July 2007 | blackfilm.com | features | Anne Hathaway film update

Anne Hathaway film update
Hathaway briefly talks "Get Smart" and Jonathan Demme film
by Wilson Morales

July 14, 2007

At the age of 24, Anne Hathaway is probably in a league of her own. With the growing competition for roles, she's had quite a ride up so far, from the successful "Princess Diaries" films, to "The Devil Wears Prada" to the Oscar-nominated "Brokeback Mountain". With "Havoc", she certainly shed that Disney image folks may have only seen her for. With her upcoming role as Jane Austen in "Becoming Jane", Hathaway recently spoke about her role in "Get Smart" and other projects while promoting "Jane" in New York City.

How hard was it to go from "Becoming Jane" to "Get Smart"? Was the role of Agent 99 hard to fill?

Anne Hathaway: Absolutely! Barbara Feldon is sublime. She's on par to as close as we can get to the planet. I've read some of her books and she's so smart, and charming and elegant; and it really meant a lot to me when I found out that I had gotten Mel Brooks's sign of approval and Leonard Stern's sign of approval and Barbara Feldon's. She was very happy with my casting. At the end of the day, that really meant more to me than anything else.

Did you meet with her?

AH: I haven't. She was going to come up to the set and something came up at the last minute.A project came up that she had to do. No, I haven't met her. In a way, I'm happy it didn't on set. I hope to meet her in private. I have loads of questions for her.

Did you shoot some scenes in Montreal?

AH: Yes. I was there for the month of June. It was wonderful. I didn't get to see enough of Montreal because I was injured on the set. I could'n walk for about a week. It was a stunt that week wrong. There was a pike that I had to kick that should have been covered and my shin smacked it and 15 stitches later, I spent a lot of time watching "The Office" and not enough of Montreal.

Are you a fan of his (Carell) work?

AH: I was a fan of him before but I hadn't really gotten into the office and I would come in and I would just stare at him and would be like, "You're creeping me out." (Laughs)

Do you like to do physical comedy?

AH: A lot of my roles have physical comedy in it. This one was much more about the rapport with Steve. In terms of the phyiscal comedy, that was more his job. I had to look like a credible spy. We'll see.

What's after this?

AH: Well, I just wrapped up "Get Smart". I did a film earlier in the year called "Passengers" and I'm going to work on a Jonathan Demme movie in the Fall called "Dancing with Shiva". It's a fun premise for a movie actually. Not fun, but it's a dark comedy. I play an ex-model who's been in and out of rehab for 10 years and has just come out of a 8 months stay so she's really serious about it this time, and she arrives home on the weekend of her sister's wedding.

Who plays the sister?

AH: We don't know yet. Jonathan hasn't cast her, but I'm dying to found out, but Debra Winger plays my mother. That is really cool.