Before you start yelling about how trashy Emma Watson looks on the cover of the May issue of GQ UK, just know that she’s “in character” as Nikki from The Bling Ring. Meaning, she’s supposed to look trashy and she’s supposed to look like a sort of LA-escort/crack burglar. It’s actually a smart choice for styling, I think – many people believe that The Bling Ring will be Emma’s first big breakout, her “adult” role that changes her career from “Harry Potter child actress” into “sexy actress capable of playing adult roles.” Some highlights from the interview:
Deciding to do The Bling Ring: “When I read the script and I realized that essentially it was a meditation on fame and what it’s become to our society, I had to do it. The character is everything that I felt strongly against — she’s superficial, materialistic, vain, amoral. She’s all of these things and I realized that I hated her. How do you play someone you hate? But I found it really interesting and it gave me a whole new insight into what my job or my role as an actress could be.”
Emma doesn’t want to be typecast: “I was open-minded about doing anything but the one thing I didn’t want to do was get myself into a corset because I was worried I would never get out again. I knew it would be a really comfortable thing to do, but I felt… I had to dive into something really different. This has been a really big departure for me. It’s a really big character. That’s so exciting for me because it meant I was really acting.”
Ha, I like the part about “getting into a corset”. That’s SO true when you’re talking about English actresses. Once they put on the corset, that’s it. They just get offered endless period pieces. Kate Winslet fought against The Corset Typecast, as did Helena Bonham-Carter and Emma Thompson, all of whom were able to eventually move past their early successes in corseted dramas to do more modern work. It’s interesting that Emma is so aware of it, and that she’s actively avoiding the corset. As for Emma’s thoughts on her “vain, amoral” character – judgy much? No, I get it. The real Bling Ring girls were completely awful people, but what struck me was that they were pretty stupid too.
Meanwhile, Emma makes an appearance in the new red-band trailer for This Is the End. It looks pretty funny but the real star (for me) is Mindy Kaling going off about how she wants to bang Michael Cera. Beware, the language is totally NSFW.
Photos courtesy of GQ UK.
Eh. I find her so bland. I’m sure she’s a lovely girl but I’m sort of over people trying to make her a thing post Potter.
I agree. I thought she was pretty bad in Perks of Being a Wallflower, and I find her kind of meh in general.
She was terrible in Perks. It was such a good movie otherwise. Her accent and her weird delivery of lines really took me out of it sometimes.
Yeah, I found her terrible too… the movie was great but she was way off.
Really? I thought she was not very good in HP, but I loved her in Perks! I grew up in the area where the movie was based, and I found nothing off with her accent at all.
Me three.
Yup. She makes Natalie Portman look charismatic! Completely bland, asexual and very limited as an actress.
Same here. I seriously don’t understand the hype. So she hasn’t gone off the rails and went to university for a bit. Scores of teenagers do the same every year.
You know there’s something wrong in the film industry when you have to applaud someone for not sticking their nose in a bowl of coke.
I’m so glad other people feel that way too, because for a while there it seemed no one was allowed to say anything against her. I wouldn’t mind how the press promoted to death her “good girl” image and her flat personality if she was at least a tolerable actress, but she-has-no-talent.
She only gets by because of her pretty face. I think she wants to be taken seriously as an actress but meh, she really has no acting chops.
+1
She’s very pretty, and a terribly wooden actress. Same facial expressions in every movie.
Agreed! She’s nice but not the mega star they’re making her out to be. I wish these actresses would just work hard & try to find good, interesting projects. This try hard generation is making me hate movies.
I don’t see vain and amoral, just lifeless and dead behind the eyes. What terrible pictures.
I agree. She seems like a nice person who would be a lovely friend, but she seems very blank on camera. These pictures make her look like she isn’t thinking anything at all!
Terrible style. her character is supposed to be a fashionista. why is she wearing such cheap looking accessories?
I’m soooo looking forward to that movie! High-brow stuff… but I’m going to laugh my nether regions off.
I haven’t seen her in anything post-Potter but a few more layers of fake tan and a hair shade or two darker and she could easily pass for one of the Jenner girls. I guess in that regard she’s totally nailed the vapid, materialistic LA look.
She has no edge, which she would need to carry of these pictures.
So, when is she going back to university? Wasn’t she supposed to do that in January or something?
I like her. I think she is a better actress then people give her credit for.
I remember people absolutely trashing her a few years ago for re-wearing the same shirts multiple times.
+1
I agree. I have noticed that most of the people that bash on her are female. But she is huge with people my age (18-25) and men everywhere seem to love her. I admit I do have a soft spot for her because of Harry Potter though. I hope she succeeds at a post-Potter career.
I dislike her because of HP, she ruined Hermione, my favourite character.
i’m a guy and i don’t like her at all
Vain comments from a girl who primarily shops at Chanel. Eh. I think she is an ok actress..
I actually love the cover and I’m weirdly excited for this movie.
pretty clever to do that photoshoot in character. she can show another side without actually making it an Emma Watson photoshoot which would be just another girl poses in slutty clothing to appear adult.
her choices seem really good. she isnt just getting naked like so many other starlets she plays a role with social critisim attached to it.
that cameo in End of the World, this movie and Noah from Aronofsky: it looks good for her career.
if you like her or not she makes great choices.
What ever happened to that part where she was dressed in short jean cut-offs for a day or two on set? I think she was sitting in a beach chair? I remember thinking she was really going for it. Must be this movie.
I thought her character’s name was Alexis? Alexis is the one who got that terribly boring show on E! “Pretty Wild” who was always crying @ the drop of a hat. I’ll def b seeing this movie. Sofia’s a very talented film maker
i remember pretty wild and i remember that show being anything but boring. it was like the kardashians on crack. literally they were all on drugs. it was seriously entertaining. her character is supposed to be based of alexis but in the trailer she doesn’t seem to dress like her or act like her or anything. she seems like an awkward high school freshman trying to be sexy. it’s just not the right role for her.
Omg I thought I was the only one who saw that terrible reality show xD!! They were all horrible, spoiled, vapid and pretty dumb people, but I couldn’t look away.
My money is on her making a successful transition from Potter to more adult roles. I don’t think we’ve really seen her challenged yet by a part, but I’m rooting for her.
In these pics she kind of looks like Lana Del Rey in Julia Roberts’ Pretty Woman costume.
“Well color me happy, there’s a sofa in here for two.”
The days when Julia was so likable.
Yet in real life Emma dates a college kid who wears Gucci loafers. Superficial, materialistic, and vain much?
wait, dating a college kid who wears Gucci loafers makes a person superficial and vain? Shoot. I’d better tell my college educated fiancee to throw out any clothing with a designer label, especially that hot Tom Ford suit, lest I appear vain and superficial.
It makes the guy she dates (or is attracted to) superficial, materialistic, and vain. Which according to her quotes is something she hates. A 22 year old in Gucci loafers? Please. Next.
I hate to say it to you Ava but she went to brown, which is an Ivy League school, so I am not AT ALL surprised her bf wears Gucci loafers. I go to Georgetown, and I see the same crap there as well. College kids who wear McQueen, Gucci, LV, DC, etc. not at all surprising.
To be honest there’s nothing wrong with that either. I’ve bought a handful of designer stuff as well (with my own money). Doesn’t make me superficial or vain or materialistic.
Shoes do not make someone materialistic, superficial, and vain.
She looks like Kristen Stewart in that last pic. Completely unaffected by anything and quite bored actually. lol
This is a Sophia Coppala movie so it will be big on atmosphere and little in dialogue. I think it’ll be a big yawn fest and not the big break out role she’s hoping for.
.
So did what Selena Gomez did with “Spring Breakers”. I don’t think Emma’s career will fair much better. She looks just as dead and makes the same typical career moves as the rest. And I don’t think Sophia Coppala is going to help. This movie looks terrible.
Also, the photoshop on the cover picture is horrible. Nice cutout. and her head is too big.
I don’t think you can compare the two. I don’t see a lot of these young actresses taking a part in a movie like “Noah”.
I like Emma, but the role in Noah is pretty minor and Dakota Fanning was actually the first choice. It’s also a role where she plays another teenager…and she really needs to break out of that phase. Also, the chance of the Del
Toro movie happening is pretty slim…He already has two films before that, and she signed on way back
in 2011. I do think she’ll be fine though…just not an A list actress.
So, Emma posed “in character” for a men’s magazine so that she could appear sexy and desirable to those outside the Potter audience, but still maintain the marketability of her good girl image. Clever, Watson’s PR team. Very clever.
I love Danny McBride so much! I could literally watch him in anything, even crappy Land of the Lost.
I agree; she reminds me of Kristen Stewart in these photos.
That trailer made me laugh so much -and I know it’s awful for a lot of reason, like Franco LOL- anyway it’s good that Emma keeps changing roles and be out of her comfort zone, even if that means she has to play a vain, amoral bi+ch.
I think it’s gonna be fun.
Lana Del Rey wannabe. Or just another Kristen Stewart. Both have wooden features and no talent.
How is she anything like LDR? One is a hipster singer the other a British actress with a clean-image…One is bubbly and sweet, if a bit boring, the other tries excruciatingly hard to be edgy…
The bling ring girls were hella stupid they bragged about their heist online thats how they got caught.
looks like a little boy. no lips or hips
As someone mentioned already, something about Emma is just completely asexual to me. She has such a ‘little girl’ face that it’s hard to get past, no matter how much makeup they use. It kinda looks like they altered her face somehow, in the title pic.
I’ve never cared for her, & find the hype around her hard to understand. I don’t wish her any ill-will of course, just don’t see her getting too far, at least not with American audiences.
Isn’t the same girl that maintains the less you show the more people wonder? She’s been doing a lot of showing the last few years. Isn’t this the same girl that maintains she has a hard time acting like a bad girl? Yet here she is with the past two movies. Isn’t this the same girl that said playing a rebellish teenager would be a nightmare for her? Yet here she is with the last two movies. Isn’t this the same girl that swore she would never do a celebrity perfume fragrance? Yet here is she being the face of Lancome’s Midnight Rose. Isn’t this the same girl that says she would never wear hot pants? Yet you see her in public, photoshoots and movies wearing them. Isn’t this the girl that said education is really important to her? Yet she is not there and has chosen roles she said she would never do in place of them?
This stuff is endless.
Kaiser when is the media going to start to call her out with any of this? You used to get on her for these sorts of things but you don’t anymore. BTW I love reading your thoughts in all that you post. Keep up the good work. =)
Ex-emma fan
dang, that is a lot of hypocrisy
hahahaha this is the end looks epic. but i don’t like jonah hills styling though. jewelry and stuff? hes much cuter when he looks kinda geeky 🙂