was interesting.” Interesting, yes, but also a blessing for Franco. “I am a terrible dancer and so I didn’t have to embarrass myself in front of any girls.”

[Originally published in Wonderland Magazine Issue 22, April 2010. Photography Kenneth Cappello]

AMBER HEARD

Amber Heard has been building up an impressive film CV since her breakthrough in 2008's All The Boys Love Mandy Lane, with recent parts in blockbuster comedies Pineapple Express and Zombieland.

In her forthcoming film, The Rum Diary, she heads the cast alongside Johnny Depp. "It was fantastic!" the actress exclaims. "Johnny is not only a brilliant actor, but he is a really kind person."

Coming from Texas, Heard moved to LA to pursue a more fast-paced life. “I am a very restless person and I want nothing more than to do and see different things. Travelling is such a big part of it, but after shooting for the majority of the year, I love to do domestic things like cook when I’m home.”

Amber Heard certainly sounds like she would make an ideal housewife. “That is horribly, horribly stereotypical of you,” she scolds. “But yeah!”

[Originally published in Wonderland Magazine Issue 22, April 2010. Photography Kenneth Cappello]

JOHNNY SIMMONS

“Scott Pilgrim, for me, was more of a learning experience than any other film I’ve done,” says Johnny Simmons of his experience playing Young Neil in Scott Pilgrim vs The World. “There’s a lot of comedic elements and I was working with Jason Schwartzman, Michael Cera and Edgar Wright – all these big influences in comedy – so I was trying to understand how ‘funny’ works. It was great to sit and learn for a while.” 
    ‘Funny’, in a sense, is the way Simmons discovered he landed the part in the film, as he was notified via Facebook. “Six months went by and all of a sudden I got a message on Facebook from Edgar saying, ‘I’d love to meet for a coffee. By the way, I’d love to offer you the role’. I called my manager and said, ‘Is this for real?’ and it wasn’t some poser or faker and I got the movie.” Another upcoming project includes playing historic character John Surratt in Robert Redford’s Lincoln assassination drama The Conspirator – and similar to his notification to winning the role in Scott Pilgrim, Simmons thought he could have been victim of a prank. “This is the first film I didn’t audition for. I was completely shocked when I got the call. Working with a legend like Robert Redford was like... I need to find a new word for incredible.”

[Originally published in Wonderland Magazine Issue 22, April 2010. Photography Kenneth Cappello]

MARY ELIZABETH WINSTEAD

Despite starring in various horror films – The Ring Two, Final Destination 3, Black Christmas – Mary Elizabeth Winstead insists she is not worried about being pigeonholed. “Horror movies are a lot of what’s being made right now and what people love to see. As long as the material is interesting and elevated from the usual running around screaming, then I’m all for it.” 
    Leaving the slasher flicks for the time being, Winstead is taking the lead female role in Edgar Wright’s Scott Pilgrim vs The World, where she plays Ramona Flowers, the love interest to Scott Pilgrim who must defeat all of her evil former lovers. “I feel like Ramona is a sad character; she creates mayhem wherever she goes and these guys obsess over her,” she explains.  The training process for the film saw the cast put through an intensive course of martial arts, rollerblading and music practice. “We trained for three months before we started filming and it was really fun – like some crazy summer camp!” 
    After this foray into action-comedy, what next for Winstead? More horror – with a prequel to The Thing. “I see it a bit more sci-fi with horror elements in it,” she rationalises. “But it is definitely in the horror realm.” 

[Originally published in Wonderland Magazine Issue 22, April 2010. Photography Kenneth Cappello]

Beth Behrs

Stunning American actress Beth Behrs has been acting since a very young age. Having learnt her craft treading the boards of theatre, the 26 year old has parts on screens since 2009 and landed the role of rich-girl-who-looses-everything Caroline Channing in E4’s hit new American import, Two Broke Girls. Joined on screen by Kat Dennings (who plays Max Black) the leading ladies struggle through the day working at a diner whilst chasing their dream of opening a cupcake shop. Created by Michael Patrick King – whose writing credits include Sex And The City, Will & Grace and Cybill – and comedienne/actress Whitney Cummings, the show has enjoyed unprecedented success, bagging a People’s Choice Award for “Favourite New TV Comedy” and a second season was commissioned before the first had been finished. WONDERLAND caught some time with Beth for a quick chat about the show and find out how she got involved in acting.

Is Two Broke Girls a fun show to be part of?
It is! Kat Dennings has become a great friend of mine and she’s so hilarious and talented and we shoot in front of a live audience. It’s fun when they clap and cheer or they’re cracking up. It’s such a cool thing seeing them react.

Do they ever not laugh?
We have an amazing writing staff – Michael Patrick King and all of our writers – who give us alternative jokes and that’s a cool thing as an actor because it won’t be rehearsed and you have to work with it right then. But we’ll always keep them laughing!

What attracted you to your character, Caroline?
I love that she’s not a stereotypical Upper East Side blonde. She is a fish out of water in the restaurant and there are things she doesn’t know, but she’s not dumb. She went to Wharton Business School and has this incredible savvy for money and business. I also love that the girls were never outwardly mean to each other even though they are from different walks of life. I think that’s really refreshing to see – especially to young women out there.

You’re playing a waitress in the show – being an actress, have you had lots of experience of being a waitress in real life? 
I have! I worked at an Americanized Mexican restaurant for a while called Chili’s. I’d work in the cocktail area and they served big beer glasses. On my first night I put all the beer glasses on one tray thinking I’d be fine to carry it and I spilt them all on a table of ten people. I went to the bathroom and cried. It was awful. I wasn’t the best waitress

The show has already won a People’s Choice Award and was commissioned for a second season before the first had finished airing – has the success surprised you?
When we were filming the pilot it was a special experience it felt like we’d been doing it for years which I’ve heard from other actors is very rare so I think we knew we had something special and we all loved each other and working together. At least we were having a good time and you hope that energy and specialness translates to the audience and I’m glad it did.

There has also been a bit of controversy attached to the show. Michael was accused of being too crude and touching on stereotypes – do you think some people have failed to notice it’s a comedy and not a documentary?
Yeah and I think Michael said before, everything the characters do comes out of a real place. There’s backlash with everything but we love what we’re doing and we believe in the show and the characters and it seems like the audience agrees.

Controversy is also good in that it means people are watching.
Exactly! We’ve said the word “vagina” on TV like it’s never been said before. Doing comedy is supposed to push boundaries but that’s what makes it new and innovative and exciting. I’m glad, at least, to be a part of that and this whole “women in comedy” loop that’s going on.

Vagina is hardly offensive at all. If you spent a day in our office you’d be shocked by the language you’d overhear.
[laughs] That’s honestly the truth! In most people’s day-to-day life the word “vagina” is not that big a deal but for whatever reason, saying it on network television was a big deal.

According to your Wikipedia, you’ve been acting since you were 4 – is this true?
It is true. I’ve been doing theatre since before I could read. My mom had to read my lines for my auditions. I used to watch The Sound of Music a million times a day and I fell in love with it and kept asking my parents to let me do something like that so they got me into theatre which was great.

You’ve been an ambitious actress your whole life!
Yes, definitely. And I still hope to come to the West End or Broadway eventually. My dream is to do a Broadway or West End musical. I love Les Miserables and The Sound of Music and Wicked. Although I’d also love to be in a new one – is Andrew Lloyd Webber writing a new one any time soon?

We’ll find out and get you a part.
I’ll cut you 10%

It’s a deal.

Two Broke Girls is on E4 Thursdays at 9pm. Beth Behrs will be in a new Andrew Lloyd Webber musical as soon as we have a word with him.

[Originally published on Wonderlandmagazine.com, April 2012]

Peter Vack

Admit it. We’ve all been there. After a particularly dry spell you end up going out, getting blind drunk and wake up the following morning next to the woman of your dreams only for her to up and leave wearing your favourite pair of jeans and passing you a fake number. You’re gutted to have been so brutally shaken off. And you want those jeans back. Yeah. We have been there. But can this really be the premise for an entire TV show? MTV think so and I Just Want My Pants Back, based on the novel by David Rosen, has turned out to be a surprise hit with its hilariously honest approach to modern day dating. Wonderland met its star, Peter Vack, who plays hopeless romantic Jason who wants to get the girl – and his jeans.

Jason has phenomenal luck with the ladies and is bed hopping each episode – are you as successful with women in your own life?
If only I could be as successful as Jason! The cool thing about him is if you look at the raw facts of his life you would think he is a player. A smooth talking Don Juan type, but I feel like his success with ladies comes from a much more pure place and each new sexual encounter Jason really believes “This could be the one”. He’s not a womanizer even though he does get a lot of action.

Are those characteristics that you can relate to as well?
Being a pure hearted romantic? Oh yeah. [laughs] I mean I’m not exactly like Jason, but I’m definitely a romantic guy. Although there are probably people who would read this and go “No he’s not!”

Oh really? You have some bad history?
I have no history. My reputation is completely unblemished. And I want that written in print! Peter’s reputation is unblemished!

The sex scenes in the show are always a bit awkward – are they just as awkward to film?
It’s interesting. I do think that the show touches on this sort of fantasy of how sexy your 20s are and how everyone seems to idealize this urban lifestyle of young, cool, attractive people hooking up all the time. And I like that Pants shows you that world but it shows how awkward and bizarre it is. There is definitely an underbelly of the single free life that is you might be talking to someone in a bar and they seem normal and then you get home and your in bed and you realize that the world is full of weirdos.

In the UK, Pants means underwear what would the show be like if it was titled I Just Want My Underwear Back?
That’s funny. It would be a totally different show. It would be about a guy who has one pair of underwear that got stolen and then he was uncomfortable having his bear bottom on the harsh denim of his jeans. It wouldn’t be a comedy but it would be a deep meditation for someone expressing their dislike for freedom ‘down there’. I want to be constrained. At least that’s how I feel. It’s really important for me to wear underwear.

The way the show is written is very realistic and honest and seems very genuine – do you feel you could be friends with Jason and everyone?
That’s the thing that first struck me – especially between a male female relationship like the one with [Jason and] Tina (played by Kim Shaw, Jason’s best friend). It’s something so specific and interesting what happens when a man and a woman are just friends with no romantic tension and I think Dave Rosen just nailed that. When I read the script I thought I was reading a transcript of two friends with real history. That’s the kind of truth an actor is looking for in a script.

According to your twitter, you are Piers Morgan’s understudy – how is that going?
Normally he’s fine and he doesn’t need me to go on, but sometimes he does but then I kill it. It is just a side gig but I like it. [laughs] It was meant to be a throw away joke and be funny but I guess I do actually like him. That’s the thing about Twitter. You write something very off hand and “You mean I actually have to answer for what I write?” That’s why I’m not very good on twitter because I’ll come up with something I think is funny to but then I’ll think about it for half an hour and end up not tweeting it which I think flying the face of the whole tweeting handbook. I think I overthink for twitter.

Don’t deliberate, just let it out.
I think those are great words to live by – “Don’t deliberate, just let it out”. I think you should end the interview with that. If there’s something we came to it’s that.

[Originally published on wonderland magazine.com, April 2012]

Tom Sturridge

I’m sat on a rickety bar stool in a west London pub awaiting the arrival of Tom Sturridge. The meeting point is not the most likely place you’d expect to find an on-the-up actor, but I’m here at Sturridge’s suggestion and am surveying the relatively unassuming location. There’s a reassuring pub smell in the air, a dartboard hangs on the wall, a garish red carpet runs throughout and a token drunk is swaying at the bar gesturing towards the barmaid’s breasts. The barmaid barely flinches. He must be a regular.

Sturridge arrives. He’s wearing a long dark coat and grungy beanie. He expertly bypasses said drunk and, like a true gent, whips off his hat before introducing himself with a firm handshake. He’s warm, charismatic and down to earth. Should’ve guessed from the pub.

Born and raised in London, Tom is the son of director Charles Sturridge and actress Phoebe Nicholls and, although he made his on-screen debut aged 7 in a 1996 Channel 4 production of Gulliver’s Travels, directed by his father, he insists he never thought he’d end up being an actor.

“I was a pretty clichéd teenager that didn’t want anything to do with what my parents did,” he explains (the Gulliver’s Travels thing was, apparently, an excuse for his father to legitimately have him on set in Portugal). “I genuinely never thought that acting could be something I would be interested in.”

But then, a combination of admiration and fate convinced him otherwise. A longtime fan of Academy Award-winning Hungarian filmmaker István Szabó, Sturridge jumped at the opportunity to appear in his 2004 film Being Julia when he was approached by a casting director friend to play the on-screen son of Annette Bening and Jeremy Irons.

“It was a seductive experience, really,” he says of the filmmaking. “It was shot in Budapest during the summer holidays of school when I was 17. I was living on my own and it was the first time I felt like a grown up. I wasn’t with my friends or family or the school football team, I was in a foreign country because I was doing a job. It was formative.”

Since then he has enjoyed a small part in Vanity Fair opposite Reese Witherspoon (“um… one scene”) and a supporting role in Brit hit The Boat That Rocked. Yet despite rubbing shoulders with some of the biggest celebrities in Hollywood, Sturridge has so far managed to avoid falling victim to the seemingly relentless paparazzi that would normally surround a good looking young actor scoring parts in Hollywood films. “All I know is the life I have lived and [the paparazzi] have never come into my life once,” he says, stating he prefers a more low key lifestyle.

But wait, isn’t he the much-hounded Sienna Miller’s current squeeze? Er, yes. So it’s fair to say he’s not looking to encourage active interest in his personal life (Miller herself has for years campaigned for improved privacy laws and recently won a small victory against News International on the matter). “The one power I have in these situations is to choose not to talk about it for once,” he says, politely refusing to comment on both their relationship and the fact that they are expecting a child together.

His next film project is On The Road, the highly anticipated Walter Salles adaptation of Jack Kerouac’s heavily autobiographical and era-defining novel. This May, it’s premiering at Cannes – and Sturridge is hoping to eradicate all memory of his last experience there.

“Sometimes you go to Cannes with a trailer,” he begins, describing the last time he came to the French Riviera with 2007’s Like Minds. “They held a press conference for this trailer to try and sell the film. It was seven in the morning and the only person who came to the press conference was from Australian Teletext. So my notion of Cannes is a seriously depressing place where bad films are desperately sold.”

On The Road, is the most ambitious project Sturridge has been involved with to date – not least because it is the adaptation of one of the most celebrated novels in American history, so celebrated in fact that the Americans themselves have long been “too scared to make it,” he remarks. The cast, crew and production of the film have been put together on a truly international scale with funding by Film 4 and French company MK2 Productions. Director Walter Salles is Brazilian, and the cast is balanced between Americans Garrett Hedlund, Kristen Stewart and Kirsten Dunst peppered with Brits Sam Riley and Sturridge, who supports the cast in the role of Carlo Marx. Fans of the novel, will know that Marx is a thinly veiled dramatisation of Kerouac’s real life friend, Allen Ginsberg, but not in the form of the large, balding, hippy that springs to mind when you hear the name.

“The person I was playing was an 18-year-old guy who hadn’t come out yet, wasn’t the voice of a generation, was confused, shy, intellectually brilliant but sort of socially inarticulate – which is totally against what the world’s thought of him would be,” he says, adding that he had a wealth of material to help him research the historical figure. “His diaries and letters from that period have been published so you can literally go through On The Road the book, work out the scene and go to June 1949 to read his diary. You can find what brand of tea Ginsberg was drinking when he had [a particular] conversation.” You might think all this would be incredibly helpful for an actor who was determined to give a good performance, however the materials were almost a hindrance instead of a help, says Sturridge. “I read everything,” he begins. “Every piece of poetry he wrote up until that age, all his diaries. I read biographies, I read so much stuff but remembered on the first day of filming that I wasn’t trying to become a Ginsberg expert, I was trying to play a character. I remember shooting a first scene and them saying “action!” and thinking “fuck! I’ve totally forgotten to sort of… read the scripts!” I can tell you all sorts of things about Ginsbergs dietary feelings in this period in time but have no idea how to say these lines.”

The film itself has effectively been in production since the rights were bought by Frances Ford Coppola in 1979 (Coppola is an executive producer on the project). Attempts stalled until Salles came on board, shortly after completing his own road trip epic, The Motorcycle Diaries. However even with the right talent behind it, it was still a little longer before the film finally went into production in the latter half of 2010 – but the role of Marx was one that Sturridge was determined to bag.

“I did an audition for Walter and it went well. But that was three years before it got made. And then I found out from friends that it was being made again and I knew Walter was in New York so I pretended that I was in New York, when in fact I wasn’t,” he says. “I arranged a meeting with him, and then flew to New York to be like “hey! I was here the whole time, just passing by” and had lunch with him and we talked.”

After going to all that effort to get the part, does he feel he did it justice? Well, yes, but he doesn’t seem to be the sort to torture himself unnecessarily about his craft. “It’s acting,” he says with a smile. “I’m not fucking up surgery. No one’s getting killed.” 

[Originally published in Wonderland Magazine, Issue 30, April 2012. Photography by Toby Knott.]