NAOMI WATTS
We still aren´t sure what Mulholland Drive was about, but we know one thing - this actress is taking the film world by storm

By Brad Goldfarb // Photography by Carter Smith

It´s fitting that after 12 years of trying to break through in the movies, Naomi Watts did so in a film in which she took on flip sides of that Hollywood archetype "the aspiring actress," nailing both its giddy optimism as well as its potential for dashed dreams. The film, of course, was Mulholland Drive, a project that put Watts on the fast track to big-screen dominance. In the coming months, she has no less than four films slated for U.S. release, including The Ring, a thriller due out in theaters next month; Plots With a View, opposite Brenda Blethyn and Christopher Walken; The Kelly Gang, the biopic based on the life of the legendary Australian outlaw Ned Kelly, starring Heath Ledger; and Merchant-Ivory´s Le Divorce, co-starring Kate Hudson.
When I first met Watts, she was taking a break from her photo session for this issue and sharing a quick chat with Sean Penn, who happended to be staying at the hotel where we were shooting. It was the kind of Hollywood power moment seldom witnessed in New York Ciry, and one which perfectly summed up where Watts is at this point in her career - in demand. In fact, the trades announced a few days later that she had signed on to star yet in another high profile project - Alejandro González Inárritu´s 21 Grams, a films which also stars Penn and Benicio Del Toro, and which is scheduled to start filming at the end of the year.
Later that morning, watching Watts work it for the camera, I was struck by her uncanny ability to transform herself with little more than the turn of her head or a twist of the body. She´s one of those rare actresses who can take on a role so completely that she becomes virtually unrecognizable from one moment to the next. It´s a skill that gave particular resonance to Watt´s performance in Mulholland Drive, and which will be no doubt be in abundant, delightful display in the months ahead.

Naomi Watts: Hi, Brad!
Brad Goldfarb: Hi, Naomi. Hold on one sec - I want to patch us in to another phone line, just to make sure we get our recording here.
NW: Oh, my God. So high tech.
BG: Not really, but if it sounds that way then it means we´re doing our jobs... So I understand you´re in the midst of an incredibly busy week, not to mention a busy year. In the 12 months we spoke to you last, you´ve worked nonstop. Today I hear you were putting the finishing touches on The Ring before you head off for a well-deserved break.
NW: Yeah. Today was like 18 hours of looping. It´s been a long one.
BG: To put all this in context, when we talked a year ago, Mulholland Drive was about to come out and the early buzz on the film was extremely postive, but you didn´t have any specific projects lined up, and you were still having to fight for roles. Now you´ve got a number of movies in the can, others lined up, and God only knows how many people scratching on your door.
NW: Tonight - when I get on the plane and start my vacation - will, I think, be the first opportunity I´ve had to process this whole year. I know it will be the first time I´ve sat still for more than three days straight. I think at that point what´s happening might all start to think in.
BG: How has your life changed physically? Still driving in the same car? Still living in the same apartment?
NW: I´ve upgraded the car, but I´m still living in the same tiny apartment. If I spent more time in L.A. I would probably have moved six months ago.
BG: And, I imagine, you´re not having to fight for good roles anymore.
NW: No, I haven´t done an audition since The Ring.
BG: A nice change.
NW: You have no idea. [laughs] Not having to do an audition is the meaning of success for me. If I just know that I don´t have to audition again, or too much, that will be enough.
BG: Why?
NW: Auditions are just so humiliating and degrading. You get a five-minute time slot for a part you´ve spent six hours or more studying for or thinking about, and you get into these rooms full of people who barely make eye contact. They´re bored and frustrated that they can´t find the right person, energy that is instantly crushing and which makes it hard to shine. Going through that process over and over, you become so wounded and guarded that it´s impossible to give you best stuff away. That´s why I will never forget what David Lynch did for me. When he cast me in Mulholland Drive I was literally at the lowest place, and yet he managed to pull away all those masks.
BG: The story goes that Lynch cast you from a head shot and never had you read for the part.
NW: David works with a casting director who knows all the actors and chooses the head shots. By process of elimination, David selects maybe three or four that he responds to, without looking at their resumes. It was probably the easiest job I´ve ever had getting. He just talked to me for about a half hour one day, and then another 40 minutes the next, and never about work.
BG: At this point, how long had you been in L.A. waiting for your "big break"?
NW: It had been about five years of getting close to things. I had a long list of coming in second place of big movies, of almost getting that big job that might have changed things.
BG: Were you aware that your own experience as a struggling actor would be so relevant in the film?
NW: Certainly in the audition scene. When I read the script that was the scene where I went "OK, this is the part." I remember the day we shot it - it was magic in the room. All the actors had been on auditions, of course, and we all had a comment on that situation and it just bubbled up. I remember looking up over at David´s face and he was just grinning from ear to ear. We were all able to bring pretty good stuff to it, I think.
BG: I`ll say. Throughout the film, and in that scene in particular, one can sense not just your understanding of the material,but the fun you´re having wrapping yourself around a good part. It´s an immensely satisfying thing to witness.
NW: Thank you. That part was the role of a lifetime. It was something I really got to sink my teeth into. I wouldn´t have been surprised if there wasn´t another one like that for the rest of my life, except that the next film I´m making is the second role of a lifetime - you wouldn´t think you could get that lucky again.
BG: You´re referring, of course, to 21 Grams. What can you tell us about the film?
NW: Not too much, because it´s just become official and I´m not sure what I`m allowed to say.
BG: Obviously, it´s something you´re very excited about.
NW: Oh yeah. I can´t believe it. Alejandro´s last film, Amores Perros, blew me away. It just stayed with me for days. So when Alejandro called and wanted to see me I was very excited. I was coming to the end of The Ring at this point - I was beyond exhausted, I was pressing on to this other movie, and we were three weeks behind schedule, which was eating up all of my rest time, so I was really stressed. We arranged for him to come to my trailer - I remember it was a day I was shooting a scene in which my character has been down a well for about a week, so I was in a wet suit, I had wet hair, wounds on my face, no make up. I was looking like death warmed over. Alejandro sits me down and says, [in a Mexican accent] "Naomi, I want you to do my film." I was like, "OK. I´d love to work with you." But I just thought it was one of those Hollywood lines. Then that day or the next, I got a call from my agent saying, "You got the offer." I was like "Are you kidding?" I was just screaming, screaming, screaming.
BG: Had you read a script at this point?
NW: No. He promised me to send me the script, which finally came like six weeks later and I could not believe how great it was.
BG: What´s the meaning of the film´s title?
NW: Essentially, 21 grams is the difference in weight between a person who´s living and one who´s dead. I guess you could say it´s the weight of one´s soul.
BG: Tantalizing...
NW. Interesting, huh? That was basically all Alejandro said. That and "she goes through a lot." He wasn´t kidding.
BG: Of course, this project doesn´t start filming until the end of the year. You have four other films in the can, all completed since we spoke with you a year ago. That´s mindboggling when you consider that two films a year is a lot by most people´s standards.
NW: [laughs] I know. Well, my part in The Kelly Gang was small and really only involved six day´s work. But all the films were done back-to-back, so it´s been pretty chaotic. A friend said to me the other day that I need to go into therapy to learn how to say "No." She said I don´t know how to turn anything down.
BG: Why is that? Are you afraid the parts are going to go away?
NW:Probably. I´ve spent 12 years waiting for the right thing and never getting it, and finally I´ve got the chance. And I do fear that the opportunities are going to go away - but it´s also that the projects themselves are so great. I have said no, by the way, a lot, especially in the last six months, and then I hear the names of the actresses the roles have gone to and I think, Oh my God! Who the hell do I think I am?, and begin to have second thoughts about my decisions. But it´s only been in the last six months that the offers have gone out of control.
BG: One of the early pieces I read about Mulholland Drive described you and your co-star Laura Elena Harring as being too old for your parts, which is crazy, not least of which because you´re only in your early thirties. But I´m curious, is age a factor here as well?
NW: There is a little bit of that concern, that time´s running out and roles will dry up, as they do for women in their late-thirties. But I´ve started to notice in the last few months that the roles available to women in their thirties suddenly seem a lot better than the ones for women in their mid- to late-twenties. Which makes sense. Women have got more to say at this point in their lives. They´ve had a decade of getting to know themselves, of making mistakes, reflecting back to failed relationships, having children, all those things, and as a result, the characters, the roles, become much more interesting, more dynamic.
BG: That´s great news. You´re the first person I´ve heard say that. Talk to me about.what drives you creative choices. I imagine, coming off of a success like Mulholland Drive, you could have picked any project you wanted, yet from what I can gather the roles you´ve chosen are notable more for their emotional bravery than for their blockbuster potential.
NW: Well, The Ring is sort of a commercial movie, but the role [in which Watts play a newspaper reporter investigating a mysterious videotape tied to the deaths of four teenagers] is really quite a brilliant one. Plus it was such a departure from Mulholland Drive. It has some serious emotional material - all that good stuff actors love to play - but she´s really a normal girl, whereas Betty and Diane in Mulholland Drive are both so extreme they´re sort of psychotic. I just want to make sure that I keep people guessing, that the mystery is always there. I don´t want to be defined. I feel like I can do lots of different things and whatever speaks to me at a given time, that´s what I´m going to gravitate towards.
BG: Anything that you´d like to try that you haven´t had the chance to?
NW: I`m burning for a comedy, but I´m not a lover of quintessential romantic comedies. You know, You´ve Got Mail [1998] is not me.
BG: Though interestingly, I read a piece in which you were compared to Meg Ryan.
NW: Oh, my God!
BG: Others compared you to Grace Kelly, Tippi Hedren, Sharon Stone -
NW: - I´ve heard those. Who else? Any sort of psycho ones in there?
BG: That´s all I´ve come across. Wo would you like to be compared to?
NW: Meryl Streep, Jodie Foster, Julianne Moore - those are my favourites.
BG: One aspect of your life that´s gotten a lot of press over the past year is your friendship with Nicola Kidman, which dates from when you met as teenagers on the set of a bathing suit commercial in Australia. How important was that relationship during those years when you were struggling for work?
NW: Nicole has been incredibly supportive and a constant source of inspiration. She and I are very different people in terms of our backgrounds and how we were raised, but having said that, I could identify with her becaus we both come from Sydney. Her success has given me hope for myself. And you know, she encouraged me all the time. She used to say, "Naomi, just one role, one great role, that´s all it takes." I think I can confidently say that Nicole has always believed in me and has always been incredibly encouraging, and that goes back to the days when we rehearsed together for Flirting [1991]. We had a friend in common and I remember that friend saying, "Nicole said you were amazing, and she doesn´t say that lightly." I can recall thinking, Oh wow! An actress I admire thinks I´m worth something.
BG: Any thoughts on why so many of our best actors right now are from Australia?
NW: I don´t know! People keep asking me that, and I wish I could come up with an intelligent answer. One possibility, I guess, is the fact that in Australia, like in England, we have a government-run drama program, so you´ve got people who are seriously well-trained and know their craft and have a great work ethic. That extrapolates into a great attitude and talent.
BG: I put the question to an Australian colleague here, and she suggested that it had more to do with the general fearlessness of the Australian personality.
NW: That´s so true. But then there´s also a selfdeprecating thing as well. It´s not too gung ho. It´s not too in-your-face. Australians are very unself-conscious for the most part.
BG: How are you feeling about the whole publicity aspect of making movies? With the number of big films you have coming up, it seems likely that your anonymity is on the verge of disappearing.
NW: I haven´t got in touch with that because I do not get recognized in the States. Hopefully I can retain my anonymity for as long as possible. It really does scare me, the idea that I am going to have to make all my appointments in my house and go out there and interact with the world. That is something I really don´t want, and it´s going to hurt my work. Acting is about studying life and human nature. I need that contact with the girl who´s got the black eye at the checkout counter, whose soul is just crushed inside and she´s smiling at me while she´s ringing up my talcum powder or whatever. You need that exchange, and you´re not going to get it just from your imagination. If you´re not able to go into the shopping malls and these weird, wonderful places where you run into all walks of life, I think you´re subjugating your work. I don´t know anyone who´s chosen to be an actor because they´ve desired that kind of fame.
BG: Though I think a lot of people imagine actors choose their profession because they want exactly that.
NW: You know, it´s embarrassing to admit, but when I was growing up, one of the films that had the biggest influence on me was the movie Fame [1980]. And it´s not because I dreamt of being famous. It was literally because I wanted to be in that class dancing on table tops with leg warmers on. [laughs] I wanted to be doing splits in the air with a black man catching me as I came down. I think a lot of people who choose acting as a profession feel that way.
BG: Was there one moment when you knew acting was "it" for you?
NW: I remember when I was four or five watching my mother onstage playing Eliza Doolittle in My Fair Lady. She was so beautiful up there - everyone was wearing these incredible costumes - and I was in the front row with my nana, waving at her the whole time, going, "Mom, Mom!" But she couldn´t wave back because she was in character. I remember wanting her to wave at me, to acknowledge me, to bring me into that world, and I couldn´t understand why she wouldn´t. Finally, about two-thirds of the way through the play, she gave me a little signal, a little flip of the hand, a bit of eye contact, and at last, I felt like I was part of that world. It meant so much to me. I didn´t need to keep waving. I was there. I was in it. I was part of the play and part of the magic.