Academy Awards season means pretty people posing for pretty pictures. And one of the prettiest is Vanity Fair magazine’s annual Hollywood Issue, featuring its “Young Hollywood” cover. From left to right: Ryan Reynolds, Jake Gyllenhaal, Anne Hathaway, James Franco, Jennifer Lawrence, Anthony Mackie, Olivia Wilde, Jesse Eisenberg, Mila Kunis, Robert Duvall, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Andrew Garfield, Rashida Jones, Garrett Hedlund and Noomi Rapace. The photo is by Norman Jean Roy.
Now that you have given up on trying to enlarge the picture of Olivia Wilde hoping for a wardrobe malfunction, note that this year’s group has a tiny bit of diversity, with two people of color: Anthony Mackie and Rashida Jones. After last year’s lily white spread caused something of a kerfuffle, perhaps VF got the message – even if Hollywood itself has not.
Of course, a cover that was designed to “evoke the glamour of 1930s Shanghai,” according to style director Jessica Diehl, might have been a bit more evocative with an Asian or two.
The cover shoot took several days on both coasts to complete. With the busy schedules of the stars and the uncooperative travel weather, coordinating the shoot was tricky. Noomi Rapace hopped a red-eye from London, traveled 36 hours, did the shoot, then shuttled back to London. Lisbeth Salander has nothing on her.
The stars talk about making the cover in this behind-the-scenes video.
VanityFair.com also teased us with some behind-the-scenes pictures – here are a few featuring our favorite women. I’m still taken aback when I see Noomi when she’s not being Lisbeth. She is stunning. No offense to the My Idiot Brother wardrobe designer, but I think I prefer this look on Rashida. The lucky little lion cub got her full attention most of the day.
The Hollywood issue of Vanity Fair drops today in New York and LA and in less-important cities next week.
Is this year’s cover an improvement in terms of diversity? Who’s missing that should be part of the Young Hollywood celebration?
