MORE ABOUT NATALIE PORTMAN
Natalie Portman was born June 9, 1981 in Jerusalem , Israel Israel Maryland Connecticut Long Island , New York New York Syosset High School Harvard University
Discovered by a modeling scout at a
Her first acting experiences came from her summers at Stagedoor Manor, where she was cast in the theatre performances of A Midsummer Night's Dream, Cabaret, was the title character in Anne of Green Gables, and performed in Tapestry.
Natalie's film career started with her role in the 1994 film, The Professional (a.k.a. Lion), as a hit-man's protegee. The following year, she appeared in the crime-drama Heat, alongside heavy hitters Al Pacinoand Robert De Niro, and was noticed in the 1996 film, Beautiful Girls, stealing the screen from another beautiful actress, Uma Thurman.
Her role in Beautiful Girls garnered rave reviews for Natalie, and that same year she could be seen in the Woody Allen star-studded musical, Everyone Says I Love You, as well as Mars Attacks.
After having turned down roles in movies such as Lolita, due to her feeling that young actors should not be exposed to sex at such a young age and the role of Juliet in William Shakespeare's Romeo & Juliet, because of the age difference between her and Leonardo DiCaprio, Natalie refused the supporting role in The Horse Whisperer, opting instead to star as Anne Frank in the Broadway production of The Dairy of Anne Frank.
But the role that turned Natalie into more than a Broadway and film actress is that of Queen Padme Amidala, in the first Star Wars prequel. Her three-film contract, which started with 1999's Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace, has transformed her into an historic film character. Ironically, Natalie had never even seen the original three Star Wars movies before being cast by George Lucas.
Natalie's graduation from
Since her role in Phantom Menace, Natalie has co-starred with Susan Sarandonin Anywhere But Here, and starred in the lead role alongside Ashley Judd in the film adaptation of Where the Heart Is.
Trilingual (Natalie is fluent in Hebrew, English and Japanese) and having shared aspirations of becoming a doctor, Natalie is currently studying Psychology at
QUOTES:
" Young actors often don't think of the consequences of doing nudity or sex scenes. They want the role so badly that they agree to be exploited, and then end up embarassing family, friends, and even strangers." " Venice USA Morocco Israel Hollywood Israel
"On Lolita (1997): "I don't think there needs to be a movie out where a child has sex with an adult."
On Lolita (1997): I think there's enough exploitation out there that it's not necessary to do more.
"Young actors often don't think of the consequences of doing nudity or sex scenes. They want the role so badly that they agree to be exploited, and then end up embarrassing family, friends, and even strangers."
On acting: "I started to do this at age 11. At age 20, I might say, this is enough."
On violence in the media: "We live in a violent world, but since the success of films like Pulp Fiction (1994), it seems every movie has some violence in it, and it's now being used as a form of comedy: audiences are now being encouraged to laugh when people get their heads blown off. I just don't like hearing people laugh at violence."
"I also feel I'm a positive role model by not putting my education on hold."
"I want to use college to explore what other careers I might be interested in."
On acting: "I'm taking it day by day. Right now I like acting, but if something else sparks my interest in college, I'll do that. It's so limiting to say, this is it for the rest of my life. There are so many things that interest me: I love math, science, literature, languages."
On Lolita (1997): "Let me tell you, this movie's going to be sleaze."
"I'm going to college. I don't care if it ruined my career. I'd rather be smart than a movie star."
"I don't know if acting is what I want to do for the rest of my life, it's just what I've, you Know, ended up doing when I was little, and I've kinda grown up with it."
"When I'm working they pretty much treat me like an adult, but then when there's a break everyone else goes to their trailers and drinks beer and I like, go to school."
"There's so much else to do in the world. To just be interested in doing films would limit my life."
"I think school is so much harder than real life. People are so much more accepting when they are adults."
"Danny [Aiello] told me, 'Don't do television.'"
"Cute is when a person's personality shines through their looks. Like in the way they walk, every time you see them you just want to run up and hug them."
"I've never tried smoking. I don't drink. I've never tried drugs." (Australian Dolly August 2000)
"Politics is easy to segue into from acting. I'm very interested in it, though I would never run for office. But after this, anything I do is going to seem very bizarre to me." (Interview October 1999)
"No, but I've been thinking about it a lot. I love acting, but I don't know if there's something out there that I love more. That's what college is going to be about for me - checking things out." (Interview October 1999)
When asked by Seventeen magazine what advice she had for teenagers going off to college she said, "I would say practicing laundry it's so hard." (November 1999)
"There is a lot lacking on the intellectual side and on the values side when being an actor." (Seventeen, November 1999)
Told the November 1999 issue of Mademoiselle magazine that she wished she knew David Letterman because, "He seems to be so smart, but you never get to hang out with him after the show."
When asked by German Cosmopolitan (3/00) if she would like having herself as a daughter she replied, "Well of course. I am a good person, nice, smart, witty, trustworthy, know nice people, don't do drugs and earn a lot of money." On what she likes about her parents: "They have made it quite clear that they believe I can be great. Had my parents expected less of me,I would not be the person I am now. And I am very happy with myself." (German Cosmopolitan March 2000)
"I'm not planning to be an actress as an adult, I'm planning other things for my future." Source:
"I don't think I'd be able to deal with just acting, because I don't know if you get to use your brain that much. You do, for certain roles, but not most. Acting is more of a hobby for me."
"There's a big intellectual aspect that's kind of lacking, " she says of acting in films. "Right now I supplement that through being in school. I'm not sure I'd be happy if I was just acting. I haven't explored a lot of other avenues. Hopefully I'll figure it out by the end of school, so I know what I want to do with my life."
When asked about her prom dress: "A designer is going to give me something to wear. It's the most amazing perk I have."
"I didn't have this undying need to be an actress. I didn't have that fire in me ever -- at any point. And still, I don't think I have that within me."
"I don't really know if acting would have ultimately become my passion as an adult, or if there's something else I would have found had I not been in the pizza shop. That's what college is helping me investigate."
"I'm ready to ditch the movies and keep at the books. There are so many other things, and it would feel limiting to say, 'Acting is it for me.'... I love psychology. That's what I'm studying right now. It would probably be difficult, because of my current occupation, to become a clinical psychologist, but I could certainly do research. And I'd like to have a family someday, too."
It's horrible to be a sex object at any age, but at least when you're an adult you can make the decision if you want to degrade yourself.
"I don't go wagging my boobs around in people's faces" - Rolling Stone (
"I couldn't be anorexic because I like food too much, and I couldn't be bulimic because I hate throwing up too much."
"I've wanted to be an astronaut, a doctor, a vet - these are things I've said in interviews. Before that, I wanted to be a mermaid and a fairy".
"I was in a relationship recently with someone who yelled at me for being too much in my head, you know? He said I was thinking too much about everything".
"I usually run three or four times a week now. Pretty boring, but it's so worth it. It's done wonders for my mood".
"I basically have a little boy's body. They tell me, 'OK, this is where we're going to push up your cleavage,' and I'm like, 'What cleavage?'"
On traveling through
"As I look back on it, I'm glad that I had this false image. I was who everyone else - my parents, my friends, society - wanted me to be. I was a pleaser, someone who wanted to make everyone happy, to not let anyone down. Now, I'm not like that."
"My contemporaries in
"My grandfather was a Polish Jew and a socialist, and as a youngster he helped to organize special camps to teach agriculture to all the young men that where moving to
"At college I began to do research for a professor and so I became part of the organization promoted by the Queen of Jordon: the Foundation for International Community Assistance. That offers microcredits, offering small loans of money to women who want to start their own businesses. The interest is very low and the results are extraordinary."
I'm pretty much a boring Goody Two-shoes. I've definitely gotten drunk before, I don't think it's possible to go through college without getting drunk, but I don't really like it at all. I actually tried my first cigarette last year at school. I just figured, if many people are smoking, there must be something to it, and before I pooh- pooh it I should at least know what it's about. I took one puff and I was like, OK, I was right. There's nothing to it. They're just wrong, it's disgusting.
"I've been doing like one movie a year so I haven't made that many movies. A lot of girls my age have done 40 already, so I guess I'm a little behind."
"I get like 400 Holocaust scripts. That's what you get for being the openly Jewish actress!"
"I wanted to be able to form my own sexual identity. If other people have you in their mind as some sort of sex object, you have two choices: either live up to it and become super-sexual or rebel against it and be super-asexual."
"I'm the anti-Method actor. As soon as we finish a scene, I need to go back to being myself, because it freaks me out. But it was hard not to take this home with me. I would feel cheated on when I went home. There were weekend nights I would lie in bed instead of going out with my friends."
"I had a bad early experience when "The Professional" came out. I'm really proud of the film, but it was strange for me to be looked at as a sexual object when I was 12."
I think it is a really beautiful thing that we have recognition within our industry - but it's not that important.
But we have to remember that almost all films are written and directed by men. Female characters are women imagined by men, so it's always this classic figure of a sexy woman with a childish innocence.
You walk into a nice strip club, the ones where the women are treated well - obviously well is debatable - and the women just seem so powerful. Women have full control; they can get whatever they want from these guys. But they realise it is a tacit contract: they are that way because men want them to be like that. Obviously, if the men wanted them on the floor scrubbing their shoes they'd probably be doing that too.
Sources: www.tv.com, www.biggeststars.com, www.celebsrate.com