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Interview with Marisa and Hilary
By Lisa | May 6, 2008
The satirical war movie, War, Inc., written and produced by John Cusack also stars Marisa Tomei, Hilary Duff, Joan Cusack, Sir Ben Kingsley and Dan Akroyd. iVillage had the chance to sit down with Marisa and Hilary at the Tribeca Film Festival, which was screening the film.
I have a great affinity toward both Marisa and Hilary. I was a camp counselor when The Lizzie McGuire Movie came out, and thanks to my campers, I not only have every song from the movie memorized, but I have dances made up for each of them too. (Yes, I just admitted that to the world.) I’ve also loved Marisa Tomei ever since I was little. I memorized her lines from My Cousin Vinny and I even have a VHS tape (old school, I know) of her movie Untamed Heart. So you can only imagine my excitement when I found out that I’d have a chance to interview both of these ladies.
Marisa Tomei ended up being much more subdued than I expected—I probably still envisioned her as the outspoken Mona Lisa Vito from Vinny—and Hilary Duff was cooler than I could have hoped—she completely came off as a normal, down-to-earth 20-year-old.
Let’s start with Hilary. She really did seem like every other 20-something girl I know. She wasn’t stuck up or overly egotistical like you might expect. The best part of the interview was when her cell phone started to ring. She couldn’t stop apologizing and kept saying how sorry she was. It was such an honest and real reaction. (Side note: her phone looked like something from the year 2075. I had no idea that phones could look so high tech!)
Hilary also gave a brilliant response when asked what advice she’d give to Miley Cyrus about the racy Vanity Fair photos. At first Hilary tried to stay away from the question, but she ended up making the point that if Miley wanted to do the photos, she should own it. “I feel like everyone takes their own path,” Hilary said. “People are pressuring you to do something but if you wanted to do it that’s a different story, and I don’t feel like I’m to comment on whether that’s what she wants to do… It’s not something I would choose to do, but if she did, then that’s fine. I don’t know how her fans would feel about it, but maybe she doesn’t mind.”
Hilary seems like a good girl, right? Well that’s why she wanted to play the role of Yonica Babyyeah in War, Inc 
. Yonica’s a somewhat trashy, purple-haired, very sexual popstar in the fictional country of Turaqistan. “My character obviously is very different from who I am in my everyday life and so different from any character I’ve ever played before and it’s nice to get to challenge myself and just do something that’s so unexpected and that a lot of people didn’t think I could do,” Hilary explained. “The theme of it is so crazy and out there and I don’t think anyone would necessarily be like ‘Oh Hilary Duff is going to be in this film.’ Most people didn’t think that I’d choose that, but it’s all that I really wanted at the time.”
Hilary’s character Yonica really is different than anything she’s played before. She has a thick accent, purple hair, crazy make up and clothes, and oh yeah, she puts a live scorpion down her pants. Hilary’s right—most people woudn’t expect her to do that.
Not only did Hilary have to perfect the accent while speaking, but while singing as well. “It was so fun to get to sing and we wanted it to be funny… A lot of them [the songs] are really flat… She’s not really like a huge talent so it was funny to sing in the accent and sing off pitch and off key… Actually talking in it [the accent] was actually quite challenging because I wanted it to be consistent.”
As for dressing up as Yonica, “I love clothes and fashion and it was just horrible to get dressed every day and put those clothes on… and I had so much makeup on, like the white lips with the purple lipliner. It was horrendous.”
In War, Inc. Marisa Tomei plays Natalie Hegalhuzen (say that name five times fast), a left wing reporter who is investigating the declining civilized society of Turaqistan. She also happens to catch the eye of Brand Hauser (Cusack).
Marisa Tomei is more than skilled at playing a romantic leading woman. After all, she’s starred in My Cousin Vinny, Only You and Untamed Heart to name a few. So why this movie?
Marisa said, “The main thing was really Mr. Cusack and his passion for it and his excitement and he said he wanted to work with me… and he had described it in the tone of Grosse Point Blank and I love that tone. Very smart comedy. Very rare to find that. So that’s what got me intrigued.”
It seems that Marisa picks her roles based entirely on what intrigues her, and not based on whether it will be the next hit movie. “I do things like this for not a lot of money and then I get pissed off at myself and say I’ve got to make more of a living then this,” Marisa explained. “I show up a lot when people don’t want to really. There’s a lot of downside too. Not a lot in the scheme of life, but comfort and money and risk.”
Everyone hates when celebrities talk about money, but I guess since Marisa does star in a lot of plays (she’s in Top Girls right now) and independent movies, her income might be lower than some of her peers? But at least she’s making good art, right?
Speaking of good art, I had to ask Marisa if she cared that people still mostly remember her for her role in My Cousin Vinny. There are lots of stars who want to forget their earlier days (like Mark-Paul Gosselaar and Saved by the Bell), even though those were the films and TV shows that boosted their careers. Marisa’s take on the situation? “I used to really not like it and now I really like it because it’s really made a lot of people laugh for a long time and people really appreciate that film and it’s a good film, so I feel like I’ve done enough other things now that that’s not the only thing.” Fair enough!
Considering War, Inc. is a political satire about the first privately outsourced war, it’s easy to imagine that many people would take offense to the movie, as the current war is still very real. While Marisa understands that this movie might be difficult for some people, she said, “You can have a really good release from crying in a real tragedy, and the situation that this is based on is really tragic. But you can also process your emotions through really hard laughter too, so hopefully that will be the case.”
You’ll have a chance to decide for yourself when the movie comes out in NY and LA on May 23.
More like this...
'War, Inc.' heading straight to DVD on March 18th, 2008
'War, Inc' publicity photos on April 4th, 2008
Tentative release date for 'War, Inc.' on February 6th, 2008
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