BOP Interview: Elizabeth Banks

By Ryan Mazie

January 26, 2012

I never can remember the name of this movie.

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What’s it like having an audience watching you from below while you are acting?

EB: (pointing to the poster) That is the perspective, so the people below are like dots. We could hear them every once in a while when they did something together, but ultimately we can’t really interact with them. However, the buildings around us were office buildings and lots of people were at work and would wave to us. … The building right across the street has a roof deck so people would come out and have smoke breaks on there, trying to yell at us while we were filming (laughs).

You said in an interview earlier that you don’t know what is in store for your 30 Rock character, Avery Jessup, but can you tell us what it is like working side-by-side with Alec Baldwin?

EB: I’ve learned about really great restaurants. I learned about having a car service 24/7. But no, he’s the best. He’s what you want him to be, meaning that he is a total movie star, he’s like super husky and sexy and old school. He’s very funny and so pro. He’s working really hard, because he’s very professional, but he makes everything seem super easy.

Your next movie coming out is The Hunger Games, which I have to ask about.

EB: You should read it, it’s really good. You won’t regret it.

But you had to shave your eyebrows for the role?

EB: I didn’t shave them, I bleached them. It’s almost worse than shaving them (laughs). If I shaved them, I could paint something on probably. But when you bleach them, you just have bright-white eyebrows. They are literally (holds up an egg white coffee cup to her eye) this color on your face. It’s really freaking, because you look like you are an albino, but only right there.




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How long did you have to keep that for?

EB: I kept them for three months. You can color them in, but it doesn’t really work.

Did you help shape the look?

EB: It was a true collaboration. ... I have super white skin. It’s very Marie Antoinette meets kabuki (laughs). …. The reference from the director was Joel Grey in Cabaret; that cracked white, overly made up face. So we kind of started there, that was the first picture that we looked at. Then we went to the hair, “Is it curly or is it up?” Then the whole Marie Antoinette hair thing came into it. We wanted decadence, madness, she’s a very theatrical character. That was my mantra word, “She’s theatrical!” And futuristic, but recognizable. We didn’t make The Fifth Element.


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