Emma Stone cried tears of joy after winning the Oscar for Best Actress for the movie "Poor Thing." Picture/ic photo
On March 11, Beijing time, at the 96th Academy Awards ceremony, 35-year-old Emma Stone won the Oscar for Best Actress for the movie "Poor Thing". This was her second Oscar in 2017. After "La La Land", it was the second time to win this award. Emma Stone accepted the trophy from the previous Best Actress winner Michelle Yeoh and held back tears during her acceptance speech: "This is not about me, it's about a team working together to create something bigger than its individual parts." "Add something greater."
"Poor Thing" is adapted from Alasdair Gray's novel of the same name. It tells the story of a woman named Bella (played by Emma Stone) who committed suicide in the late Victorian era, and... Resurrected by a scientist (Willem Dafoe) using the brain of an unborn child. The film tracks Bella's intellectual journey from childlike innocence through adolescence to adulthood, with Bella's sexual awakening being an important part of her maturation process.
It's no exaggeration to say that "Poor Thing" is quite possibly the best performance of Emma's career. Emma's physical talents have never been explored to this extent, and over two hours she creates a complex female character who grows from a clumsy, nonverbal infant to a girl who craves sex and adventure and refuses Become the domain of any man, a dynamic independent woman.
20 years ago, a Hollywood executive once told Emma that an actress's career is like a sprint, not a marathon. She scoffed. Along the way, Emma is grateful that she has been able to keep trying new things and making different choices. As an actress, she knows how rare it is to choose what you want to do and who you want to work with. She hopes to have the opportunity to try new things for many years to come and keep the performance marathon going.
It was embarrassing during rehearsals, but there were no taboos during filming
"Poor Thing" is the second collaboration between Emma and director Lanthimos after "The Favorite". In fact, the two had an intersection before "The Favorite".
In 2014, before Lanthimos was filming "The Lobster", there was a character with a lisp in the film, and he planned to consider inviting Emma to star. But Emma herself also had a problem with her speech. Lanthimos was worried that both of them would be too involved in the drama, so he gave up the idea. Although the cooperation did not work out, a beautiful friendship was born. Since then, the two have maintained close contact.
Emma (right) and director Lanthimos have collaborated many times, and the two parties have already established a tacit understanding.
"Poor Thing" is a project that director Lanthimos has been brewing for more than ten years. "I had never read a book like this before and I was fascinated by the characters, the themes, the humor and the complexity, and I was even fascinated by its visuals because Alasdair Gray was also a painter. Draw your own illustrations. You immediately interpret the book as something very visual and complex." Director Lanthimos was fascinated when he first read the original novel.
In 2012, director Lanthimos and Gray met for the first time in the author's hometown of Glasgow, Scotland. After the meeting, Gray handed over the adaptation rights of the novel to Lanthimos. The adaptation was quite difficult, and the author Gray passed away before the movie was released.
"Poor Thing" has a witty and even vulgar script, and screenwriter Tony McNamara has made no secret of his love for this "very polarizing" film. But he also mentioned that although the original novel is wild and crazy, the story is told by a man, and the audience will never empathize with the heroine Bella. Therefore, the screenwriter changed the center of the story and got this coming-of-age comedy about ironic control.
When creating the character of Bella, screenwriter McNamara said that he created it on a blank sheet of paper. Bella is a woman with a baby's brain implanted in her body. The imprint of childhood and society has not left any mark on her character. "I write about a person who approaches experience in an open, adventurous, optimistic way," McNamara said.I didn't have any preconceived ideas about how I should view her, how I should judge her. anything. I'm just in a state of constant self-creation." There is a passage in the
film where Bella is annoyed by the cry of a baby while eating, and she yells: "I have to hit that baby. The line was inspired by the screenwriter's son. In early drafts, the screenwriter worried that Bella would be too polite at an early age, noting that young children could be "like narcissistic sociopaths." He gave Lanthimos He told a story about how one time his family was eating in a restaurant and a baby was screaming, and his son said, "Someone hit that baby!" Lanthimos liked this sentence so much that he Added.
Emma is the heroine of director Lanthimos's last film "The Favorite". After filming "The Favorite", Emma received an invitation from the director to star in "Poor Thing". In the film , Bella, played by Emma, initially had the intelligence of a child. She could only learn a few words a day and stumbled around. Before filming, Emma had watched some videos of young children walking, but found them basically useless.
Director Lanthimos With Emma on the set of the film "Poor Thing".
Director Lanthimos built Bella's world in a large studio in Budapest, and the actors rehearsed for a month in advance. Emma was filming "Love" "La La Land", it took a long time to rehearse, and the rehearsals were very specific, singing and dancing. But when Lanthimos talked about rehearsing, Emma didn't know what that meant. It turns out, Her rehearsals had nothing to do with what she was going to do in the final shot.
However, the rehearsal process was very helpful for Emma's performance. "When rehearsing with Lanthimos, all you do is mess around," Emma said. Ma said that during rehearsals, everyone had already made fun of each other and felt stupid and embarrassed, so when it came time to actually shoot on the set, there were no taboos.
There is no "male gaze", and we must learn to abandon the sense of shame
Since its debut at the Venice Film Festival last summer, "Poor Things" has sparked widespread discussion over its explicit content, which includes explicit depictions of sex. Plus, the fact that it's a male author and director , which also made many viewers think that the film has a serious male gaze and is a female exploitation of actresses.
As the starring role, Emma defended the female characters in the film and refuted her being a victim of the "male gaze" "I think it took away my status in the film because I was also a producer on it. It’s the way we chose to tell the story, so I feel like it’s a little weird to exclude myself because I’m presented in it as if I’m not the main voice or I’m being told what to do."
Emma Stone She felt that she should not be separated from the main creative team of "male directors and male writers" just because she starred in this movie as an actress. She was not only an actress, but also a female producer, and she was also interested in the direction of the movie. Played a key role. Emma said: "I wanted to be as respectful as possible to the character and this is part of her journey. While she personally doesn't want to be "nude all the time," it's important to the character that sex is a big part of Bella's character's experience and growth, as it is for most people. If the camera avoids this, For Bella, this role lacks reality.
Emma said that after she played Bella in "Poor Things", "I learned to abandon a lot of things, such as shame, that are imposed on us. s things. "
director Lanthimos also feels that sex is an inherent part of the novel itself and that the character is free to everything including sex. For the director, don't be prude in the movie because that completely betrays the protagonist , and Emma is not ashamed of her nudity in the film."The thing about Emma and I, we've made four films together, is that there's a kind of telepathy where you can communicate without having to explain or talk about too much, and as soon as I start saying something sexual, she will Say: 'Yes, of course, it's Bella'. We'll do what we need to do." Director Lanthimos said. When
won this year's Critics' Choice Award for Best Actress for "Poor Thing," Emma gave an acceptance speech: "This is one of the best choices in my life. It taught me to abandon a lot of things, such as shame. , things that are thrust upon us, which I'm still learning, and now the Critics' Choice Awards, are outside perceptions. I'm grateful to the critics for giving me awards, but I'm learning not to care what you think. ."
Acting is a marathon, not a sprint
There is an opinion that after Leonardo DiCaprio's generation, no new movie stars will be born in Hollywood. But from now on, if there is one, Emma Stone is definitely one of them.
Emma Stone plays high school girl Olive in "Scandal Project".
After supporting roles in films such as Bad (2007) and Zombieland (2009), Emma Stone rose to fame in Scosfield (2010), her first starring role in a film . In Will Gurler's comedy, Emma Stone plays a smart and lovable high school student who instantly defines her stardom: an everyman charm mixed with a... A playful snarky streak, and a real flair for comedy that made her stand out on screen.
Starting with this film, for which she was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture Musical/Comedy, the then 22-year-old Emma quickly transitioned away from the world of teen comedies into wider fields, although her choice of projects, including Crazy Stupid Love," "The Amazing Spider-Man" series, "The Help" and more didn't always live up to her acting potential.
"Birdman" in 2014 was a correction in her acting direction. She was nominated for the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for this film, and later won the Oscar for Best Actress before she was 30 for her role in the musical "La La Land".
Emma won the Oscar for Best Actress before the age of 30 for her role in the musical "La La Land".
Actually, Emma was not the first choice for the heroine of "La La Land" (another Emma-Emma Watson was the first choice), but this role does feel like it was made for her Born with a unique personality on screen. As expected, her performance is stunning, displaying every-woman relatability and acerbic humor while possessing an innocent romantic streak. When La La Land came out, there was a lot of debate about the quality of Emma and her co-star Ryan Gosling's singing. Indeed, for a movie that bills itself as a classic musical, the singing and dancing performances of the two protagonists cannot be compared with those of Gene Kelly (the male lead in "Singin' in the Rain") or Judy Garland (the female lead in "The Wizard of Oz"). Comparison, but Emma's performance largely makes up for the singing flaws.
It can be said that since "La La Land", Emma has shown ambition in the film projects she chooses. She no longer stops at some sweet roles, but opens up a broader territory in character creation. Starring in arthouse films like Lanthimos' The Favourite. She also received her second Oscar nomination for her performance in the film.
"The Favorite" is a very important film for Emma. This film provides her with enough artistic performance space. She also seized this opportunity to expand her acting skills in new and interesting ways. Performance style. Most importantly, she developed a trusting and creative partnership with director Lanthimos, who later collaborated on Poor Things, The Good Seed and the Korean film adaptation of Save the Planet .
The literary film "The Favorite" directed by Lanthimos opened up a new performance space for Emma Stone.
In addition, Emma is also very enterprising. She co-founded a production company with her husband Dave McCary. Emma won the first contract with the famous independent production company a24, and produced with the help of a24 Independent films such as "When You Finish Saving the World" (2022), "The Problem" (2024) and the upcoming "Screen Is Glowing." In addition to starring, she also produced Benny Safdie and Nathan Fielder's quirky drama Cursed, in which she gave a deeply unlikable performance as a paranoid and selfish reality TV host. But it's exciting.
20 years ago, Emma, a newcomer in Hollywood, had just moved to Los Angeles and went to attend a conference. At the meeting, an executive told her that the acting industry is a marathon, not a sprint, for male actors, but for actresses, it is just the opposite. Although she was still new to the company, Emma realized at the time that the executive’s advice was “total rubbish.” Because there are many women she respects in the industry who have proven that life and work only get more interesting and fulfilling over time.
Along the way, Emma is grateful that she can keep trying new things and that she has the opportunity to make choices at work. As an actor, she knows how rare and precious it is to choose what you want to do and who you want to work with. She also hopes to have the opportunity to try new challenges in the coming years to continue the marathon of performing.
Beijing News reporter Teng Chao
editor Huang Jialing
proofreader Zhao Lin
