In April, we will see her on the screens in the film «Like Clockwork» — not a radical doctor, a creature from another galaxy or a cyberpunk Amazon, as everyone, in fact, is used to. In it, she is vulnerable, somewhat comical, desperate. This is exactly the kind of Olivia Wilde we met in person.
She says that here, in New York Williamsburg, they don’t recognize her on the streets. Because, firstly, she is not a star yet, but only a more or less famous actress. And secondly, because the local public «spits on such things from a high bell tower.» “I lived here before. On the corner of XNUMXth and Bedford. The area is bohemian, everyone here is more or less an artist,” smiles Wilde.
But I mentally disagree: how to recognize a person who, like Woodiallen’s Zelig, takes the forms necessary in a given environment in given circumstances? Anyone who saw what Olivia Wilde looked like at the Golden Globes ceremony — a dress with a train, a face with a seal of bliss, a look full of mystery — will never recognize her in this … yes, just goth, who is sitting next to me . She’s wearing a black leather jacket, and black jeans, and a black scarf, and she’s pulled a black knit cap off her brown hair, and her almond-shaped, strangely long eyes are outlined in deep black.
Yes, we are sitting next to each other — because we are in a cafe, where the window is the wall itself. And only along the window you can sit here — on bar stools at the high counter, in a row. Which is not very convenient for interviewing, of course: you can hardly see the eyes of the interlocutor. That is, it would be inconvenient if there was someone else in Wild’s place. But she, successfully overcoming the fixedness of the seat, manages to turn to me full face, express her feelings with facial expressions in such a way that it is clear what they are in profile, and in general completely destroy the image of the beautiful ice maiden that was formed in my head from the totality of her roles. There is some kind of sweet, paradoxical discrepancy in it: between appearance (beautiful) and “self-shaping” (scornful); between the cold oceanic transparency of her eyes and the warmth of her deep voice, between her starryness and the shabbiness of a purely New York place, where she likes to visit from old memory and where we met. And I decide to start with him — with the paradox of Olivia Wilde.
Psychologies: It’s no secret that many people first heard the name of actress Olivia Wilde when the tabloids enthusiastically began to write about your passionate kisses with another young actress in the same television series. The series itself was easy to miss, but the excitement that gripped the press was impossible to miss. Then, in House M.D., you turned out to be the bisexual Thirteenth. No one suspected you of bi- or homosexuality in real life, but it became clear that you stand apart, that you have a secret power. And screen unconventionality is a projection of this power and mystery.
Olivia Wilde: Thank you… But I’m afraid I have no comments. That is, I can assume that there is “not that” in me. You see, I am an absolute cynic. I look at the world soberly, without illusions, I do not hope, I do not expect gifts from fate, I do not count on her help. But at the same time, I am an absolute romantic, because I give myself one hundred percent to what I love — work, this current role, this political campaign, this man, this girlfriend, this soup — I love to cook. Only a romantic can give his all, completely, without setting conditions. And I think my two sides — illusory cynicism and desperate romanticism — this is my insidious «bi». What you call a riddle, and I call adulthood. So far it seems to me that growing up means understanding that the surest way to happiness is to give yourself, and not row for yourself.
By the age of 27, you really did a lot: you played wonderful roles, became a celebrity, participated in serious political and charitable campaigns, tried your hand at film production. You got married at eighteen, lived in marriage for many years, divorced …
“I LOOK AT THE WORLD WITHOUT ILLUSIONS, I DO NOT EXPECT GIFTS FROM FATE, I DO NOT COUNT ON ITS HELP”
ABOUT. U .: You list, but, you know, it’s strange for me to listen. In the sense — how it all sounds in the enumeration. It never crossed my mind to count my life’s deeds like this. For me, it’s all one thing, one life. What is my film production? As a producer, I made a documentary film «Cinema of the City of the Sun». About how in a refugee camp, where people who were left homeless after the earthquake in Haiti found a temporary roof over their heads, a person decided to open a cinema — in a large tent, almost by sheer force of will! When, during one of my trips to Haiti, I learned about him, about this man, I decided that it was necessary to make a film. The film is about his effort, his will and his experience. I grew up in a family of journalists, my parents also do documentaries. My ex-husband (Tao Raspoli. — Ed.) is a documentary filmmaker with a name. This genre has fascinated me since childhood. You see, the hero of a documentary film is valuable already because he exists, he really exists in the physical world. And shooting a film gives its personal, individual experience a universal meaning. He becomes an image. A physically existing person, made of flesh and blood, becomes a metaphor for human existence! And I was not a producer here — unless, of course, you count the collection of money for the film and the organization of filming. I was a transformer. I wanted to show the world this man, his will, his passion, his dedication, his belief that art can comfort and uplift – even in disaster-stricken Haiti. And it was my life — as much as my husband, sister, brother, parents, films in which I starred, a campaign to raise money for Haitian refugees … It’s all the same. And it’s not the things I did. This is the life I lived.
You saw fit to make a film, and you did it. According to your logic, in order to do something, it is enough to want it? Doesn’t it happen when it doesn’t work?
ABOUT. U .: But I don’t want anything special for myself. And when I want it, it’s not for myself, for business. For someone who really cares that I succeed. And so it often succeeds — nature helps those who do not try for themselves, it’s true. And besides, even as a child, my mother told me, and I remembered for the rest of my life: “Do not trust the one who will tell you that you cannot do what you want to do.” It can be said that this is my personal slogan.
Does this apply to marriage at 18? Hence the decisiveness?
ABOUT. U .: Decisiveness communicates love to a person — have you heard of this? Decisiveness arises from the feeling that there is simply no alternative. Love is absolute and strives for final solutions. When Tao and I decided to get married, we just had this feeling: there is no other way. We can’t just live together, just be in a romance, a partnership. We should be a family, we should be connected — we don’t need freedom anymore. But then Tao still reasonably asked my dad what he thought of our decision. Dad sighed and said: “Yes, we are already used to the fact that Olivia always goes her own way.”
So your parents accepted your choice?
ABOUT. U .: My dad is Irish, real, he came to the USA from Ireland, he knows what Irish wildness is! And my mother … I was afraid that she would be against it — after all, I was only eighteen. But she reacted, as always, in a peculiar way. She said: «The devil knows you, but maybe this is what the thing will come out of!» She meant that even reckless actions, if they are sincere, make sense. Some higher, non-domestic meaning.
Sounds like your parents are wonderful people.
ABOUT. U .: It’s true. Rare. Mom, five months pregnant with my brother, went to Somalia, where there was a civil war. She was a TV reporter and felt it was her duty to tell the world about the civil war. I’m scared to even imagine it. She really risked herself, her brother, her life. But in another way, apparently, could not. My parents… You know, they really respect freedom. Freedom of decision including. The freedom of a person — and his own child too — to be what he is. This has always been the case, even in my childhood. As a child, I was a terrible dreamer, a liar and a bandit. And the parents … no, they didn’t scold, but in some ways they even supported me. Dad said that he felt such unfocused, but desperately strong energy in me, that as soon as I said that I wanted to become an actress, at the age of seven, he immediately took the news with enthusiasm. Acting is a way to channel that energy. An outlet for my fantasies. After all, alone with myself, I played incredible scenes from the mini-performances I had invented … I think if I grew up in a different family, I might even be treated, they would be stuffed with medicines — from my fantasies and inability to focus on priorities. I was lucky that my parents were my parents! And that there were always such people around. Tao is the same. He let me be me. He was not afraid to coexist with a strong woman. We were connected and free at the same time. It was freedom in recognizing the strength of the connection.
But after eight years of marriage, you still broke up. Why?
ABOUT. U .: We got married because it felt right, because it made us happy. And we swore to each other that we would part as soon as one of us lost the feeling of happiness. You know, I did not believe and do not believe the statement that relationships need to be worked on. Parents — and they have been married for 35 years — told me: «There are failures in married life, relationships need to be worked on.» But it’s just not for me. What needs to be worked on… This is no longer freedom, not free choice, not love. This is coercion. And our relationship really came to the point that it became necessary to work on them. And so they lost the ease, the bohemian laxity that made them so beautiful. Once upon a time, in the bus that Tao equipped as a motor home and mobile film studio, we traveled around the country. And these were the best years — it was this lightness of love that brought us together, the lightness of lifting, the lightness of natural mutual affection. But then life began to take shape somehow seriously — we both had careers, «production» obligations. Yes, that fascinating bohemianism in our very feelings for each other was no longer there. And we decided to leave. Because… they became each other’s work. Work, not life.
Was it a painful experience?
ABOUT. U .: I would say humbling. At first I kept talking to myself: “Failure! Failure! I could not. Didn’t build it.» Then I realized that all these remorse are the result of constant luck, good luck, which I owe not to myself at all. And I myself am an ordinary person. Not ideal, and not everything depends on me. And it’s okay that I disappoint someone: I’m not perfect, like everyone else. But there was still a sense of insecurity. I felt some kind of wadding under me, instability. Probably because in ordinary life we do not want to admit weakness in ourselves. We hide it from people, we flaunt it with force. If life breaks down, you become more vulnerable. If your familiar world is dramatically transformed, you become more sensitive, thinner. Post-traumatic instability, oddly enough, is good for our work. David Shore, the author of House M.D., even said to me at the time: “Olivia, get divorced as often as possible – you have never played so well!”
But what kind of feeling can a woman experience who got married at 18 and divorced at 27? You were never alone — how did you experience this unusual
ABOUT. U .: Pretty comical, to be honest. I felt like an adult — that is, having the right to go on dates. And one person appeared … In general, I see myself as an independent, firm person who despises jealousy. But I love clarity. And at the very first meeting, I asked this person about 150 questions. He answered, answered, and then said: “This is probably because you were brought up by journalists: you only want to know facts about me!” Sounds like it, of course. But partly true: I want to know a lot about the person who will be there. And from the very beginning. And this, as I found out, is not very accepted during the primary “marriage dances”. And in general, I found out a lot of new things for myself in this area. It turns out that people correspond by mobile about love and their relationships. With special icons that mean something special. In general, in the field of dating and flirting, I felt like a person who spent eight years in a coma, and now woke up and discovers a world that has changed so much during the years of his absence! During my years of absence.
And it seemed to me that you could discover in yourself a temptress, a seducer.
ABOUT. U .: But then how can you respect a person if he ended up in your life in an unconscious state, under the drug of seduction? I am for a world without drugs.
Don’t you think that seduction is just a realization of the desire to please?
ABOUT. U .: I think you are simplifying. You know, I recently stood in front of my entrance, on the street. It was cold, but the sun was hot. And here I stand and expose my face to the sun … Some lady, about seventy-five years old, is walking by. Purple sunglasses, gray perm, loose, colorful clothes, I think she’s a hippie past. And then she slows down, takes my hand and says sympathetically with a Brooklyn accent: “Heels! Horror! Legs are probably falling off. Who did you wear them for? Dress up for yourself! Don’t think about what other people think of you!» He releases his hand and walks away. I laugh at first, then I think. Not about heels — my Sergio Rossi boots, really with 10 cm heels, are beautiful, they are a victory in their own right. I wonder why I really wear and love them. And I come to the conclusion: because I feel … unfinished. Because my legs are a little short, because my sister is 185 and I am 170. On days when I need to feel especially confident, I add a few centimeters with my heels — I correct nature and my somewhat knocked down proportions. Then I think: it turns out that I am so attached to physical data that I can’t be sure of myself if I don’t correct them with heels? And I say after the departed old hippie: “I wear heels because they give me strength!”
Indeed, we look our best when we feel confident!
“I AM NOT AN IDEAL, NOT PERFECTION, LIKE ALL OF US. IN THIS LIFE NOT EVERYTHING DEPENDS ON ME «
ABOUT. U .: No lover’s compliments will make me feel more confident if I think I’m fatter than a seal. We make ourselves feel insecure. But after all, our self-esteem depends on ourselves, and on it is the signal that we send to the world. And the world responds accordingly to the signal. I wear heels. I am epilating. And a lot of different things to be attractive to yourself. And thus allow everyone else to see the attraction in me. So it’s not about physics at all, but about finding a way to reconcile yourself with yourself. With that inner high school me who is still insecure as hell. Let it be heels or shadows, whatever. They are just a means to feel worthy of the attention of the world.
Can’t do it without them?
ABOUT. U .: You can refuse these devices when you feel that you are equal to yourself even without them. Self-confident. And there will no longer be a need to seduce or seduce anyone. There is no need to flirt at all. Turn the other person into an instrument of your self-affirmation. You don’t need it yourself — you know that you can be appreciated. You know, that’s the right word. Dignity.