I’m really enjoying WSJ. Magazine these days. The NYT’s T Magazine used to be great, they used to do these in-depth profiles of interesting celebrities or up-and-coming actors, but T Magazine has sort of stopped doing that so much and WSJ. Magazine has taken up the mantel. Emma Stone covers the newest issue and this is honestly one of the best profiles I’ve ever read with Emma. Emma is smarter than the average starlet and in most interviews, she’s able to successfully withhold and deflect when it comes to personal information. But in this piece, she actually ends up talking about Andrew Garfield, Woody Allen (she’s promoting Irrational Man) and more. You can read the full piece here. Some highlights:
Moving back to LA after several years in NYC: “It feels different being by the water. You’d be surprised at how much of life can be taken up by doing yoga and nothing.”
She had panic attacks as a kid: “It was really bad. The first time I had a panic attack I was sitting in my friend’s house, and I thought the house was burning down. I called my mom and she brought me home, and for the next three years it just would not stop. I would go to the nurse at lunch most days and just wring my hands. I would ask my mom to tell me exactly how the day was going to be, then ask again 30 seconds later. I just needed to know that no one was going to die and nothing was going to change.”
She didn’t write a speech when she was nominated for an Oscar: “Are you out of your mind? Are you actually insane? Patricia Arquette had that thing locked up!”
The rumors about her breakup with Andrew Garfield: “See, I never talk about this stuff for this exact reason—because it’s all so speculative and baseless. Once you start responding—once you’re like, ‘No, that’s not true’—then they’re like, ‘Well, if we push enough, we’ll get a comment, so let’s see what else we can make up.’ I understand the interest in it completely because I’ve had it, too. But it’s so special to me that it never feels good to talk about, so I just continually don’t talk about it.”
When she walked around LA with a bad with Andrew’s name on it: “When I picked up the bag, I was like, ‘This is kind of funny if there are any [paparazzi] out there.’ There’s probably some rebelliousness that comes out in me after all these stories and people texting you for weeks about something that, for the most part, is not true. But even when it’s false, I would rather just let it be false.”
Her pet peeves: Animals dressed in outfits, people who send eight texts instead of one (“Just take a second!”), classic names intentionally misspelled. “Like Emily being E-M-A-L-I-E. Drives me crazy.”
Working with Woody Allen: “It’s terrifying. He doesn’t do table reads or any rehearsal. You can’t even ask questions about your character, because he’ll be like: ‘You know this is a movie, right?’ ”
Why she turned down the all-female Ghostbusters reboot. “The script was really funny. It just didn’t feel like the right time for me. A franchise is a big commitment—it’s a whole thing. I think maybe I need a minute before I dive back into that water.”
The Andrew Garfield section is interesting. I see her point about not giving in to false reports, but she IS still reacting those reports, she’s just not issuing a statement. It’s like she’s making it more complicated than it needs to be – when People, E! News, Us Weekly and Star all agree that Andrew and Emma had broken up, a simple “No, they’re still together” from her rep would have been the easiest path. Except that I still believe they probably were on a break and they just got back together when they were finally back in the same city together.
There’s also a lengthy part where she talks about the Sony Hack and her personal information ending on Wikileaks, and how she got all these weird emails from fans. What else? There’s a part where she talks about having insomnia while doing Cabaret on stage and she would go online at 3 am and buy stuff to make her own lotions. She also confesses to being a lurker on mom blogs and baking blogs, and she even met one of her favorite baking bloggers and they made apple-cider donuts together in real life. Emma is… quirky.
Photos courtesy of Angelo Pennetta for WSJ. Magazine.
Real life Cool Girl. How ’bout that.
We have a winner.
Totally agree. I love her and think she is refreshing.
I’m torn because sometimes I really do like Emma. But then she reminds me that she continuously works with Woody Allen. And also, I think Andrew Garfield makes her slightly pretentious and annoying. It’s like he rubs off on her. I hated when they put those signs in front of their face when they walked by the paparazzi.
I like her too, but I can’t get past the fact that she chose to work with him, not once but twice- and AFTER the recent publicity about Dylan.
I write off anybody who works with Allen.
Loathe that she works with and talks about Woody Allen. I used to be so fond of her, but I just can’t stand her anymore. Oh, you’re just so scared to work with such a talented genius? Poor you. Shut the @ up.
I’m kind of ambivalent about her, but she is kind of annoying. She’s been picking really sh*tty projects lately trying to be certain directors’ muses.
I’m ambivalent about her as well. I’ve only seen two of her films (I’m so done with Woody Allen), but I like what she said about having panic attacks. I’ve had them since childhood, with experience and meds, they can be controlled. Her description was right on and I appreciate her for discussing it.
I agree with her not picking the best projects. She is at the top right now and she chose to do “Magic in the Moonlight” and “Aloha”. Why?
She needs to do some juicy drama to grow professionally.
Gnat is taking no prisoners this morning 🙂
I did wake up grumpy this morning. I’m sorry if it shows.
I like grumpy gnat. 🙂
Aww, GNAT you’re always awesome.
Thank you! I am feeling better now.
That and her comments about the paps are just eyeroll-worthy. Yeah, like she didn’t know the paps were there.
Agreed. I use to love her and now I’m like, “please stop talking”.
Yep I agree. I don’t think this interview does her any favours.
Yup, I adored her and Cate Blanchett, but working with Woody Allen put an end to that. Two reasons for that: obviously the abuse of Dylan Farrow and possibly his current wife (feels like there must have been grooming), second: Woody Allen does not make good movies. He may have made good movies once (they’re not to my taste), but he doesn’t make good movies anymore. Sucking up to him is being sycophantic to someone who’s coasting on previous succes and may still be able to pull some strings in navel staring Hollywood. The emperor wears no clothes people, we can all see it.
I like her.. and I too believe they were taking a moment. It happens to a lot of couples. And they find they miss each other and get back together. I wouldn’t be surprised if they got engaged and married in a year or so.
She is someone that I like in quirky roles. I don’t see or feel her in things that are too serious. Sadly I feel she is herself in every role. doe eyed and cute. I see her as a Annette Bening type as she gets older.
That’s what’s off about her, and I haven’t realized until u say it. She is talented, but I always feel she’s playing herself. It takes a hell of an actor to disappear into the character AND impress at the same time. But she’s pretty good and I like her.
She’s adorable and interesting, but the Woody Allen muse thing puts me off.
The Andrew Garfield bag stunt, which she admitted was intentional, is just silly, tossed amongst all the other words about keeping the relationship details locked down. Her pet peeves are literally pet peeves.
ETA: Not all that quirky interesting, kinda meh. She pretty much parrots what every other actor on the face of the Earth says about Woody Allen.
Yet there are people out there that thinks she is so cool and above it all. Both of them are pretentious twits. If I was on the fence about her, this interview confirms I do not like her.
Agggggghhh this girl! She’s just so damn compelling. She’s got the X factor in spades.
Miss Ng, 1/4 Hawaiin tries so hard to be a serious actress yet all I see is the same character.
I don’t think she can be more than quirky.
Her turn as sexy in Gangster Squad was cringe inducing.
And she and Garfield have been newly pictured almost every day on other celeb blogs, so I definitely think they reacted to the stories while spouting the ‘above it all’ line.
“Cringeworthy” is the perfect way to describe her performance but to be fair, Gangster Squad was a huge mess. I don’t know if it was sloppy direction or a weak script but that movie managed to make Gosling seem awful as well, and I normally like him.
I agree with your second paragraph and I really like Emma, but the “sshhhhmyrelationshipissoprivateandsecret!!!” stuff is incredibly annoying.
I’m with you on Gangster Squad and I’ll add The Help as another annoying turn (maybe the fact I didn’t like this movie blurs my judgment here).
Good in Crazy Stupid Love but that may come frome the fact I found her costars great and it somewhat rubbed on her.
I HATED The Help. Despised it.
And I agree with your assessment of her performance.
+ 1- Jegede as always hitting the right spot on observations.
It does not suprise me that Woody Allen does not aswer questions about the characters in his films, the characters seem so shallow.
BOOM. So true.
She seems like most people who gain fame and fortune and then realize it’s all BS, so they begin to crave normalcy.
“But it’s so special to me that it never feels good to talk about, so I just continually don’t talk about it.” .. so Instead we just keep calling the paps throughout our relationship so you can SEE it!!!! Privacy yooo.
I used to really like this asian and hawaiian thirsty constant pap calling Woody Allen muse.. but she lost me somewhere, somehow. How sad.
How do you know she calls the paps?
@Erykah B
So true.
Since Aloha she and Andrew have been snapped together almost constantly but some still insist they don’t play the game. The paps just always know EXACTLY where to find them in big ol California. Interesting how some celebs get called out and others don’t.
“Asian and Hawaiian” – I’m SCREAMING!
They moved to LA which is worse than NY for paps and there has been increased spotlight and $$$ for their photos because of the rumors. i don’t believe they call paps at all. Emma often looks stressed out when she’s followed by paparazzi.
It’s paparazzi’s jobs to tail celebs. Once they figure out a star’s routine – gym/store/nail bar/cafe/beach then you bet they will continue to stalk if the star is profitable.
Well I believe they call the paps.
They’ve been in LA for how long and have somehow in the past managed not to get constantly almost daily papped at the supermarket, the gas station, parents homes e.t.c like they have this last month plastered all over several celeb blogs.
Especially as Emma conveniently had a movie coming out. Other celebs are called out for less than this – Andrew and Emma are not special. IMO anyway
They just moved back to LA and yes when they were living there a couple years ago, they were papped everywhere too. It’s just that the pics are showing up more on the blogs recently b/c of the heightened interest b/c of this so called split. And yes, they were papped just as much (if not more) when they lived in NYC, there were daily pics of them in January before Andrew left for Taiwan. They just weren’t widely posted, but they were definitely there if you knew where to look.
I don’t like nor dislike her but her work with Woody Allen is not a good look on her. Especially when people were pointing out his sexist Spiderman comment to justify their dislike for him yet Stone works with Woody Allen and she never gets the negative attention. I’d say that’s much worse than what her boyfriend said.
So she’s living with her brother in Malibu and not Garfield? Bit odd when they lived together in New York. She was very young when she got with him, and he is a few years older, so i wouldn’t be surprised if she was craving some freedom and him going away for 4 or 5 months was probably a relief for her. It doesn’t mean she isn’t into him, but if you get together with somebody that young then you do eventually end up thinking ‘i wish i had some single years’. She jumped into it with Andrew very soon after her thing with that Culkin guy.
Also, people never ever seem to call Andrew and Emma out for the obvious cheating that led to him dumping Shannon Woodward. They were together for a long time, all through his struggling actor years and the second he gets success with Social Network he dumps her for his starlet co-star. Other people get annihilated over their personal life yet Stonefield gets a pass? Either way, i don’t get the fuss over them being together.
I like Emma more than jlaw, she doesn’t seem as fake and phony. I hate how Jlaw pretends to be nervous and awkward when really she is the most confident person in the room. I can believe Emma knows what anxiety is and has learned to channel it in her acting. And i am also glad that even though she is friends with Taylor Swift she doesn’t follow her around like a puppy waiting for some attention.. She has her own life unlike a lot of Swift’s other famous ‘friends’ who seem to be at her beck and call 24/7
Not defending it, but I suppose bc it was non-celebrities that were victim to the Stonefield overlap.
Shannon is a known actress. She’s not mega famous but she’s Katy Perry’s bff so there are a lot of people who loved her and Andrew together (can anyone imagine Katy Perry and Andrew hanging out? so weird)
This interview was done in April and her bro was staying with her at her new place by the beach in Malibu while Andrew was away in Taiwan. Now that Andrew is back, he’s living with her and I assume her brother has gone back to his old place since that aren’t any more sightings or pap pics of him for the past couple of months
Agree Gilda
Garfield was with Shannon Woodward when he started working on Spider-Man. A month into filming, the Sony PR went into over-drive releasing statements about Andrew and Emma’s off the charts “chemistry” then Garfield broke up with Shannon soon after. It seemed at first like it was just a studio plan to sell the movie romance but then it became obvious he really did hook up with Emma for real and drop Shannon. IMO those pesky details about how the met and fell in love is while they avoid questions about their relationship because they had no trouble selling it for their movie. Or doing convenient pap works. Everyone in Hollywood is shady including Emma Stone so that’s why they have no problems supporting the Woody Allens of this world to advance their careers.
@Gilda: I’m not sure if you are aware, but Jennifer Lawrence has also admitted that she suffers from anxiety and terrible panic attacks as a kid…I don’t doubt that she is confidant (and good for her) but that doesn’t mean that she doesn’t still get anxious. I think she is very good at dealing with her anxiety.
@ gilda Andrew never had struggling actor years. He won awards for his acting in his first year out of drama school. He had a very promising career in the UK with interesting stage, TV and screen parts. Got nominated for an Oscar at the age of 26-27. That guy didn’t even wait tables for a minute.
I want to like her, because she generally seems down-to-earth and relatable. She certainly seems smarter than a lot of Hollywood starlets. But then I remember this is someone who chooses to continue to work with Woody Allen. This is someone who didn’t stop to consider what the response or ramifications might be when she agreed to play a 1/4 Hawaiian, 1/4 Chinese character without having any sort of minority descent or culture in her background. I start to question her judgment and character because of these repeated objectionable choices.
Why is it that it’s only the actresses who work with Woody Allen who get all the judgement? Nobody ever brings up how awful Jesse Eisenberg or Joaquin Phoenix is for working with him. Almost every actor in Hollywood praises him. Just the other day i heard Bill Hader talk about how working with him is on his wishlist. Judd Apatow and Amy Schumer were talking about how his work influenced Trainwreck which was filmed in New York. I’m not going to pick on Emma or Cate or Scarlett when everybody else in their industry would do the same. Are you just going to stop watching movies because 90% of the industry have either starred in or want to be in his movies.
Every human being alive makes ‘objectionable’ choices. We would be screwed if we judged every actor and actress on their personal life. I cannot stand his movies personally and i think he’s creepy, but he hasn’t been charged with any crime even though he was investigated. It’s all he said/she said.
This is so true. There are SO many celebs that have worked with him, plan on working with him in the future, or aspire to work with him. Emma Stone, Scarlett Johanson and Cate Blanchett are continually singled out but if it’s a Joaquin post, nobody ever brings up Allen.
People around here LOVE Rachel McAdams (I love her too) but when has anyone ever brought up the fact that she worked with Allen?
Personally, I don’t dislike an actor because of who they choose to work with professionally, but if I did, I’d have to rule out half of Hollywood. That would include anyone who works with Mel Gibson, Charlie Sheen, Terrence Howard, anyone who has ever let Terry Richardson take a photo of them, etc. It’s exhausting.
Playing devil’s advocate: I think the difference is that the actresses who are criticized for working with him constantly make a big deal about how they’re feminists and how Hollywood is very sexist. To then work with Allen *after* Dylan’s NYT piece came out about how Allen (allegedly) abused her is not just objectionable morally, it’s also hypocritical.
Also that there aren’t as many Joaquin Phoenix or Jesse Eisenberg posts around here compared to those for the criticized actresses.
Are you just going to stop watching movies because 90% of the industry have either starred in or want to be in his movies.
Yes I did. I watch items from across the atlantic and love it.
So true, Kitten. It would be down to a very short list if we eliminate anyone who’s ever worked with someone sketchy.
I personally would not choose to work with WA, and have a hard time understand why anyone would, but that doesn’t mean I won’t watch and enjoy them in another film (I won’t watch anymore WA films).
But it does seem like the actresses get blasted a lot more for it than the actors do.
Thank you! It’s just illogical to blame these actors for others supposed actions.
@MAC-And that is entirely your prerogative. Truly.
Look, movies and other forms of art are about escapism for me. I refuse to politicize every single aspect of life to the point where I can no longer enjoy a good movie because I have to worry about the personal lives of every actor, writer, director, casting agent, and set-designer involved. If that makes people think I’m an apologist or a traitor to feminism, then so be it.
Well, I have been waiting for people to call Joaquin on it. But nobody wants to criticize Joaquin apparently.
You are right, only women get the backlash.
Truth be told, Woody Allen lost his spark. His movies these days are boring and this is my selfish reason for not wanting all these talented actors to be working with him. I’d rather they do something else.
0% respect for continuing to work with Woody Allen. She was filming when the Dylan piece came out and any self-respecting actress would have dropped out immediately. Her career was just as on a high then as it is now and it wouldn’t have hurt her. And then she continues to make movies with him. Newsflash, Scarlett Johansson and company: being a Woody Allen muse is not career-making anymore.
Agree. 0% respect.
I like her poncho. Almost makes me wish for Fall!
She just needs a cup of chocolate and is ready!
NYC is by the water too… Glad she is not in Ghostbusters, cast is perfect as is. I used to really like her now not so much.
My pet peeve: people talking about animals dressed in outfits being their pet peeve. My beloved late dachshund got very sick because I wasn’t dressing him in a warm coat in the winter and my vet explained to me in great detail how irresponsible it is to not dress some particular races of dogs in winter outfits. Now I hate to read about people ridiculing others for doing it, because if someone is too embarrassed to dress their doxie, yorkie or other vulnerable type of dog (or other type of animal, my uncle has to dress his horse in a cape for more than half a year) just because Emma Stone or their hot neighbor said it’s ridiculous, the poor dogs can get sick or die.