Passion and Vision

Fashion power houses & their muses making waves from coast to coast.

Nov 13th. Dior Mag and Nov 14th, Chanel News

Robert Pattinson at 9th Annual Governors Awards, Hollywood.

Kristen Stewart. Androgyne. The Beautiful Boy. Gamine. Epicene. The Tomboy. Either/Or. Neither/Nor. Both.

by Sheila O Malley

(I simply HAVE to share and post this brilliant piece by Sheila about Kristen’s acting. Read her profile if you question her capability to judge)

Camille Paglia is not the only one to observe that the great movie stars – of any era – are those with androgynous characteristics. The same could be said for literary characters (people always seem to forget the cross-dressing incident with Mr. Rochester in Jane Eyre), for art, for architecture. Not so much yin-yang, but a fluid back-and-forth, an effortless integration, a beckoning that can be very destabilizing. Part of star power is that destabilizing effect. Kristen Stewart is the best example we have today of an actress working in that hard-to-quantify-or-even-talk-about realm. When we talk about charisma, I’d just point to Personal Shopper, one of the best films of 2017, where the majority of the film features Kristen Stewart answering and responding to texts … seriously, that’s most of the movie … and you cannot look away.

It’s not a ridiculous over-statement to call her this generation’s Brando. Brando (I’m talking his acting persona now) was macho, brutish, carelessly and thoughtlessly Alpha (he hated those qualities in men which just goes to show you you don’t have to “like” the characters you play). However: without his sensitivity, his soft beautiful features (beautiful as opposed to handsome), and his vulnerability which – frankly – put many of his female co-stars to shame … he would not be Brando. It is the overwhelming sense of an almost feminine openness and softness, mixed with the muscly sexy body, the brawny confidence, that makes Brando Brando.

It’s almost forgotten now but one of the reasons Brando was so explosive – and also so controversial – was that no one had ever seen a leading man like that before, a leading man that vulnerable and emotional. It just wasn’t done. Screaming and crying “Stella” was not particularly … manly. It’s hard to imagine John Wayne (as much as I love him) doing such a thing. Brando punched open the door for other men, creating a larger emotional space in which they could operate. AND, in addition to all of this, Brando is also one of the most riveting people to have ever graced the silver screen. What he had – in terms of personality, beauty, intrigue – was magic. It cannot be imitated, manufactured, manipulated, or created by a PR team. Alain Delon had it. Monica Vitti had it. Cary Grant had it. Marlene Dietrich had it. Talented people, all. But with something ELSE: magic. It’s also not a surprise that all of these actors had an androgynous quality, an “other” quality, something that made you look at them closer to try to figure it out, a mysterious and self-consumed self-obsessed quality that is a powerful draw for an audience.

And to those of you out there who are Supernatural fans, this is the realm in which the green-eyed freckled Jensen Ackles works too, and is one of the main reasons I got hooked into the show, since I could not stop watching him. I’ve written about that extensively. I talk a lot about his “burlesque,” and how he seems to have consciously (or no) incorporated it into the character he plays. The character was not written that way. The character conception initially was that of Han Solo. The sexy masculine wisecracker. Ackles is tall, muscular, Alpha, casually and intuitively tough, a Leader. He is a throwback to John Wayne, which comes very naturally to him. But he’s androgynous too, in a way Wayne was not. The burlesque – the softness – the receiving type of sexuality – but it’s a receiving presented in a performative way which can seem very aggressive … it’s hard to pin this stuff down, and that’s why it’s interesting – is all him.

Kristen Stewart may not have the range of a Brando, but “range” is over-rated. Especially by many of today’s credulous film critics and many aspiring actors. I remember getting into an argument with some dumbbell actor in a class I took who compared Spencer Tracy negatively to Dustin Hoffman. “He’s always the same,” complained the dumbbell. I have a talent for making new friends so I lectured him on why he was wrong. Ever since Robert DeNiro gained all that weight for Raging Bull, radical ACTUAL transformation is what has won Oscars, is what gets the most awe-struck commentary. (And I love DeNiro. But I don’t want the OTHER kind of acting to be dismissed as “just playing themselves,” “they’re always the same”. It’s incorrect.) Old-fashioned star power … well, you can’t put a price on it. No coincidence that those who “have it” are still some of the biggest box-office draws.

Kristen Stewart is one of the most naturally charismatic, naturally gifted actresses working today. I was so pleased when my mentor from the Actors Studio, Sam Schacht, a man who studied with Lee Strasberg, who KNOWS from “Method”, listed her as one of his favorites (*great interview…click link!!) when I interviewed him, a girl who struck him as “authentic.” The very nature of authenticity means it cannot be faked. You can’t TRY to be authentic because then … you wouldn’t be authentic. It’s like the copy of a copy of a painting. Well-trained eyes can tell the difference.

You cannot take your eyes off of Kristen Stewart. Even when she is just buried in her phone.

In Personal Shopper, she is depressive, intense, thoughtful. It’s interior work. This is not an expressive character. She dresses like she’s a teenage boy, in ratty sweaters, sneakers, wool caps pulled down, a blunt-edged ponytail sticking out of the back of her head. But in one extraordinary sequence, filmed almost in one take, she tries on a dress hanging in the closet of the high-profile woman she assists. She is not supposed to be doing this. It’s hard to even conceive of this character WANTING to put on a see-through black dress with an S&M type harness underneath. As Marlene Dietrich croons “Das Hobellied” in the background, Kristen Stewart strips down, and … languorously, slowly … puts on the harness, pulling at the straps to give her more breathing room. The straps though bind her down. Her bare breasts emerges between the straps. She stares at herself, completely unselfconscious in her near-nudity. She thinks again, takes off the harness, and slips on a black see-through bra. On with the harness again. The straps constrict her. She looks like she’s being served up as some male fantasy. And maybe she’s trying that on for size. Being a male fantasy is not entirely a bad thing, you know. I would also suggest that women love to look at beauty too. She’s a female fantasy too. But she doesn’t strut. Or pose. Or “act sexy.” She stares at herself. She slips on leopard-print shoes with dizzyingly high heels. She walks around the apartment.

Marlene Dietrich – one of the most famous androgynes who ever lived, accompanies this strange slim boyish girl in her transformation.

The sequence ends with her lying in the bed – wearing the dress – and masturbating. Is she thinking about anyone? The Unknown texter? Or herself, and the memory of her reflection in the mirror? Or both?

It’s one of the sequences of the year. And why? Nothing happens. It’s like any other “play dress-up” scene, a version of the well-known “fashion montage” in countless other films. Assayas knows what he’s playing with, knows we will come to such a sequence with preconceived notions and expectations. He doesn’t oblige us, though. Neither does Stewart. What goes on in that sequence is something else entirely. She is beautiful boy, pre-teen tomboy, glamorous woman, simultaneously. With deference to Camille Paglia, she is an extreme example of a sexual persona. And it is hers alone. The fact that she’s uncommonly beautiful … almost intimidatingly so … adds to the overall effect. And, like Marilyn Monroe, Kristen Stewart can – at will – depending on the project – dim her beauty. She can appear extremely ordinary. She could walk through Times Square undetected, I have no doubt.

Watch her extraordinary performance as the over-tired lawyer visiting a small town to teach classes in Kelly Reichardt’s film Certain Women. Hunched over her coffee late at night, with a long drive ahead of her, she is plain, dowdy, with circles under her eyes, almost tubercular in her exhaustion.

But she doesn’t make a big deal out of it. She does not “strut” in her plain-ness, she does not want to be congratulated for opting out of the Beauty racket.

Stewart is completely beyond those prosaic and careerist types of concerns. This is what Sam Schacht was talking about when he mentioned her authenticity.

Stewart is not vain, but she is CLEARLY aware of the effect she can have … she is not some “idiot savant”.

She knows what she’s doing.

Lots of actors know what they’re doing, though, and don’t create the captivating effect she does. She works ONLY with subtext. It’s part of her genius.

The camera is designed to pick up thoughts. She does not have to work to show that she’s thinking. She does not “act like” she’s thinking. She just THINKS, and the camera catches it. (Many actors – even good ones – “act like” they’re people. They don’t know how to BE.) What she has is total trust that the camera will catch what she’s doing. She knows she doesn’t have to act. She knows that the name of the game is not ACTing. It’s BEing.

The thought of anyone else doing the dress-up sequence in Personal Shopper makes me wince with discomfort. They’d be very busy showing us how this slim and competent and depressed boy-girl feels about what she sees in the mirror.

Kristen Stewart doesn’t “busy herself” with acting.

She stands in the harness. She looks at her breasts. She adjusts the straps. She looks in the mirror. She looks and looks and looks.

And we can’t stop looking either. At her. 

(**I’ve added a reply comment screenshot to her essay addressing criticism of Kristen’s acting, including Rob’s):

I’m baffled by those who think she’s a “log” – although I’ve heard that a lot! She does not EMOTE, even her crying is somewhat interior – she doesn’t sob.  She’s just so RELAXED onscreen and relaxation is so hard to come by, especially in acting. It’s even more extraordinary when you consider how she started out – as a teenager in this insane franchise which catapulted her to international celebrity – before she even had a chance to develop herself. Usually people like that vanish – or have a hard time finding their way.  But look at what she’s done with it!!

Same with Pattinson too. He was in TWO great movies this year.  Wildly different. Non-mainstream.

Both of them are really doing it right.  

Stewart on the Come Swim set (Photo: Lindsey Byrnes/courtesy Everett Collection)

As a child actress growing up on the sets for films like Panic Room and Catch That Kid, Kristen Stewart learned early on to pay close attention to the director behind the camera. “That’s your boss,” she tells Yahoo Entertainment about her earliest memories of watching filmmakers at work. “You look to that person for everything. When a movie is really good, it takes a lot of people’s efforts. But what starts it is something so singular with a specific perspective. Even when I was really little, I knew that my job was to listen to that [perspective] and hold it like it was precious. And even as a little kid, I was like, ‘F**k, I’d like to hold that myself one day and share it!‘”

Flash-forward to the present day, and the now 27-year-old actress is sharing her own directorial debut with the world, the evocative short film, Come Swim. After premiering at the Sundance Film Festival in January, the 17-minute production is being released today as part of Refinery 29’s Shatterbox Anthology, which provides a platform to emerging female filmmakers. Starring first-time actor, Josh Kaye, Come Swim grew out of a recurring image that embedded itself in Stewart’s mind several years ago and became the linchpin for a half-realist, half-impressionist portrait of a man whose mind is plagued by memories of a failed love affair, to the point where he feels like he’s drowning even on dry land. We spoke with Stewart about how she relates to the character we see onscreen and whether she has any desire to direct a Twilight-style blockbuster.

Yahoo Entertainment: You’ve said that the idea for Come Swim originated with the image of a man sleeping at the bottom of the ocean. Where did the vision come from? Kristen Stewart: Initially, I was just fixated on the idea of a person that’s so over-aware of what’s essential to them — what they’re really in need of — but are unable to absorb it. So even at the bottom of the ocean, the most ultra-hydrated place in the world, they’re dry. When you’re in your own head, your pain and struggle seems so dramatic and unrelatable. And yet, it’s so universal! There’s any any feeling that somebody hasn’t before you. Once you’re in it, it feels all-consuming, but when you step back, you go, “What the f**k have I been doing?”

For me, the film tapped into that feeling of being mentally underwater: there’s so much buzzing around in your head, and you’re just in need of a moment of clarity. Exactly. He’s punishing himself with memories and can’t really organize them. He can’t put them somewhere easy to process. I wanted to externalize a very internal sound. When he starts out, he feels things are whizzing by him, and he can’t grab them, but they also won’t go away. It’s about waking up in the morning and going, “Wow, I’m allowed to use my mind! It’s not controlling me.” When you’re in that state, easy things seem hard.

Is there something about the modern world that exacerbates that? You place the character in settings like a busy office and the front seat of his car, where there’s a lot of stimuli. I wanted to put him in places that were normal; stripped-down environments without much detail. We don’t have much time to get to know this guy really well, so what I wanted you to focus on was your own projections of doing mundane things like getting up and going to work. But he is always cubed in: his office cubicle is small, the car is small. It’s only once he gets outside and finds the ocean that he allows himself to breath. His regrets about his relationship that have sent him into this existential crisis, and even though he hates swimming and water, he realizes he’s got to let himself float. Water is stronger than us, and if you fight it, you’re just going to f**king tire and drown. But if he lets himself look like a dork and bob around in the water, when he gets out he’ll be cold, but he’ll also realize that he’s not going to have to try and control everything.

Josh Kaye in Kristen Stewart’s directorial debut, Come Swim (Photo: John Guleserian/Courtesy of Sundance Institute)

The character’s circumstances are intended to be universal, but in working with Josh Kaye did you discover that men and women have different responses to this kind of mental state? I think there are big differences between him and I, but more on an individual level. It doesn’t really have much to do with gender necessarily. The character in the story isn’t necessarily me, but I wanted to be as close to it as I could. The main difference between us is that I’m a little bit more explosive. There are a few things in the film that I’m so excited I didn’t do myself, because he grins and bears it whereas I think I would be a little more dramatic. He’s never acted in anything before, so he wasn’t trying to prove anything to me. He was just realistically in this environment, and allowed whatever memories or ideas to stir him.

You incorporated paintings you made into the film via a process called “neural style transfer” as opposed to traditional CGI. Was that at process you had a hand in developing? No, I have a friend who works at a VFX house and she was familiar with Bhautik Joshi’s research. I spoke with her about my painting and how I wanted it to feel illustrated in the film; I wanted parts of the movie to feel like a painting. I was talking a lot about grain and how to do that, and she told me about this guy who could take a physical painting and apply that style to a moving picture. So he helped us out, but I think it was something he came up with and when the movie came out it was a good chance for him to talk about that process. I was lucky to be able to do it and take those two mediums and put them together. [Stewart is listed as a co-author of an academic paper about neural style transfer that’s on file with Cornell University.]

Stewart in Snow White and the Huntsman (Photo: Universal Pictures/courtesy Everett Collection)

Has working on big-budget movies like Twilight and Snow White and the Huntsman made you leery of incorporating CGI into your own films? Not at all. Initially, I thought I was going to need a lot of digital work on Come Swim. I had this long list of shots, but after we went out and shot everything I kept crossing them off my list during post-production, going “I don’t need that one, I don’t need that one.” We did minimal digital work, because everything we did physically was so cool. All of the make-up work on Josh was practical and worked. I really like it when you only have to use a small amount [of CGI] to patch things up and refine them. If you can get as much as you can while taking f**king pictures, that’s what looks the most immersive.

Would you ever want to do direct a tentpole film yourself or does that not hold any interest for you? Maybe, because I do like to suspend reality; not in a way that’s fantasy, but to get inside someone’s head and really feel embedded in something internal. Because a lot of times it doesn’t resemble what you’re seeing on the outside. So I think I’ll want to make small movies; I have no interest in making huge movies, although I like working on them as an actor.

One of your earliest movies was Panic Room, directed by David Fincher. Do you recall observing any part of his process on set that you held onto for your own work? That was the second movie I ever made. I was lucky to have that experience so young because it was so labor-intensive and for all the right reasons. I always want to be in movies where if you have to work tirelessly and endlessly, and if it has to hurt and you have to do it over and over again, you get something that really matters at any cost. That’s what you do — you just do f**king anything to get it. That [feeling] probably started on that movie.

Stewart and Jodie Foster in Panic Room (Photo: Merrick Morton/courtesy Everett Collection)

It certainly feels like the fans that have grown up with you through the Twilight films are embracing the work you’re doing now. Are you conscious of how they’re seeing you evolve as an artist, and do you hope they take any lessons from you as the develop their own creative voices? Yeah, of course. No one is so special as to have any kind of original thought or feeling that nobody’s had before you. But I really do follow my gut as to the things I’m drawn to artistically and hope that there will be someone out there that feels it too. For that, I’m lucky. I don’t think about the greater narrative [of my life] or alter my decisions to say things to people. But I feel that if you’re really honest about something and are exploring something that feels worth it, there will be other people interested in it, too.

Come Swim is available to watch today on Refinery29.

Watch the trailer:

Read more from Yahoo Entertainment:

‘November Criminals’: Ansel Elgort and Chloë Grace Moretz share a sweet moment in exclusive clip

‘The Greatest Showman’: Check out exclusive character posters from Hugh Jackman’s new musical

Robert Pattinson fancy being a scriptwriter or a writer for politicians?

“So much of it is performance now…” Robert Pattinson on the idea of writing for policitians.

Full interview with BBC Newsnight : https://youtu.be/BFpj0QIcVDg

Kristen Stewart new Gabrielle Chanel print editorial outtake in Aubazine  + photos with Olivier Polge, creator of Gabrielle Chanel perfume.

by Ethan Alter. November 10, 2017

As a child actress growing up on the sets for films like Panic Room and Catch That Kid, Kristen Stewart learned early on to pay close attention to the director behind the camera. “That’s your boss,” she tells Yahoo Entertainment about her earliest memories of watching filmmakers at work. “You look to that person for everything. When a movie is really good, it takes a lot of people’s efforts. But what starts it is something so singular with a specific perspective. Even when I was really little, I knew that my job was to listen to that [perspective] and hold it like it was precious. And even as a little kid, I was like, ‘F**k, I’d like to hold that myself one day and share it!‘”

Flash-forward to the present day, and the now 27-year-old actress is sharing her own directorial debut with the world, the evocative short film Come Swim. After premiering at the Sundance Film Festival in January, the 17-minute production is being released today as part of Refinery 29’s Shatterbox Anthology, which provides a platform to emerging female filmmakers. Starring first-time actor Josh Kaye, Come Swim grew out of a recurring image that embedded itself in Stewart’s mind several years ago and became the linchpin for a half-realist, half-impressionist portrait of a man whose mind is plagued by memories of a failed love affair, to the point where he feels like he’s drowning even on dry land. We spoke with Stewart about how she relates to the character we see onscreen and whether she has any desire to direct a Twilight-style blockbuster.

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Q&A with Kristen:

Yahoo Entertainment: You’ve said that the idea for Come Swim originated with the image of a man sleeping at the bottom of the ocean. Where did the vision come from?

Kristen Stewart: Initially, I was just fixated on the idea of a person that’s so over-aware of what’s essential to them — what they’re really in need of — but are unable to absorb it. So even at the bottom of the ocean, the most ultrahydrated place in the world, they’re dry. When you’re in your own head, your pain and struggle seems so dramatic and unrelatable. And yet it’s so universal! There isn’t any feeling that somebody hasn’t had before you. Once you’re in it, it feels all-consuming, but when you step back, you go, “What the f**k have I been doing?”

For me, the film tapped into that feeling of being mentally underwater: There’s so much buzzing around in your head, and you’re just in need of a moment of clarity.

Exactly. He’s punishing himself with memories and can’t really organize them. He can’t put them somewhere easy to process. I wanted to externalize a very internal sound. When he starts out, he feels things are whizzing by him, and he can’t grab them, but they also won’t go away. It’s about waking up in the morning and going, “Wow, I’m allowed to use my mind! It’s not controlling me.” When you’re in that state, easy things seem hard.

Is there something about the modern world that exacerbates that? You place the character in settings like a busy office and the front seat of his car, where there’s a lot of stimuli.

I wanted to put him in places that were normal — stripped-down environments without much detail. We don’t have much time to get to know this guy really well, so what I wanted you to focus on was your own projections of doing mundane things like getting up and going to work. But he is always cubed in: his office cubicle is small, the car is small. It’s only once he gets outside and finds the ocean that he allows himself to breathe. He has regrets about his relationship that have sent him into this existential crisis, and even though he hates swimming and water, he realizes he’s got to let himself float. Water is stronger than us, and if you fight it, you’re just going to f**king tire and drown. But if he lets himself look like a dork and bob around in the water, when he gets out he’ll be cold, but he’ll also realize that he’s not going to have to try and control everything.

The character’s circumstances are intended to be universal, but in working with Josh Kaye did you discover that men and women have different responses to this kind of mental state?

I think there are big differences between him and I, but more on an individual level. It doesn’t really have much to do with gender necessarily. The character in the story isn’t necessarily me, but I wanted to be as close to it as I could. The main difference between us is that I’m a little bit more explosive. There are a few things in the film that I’m so excited I didn’t do myself, because he grins and bears it whereas I think I would be a little more dramatic. He’s never acted in anything before, so he wasn’t trying to prove anything to me. He was just realistically in this environment and allowed whatever memories or ideas to stir him.

You incorporated paintings you made into the film via a process called “neural style transfer” as opposed to traditional CGI. Was that a process you had a hand in developing?

No, I have a friend who works at a VFX house and she was familiar with Bhautik Joshi’s research. I spoke with her about my painting and how I wanted it to feel illustrated in the film; I wanted parts of the movie to feel like a painting. I was talking a lot about grain and how to do that, and she told me about this guy who could take a physical painting and apply that style to a moving picture. So he helped us out, but I think it was something he came up with, and when the movie came out it was a good chance for him to talk about that process. I was lucky to be able to do it and take those two mediums and put them together. [Stewart is listed as a co-author of an academic paper about neural style transfer that’s on file with Cornell University.]

Has working on big-budget movies like Twilight and Snow White and the Huntsman made you leery of incorporating CGI into your own films?

Not at all. Initially, I thought I was going to need a lot of digital work on Come Swim. I had this long list of shots, but after we went out and shot everything I kept crossing them off my list during post-production, going “I don’t need that one, I don’t need that one.” We did minimal digital work, because everything we did physically was so cool. All of the makeup work on Josh was practical and worked. I really like it when you only have to use a small amount [of CGI] to patch things up and refine them. If you can get as much as you can while taking f**king pictures, that’s what looks the most immersive.

Would you ever want to direct a tentpole film yourself or does that not hold any interest for you?

Maybe, because I do like to suspend reality — not in a way that’s fantasy, but to get inside someone’s head and really feel embedded in something internal. Because a lot of times it doesn’t resemble what you’re seeing on the outside. So I think I’ll want to make small movies; I have no interest in making huge movies, although I like working on them as an actor.

One of your earliest movies was Panic Room, directed by David Fincher. Do you recall observing any part of his process on set that you held onto for your own work?

That was the second movie I ever made. I was lucky to have that experience so young because it was so labor-intensive and for all the right reasons. I always want to be in movies where if you have to work tirelessly and endlessly, and if it has to hurt and you have to do it over and over again, you get something that really matters at any cost. That’s what you do — you just do f**king anything to get it. That [feeling] probably started on that movie.

It certainly feels like the fans that have grown up with you through the Twilight films are embracing the work you’re doing now. Are you conscious of how they’re seeing you evolve as an artist, and do you hope they take any lessons from you as the develop their own creative voices?

Yeah, of course. No one is so special as to have any kind of original thought or feeling that nobody’s had before you. But I really do follow my gut as to the things I’m drawn to artistically and hope that there will be someone out there that feels it too. For that, I’m lucky. I don’t think about the greater narrative [of my life] or alter my decisions to say things to people. But I feel that if you’re really honest about something and are exploring something that feels worth it, there will be other people interested in it too.

Kristen Stewart at The Landmark in Los Angeles. Nov 9 2017

¬ for her directional debut screening of Come Swim

Kristen wore 🌹 The Fade t-Shirt from MurMur and a pair of  🌹 Zuhair Murad Pre-Fall 2017 Fuchsia high waist crepe pants with pleats from the Rtw collection.

Completed the look with 🌹 Giuseppe Zanotti “Coline” black sandals​, 🌹 ring from Chanel & 🌹 necklace from Jillian Dempsey.​

🌹 Makeup by Beau Nelson  🌹 Hair by Bridget Brager 🌹 Styled by Tara Swennen

Robert Pattinson Talks ‘Good Time,’ 'Twilight’ and Career Longevity at Savannah Film Festival 2017 with Scott Feinberg of THR

Full HD Video : Run Time 18:21 minutes