Title:"No one can shut me up; How I learned
to stop worrying and start taking risks"
BY JULIA STILES

quote:

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"I'm about to phone the editor of YM to tell her I give up. I am suffering from an oppressice bout of writer's block, and I regret to inform her that i will be unable to write my own aritcle for her February issue. We'll have to leave it to a professional jornalist because I am just a big, inarticulate loser! I feel like I'm back in my first two years of college, staring at my computer screen at five in the morning with no clue how to fill five pages on Etruscan art.
How is this possible? I finally have the opportunity to express myself directly, to cut out the middleman journalist and say something meaningful while I promote my new movie A GUY THING, but I have nothing to say. I guess it's easier for me to play opinionated character in movies, where everything is scripted and I know the audience will root for me. Or maybe, as an actress, I've gotten so dependent on endearing myself to my audience that to actually take risks is scary. That's why playing Becky in AGUYTHING was so much fun. Becky's eniterly free-spirtited and oblivious to any criticism. I chose the role because, in a way, I want to be like Becky: I don't want to be afraid tof taking risks.
So how is it that I havbe nothing to say for YM? I used to be quite adevilish little girl. My parents, who own their own business, encouraged my outspoken ways. And in school, I was the one who was told to put her hand down in class, the one whoe everyone had always heard enough from.
I grew up in NewYOrkCity, where you get stepped on if you can't demand what you want. Onve, in my seventh-grade English class at Friends Seminary, which is a Quaker school that prides itself on promoting individuality, I went on a tirade when the boy I had a crush on dismissed my favorite author. He boisteroulsly declared that John Stienbeck was slow and boring, and he thought all the descriptions of nature in THEGRAPESOFWRATH were irrelevant. I told him that if he had read the ending, he would understand that every description of an animal in the desert relatied to human interaction as well. When I was done, he turned to the teacher and said, "Ugh--she's such a feminist." Imagine a classsrom full of twittering adolescents. That shut me up.
It shut me up, that's just it. What I'd said in class had nothing at all to do with women or feminism, I was just unabashiedly expressing my opinion. Suddenly I was being mocked and labeled. I can see now that the boy was just embarrassed and defensive. At the time, though, I wanted him to think I was the coolest, sexiest, most gorgeous goddess on earth.
I had a similar experience when I stated college. I chose to go to Columbia University precisely because the student body seemed diverse. NOt just diverse in terms of race, but on a deeper level" The classrooms would be filled with people from different economic backgrounds, different countries, with diggerent opinions. I was excited that my classmates would argue rather than agree. Despite wanting this diversity, I was reluctant to stand out. Two years ago, during freshman orientation, when everyone goes around and says their name and where they are from and what their favourite animal is and what they want to be when they grow up, I had no idea how to handle the idea of my profession.
I started acting at a young age. I was fortunate because by the time I was 11, I knew exactl wat I wanted to do and devoted all my energy to making that happen. I loved performing and playing pretend. I had grown up without a backyard, so my imagination became my pastime. My after-school activities consised of play rehearsals with an off-Broadway theater company, or cattle-call auditions for any role I could get my hands on. The time I spent in high school trying to prove to people that I could act had luckily paid off; I was now a college freshman with the rare resonsibility of a career in motion.
But I didn't know how to handle that with my peers. Should I ignore it altogether? Should I say I want to be an actress when I grow up, even though I'd been actinf for almost 10 years? Or should I make a joke about it and say, "Hi, I'm Julia. I'll be majoring in English. My favorite animal is a Siberian tiger, and perhaps you've seen me is such hit movies as SAVETHELASTDANCE and 10THINGSIHATEABOOUTYOU!" I figured the joke wouldn't go over well. People would think I was seriously self-absorbed, so I refrained form saying anything about acting.
I approached the start of college in utter denial of the fact that I had been in any movies whatsoever. I went to class in my pajamas just like everyone else, and I insisted to my classmates that I wasjust anouther student. I make sure I was sweet as pie to everyone, so as never to be called conceited, or a feminist, or disagreeable. The odd thing was, it didn't really matter how much I tried to "yes" everyone. One girl in my dorm admitted to me that she'd planned to ignore me before we had even met. She had assumed I'd be a "glamourous, stuck-up Hollywood girl" (we actually became good friends, which is why she divulged such information).
Freshman year we had a required essay-writing course to improve our skills as grammarians and logicians. In every class we were handed back our papers, entirely covered in red ink, and a new topic was assigned. We'd go bak to our rooms, write two to four pages on the new tpopic, and wonder why we were such bad writers. Then we'd all return to class to correct our papers out loud. Initially, I never got above a C in that class because, to be honest, my papers were really obvious and boring. I never dared to say anything new, I just wrote what I though was expected of me. For examle, when asked to ponder censorship, I wrote that it was bad but in certain cases okay, blah, blah, blah. I actually completely opposed censorship, but I threw an escape clause into my papers so as not to have to defend my position in class.
My professor saw through this immediately. For the next topic he asked us to argue a political opinion we didn't agree with or believe in. I was stuck. I couldn't write anything just for the sake of argument because I was afraid my paper would be read aloud and my classmates would think poorly of me. My professor took me aside and said, "Write about what you know." He loooked at my censorship paper and said, "I still don't know where you stand on the issue. You haven't taken a stance." And he knew I had one. When I confided that I was having a hard time arguing a definitive position because my own experiences in moviemaking force me to be biased, he exclaimed, "Good! Include your biases. Tell us about them!"
I remember labouring over that paper for hours. I would type an idea, imagine my classmates criticizing it, and then delete entire paragraphs before they were finished. Finally, I threw my hands up and decided to screw being popular. Every time I put a sentence down I didn't wonder if people were foing to agree with or like it. I just asked myself, is this true for me? It was the most liberating, enjoyable paper I had ever written. I got an A, and the approval I had been looking for.
Learning to assert myself hasn't been limited to colled. I've found myself faking in Hollywood as well. There have been numerous t imew where I've read an interview I did and gone, Did I really say that? I don't believe that, so why would I say it!!??? Or found myself at a premiere in some cockamamie dress I couldn't move in and heels that made me feel like I was going to tip over. I felt so out of place, all becasue I thought I had to play the role of "glamourous Hollywood girl."
The first time I went on LATE NIGHT WITH CONAN O'BRIAN was to promote SAVE THE LAST DANCE. I knew people involved in the show were afraid I wasn't going to be funny, and I wanted desperately to get a laushg. I made some wisecrack about the school cafeteria without even thinkg about what it meant, or that nayone would be hurt by my comments. When I went back to school for my secon semester, the people who'd been working very hard to feed all the studenets, and clean up our messes, and smile at us before exams, were really hurt by what I had said. And the worst part was that I hadn't meant it.
So what do I have to say when I don't imagine any critics? When my words arent' filterd through a jornalist or skewed for the sake of entertainment, what do I really believe in? here goes:
"ALL I REALLY NEED TO KNOW I LEARNED ON A MOVIE SET"
1)Every job is important, from the grips who lay the equipment to the makeup artist who paints my face. That goes for pretty much the rest of the world as well (especially hungry college students and school cafeterias).
2)A girl with a good head on her shoulders can get what she wants. I've worked with a number of actresses who are focused and articulate. Even when they want a whole scene changed, they can ask for it, and get it. Their brillance is that they can do it in a non-diva-ish way.
3)You can't please everyone all the time. It's a cliche because it's true. My middle-school crush may have been embarassed that I openly contradicted hime, but all the worthwile guys I know (and their are plenty of them) find a girl with an opinion enticing. If she's got a mind of her own and isn't afraid to use it, those fellas want to know more=,
4)I have been fortundate to have something that I love doing, where I can focus all my creative energy and experiment and take risks and feel a sense of accomplishment. Acting has giben me a way to express myself, to play pretend, to ask questions and to propose answers. I find that most of the people I know are happiest when they have something that consumes them. So find something you like to do, whether it's writing painting, throwing a football, or performing in the circus, and do it with all you might. (P.S. Dieting or worrying about the size of your boobs does not cound as a hobby, and it will probably take up more time.)
5)There's life after highschool. The process of making a movie, because it means so much to me, coan make me forget about the rest of the world. Similarly, it takes an intense amount of orgainzation for a film crew to complete the scheduled scenes every day, and any obstacle to "makinga day" wreaks havoc--whether an aiplane makes too much noise in the middle of a scene or someone gets the flu. but more often than not, the movie gets made and we're on tto the next job. It's the same with high school. Whatever seems like abig deal is soon to be forgotten.

The process of writing this for YM is kind of what I had to go through to prepare for A GUY THING. Becky's trying her hand at different jobs because she's curious, and she leaves them when they get to boring or comfortable. All she really cares about is experienceing life. I loved how honest and straightforward she was; becky never censors her opinions. I aspire to be like Becky in many ways, and I hope her freedom inspires you as well." end.

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Anyway, in today's edition of NYC's DAILY NEWSNOW/MOVIES sec., they feature a story on Julia Stiles. It reads,

quote:

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STILES GETS SERIOUSLY SILLY.'AGUY THING' is comic relief for the focused actress and Columbia student.By Nancy Mills
Hollywood--Julia Stiles is an earnest, focused young actress, but college is giviong her a chance to lighten up. "Columbia has allowed me to just hang out with my peers, " says the girl who got her start in downtown experimental theater at age of 10 and says she feels more at home working on her Shakespeare than going out.
So What's she doing in a grass skirt and coconut-shell bra at Jason Lee's bachelor party in a "A GUY THING"? Short answer: the hula.
LOng answer: "I embrace my humor more now," she says of the film, which arrives Friday--another in a January series of light, romantic and box office friendly comedies.
"A Guy Thing" is exactly my sense of humor--humor that comes out of awkward situations," she adds.
"I love that hula scen because I felt uncomfortable in that skirt. It reminded me of the pressure of being at a premiere and having to wear really high heels and a slinky dress and feeling like a tomboy. So I used that to make fun of women wearing silly costumes at a bachelor party and acting goofy and tripping and falling in my high heels, because I think that's true to life."
Stiles said she notices the difference, too. "For along time, way before I made this movie, I was very into having a plan," she says. "I was very goal-oriented and myopic [??]. Now I have a plan, but I can also adapt easily. I can go with the flow." Stiles' plan to be an actress started early, inpart because her grandmother tool her to a lot of Off-Off-Broadway plays.
Ridge Theater directo Bob McGrath provided her first job.
"Julia saw a show we did and wrote us a letter, some of which was in crayon," says McGrath. "She said, 'If you have any, and I mean any, parts for kids, I'll do them.'
"We got in touch with her, and she came over. I thought she had great presence, so I put her in some shows and kept putting her in shows until she was 17."
"I was very upstart," Stiles recalls about herself as a preteen inSoHo and a student at the Professional Children's School, which prepares students for careers in the arts.
"I was a lot like Eloise, the children's-book character [who lives at the Plaza]. I was almost overly confident and probably spoke with much more authority than I had. BUt I didn't have that voice in my head saying, 'You can't do something.' My mother [Judith, a ceramic aritst] was very encouraging.
"I have opinions, and I'n not afraid to express them. But I still am a girl, and girls have this thing where they're eager to please.
...If you're too opinionated, sometimes people are put off by that, and nobody wants to be off-putting.
"After freshman year, I decided it was a waste of time to second-guess myself and try to please other people. Now It's hust a matter of practicing it."
McGrath has admired her outspokenness since the early days.
"Juslia was very singl-minded and focused," he says. "She had such a great presence, quality and ease about herself and such determination that you forgot she was a kid."
Tim Blake Nelson, who directed "O," agrees.
"Julis has intelligence and grace to match her considerable beauty," he says. "I've met a lot of physically attractive young women. The abound right now in the ranks of actresses her age. But Sshe almost singulary exhibited an intelligence which eclipsed her beauty.
"I felt I was dealing with a palpable min and [that she] was going to take the craft of acting seriously for a very lon time, not someone who was looking for immediate results at the expense of her future. What proves that is, like Hodie Foster, Claire Danes and Anna Paquin, Julia chose to go to college when her beauty is in full bloom, where Hollywood is always looking for the next 18-year-old. I respect Julia for what she's done."
Still, Stiles has missed school to work. "I should be graduating this year, but I have two more years to go," She admits.
She skipped the past semester to co-star with Julia Roberts in "Mona Lisa Smile," Which will be released this year. Also coming this is "CArolina," with Shirley Maclaine.
Stiles has her own production company and has already optioned an adaptation of Oscar Wilde's "Lady Windermere's Fan."
"I think Julia could do anything she wants," says MacGrath, who wrote a screenplay with her several years ago that got into the Sundance Writers Lav. "I think she could run a studio."

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quote:

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Originally posted by LoveTSegarra:
I know that it's hard to turn down parts in Hollywood, but not finishing school leaves a bad taste in my mouth for some reason. I couldn't never stand when people I know rationalize why they haven't finished a goal or project that they've started...Your either determined or you not? So which is it Julia???

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Good Morning America
Jan 17th-- I think its on at 7am but I don't know it's in the morning though

Regis & Kelly
Jan17th 9am

Caroline Rhea
Jan17th. To see what time you can check your local listings

TRL
Jan 17th I dont know what time it's on but i'm sure you or someone you know will.

(as you can see she's um pretty busy on the 17th)

Julia Stiles Diary on Mtv

Sat Jan 11 09:30A- MTV
Sun Jan 12 10:00A - MTV
Wed Jan 15 02:00P - MTV
Thu Jan 16 06:00P MTV

Saturday night Live
Thu Jan 16 08:00P - Comedy Central

10 things I hate about you
Thu Jan 16 09:00P - USA Network
Fri Jan 17 12:00A - USA Network

O
Wed Jan 15 11:00A HBO3- HBO Signature
Sat Jan 25 11:45A HBO3- HBO Signature
Thu Jan 30 12:45P HBO3- HBO Signature

Save the Last Dance
Tue Jan 14 12:05A TMC- The Movie Channel
Thu Jan 16 08:30A TMC- The Movie Channel
Thu Jan 16 09:00P TMC- The Movie Channel
Sun Jan 19 11:00A TMC- The Movie Channel
Sun Jan 19 11:45P TMC- The Movie Channel
Tue Jan 28 10:15A TMC- The Movie Channel
Tue Jan 28 09:00P TMC- The Movie Channel
Fri Jan 31 08:30A TMC- The Movie Channel
Fri Jan 31 07:00P TMC- The Movie Channel

Wicked
Thu Jan 16 12:30P Cinemax
Thu Jan 23 01:30A - Cinemax

*american times*

[This message has been edited by juliastiles81 (edited January 16, 2003).]

Go here:
http://www.teenpeople.com/teenpeople/chat/celebbio/0,8618,406513,00.html

Peace.

------------------
Ezra Moses Galston

Owner of Julia-Stiles.com -- ezramoses@julia-stiles.com

"Pussies Unite!"
-Julia Stiles, The Vagina Monologues

From countingdown.com

Interviews with Julia Stiles, Selma Blair, Jason Lee and Chris Koch as well as 6 clips from A Guy Thing. In all three major formats as well as a variety of sizes

http://www.countingdown.com/theater/interviews/detail/2786268/

-----------------------------------------

Jenna Lewis- I’m Jenna Lewis with Counting Down dot com interviewing Julia Stiles from “A guy thing.”

Julia Stiles- And I’m Julia Stiles from the hit movie “A Guy Thing”

JL- Excellent, excellent, so, why did you choose this project?

JS- Um, ha ha, because it was just really well written. I opened up the script and I was bowled over with la…bowled over, doubled over with laughter. Bowled over, doubled over, either way. Doubled over with laughter. And too see that from like a written word is great, so I had a lot of confidence in that. And I also wanted to just laugh and have a good time every day when I went to work. And um, I was really eh excited about my character because she’s very much a risk taker and real girl. She makes mistakes and she’s klutzy and um, silly, but I think ultimately endearing.

JL- Very endearing yeah, now your character Becky goes through a series of different jobs in the beginning of the film.

JS- Yeah

JL- Did you have any weird jobs that you did when you were starting you acting career?

JS- Um, I worked at Taco Bell.

JL- Nice

JS- Yeah, and Every time I get “Made Up” by a make-up artist, and they put lipstick on me, all I can think about is the deep fat fryer and how the grease was emptied out of Taco Bell and shipped to make-up companies to put in lipsticks.

JL- it wasn’t really?

JS- Yeah, it is, yeah.

JL- Oh, that’s disgusting.

JS- Yeah I know. So, I’ve got some lipstick right here if you want some.

JL- Oh, great. No thanks. I’m all set. So, um, Was Jason Lee attached to the project when you signed on to do it?

JS- um, yeah, he was.

JL- so, Is that one of the factors when you decide on a script, who your leading man is or who the other characters is going to be played by?

JS- Um, yeah. I Thought Jason Lee was really funny, and in a way that’s very unique. He reminds me a lot of Jim Carrey, cause he walks like a monkey.

JL- I heard his nickname is Monkey Boy.

JS- His nickname is Monkey Boy. And aside from that, he is very sarcastic, which I think is wonderful.

JL- so were there any practical jokes on the set? It’s very much a comedy film. (Pause) Any practical jokes?

JS- Um

JL- you have to think about it?

JS- I know, I have that blank stare of like, “Oh no, that question?”

JL- Yeah. Sorry

JS- Um, practical Jokes. If you count Selma’s Flatulence problem as a practical joke.

JL- Really!

JS- Yeah, I mean like god, whooo. Did I say her flatulence problem? I meant my Flatulence problem. Shit! Uh, yes.

JL- So, you were excellent in the comedy. We’ve seen you a lot in the dramas, and the Teen Movies, but you really have a knack for comic flair. Are you going to try this again?

JS- I’d love to. Sure, yeah. It think that um, it’s hard to find well written comedy’s, but if I find another one, I’d love to. It’s a lot of fun. And I think that we need more laughter.

JL- Ok, so what projects are you looking at doing now?

JS- Um, I’m in the process of finishing a movie, called “Mona Lisa Smile” that Julia Roberts is in, and Marcia Gay Harden. And Kirsten Dunst. It’s completely different though. It’s set in 1953, and it’s all about Women in college. Then, um, and I play a very Well mannered, prim and proper girl.

JL- There won’t be many sun and shower scenes in that one.

JS- no, not many Prat falls

JL- Sorry. So, I heard that you wrote a screenplay, um, that went to Sundance.

JS- Mm Ohm.

JL-Are you looking into getting that made?

JS- No. That I wrote a while ago, and I wrote it with a couple of other people and we kind of went our separate ways. And um, I’m kind of over that story. But I like writing just for the sake of writing, not necessarily for the sake of making it into a movie.

JL- are you going to be like Ethan Hawke and publish your own book, or Poetry like Jewel? Anything like that?

JS- it’s an interesting idea. I think I need to live a little bit more before I have anything to write about. I’m only 21, it think it’d be kind of obnoxious to be like “Hi, I have a lot of say. I’m 21 years old, read my book”.

JL- I’m getting told I’m done. Oh wait; I have one more question for you. If you were a comic book character, who would you be?

JS- Oh, uh, Does Mad Magazine count as a comic Book?

JL- I guess so, I’m not really, but you’d be any of the characters in there?

JS- The silly looking ones.

JL- oh, at the back, where you fold it and you make it into something.

JS- Yeah

JL- that’s great, thank you very much.

On the subject of the teenpeople chat, Julia Stiles chat last friday is not in the transcript archive at http://www.teenpeople.com/teenpeople/
chat/transcriptsarchive