As
the troubled rich girl Tamsin in My
Summer of Love, the new movie by
Paul Pavlikovsky, young British actress Emily Blunt has
her work cut out for her. First, she has to hold her own
against Nathalie Press, who plays her summer love interest,
the irreverent yet charismatic Mona. She also has to make
a potentially unlikable character agreeable to audiences
from all walks of life. As far as I’m concerned, she
succeeds on all counts. I spoke with Ms. Blunt when she
was in Chicago for a special screening of My Summer
of Love.
AfterEllen.com:
Early in the movie we learn that Tamsin was suspended from
boarding school “for being a bad influence on people.”
What was it like to play a bad influence?
Emily Blunt: It was great! Because I was a bit
of a goody-two-shoes at school. I was never Tamsin, I was
always the geek following her around, desperate for her
to smile on me. So, I guess it was great to play someone
like that who is troubled, who has such a pretentious quality
to her. But you’ve got to love her; you’ve got
to find her magnetic.
It’s
a challenge to play pretentious people, I think. You can’t
have the audience hating her. You have to see moments where
she’s generous and warm. It was great to play someone
with an eccentricity about her.
AE:
She is magnetic. It’s easy to understand their attraction.
EB:
Yes.
AE:
So, you’ve never been a bad influence on anyone?
EB:
Not really. I’d love to be exciting and say that I
was the rebel at school, but sadly I wasn’t.
AE:
In addition to being a bad influence, Tamsin calls herself
“a fantasist.” As an actress, do you think being
a fantasist is a necessary skill?
EB:
In a funny way, I think it’s the complete opposite.
I think it’s about being a realist and being true
to yourself, and your instincts and emotions; rather than
it becoming a façade. With Tamsin, it’s all
façade. She has kind of a frightening imagination.
You have to have that as an actress. You have to be able
to touch on those experiences that you haven’t had
and characters that you have no relation to. It’s
important to be able to dig deep, but I think it’s
about being very real with yourself more than anything.
AE:
There’s a wonderful scene where Tamsin and Mona are
listening to Edith Piaf, which leads Tamsin to describe
some of the aspects of Edith Piaf’s troubled love-life,
saying that “in France, crimes of passion are forgiven.”
In a sense, what Tamsin does to Mona is something of a crime
of passion. Would you agree with that?
EB:
It’s just some kind of elaborate game that she’s
been playing, I think, more so than that she’s compassionate
about Mona. I think she finds in Mona what she lacks in
herself. In a funny way, they each need the other.
I
think it’s more of a crime of boredom for Tamsin.
She’s bored and lost and she knows that she has all
of these abilities to draw people in, and she’ll use
them to discover her own self-worth; which is kind of a
dangerous and uncompassionate game to play. More than a
crime of passion, I think it’s just a teenage fantasy.
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