Emma Watson [1] is one of the most private actresses in Hollywood, but in light of her exciting new role in Disney's live-action Beauty and the Beast [2], she sat down with Vanity Fair [3] for an illuminating chat. From touching on the hardships of having a boyfriend in the public eye to the one person she needed approval from before agreeing to play a Disney princess, read on to see everything Emma revealed to the magazine.
- On why she has a strict "no photos" policy with fans: "For me, it's the difference between being able to have a life and not. If someone takes a photograph of me and posts it, within two seconds they've created a marker of exactly where I am within 10 meters. They can see what I'm wearing and who I'm with. I just can't give that tracking data. I'll say, 'I will sit here and answer every single Harry Potter [4] fandom question you have but I just can't do a picture.' I have to carefully pick and choose my moment to interact. When am I a celebrity sighting versus when am I going to make someone's freakin' week? Children I don't say no to, for example."
- On balancing her love life with fame: "I want to be consistent: I can't talk about my boyfriend in an interview and then expect people not to take paparazzi pictures of me walking around outside my home. You can't have it both ways . . . I've noticed, in Hollywood, who you're dating gets tied up into your film promotion and becomes part of the performance and the circus. I would hate anyone that I were with to feel like they were in any way part of a show or an act."
- On why she doesn't want advice from famous child stars: "People will say to me, 'Have you spoken to Jodie Foster [5] or Natalie Portman [6]? They would have great advice for you on how to grow up in the limelight.' I'm not saying it was in any way easy on them, but with social media it's a whole new world. They've both said technology has changed the game."
- On why she sought out Gloria Steinem's approval before agreeing to play Belle: "I couldn't care less if I won an Oscar or not if the movie didn't say something that I felt was important for people to hear."
- On transforming Belle into a feminist: "I was like, 'The first shot of the movie [7] cannot be Belle walking out of this quiet little town carrying a basket with a white napkin in it. We need to rev things up!' The original sketches had her in her ballet shoes, which are lovely — don't get me wrong — but she's not going to be able to do anything terribly useful in ballet shoes in the middle of a French provincial village."
Buy the March issue of Vanity Fair when it hits newsstands on March 7.