Kristen Stewart

KRISTEN STEWART

In show business and in life, one can never predict which associations are going to bring the most profound changes.  Who knew what would transpire when Lennon met McCartney, Scorsese met DeNiro, Cheech met Chong, Ben met Jerry, or ... when Kristen Stewart met Stephenie Meyer.

Kristen Jaymes Stewart was born on April 9th, 1990 -- she is an American film actress best known for her role as Bella Swan in the film version of Stephenie Meyer’s “Why must I be a teenager in love with a vampire?” series Twilight.  Kristen was born in Los Angeles.  Her father, John Stewart (no, not that one) is a television producer who at one time worked for Fox.  Kristen’s mother, Jules Mann-Stewart, is a screenwriter who hails from Sydney, Australia.

Having caught the acting bug quite early (age 8), Kristen was noticed by an agent while performing in an elementary school Christmas play.  Her first paid role was as an extra on the Disney Channel’s The Thirteenth Year.  She next appeared in the low-budget film The Safety of Objects, as the tomboyish daughter of a troubled single mother played by Patricia Clarkson.  Her first big break came in 2002, when director David Fincher cast her as the Jodie Foster’s diabetic daughter in his taut and very effective thriller, Panic Room.

Another thriller, Cold Creek Manor, followed, where she played the daughter (lots of daughters here, but what else is a teen actress to do?) of Dennis Quaid and Sharon Stone -- the film was a failure.  Catch That Kid and Undertow, under-performers both, came next.  However in 2004, Kristen received the notices of her so-far, so-short career.  In the tele-film Speak, based on Laurie Halse Anderson’s novel, 13-year-old Stewart played Melinda Sordino, who after a brutal rape, stops speaking. Kristen received glowing reviews for her portrayal of the silent character, whose mute exterior was matched by a blackly-comedic internal monologue.

KRISTEN STEWART

Up next was director Jon Favreau’s fantasy-adventure film Zathura -- Kristen played Lisa, the older sister of two boys, who, while playing a board game, turn their house into a spacecraft hurtling through the galaxy.  The film received good reviews, but Kristen’s performance was small and she was largely overlooked.  Three more lackluster films came next, Fierce People, The Messengers (an average ghost story made infinitely better because of Kristen's affecting performance), and In The Land of Women, costarring Meg Ryan and Adam Brody.

Then, in 2007, Sean Penn cast her as Tracy in his adaptation of Jon Krakauer’s Into The Wild.  Both the film and Kristen’s performance received great notices.  After small roles in two more films, Jumper and What Just Happened, Kristen hit upon the role which would bring her worldwide fame.

When Summit Entertainment picked up the rights to Stephenie Meyer’s vampire romance series Twilight (after other major studios had passed), they didn’t really know what they had on their hands.  Director Catherine Hardwicke cast Kristen as 17-year-old Bella Swan, who, after moving in with her father in the Pacific northwest, meets broodingly handsome Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson) at school.  Much swooning ensues -- even after Bella discovers that Edward is actually a vampire.  The low-budget movie ($37 million) has grossed over $380 million worldwide, not including another $157 million in US DVD sales.  The sequel, New Moon, is being fast-tracked in order to meet a November 2009 release date.  Likewise, the third book in the series, Eclipse, is scheduled to hit theaters in June 2010.  (Got to get these things shot before those young vampires start looking a little long in the tooth ... pun intended.)

Up next (besides those Twilight sequels) are, Adventureland, K-11 (directed by Kristen’s mother, costarring Nikki Reed and Jason Mewes), and The Runaways, where Kristen will play 80’s rock goddess Joan Jett.

KRISTEN STEWART

One of the most talented and lovely of the young-and-upcoming actresses, I predict Kristen Stewart will be a major star in the years to come.

Kristen Stewart Quotes:

“I've always had an aversion to looking sexy, but I've grown out of it.”

“A lot of actors think that what we do is so important, like we're saving people's lives or something.”

"When I got Panic Room, I'm like, 'Oh my God, that's huge!  It's bigger than huge. I was kind of freaked out at first.”

“I love [acting] because I love to tell stories.  I like being in movies that have a great story.  I'm not so interested in being a Hollywood star.  It's a job, you know.  When you wake up at six in the morning every day for a week, it feels like hard work.”

“Acting is such a personal thing, which is weird because at the same time it's not.  It's for the consumption of other people.  But in terms of creative outlets and expressing yourself, it's just the most extreme version of that that I've ever found.  It's like running, it's exertion.  When you reach that point where you can't go anymore and you stop and you take a breath, it's that same sort of clearing of the mind.”

“All I try to do in the press is be honest about something that I really care about.”

KRISTEN STEWART

“I start everything from the same place, with that sense of responsibility.  On a bigger movie, you have to be aware that you can only control your aspect of the film.  It's nice to be on a smaller movie because you're working with your friends and you feel so close-knit.  It's your movie and you can do anything you want, and nobody's going to have anything to say.  With a bigger movie, it concerns so many people.  It's so much more of a process.  But, in terms of what I do personally, it has to be the same, or else I'm just on some big movie, being a liar, and I can't do that.”

“Really, I'm incredibly disjointed and not candid.  Just in general, my thoughts tend to come out in little spurts that don't necessarily connect.  If you hang around long enough, you can find the linear path.  But it will take a second.  That is why these interviews never go well for me.”

“I have the Aha moments progressively -- they're like milestones and they hit you.  I think my first Aha! moment was when I did this [TV] movie called Speak.  I was just rolling with it, and ended up kind of really losing myself in it, so that I felt like I was a different person at the end.  That was a big moment.”

About Bella in New Moon: “Well, she loses what basically gives her the drive to do anything in her whole life.  She loses the man she's in love with, but she also loses her entire life plan, and she's so young to have to be forced into a decision like that.  It's just a glorified, elaborate version of the worst breakup you've ever been through.  All of a sudden you question everything.  All of a sudden you know nothing and you're dropped in the middle of a freezing cold ocean.  Oddly, we have a character that's warm enough and bright enough to bring her out of that, and it's truly gut-ripping.  Because as perfect as Jacob is for her, she holds on to an ideal, the ultimate fiery love that she has for Edward even though it's not comfortable, it's not practical and it's not a good idea.”

KRISTEN STEWART

“This weird thing happens when you're in a movie that has some level of success.  People start offering you all kinds of things, and they just expect you to do them because they'll be good for your career.  It's not about the project's integrity or anything like that.  It's about raising your profile and all that crap.”

On how Twilight has changed her life: “My life hasn't changed.  Most circumstances I find myself in are different than they were a year ago, but I myself haven't changed ... however a normal 18-year-old girl would change in a year.  But it makes things so much easier.  I would do it for free every day [even] if nobody saw it.  I cannot describe how good it feels to actually have something that is truly into your heart and soul actually affecting people.  And that's amazing.  So that's the biggest change.”

On whether she wants to continue making movies or go to college: “I absolutely have no foresight.  I used to think I had a lot when I was younger.  I worked really hard in school to give myself options, and I've literally taken those options and thrown them down the toilet.  Purposely -- not to make that sound totally negative.  It's what I want.  I want to keep doing what I'm doing.  It's funny, people ask me all the time: 'What do you do for fun?  What do you do when you're not acting?'  It's a strange thing, acting.  It's a business, it's a job, everything like that.  All it is, is self-reflection.  You just never stop caring about people and I've never stopped doing that, so I'm sure it'll seep into other areas of my life.  I want to write.  I'm not going to school because I can't take the structure of it, but I'm not going to stop learning.”

KRISTEN STEWART

“Usually I come in and sit down at roundtables in America and they look at me like 'what is wrong with you?'  Just because I don't fit ... nobody fits into the frame that typical Hollywood young actresses do, but they try to.  They try to be this thing.  Try to memorize answers and make everybody happy.  That's so horrifying and scary to me.  So when you're not that, you get criticized for it.  You get criticized for being honest and criticized for being nervous.  So that's kind of annoying.  I do a whole day of press and then I get calls from publicity people that are like, 'you might want to be a little bit more bubbly'.  And I'm like, 'no'.  People get very upset in the States.  It's weird.  Fans of the book especially.  They don't understand me.  Which is fine.  I guess it doesn't really matter who I am, it just matters that they like the movie.”

Regarding interviews: “Self-evaluation is not my strong point, and you're constantly asked to critique yourself.  You just spent three months on a set and your whole life is wrapped up in that, and then it's like, ‘Okay, define that right now in five seconds.’  I can't do that.  I used to get so nervous that I would become a completely different person, and then they would think that was me.  So I've tried to calm down, but no one's ever going to write, ‘Oh, she's actually just a pretty f---in' average chick who really loves what she does.’  That's not gonna happen.”