Kirsten Stewart is Hollywood’s reluctant star, refusing to follow in the predictable footsteps of Paris, Britney, Lindsay and the industry’s other leading pretty young things.
Screams from frantic, obsessed young female fans of last year’s blockbuster vampire fantasy film Twilight follow Stewart when she steps out in public but instead of inciting the frenzy by attending red-carpet events and nightclub openings, the 18-year-old with the gorgeous green eyes chooses to stay at home and read abook.
Her Los Angeles home is not a mansion in the Hollywood Hills despite her pocketing $US2million ($2.7million) for Twilight and a reported $US4 million for the sequel, New Moon, set for release in November.
Home is comfortable in suburban LA, where she lives a regular life with her Australian scriptwriter mother, Jules, television producer father, John, and older brother, Cameron.
But this is not a shy, sheltered teen. Stewart is as wise and tough as a Hollywood veteran.
“Kristen has a great bullshit detector,” the writer-director of her new comedy Adventureland, Greg Mottola, tells S.
When Stewart arrives for this interview in a Beverly Hills hotel, a stylist has not scoured the racks of nearby Rodeo Drive’s designer boutiques for a jaw-dropping Dior creation. Stewart is dressed casually in black skinny jeans and a grey, loose-fitting T-shirt.
“This is me,” the actress says, jokingly rubbing her hands down her thin 168-centimetre frame.
Stewart also swims against the tide of Hollywood when it comes to breakfast, venturing where most refuse to go.
“I actually don’t mind Vegemite,” she says, laughing. “I know most Americans can’t stand the smell, taste or look of it but I like it.”
Stewart, of course, can thank her Maroochydore-born mum for an early introduction to the iconic Australian spread. Born in Los Angeles and raised in the US, the actress names Noosa Heads as one of her favourite places on the planet. The Queensland resort town is where she holidayed with her family and learned to ride a surfboard.
Stewart’s Australian heritage also inspired the name of her dog, a border collie named Oz.
“I love Australia and we have a lot of great family and friends down there. I can’t wait to get back,” she says.
Time for a holiday is a rare commodity for Stewart these days. The success of Twilight, based on the best-selling Stephenie Meyer novel, has Hollywood studios clamouring to sign her to their next film. Twilight cost a relatively frugal $US37million to make and ended up cashing in worldwide with $US377million in box-office earnings.
The recent DVD release in the US has added more than $US100million to the tally.In
Twilight she plays the female lead, Bella, a teenager who falls in love with irresistibly good-looking vampire Edward Cullen, portrayed by England’s teen heart-throb, Robert Pattinson.
“It feels so good to have something you love be received so hotly,” says Stewart, who became just as entranced by Twilight after reading the novel as its millions of teenage (and adult) fans.
“But the physical manifestation of the success, from the screaming fans to the box office, is just crazy.
“The fans are just so enthusiastic and I am so excited to do New Moon. I’m so ready to get on to the next one.”
You can trace Stewart’s rise in Hollywood back to a similar entry point as many young actors the Disney studio lot.
As a 10-year-old she had a role in Disney movie The Thirteenth Year but that’s where the comparisons between Stewart and Disney’s top-tier creations, Miley Cyrus and Hilary Duff, end.
Instead of starring in a child-friendly television series with spin-off albums and merchandising, Stewart gravitated to heavy, independent roles, her first being 2001’s The Safety Of Objects, a film starring Glenn Close and Patricia Clarkson, where she plays a tomboy raised by a troubled single mother.
It set the tone for some dark and difficult roles. In her nine-year career, Stewart has played a stripper, a rape victim, a diabetic and a schoolstudent struck by a degenerative muscular disease.
The big Hollywood films studios are now tempting her with do not move her but she is wise enough to realise the success of Twilight and the power of her name can get the small passion projects she loves made.
Stewart shot independent feature The Cake Eaters two years ago, a film co-starring Bruce Dern and this year’s best actress Oscar nominee for Frozen River, Melissa Leo, and directed by Mary Stuart Masterson. It had sat onthe shelf with the prospect of never beingseen.
When Twilight was released last year and became a worldwide phenomenon, The Cake Eaters suddenly had a release date. And, capitalising on Stewart’s new-found success, posters promoting the film are dominated not by Dern or Leo: they simply show Stewart’s face.
In The Cake Eaters she plays Georgia, a teenager trapped in a body racked by a muscular disease that causes her to walk unsteadily and mumble when she speaks. The US’s best-known film critic, Roger Ebert, described the performance as “remarkable”.
“If it was not for Twilight, I’m not sure The Cake Eaters, a film I dearly love, would have seen the light of day,” Stewart reflects.
“We made it more than two years ago.”
Another independent film, Welcome To The Rileys, stars The Sopranos’ James Gandolfini but it is Stewart’s performance as a street youth forced to become a stripper that is generating the most attention.
“Now people are saying: ‘Let’s see Bella in a stripper movie,”‘ Stewart laughs.
The next movie Australian audiences will see Stewart in is Mottola’s Adventureland. (Mottola’s last project was the ribald 2007 comedy Superbad.)
Adventureland is set in a rundown amusement park in 1980s Pittsburgh and again Stewart was attracted to a dark role. She plays Em Lewin, a university student with a very damaged upbringing.
“Yeah,” Stewart smiles, noting the trend.
“Em is fairly damaged. She has an odd number of hang-ups. It’s too much for her. Any time you don’t like yourself people won’t treat you well. She feels like anything she touches is just going to get messed up because she has been messed with so much.
“Do I feel sorry for her? Sure. Anybody who has issues they can’t get over and you see potential in them and want it to come out, I feel for them.”
Em’s troubles continue when she has an affair with the amusement park’s married manager, played by Ryan Reynolds.
Reynolds, a tabloid and paparazzi favourite after leaving musician girlfriend Alanis Morissette in June 2006 and dating and marrying screen siren Scarlett Johansson soon after, knows what it’s like to live in the public eye.
He is impressed with how the low-key Stewart is handling the post-Twilight media storm.
“There’s nothing I or anyone can tell her that she doesn’t already know,” Reynolds says.
“She is a pretty wise soul.”
Mottola agrees.
“Orson Welles once said his favourite actors make the act of thinking dramatic and I think she does that,” he adds.
“I see things flash across her face and I want to know more. She draws me in. She is smart and very serious, especially for someone her age. I just find her really, really interesting towatch.”
Stewart is content to juggle the Twilight spotlight and the dark, broken people she loves to portray in independent roles.
She is also not ready to leave the comfort and stability of her parents’ home.
“No,” the actress says.
“No plans to move any time soon. I’m really tight with my family and besides, I think it would be a little weird to have a big, sprawling place all on my own.”
Well there you go, she actually likes Vegemite! I guess her Aussie roots have some part in that but most Americans I’ve met hate the stuff. To Kristen, if you’re coming out to Australia soon, please let me know 
.
[via The Sun-Herald]
