More than a diva, she truly looks like a demi-god. Gorgeous, tight in a pretty coral dress Natalie Portman arrived in Rome to present a new film Thor – Love and Thunder. She’s here with her kids, having fun in the pool while she meets the press, smiling all the time. He doesn’t complain about anything, even at 38 degrees in the shade (by the way, whoever doubts climate change, take a ride around the capital). The more you look at him, the more it seems that he came from a parallel universe inhabited by nice, polite, athermic and damn nice people. Part of you has to strain to convince yourself that no, Portman is human and will not throw a hammer at any of us journalists.
If you’ll let me tell you: Marvel could only have chosen her as a worthy successor to Thor.
He says? In my opinion, it was a bold choice.
Why, excuse me?
Well, it takes guts to bet on a 40-year-old 6ft 8in Jewish woman with two kids and turn her into a blond Scandinavian goddess! (yes, as unbelievable as it sounds, Portman is 40 years old, approx.)
Initially, his character was, shall we say, supportive. Now, however, the entire scene has been filmed. A sign of the times?
When I was little, superheroes were women, in fact, she was just one. End: It’s passed into a monastery. However, today there are many more of them, and this is very important, because children need to know superheroes belonging to different genres. At the same Thor Love and Thunder, there are three of us: it’s not just me. So it was a great team game! Expanding the imagination is certainly a step forward, but there’s still a lot of work to be done… let’s just say, while we’re still surprised that a superhero can be a woman, that would mean we’re far from equal!
His Jane is tough, but fragile at the same time.
And that’s exactly what I like about her. It is difficult for me to relate to female figures, which are always very rigid, also because I am not like that. Jane is fragile and in my opinion this makes her more real and … even more feminist!
What was it like working with director Taika Waititi?
The real challenge was to stay serious! Taika has a very strange sense of humor, which is combined with deep feelings at the same time. I think it is very important to look at life with humor like he did, especially in this difficult period when we are being tested by war and Covid. Above all else, Taika has a sense of humor that never fails to respect others: you never laugh at someone else’s expense. In this case, irony becomes a form of intelligence. As for the work on the set, it struck me.
What do you mean?
I love to cook myself a lot. So I studied the story of the Mighty Thor well, I read a lot of material, but as soon as I got on the set, I realized that I should forget about everything, because we improvised a lot. At first it scared me a little, I was afraid that I wouldn’t be able to, then I was correctly pointed out: “Natalie, calm down: we are talking about aliens …”. So I let myself go and rediscovered the deeper meaning of my work, which is play. To say that we were fighting with fake weapons, brandishing them in the air against an imaginary enemy… it was like being a child again. After all, fantasy is the soul of this work.
Among Jane’s mantras is: never stop fighting. How many times did she have to repeat that phrase, even to herself?
I don’t know if I said exactly the same words, but it’s clear that there have been difficult moments in my 30-year career as well, such as in the face of a bad audition, a bad review, or the difficulties of privacy. In such moments, the first reaction is inevitably sadness. But I must say that the moment of self-pity does not last very long. Usually after a while I start thinking, “Oh yeah? Now I’ll show you what I’m capable of!”
Rumor has it that he would like to go into directing: is that so?
I don’t actually have the project finished yet, but I would like to try using my voice in different ways, both in directing and producing. This year I am celebrating 30 years of my career and during that time I have always felt like water in a container that others have modeled. Here, now I would like to give shape to this container. That’s why I opened up to the world of production: I’m working on a series Lady in the lake for AppleTV.
As a director, what topics would you like to cover?
I would like to talk about women’s experience. I read wonderful things written by Italian authors such as Elena Ferrante and Natalia Ginzburg. Here they are definitely a source of inspiration for me.
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Source: Elle