Interview articles from December 2006

Interview archives from December 2006

The change gang.(LETTERS)(Letter to the editor)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Dear Interview, I found the "times they are a-changin'" theme of your October issue to be both touchingly optimistic and (because I, too, am an optimist) right on the money. In fact, as I write this letter, just...

Come again?(LETTERS)(Letter to the editor)
December 1, 2006... Dear Interview, With respect to your article "Taking on Taboos" [October 2006] and the new film Shortbus: In today's motion pictures there is such a fine line between actual and simulated sex. However, even in a film featuring real sex,...

The reward of looking.(LETTERS)(Letter to the editor)
December 1, 2006... Dear Interview, What prize do I win by identifying Matthew Rolston's September cover portrait of Kirsten Dunst as a restaging of a classic 1934 Screen Romances magazine cover of Jean Harlow? Nice channeling! MICHAEL BARSON Glen Ridge,...

Vote.(LETTERS)(Letter to the editor)
December 1, 2006... Dear Interview, Thank you for your interview with Eliot Spitzer [October 2006]. I met him briefly at a free outdoor rock concert when he was first starting out in politics. I was very impressed with him at the time, though I must admit I...

Stop.(LETTERS)(Letter to the editor)
December 1, 2006... Dear Interview, As a New Yorker who has the unpleasant experience of walking past the city's horse-drawn carriages several times a week, I can assure Mark "Buzz" Buzolich (whose letter ran in the October 2006 issue) that this trade should...

Eddie Redmayne: he was the subject of a whispering campaign on the set of Robert de Niro's CIA movie.(ONE TO WATCH)(Central Intelligence Agency, The Good Shepherd)(Interview)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] "He'd come talk to each of the actors separately," the British actor Eddie Redmayne says of Robert De Niro's directing technique for The Good Shepherd, the story of Edward Wilson and the rise of the CIA. "He would...

Alice Smith: old-school torch with 21st-century scorch.(ONE TO LISTEN OUT FOR)(Interview)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATIONS OMITTED] Two of the biggest songs of last year, Justin Timberlake's "SexyBack" and Beyonce's "Ring the Alarm," were mere wisps of musical ideas. If they say anything about the future of music, then Alice Smith isn't going to...

Ana Claudia Talancon: she's played political orphans, drug addicts, and lost souls, but there's nothing unfocused about this actress's determination and drive.(ONE TO KNOW ABOUT)(Interview)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Ana Claudia Talancon first caught Hollywood's eye in The Crime of Father Amaro (2002). But American audiences seeing the Mexican actress play an illegal immigrant who works in a slaughterhouse and becomes a crystal...

Sigmar Polke: the sorcerer strikes.(MUST-SEE SHOW)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATIONS OMITTED] The honeyed images above are a single work, front and back, by the German artist Sigmar Polke, magus of contemporary painting. Magus would have been a strange word to apply to Polke early on, when his work seemed...

Christian Oliver: he was all set to go into banking, but he made acting his business instead.(MOVIE NEWS)(Interview)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... In Steven Soderbergh's The Good German, Christian Oliver plays Emil Brandt, a man whose disappearance sets off a frenzied search by the Russian and American armies in post-WWII Berlin. A historical thriller co-starring Cate Blanchett, George...

Beau Garrett: sometimes the streets of Hollywood are paved with bedpans and body parts.(MOVIE BUZZ)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATIONS OMITTED] Beau Garrett's body arrived on the set of Turistas in a coffin. A mutilated version of it, that is. Her actual body, a living testament to California sunshine and cocoa butter, is the picture of health. The replica...

Shohreh Aghdashloo: nearly 30 years ago she fled her home in Iran in search of freedom and the opportunity to continue her work as an actress. What followed would be a lesson in perseverance, heart, and the power of holding on to your dreams.(view WOMAN)(Interview)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATIONS OMITTED] American audiences may only have become aware of the name Shohreh Aghdashloo with the release of House of Sand and Fog (2003) and her subsequent best supporting actress Oscar nomination for that film. But in her...

Eye see you: artists have long been drawn to shop windows as a space for their work. Now Olafur Eliasson takes the baton for Louis Vuitton.(ART AND COMMERCE)(Interview)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] As an artist, Olafur Eliasson defies categorization. Often using natural elements like water, wind, light, and temperature along with the more traditional mediums of photography and sculpture, Eliasson strives to...

Tippy: for this lightning-fast rhymer, learning to rap was a family affair.(MUSIC DISCOVERY)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] For the first 16 years of her life, this 24-year-old rapper didn't know her real first name. "I thought it was Tippy until I got a job," she says. Legally, Tippy's actually Stefanie, but her mother felt she was more...

Tony Bennett: whether he actually left his heart in San Francisco remains debatable, but his commitment to making people swoon has never been in question.(MUSIC COOL CAT)(Interview)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] ROB MARSHALL: You just turned 80, and yet you're as busy and as popular as you've ever been. There's the new album [Duets: An American Classic (RPM/Columbia)], the television special we worked on together [Target...

Lea Michele: she grew up performing on broadway. Now she's rebelling against its formulas in a Risque new musical.(THEATER SPOTLIGHT)(Interview)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Lea Michele is a Broadway baby. She landed her first part, in Les Miserables, when she was 8; in the next few years, she appeared in Ragtime and Fiddler on the Roof. But no role has claimed her like Spring...

Julianne Moore: artwork by prudence whittlesey: in the new play, the vertical hour, actress Julianne Moore tests the waters of broadway for the first time--and takes on a politically-charged story that asks some difficult questions about the world today.(CURTAINS UP)(Interview)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] In David Hare's new play, The Vertical Hour, Julianne Moore plays Nadia Blye, a former war correspondent who has become an academic and teaches political studies at Yale. On vacation in Wales with her boyfriend...

Fast and loose: a hairstyle built for speed.(LOOK OF THE MONTH)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Uptight just isn't right, especially when it comes to this season's latest hairdo. In fact, it's not a hairdo, it's a hair-don't-worry-about-it. How refreshing that rather than trying not to tangle up your perfect...

Bon voyage: "to travel hopefully is a better thing than to arrive"--Robert Louis Stevenson.(FASHION HITS THE ROAD)(travel bags in fashion)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Contrary to the current status quo of liquid-free flights, cramped seats, security hassles, and airlines allowing one solitary piece of carry-on luggage, the pleasure of travel was once as much about the adventure...

A flurry of baubles: let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.(STYLE FORECAST)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] What is it about a good old-fashioned snowstorm that elicits such excitement from children and adults alike? Writer J.B. Priestley once said, "The first fall of snow is not only an event, it is a magical event. You...

Robin Wright Penn: she's one of a handful of actresses who consistently disappears into her roles, making Robin Wright Penn both versatile and a veritable enigma. Mark Ruffalo goes in for a close-up.(LOOK WHO'S TALKIING)(Interview)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Robin Wright Penn is an actress widely admired by many of the film world's most respected players, which means two things can be gleaned from the fact that she makes as few movies as she does: 1) She's relentlessly...

A tail of two artists: a new book and exhibition celebrate the prophets of natural design, the Lalannes.(THE MOLD-BREAKERS)(Interview)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] About five years ago, Reed Krakoff, the executive creative director at Coach Inc., began collecting works by Claude and Francois-Xavier Lalanne, the whimsical furniture designers who after the Second World War were...

Walk on the wild side.(BOOK LOOKS)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATIONS OMITTED] A new book about all things fashion and feline, The Catwalk Cats, includes drawings by Vogue creative director Grace Coddington, photographs by her partner Didier Malige, and an introduction by their ginger tabby,...

All the dish: when dining out is a family affair.(FOOD COLUMN)(Restaurant review)
December 1, 2006... One of the realities of the holiday season in New York City is that along with the Rockettes and The Nutcracker and the tree in Rockefeller Center, at some point between the end of Thanksgiving and the arrival of Christmas, the phone will...

Damien Rice.(RETROFITTED PLAYGROUND CHANTS, BEATLES MASH-UPS, AND SUPERGROUP SMASH-UPS)(9)(Sound recording review)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... DAMIEN RICE 9 (Vector/Warner Bros.) [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The follow-up to 2003's O--which smashed down walls with tremulous whispers--is equally powerful, but in less subtle ways. Rice ratchets up the volume, adding layers of...

Willie Nelson.(RETROFITTED PLAYGROUND CHANTS, BEATLES MASH-UPS, AND SUPERGROUP SMASH-UPS)(Songbird)(Sound recording review)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... WILLIE NELSON Songbird (Lost Highway) Willie Nelson can't make an awful record. That gently twisty, never-with-the-beat phrasing will always be worth listening to. But he can put out Just Another Willie Nelson Album. Songbird has its...

Jibbs.(RETROFITTED PLAYGROUND CHANTS, BEATLES MASH-UPS, AND SUPERGROUP SMASH-UPS)(Sound recording review)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... JIBBS Jibbs Feat. Jibbs (Geffen) First it was a minstrel show standard, then a ubiquitous playground chant among the 6-year-old set. St. Louis rapper Jibbs retrofitted "Do Your Ears Hang Low?" for the bling era in his hit "Chain Hang Low."...

The Good, The Bad, and The Queen.(RETROFITTED PLAYGROUND CHANTS, BEATLES MASH-UPS, AND SUPERGROUP SMASH-UPS)(The Good, the Bad, and the Queen)(Brief article)(Book review)
December 1, 2006... THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE QUEEN The Good, the Bad, and the Queen (Virgin) When this supergroup--Blur and Gorillaz front man Damon Albarn, the Clash's Paul Simonon, the Verve's Simon Tong, and Fela Kuti's percussionist Tony Allen--released...

The Beatles.(RETROFITTED PLAYGROUND CHANTS, BEATLES MASH-UPS, AND SUPERGROUP SMASH-UPS)(Love)(Sound recording review)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... THE BEATLES Love (Capitol) Taking in more than 40 tracks from master tapes, George Martin and his son Giles have created Love, a kaleidoscopic soundtrack for a Cirque du Soleil show. Some songs seem to have nothing added save a few sonic...

Emilie Simon.(RETROFITTED PLAYGROUND CHANTS, BEATLES MASH-UPS, AND SUPERGROUP SMASH-UPS)(Sound recording review)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... EMILIE SIMON The Flower Book (Milan) With breathy, elfin vocals and quirky electronic production, Simon will inevitably draw comparisons to Bjork. But the emotions she wraps her voice around are too epic to belong to our irony-bound era....

Swan Lake.(RETROFITTED PLAYGROUND CHANTS, BEATLES MASH-UPS, AND SUPERGROUP SMASH-UPS)(Sound recording review)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... SWAN LAKE Beast Moans (Jagjaguwar) With indie rock bands, collaboration can be precarious considering each musician's quirks and peculiarities compared with those of more commercial pop stars. Not so with this collaboration by Daniel Bejar...

Paolo Nutini.(RETROFITTED PLAYGROUND CHANTS, BEATLES MASH-UPS, AND SUPERGROUP SMASH-UPS)(Sound recording review)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... PAOLO NUTINI In These Streets (Atlantic) The Scottish singer was signed by Atlantic in 2005 at the ripe old age of 18. His first album, after a handful of singles charted in the U.K., proves the label prescient. Nutini has a sure ear for...

Dreamgirls.(Movie review)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Preview: DREAMGIRLS DreamWorks/Paramount) Directed by Bill Condon Like the long-running, iconic stage musical, Bill Condon's star-studded big-screen adaptation of Dreamgirls follows a fictional 1960s girl group,...

The Painted Veil.(Movie review)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... Edward Norton, Naomi Watts, Liev Schreiber, and Toby Jones star in this adaptation of a W. Somerset Maugham novel. Set in 1920s Shanghai, the film tracks a mismatched British couple (Norton and Watts) in the throws of a marital crisis. Their...

Notes on a Scandal.(Movie review)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... Review: NOTES ON A SCANDAL (Fox Searchlight) Directed by Richard Eyre Based on a book by Zoe Heller and adapted for the screen by playwright Patrick Marber, Notes on a Scandal has all the ingredients that one would associate with a work so...

The History Boys.(Movie review)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... Review: THE HISTORY BOYS (Fox Searchlight) Directed by Nicholas Hytner What was innovative and vibrant onstage in Alan Bennett's The History Boys, which had a Tony-winning run on Broadway after its smashing London success, has become...

For Your Consideration.(Movie review)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... Review: FOR YOUR CONSIDERATION (Warner Independent) Directed by Christopher Guest Christopher Guest leaves behind the mockumentary format of Waiting for Guffman (1997) and A Mighty Wind (2003) in favor of a more conventional narrative in...

Venus.(Movie review)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... Review: VENUS (Miramax) Directed by Roger Michell The legendary Peter O'Toole--in a performance of tremendous wit, warmth, and graceful charm-really drives Venus, the story of an aging London actor in his final days, and the unexpected...

Shots in the dark: twelve months, seventeen highlights--a look back at the year in pictures.(MOVIE COLUMN)(Movie review)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] It's that Top 10 time of the year, but rumination and speculation may say more than a list that tells only a fraction of the story. So here's a potpourri of movie happenings that disturbed or delighted me in 2006:...

Emilio Estevez: a one-time Hollywood brat revisits when America's heart was broken a second time.(COMEBACK CORNER)(Interview)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] Emilio Estevez grew up in the klieg lights. First going to sets with his father, Martin Sheen; then as a charter member of the Brat Pack, starring in movies like The Breakfast Club (1985) and Young Guns (1988). Now...

About that night: revels with a cause.(PHOTO ALBUM)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATIONS OMITTED] When you think of negronis, risotto, and handsome men in dark suits, Milan's Via Montenapoleone or Rome's Via Condotti usually spring to mind, but for One Night Only, Giorgio Armani brought his kind of Italian...

Letter from the editor: December/January 2007.(View)(Editorial)
December 1, 2006... I was sitting on a jeep, hanging out with friends when 2006 began for me, all of us watching lions muck around in the earth in Southern Africa. At one point they started to roar to each other, and other relatives in the bush. It had been...

Jennifer Connelly: they may have put her in a cage, but there's an actress who won't be tamed.(Interview)(Cover story)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] INGRID SISCHY: So Jennifer, where are you? Are you in the middle of a film? JENNIFER CONNELLY: Yes. I'm in the middle of working on Reservation Road, which we've been shooting in Stamford, Connecticut. But right...

Packin' heat: the unforgettable women of volver have breathed new life into the old subjects of love, womanhood, hope, and death.(Interview: SHOWCASE)('Volver')(Movie review)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATION OMITTED] The poet Federico Garcia Lorca said that Spain was a country of great actresses, and the director Pedro Almodovar, who first won wide acclaim here for Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown (1988), has spent more...

John Mayer: the breathy voice. The noodling guitar tricks. The softly pleasing, utterly ubiquitos ballads. Think you were tired of John Mayer? So was John Mayer.(Interview)
December 1, 2006... With the phenomenal success of his debut album, Room for Squares (2001), achieved when he was all of 23, it was easy to assume that John Mayer would be a kind of one-hit wonder--too easy, as it turns out. Since then, Mayer has released the...

Jennifer Hudson: the old story of singers using their voices to overcome hardship has transfixed audiences for decades. Here's someone who lived it. Now, in the new movie version of Dreamgirls, she's ready to make ears pop.(Interview)
December 1, 2006... Four years ago, Jennifer Hudson was singing on cruise ships, imagining what it would be like to one day perform on a bigger stage. Hudson need fantasize no more: The 25-year-old Chicago native and onetime American Idol castoff stars alongside...

Freedom wave.(clothing)(Buyers guide)
December 1, 2006... WE THE PEOPLE, IN ORDER TO FORM A MORE PERFECT WARDROBE, SECURE THE BLESSINGS OF LIBERTY. THE LIBERTY TO DRAW INSPIRATION FROM WHATEVER SOURCES WE DESIRE--WHETHER IT'S THE BLISTERING COLOR PALETTE ASSOCIATED WITH SURFERWEAR, BAROQUE DETAILING...

Lily Allen: she's got a pop star's charisma. A gangster rapper's bravado, a fast-exploding cult following, and the mouth of a spitballing truck driver. Angela McCluskey talks to the punky, spunky, funky new diva who has music fans buzzing.(Interview)
December 1, 2006... Twenty-one-year-old British-born Lily Allen has become one of the music industry's most pleasant success stories of the last year. The beauty, however, is that Allen's success is less an example of record-biz scheming than it is grassroots...

A perfect day at Eothen: Andy Warhol once said: "beauty really has to do with the way a person carries it off. When you see 'beauty,' it has to do with the place, with what they're wearing, what they're standing next to ..." we went to the seaside place that he once called home, with a bus full of talented beauties and beautiful talents, and a barn full of clothes--and Andy's words came to life.(Interview)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATIONS OMITTED] RINKO KIKUCHI AN ACTRESS WHO WENT ALL OUT INTERVIEW: Why do you want to be an actress? RINKO KIKUCHI: Ever since I was a kid, I always felt like I was acting, whether I was interacting with my mother or...

Head start.(James Kaliardos)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... [ILLUSTRATIONS OMITTED] INTERVIEW: At the shows for spring/summer 2007, we saw turbans, we felt glamour, we asked you for your signature on this idea.... JAMES KALIARDOS: This season especially, with all the head wraps, head decorations,...

Ben Whishaw: the cult book perfume has sniffed its way into theaters, and the actor who gives the film its punch smells like a cult star in the making.(Interview FORECAST)('Perfume: The Story of a Murderer')(Movie review)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... If you were to tell Ben Whishaw that his performance in his latest film, Perfume: The Story of a Murderer, stinks, he'd likely throw his arms around you and give you a big hug. So might Tom Tykwer, the director of the movie, which is based on...

Ashley Judd: she may be an actress, but she's also a warrior. For women. For kids. And for taking off the masks.(Interview)
December 1, 2006... When it comes to Hollywood actresses, Ashley Judd has never quite fit in. For one thing, she doesn't even live in Hollywood and hasn't for more than a decade, residing instead in Tennessee near her mom Naomi and her country singer sister...

Electric nights.(celebrities)(Brief article)
December 1, 2006... 1 Interview's Sandra Brant (second from left) with the Museum of Modern Art's Todd Bishop, Joachim Pissarro, and Eva Respini at MoMA for the reception hosted by Benetton and Interview following Christian Marclay: Graffiti Composition. Drinks...