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Kristen on the 'Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon'

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Nylon Magazine September 2015 Issue

What’s it like being with Kristen Stewart in public? Imagine walking around with a jaguar that everyone wants to stare at and pet, even though they know they’re supposed to be cool—even when a big, rare cat is all up in their coffee spot. Problem is, no one can be totally chill around the actress. Not even Stewart herself. 

Excruciatingly aware of her fame, Stewart the Global Movie Star orders an almond milk latte at her favorite Echo Park café in a manner best described as awkward-charm offense. She chats with the barista about the café’s latest expansion, yadda yadda yadda, while nervously raking her hands through her choppy bob. Stewart’s chatter isn’t the most natural thing in the world, but its tacit message is clear: See, I’m a nice, regular person. Tell all your friends!

Walking through the outside patio is hardly better. Anyone who isn’t buried in her laptop recognizes That Girl From Twilight. A few whisper or drink her in greedily before looking away, but it hardly matters. The charge is in the air. Stewart’s body is tense, her eyes cast down until she flops into a seat in the most remote corner, an amused, near-exasperated expression on her face.

“I really wish I could not be fucking recognizable,” she says in a low voice. “It’s so annoying. I fucking hate people looking at me when all I want to do is look back at them.”

Stewart swears exuberantly and often, fueled by something closer to joy than aggression, in a way that acknowledges the fizzing Roman candle that is life. She’s also direct in what she says, sometimes blunt, but it never feels mean, even when she says, “That’s not something I would ever talk to the fucking public about—that’s crazy,” regarding whether she’s still in contact with her ex-boyfriend/Twilight franchise co-star Robert Pattinson. Instead, she comes across as honest—bridge-burningly, disarmingly honest—which is why her friends, fans, and the tabloids love her.

Her uncompromising sense of authenticity is also why Stewart is repeatedly cast in roles that require her to say what others can’t or won’t say (see: the sensitive daughter who won’t promise college to her dying mother in Still Alice, or the assistant who calls out the snobbery of her charge, Juliette Binoche’s grand dame of the theater, in Clouds of Sils Maria). She’ll occupy another such role in Ang Lee’s Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk, out next year, as the titular character’s sister who opposes the Iraq War: “He comes back a changed person and she doesn’t recognize her brother. I’m the one thing trying to keep him home, the one clear perspective on the other side in the whole movie.”

In American Ultra, out now, her character is less contrarian, but just as emotionally explicit. “I’m always fucking terrified before every role,” she says. “Even if it’s fun and stupid or whatever. American Ultra is a stoner comedy, but it was physically strenuous, and to try and tell such an absurd story but keep it grounded so people will believe it is really hard.”

Riley Keough, who first met Stewart when they were in The Runaways together, breaks down Stewart’s fiery allure this way: “She just doesn’t give a fuck. She courageously exposes herself because she loves the art. And I think she understands what comes along with that. There’s not one part of that girl that’s caught up in Hollywood or cares about the opinions of others or whatever else, and I’ve probably met three people like that in my life.”

Stewart’s not about to let fame turn her into a weirdo who can’t connect anymore, who only speaks in PR-approved statements—especially when it comes to her sexuality and relationships. But what Stewart, now 25, will share and won’t share is a fascinating algorithm she’s honed over time. She refuses to offer up her life for tabloid sport, but she’s also not afraid to be raw and open.

Take the beginning of our day, for instance. For several hours, all I know is that Stewart is coming to pick me up at 2 p.m. We have no set plans because she rejected all previously offered suggestions: roller derby, guitar lessons, etc. Around 2:15, she calls from an unblocked number to say she’s outside. In today’s PR-choke-hold era, a star of Stewart’s wattage would usually be delivered to a neutral meeting place, no contact info exchanged, but aside from her longtime publicist setting the date and time, Stewart skipped those formalities.

Instead, she lets me crawl into her rough-and-tumble SUV, which is loaded up with trash bags filled with swag, earmarked for Goodwill.

“I get sent a lot of stuff,” says Stewart, alluding to the fact that she can boost a fashion career by wearing something once in front of the cameras. Peeking out of one bag is a pair of wedge sneakers with a graphic pattern that seems too, um, much for Stewart. Dressed in faded Levi’s, white Vans, and a vintage skateboarding T-shirt, her style is more skate-shop employee with a medical marijuana card. A chunky silver link chain with a miniature padlock adorns her neck. Flecks of navy eyeliner rim her hazel eyes, giving her a sexy slept-in look.

“I’m a skater,” says Stewart, citing her preferred mode of transport to school while growing up in the San Fernando Valley. “I’m not a hard-core skater chick—I can skate on the street, but I don’t like to trick shit out. Skating around downtown might be my happy place.”

But for our interview, she’s not up for what she teasingly calls “activities.” She wants to talk, so we set off for her favorite coffee shop, some 10 minutes away from her home east of Hollywood.

On her own time, Stewart’s got nothing against a lazy Sunday—as long as it has a touch of aggression. Growing up with three brothers gave her a fierce competitive edge. As the lone female, “I wasn’t treated better and I wasn’t treated worse,” she says. “I really was one of the boys. I think there’s an ambition that’s probably innately drilled into me.”

In short: “I like to win shit,” she says, flashing a rare full smile. “I love games of all kinds,” but billiards, Frisbee, and playing with her two dogs rank high. 

Hunger Games star Josh Hutcherson, who acted with Stewart in Zathura when he was just 12 years old, says Stewart’s never lost her sense of fun: “She’s been faced with a lot of big things in her life, but she hasn’t changed. She’s still the same carefree, cool girl.” 

Her tomboy spirit is why she clicks with like-minded musicians such as Patti Smith, who once came up to Stewart at an On the Road party to offer support with the words, “Your people are here for you,” and Joan Jett, whom Stewart portrayed in The Runaways. Stewart still laughs thinking of Jett’s primal guitar lessons: “If I wasn’t fully feeling it, she’d walk to the end of whatever set or stage I was on and be like, ‘Kristen, pussy to the wood!’”

Stewart also cleans up nicely, which is how she came to be Chanel’s unlikely muse. “I really like tapping into unexplored aspects of myself; obviously, that’s what I do,” she says. “Clothes can seriously do that, but you don’t want your clothes to wear you. So often I’m like, ‘Oh man, that is going to own my ass.’” Luckily, Karl Lagerfeld gives his muse full license to play: “He lets me chop dresses, he lets me steal a belt from that dress and wrap it around another.... I’m really into the performance aspect of it, but I still have to make it my own. I don’t want to feel like I’m wearing a costume.”

At the café, once the patrons have forgotten Stewart’s here, talk inevitably turns to the latest tabloid storm brewing in the star’s life. A few days ago, Kristen’s mother, Jules Stewart, confirmed to the Sunday Mirror that her daughter is in a relationship with Alicia Cargile, a visual effects producer. In the interview, ostensibly about Jules’s charity work with wolves, she said: “I’ve met Kristen’s new girlfriend, I like her,” and “I feel like people need to be free to love whoever they want. I accept my daughter loves women and men.”

Enter a parade of think pieces, photo galleries parsing Stewart’s androgynous wardrobe, and the re-emergence of the unfortunate portmanteau “Krisbian,” designated for fans who’d “go lesbian” just for their beloved.

Perhaps more than any other star of her generation, Stewart’s relationship to the gossip machine is tempestuous, to put it lightly, and it underscores the monstrosity of the 24-hour news cycle. “It’s funny when older actors are like, ‘Just give them a smile.’ I’m like, ‘You have no idea what you’re talking about, but thanks!’ It must’ve been awesome without the Internet.” 

She’s fully aware that every twist in her love life is feverishly documented whether she cooperates or not: “It’s like I’m involved in a weekly comic book. I have this assigned personality...which I helped create, I suppose. People stand to make a lot of money on people like me—it’s this booming industry, so why would you go and change the character that people are paying for?”

But her character is changing, because, after all, she’s 25. Is she ready right now to make any big pronouncements about her sexuality? 

Yes...

“Google me, I’m not hiding.”

...And no: “If you feel like you really want to define yourself, and you have the ability to articulate those parameters and that in itself defines you, then do it. But I am an actress, man. I live in the fucking ambiguity of this life and I love it. I don’t feel like it would be true for me to be like, ‘I’m coming out!’ No, I do a job. Until I decide that I’m starting a foundation or that I have some perspective or opinion that other people should be receiving…I don’t. I’m just a kid making movies.”

That’s not all there is, though, to Stewart’s reluctance to categorize her sexuality. She also believes in fluidity, the kind that prompted Miley Cyrus to say to Paper magazine recently that she’s “literally open to every single thing that is consenting.” 

Stewart adds, “I think in three or four years, there are going to be a whole lot more people who don’t think it’s necessary to figure out if you’re gay or straight. It’s like, just do your thing.”

She’s the first to admit that during her early Twilight years, she didn’t have her boundaries figured out—not sexually, but with the press. “There must’ve been so many reporters who would sit in front of me and think, ‘This kid is going to break down.’ I’m sure that I’ve made people so uncomfortable.” Back then, when faced with a tough question, Stewart would “either get pissed off or all of a sudden be thrown.”

Now she’s found her own way of responding fully but enigmatically: “I’ve worked really hard at feeling free and open while not selling it, or helping someone else sell it.”

Above all the chatter and feedback, Stewart focuses on her work. That’s what sustains her, and she’s planted her roots deep in the industry. “I’m sure that I can keep working,” she says. “Positive. There’s really not a whole lot that I could do right now to fuck it up for myself.” 

Her American Ultra co-star and good friend Jesse Eisenberg backs up her confidence: “She’s one of the actors consistently working who you know will make things good. Out of all of the attributes that she has—her sense of humor, her willingness to embrace the tone of the project—there’s also this healthy form of self-awareness, to understand what the story needs, what the big picture is, and the value of your place in it. It’s rare for someone as well known as her to be so humble. She’s not overshadowing the story; she’d prefer to hide in the role than show off.”

For any doubters who remain, Stewart’s full slate of coming attractions should prove her range. She can’t say much about her role in a new Woody Allen project, also with Eisenberg, but she promises that “it’s a stretch, to say the least.” 

As an actress, she gets to indulge her curiosity—unlike at the café, where she stays hidden until we leave, not daring to lock eyes with anyone. Afterwards, we walk to an artsy curio shop and boutique grocery store, where once again she keeps her head down and chats self-consciously with the cashier while buying some ghee. Trailed by whispers everywhere we go, Stewart transforms into a protective animal, subtly checking her territory for interlopers until we’re safely ensconced in her car again. “This is why I barely ever go shopping,” she says with a sigh as she starts the engine.

On screen, there is an escape: She gets to stare at and into whatever person she chooses. “In order for me to feel compelled to step off the ledge into a role, it needs to feel like it predates me.... I have to be like, ‘If I don’t do this right, I could potentially eliminate it from existing, and I’d be doing it a disservice.’” 

That said, she’s not scared to fuck up. “Mistakes are cool, even if they’re hard,” she says. “I’m down to make myself uncomfortable. I’m OK with that.”

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Kristen Stewart Is ELLE’s September Cover Star

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Transcript

Rule Breaker

You take one A-list Rebel and you add another. Cult actress and singer, Juliette Lewis interviews Kristen Stewart.

Have you ever seen Kristen Stewart take a selfie? The answer to that question speaks  volumes. She’s the only millennial A-lister who has built her career entirely on being a mysterious, kickass brand of cool. In a sea of giddy-all-access-granted starlets, Stewart has the mysterious persona of a rock star- much like the Joan Jetts, Kim Gordons and Patti Smiths of the world.

At 18, she became the most famous actress on earth for playing an angsty, lip-biting teenager who falls in love with a vampire. As Bella Swan, the central part of the $8 million per film (there were five).

For most actresses, this kind of box office win would be a blessing and a curse. It can be hard to escape such a definig role. And a lesser actress would have been stuck in tween hell forever. Not Stewart. She broke the mould, and then every rule, to find her cool.

She chose the indie parts more akin to Hollywood rebel- Joan Jett in The Runaways, wild child Marylou in Walet Salles’ adaptation of Jack Kerouac’s On the Road and Julianne Moore’s sulky daughter in last year’s harrowing Still Alice. And she worked with the most rarefied of fashion houses, Balenciaga and Chanel. Now there’s her lates, American Ultra, an offbeat action thriller centred on two stoners, played by Stewart and her Adventureland co-star Jesse Eisenberg.

In many ways, Juliette Lewis, a fellow Los Angeles native who understands what it’s like to reluctantly grow up in the spotlight, was the Kristen Stewart of her time. She received an Oscar nomination for Cape Fear at 18, then she went on to star in critically adored films such as Oliver Stone’s Natural Born Killers and Quentin Tarantino’s From Dusk till Dawn. And Lewis too dated the big star, Brad Pit being to 1990 what Robert Pattinson was to 2010. But she rebelled- and found new life with her band Juliette and the Licks.

After first meeting on set 13 years ago, the two reunited in Lewis’ LA home to discuss refusing to compromise and the power in ‘keeping it dangerous.’ ELLE listened in.

JULIETTE: I’m just going to introduce Teddy, my dog, on this tape, he is smelling Kristen. He usually doesn’t approach people [ he doesn’t know] right away, but he’s being really nice to her.

KRISTEN: I can’t take any credit for that. I have three dogs.

J: Are you a dog person, or a cat person?

K: Well, I have three dogs [ Bear, Bernie and Cole]. They make me feel safe. But I love cats too. I had a cat for a while who I was really obsessed with, but when my dad, John, got cancer, he took him, and I didn’t really have the heart to take him back when my dad was better. They’d become so close.

J: You have the same energy from when I worked with you 13 years ago [ on the set of Cold Creek Manor].

K: I thought you were so cool when I was a kid.

J: You have a distinct voice. Not just in the way you talk, but in your nature- it’s empowering. O’m just going to be goofy and say you’re the female James Dean.

K: Oh, f*uck you.

J: But you’re actually a little bit rougher. Like if you and James Dean got in a fight, I feel you might win. I think you’re a srapper. You could throw a punch.

K: I like to make people think that. I don’t know if I actually could. But if it came down to it, and someone was actually like “We’re doing this”, I’m confident I’d want it more. I’d be like, “You’re going down. There’s no way in hell I am.”

J: You and I have a certain thing in common and that is our strength. I’ve had a lot of people think I’m really strong, and talking to you, well, you come off really strong. [ A person] wouldn’t’ want to f*uck with you. But I feel like people who are strong on the outside have a lot of softness, too.

K: You actually sound like you’re describing Joan Jett. Getting to know her was the most interesting thing for me- I was fully intimidated, and totally ready to prove to her that I could absolutely step into her shoes and I could f*ucking take it. She is very prescious.

J: Was The Runaways a real turning pont for you?

K: Playing someone who you really respect- I don’t want to say idolize, because it’s an overused word – is a big deal. There is something fundamental about Joan Jett. Meeting her, she is such a good person, so I couldn’t have asked for a larger fire to be lit up my ass. I was in the middle of doing the Twilight movies and doing five of those back to back was so crazy that I was willing to just bust my ass to do things in between.

J: The Twilight movies were such a huge part of your life. I think we’re a good combination to talk today, because you too don’t walk the easy way. The easy path for someone like you would be to do Twilight, then others where you trade on your look, and do love stories that make everyone weep. But you intuitively knew: “I have to find a weird. I have to grow. I have to make sure I’m not shackled to this system or what it predicts for me. “How does that happen?

K: I grew up in LA and I started auditioning when I was nine.  My mom, Jules,was a script supervisor and my dad did live TV, he was an assistant director. So when I first started acting,I just wanted to be in the crew. But I ended up auditioning for stiff and was turned away from anything remotely commercial.I got indie after indie- and all the weird,quirky stuff.And then Twilight came along.We didn't know we were going to do more than one film,but Catherine Hardwicke was directing and I was like, 'This is cool actually.' Then it just turned into something completely different.But it was never decided: 'Right, I'm going to balance the commercialism of my career.'


J: Not to make it seem like we're twinsies,but my dad is a character actor and so I also grew up on movie sets.Do you think now,with social media and people creating their own art,is a good time for film?

K: It's hard for me to talk about how difficult it is to get good movies made because I've been asked to participate in the sickest stuff.But I do fully recognise thatbeveryone is so obsessed with making money and the nobody's willing to make a movie unless it absolutely equals to dollar signs.

J: What about your new film American Ultra?I want to know all about it.

K: It's a stoner-comedy-love-story-thriller-actiono movie.It's like a violent in-your-face Bourne film,but with Jesse Eisenberg and me getting incredibly high.

J: You threw me with thriller.What a great clash of genres.It sounds ambitious and that's the only way to go.There are people whose job it is to just sex boxes of Raisinets(chocolate-covered raisins) at the cinema.

K: I actually think we're going to sell out of Raisinets on this film.This is the first time I've ever done something where I was like 'There's no reason why this should not make a lot of money.' Usually I finish a movie and I'm like 'Oh god,what if no one ever wants to see this?'

J: Here's what I want to tell the people reading this, who have not experienced It. There's a thing with women who become famous where they lose their anonymity and start to think, 'Do I have to please you?' I've now learned that I don't always have to.And so when photographers approach me in the airport at 7am, I'm like 'Dude,would you want to get your picture taken at 7am at the airport?' But I'll say it with a smile.It's been a big learning curve,but you can say no kindly.

K: Totally.There's something so natural about saying yes.I think with women there's some natural inclination to want to satisfy people.

J: I actually don't look at anything in the press.For me it's all books,music,people and living life.I had to get out of that judgment place.My social media world is where I get that connectivity, and I find it really beautiful.

K: I agree with you.I'm not anti social media,I just haven't decided to do it.I have Instagram to connect with my friends but the idea of addressing such a massive group on social media?I can barely do a televised interview.I know how to talk to you now, and when I sit in a chair in front of Jimmy Kimmel,I know how to talk to him.But I have to zone in on Jim,because if I don't know who I'm speaking to it doesn't make any f*cking sense to me.

J: I've read little bits of horsesh*it about you I'm the press,where people are judging you about the whole not smiling thing.You should never have to defend yourself,but what I love about you is that you have am uncompromising nature,but you're not an asshole.

K: The whole smiling thin is weird because I actually smile a lot.I literally want to be like 'Dude, you would think I was so cool if you got to know me!' But so many people make so much money off these character traits that they have assigned me, and so many articles are written every single day about them,if they change my character it wouldn't make sense.

J: It's almost like they will get pictures that will feed into that.I get fearful of people who are plastic and are perfectly fitted for this public culture,likepoliticians.To me,that's scary.K: I'm not a politician.People think that they have to do it,it's as if there providing a public service.But you don't have to,you just have to do your job.J: What about close childhood friends? Do you have any left?

K: I have a bunch actually.I have five or six.There's a small group of us who have known each other forever.


J: I find the hardest thing is how others deal with fame. Some people want to protect you. Some people get agitated and a few show some odd colours that you didn’t know were there and that’s their reaction to fame. Were there shifts? Did you have a change in your group dynamic? I’ve never dealt with that level of idolizing, like when people see you so firmly as something and you made them feel and put all their hopes and dreams on you.

Kristen X Juliette

Born…

K:  1990, in LA

J: 1973, in LA

Thei dogs’ names:

K: Bear, Bernie and Cole

J: Teddy

Breakout roles:

K: Twilight J: Cape Fear

Workout choice

K: Swimming J: Weight training

High-profile parts

K: Snow White in Snow White and the Huntsman

J: Johnny Depp’s love interest in What’s Eating Gilbert Grape

Most desired skills

K: Dancing J: Karate

The Kristen files

Typical breakfast:

“ I’m the least habitual person. And I’m not a huge breakfast person. I started making chia-seed pudding, which sounds ridiculous but it’s rad because it’s so good.

Favourite book:

“East of Eden” by John Steinbeck. I’ll read that a bunch of times before I die.”

Worst dream:

‘ I sometimes dream that I’m in an expansive, ambiguous place and I’m alone. At first, I’m comfortable because I know that no one’s there, but when I start looking around, I realize that I don’t know where I am and all of a sudden, “ Oh, sh*t!”

Exercise of choice:

“I have a lap pool in my back yard. Physical exertion is the best way to reset my mind.”

Last meal:

“I don’t have a speciality, but I like to make fillet steak. I love to cook, but no one taught me how. It just makes sense to me. I watch a lot of Food Network>”

Best ever advice:

“ Patii [ Smith] said to take care of my teeth and my lungs…”

K: Because I got really, really famous in literally a day, it was a bit like, “ What the f*uck?” Everyone was graduating high school and I stopped going, so I kinda fell out of touch with the group. I was ust with my boyfriend all the time.  But then I made a really conscious effort of gathering them and being like, “I need you.” Now they are really awesome they’re all really protective.

J: That’s nice. It sounds like you knew you needed to nurture the friendship foundation rather than get isolated and pull away from it. Instead you gravitated towards it. How do you let off steam? Do you like to go to raging dance parties? That’s how I like to do it.

K: I play guitar.

J: Damn! You’re cooler than me. I just couldn’t get into the fingering. Did you learn guitar from The Runaways?

K: I started playing when I was younger. My dad played, so I was lucky to learn basic chords when I was little, and obviously I sit in trailers and have time to practice.

J: Do you use it to relax?

K: I love playing guitar, but it doesn’t relax me. It drives me crazy. I’m like “Ah, no, that’s not what I wanted to play.” I have no rhythm either. But I love it.

J: What skill you wish you could have? I want to learn to fight. I wish I continued with karate when I was little.

K: I think the most far-fetched thing is if I could something like be a f*ucking great dancer.

J: Are you talking hip-hop, street dancing, breakdancing or ballet?

K: I don’t want to be a professional dancer. I just want to be able to out on the dance floor and be sick. I want the ability to allow my body to move. I just want to tear that sh*t up. I’d also like to speak French, because I have a lot of French friends and then I’d be able to have conversations with them.

J: Well, the good news is, as long as we’re here, we can do it all: we’ve got time. So you’re wearing a Dwarves band T-shirt. My first guitar played in my band was a guy named Clint who was in the Dwarves.

K: That’s weird, because I looked at this T-shirt this morning and I was like “I don’t know this band, so is it f*cked up to wear it?”

J: It’s a cool top. You know he have to dress up, but do you feel you have found your own style? Do you have designers you gravitate towards?

K: I mean, I work with Chanel. But generally speaking there are a couple of designers I’ve always liked: Nicolas Ghesquiere is someone I’m a huge fan of. Fashion can be fun, I get inspired by it. I like being around anyone who’s compulsively making things.

J:  Who is a mentor of yours? Mine is Amy Schumer. I love her. She’s like “ Girl you just need to quit saying sorry so much”. I’m playing a detective in a series called Secrets and Lies and she doesn’t say , “I’m sorry, I just need 10 minutes of your time”. She has no social niceties whatsoever. And I respect that.

K: I apologise constantly, incessantly. As for mentors, I admire my mom, she has always been a worker.

J:  I love how you say “worker”.

K: The women that I’ve always been been drawn to are those who are unable to focus on things that don’t matter because they’re so taken with their interests and the things they like to create. Patti Smith is a friend of mine and her whole thing is “Just get back to work”. Find the source of what’s keeping you going and it’ll focus you.

J: How did you become friends with her?

K: We were in the Boom Boom Room [ in New York] for a movie’s after-party, I think it was for On the Road. I was kind of in a f*cked place and she came up and said “Hey, you doing OK?” She was like, “I just want you to know that your people care about you, that we’re here for you, and I’m your people.” And we kind of stayed in contact. Then I was in New York again and she walked up to me at another after party- it had been a long time since we’d talked- and she said, “It’s full moon tonight and I heard that you were in town, so I came out to find you and here you are!” And I was like, “You’ve got to stop saying the coolest things ever!”

J: She’s like your Yoda, which is fantastic. She’s one of the greatest writers ever. She is the most uncompromising, the most radical, the most fearless. She walks her walk and nothing else influences that. I’m so glad we have her. So in the spirit of Patti Smith and all renegades, I say, “Keep it dangerous”, and “Don’t let fear swallow you”. That the message. Goodbye

Big thank you to @ShadesOfRK_

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Kristen Stewart & Jesse Eisenberg Hotbox The Stoner Talk Show | After Hours | MTV News

Full Interview from the August Issue of Marie Claire US

It is a humid dusk in midtown Atlanta, and Kristen Stewart is perched on a too-tall bar stool at Saltwood Charcuterie & Bar in the Loews Hotel, her petite legs swinging free as she talks about girl prison. Not a literal Orange is the New Black penitentiary – more the psychological and social incarceration all women feel at various points in their lives, when we are expected to smile, please, endure, accept, be grateful, acquiesce, apologize, bend over, be happy.

Stewart, 25, knows all about girl prison: how a woman can be punished for not falling in line, for not reflecting what the culture deems she should, for not being , “I believe the operative words are, accessible, easy and uncomplicated,” she says with an exaggerated roll of her eyes.

Stewart, in town filming Ang Lee’s military drama Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk, is not, and has never been, any of those things. She spent years being taken to task for striking doleful poses on the red carpet, or not shining in talk-show settings, or daring to have desires beyond those the public prescribed to her because they believed they had the right to shape her persona since she was a young girl in a series of blockbuster films based on best-selling books. Finally, she decided to embrace the rebel labels thrown her way and say, “Fuck it all!”

“I lit my universe on fire”, she admits with a sly smile, “and I watched it burn”. Stewart drops her head, tugs at the hem of her simple black sweatshirt.Fans away a mosquito. Yanks a fallen tube sock from its cotton pool in her Converse sneaker. “Speaking very candidly”, she says at last, lifting her chin and swallowing a gulp of her vodka tonic, “it was a really traumatic period in my early 20’s that kick-started something in me that was a bit more,” she pauses, then settles on the word, “feral.”

She opts not to elaborate, and she needn’t bother. Public scrutiny of her personal life is unrelenting, the details unpacked and pecked over in the media like so much birdseed. At its height, when the tabloids wreaked particular havoc on her longtime relationship in 2012, she issued a heartfelt  mea culpa, but falling on her sword did little to placate the masses, and Stewart seems unlikely to go that route in the future. “Women are always saying they are sorry. I do it all the time. We have that nnate desire to please,” she says.

Just as in the Amy Schumer skit where an assembled panel of female geniuses do nothing but apologize for their every breath, Stewart understands the tug of wanting to seem generous even as it hastens your own abnegation.

“It’s weird because that instinct is what makes us awesome and admirable,” she explains. “Women hold us all together. But it sucks that what makes us worth our weight is what gets n our way” She sighs. “Lately, I’ve been doing less of the [ assumes whiny cry voice] “I’m sooooo sorry.” And more of the [ drops several octaves] “No. Fuck. Jesus.”

Stewart takes another swig of her cocktail, the liberation of leaving her old self behind a heady thing to contemplate. The public kind of burned me at the stake,” she says. “But that’s OK, I can take it. I’m not dead”

The actress grew up in the heart of Woodland Hills, California, with free-spirited parents in the business ( her father is a stage manager and producer, her mother is a script supervisor and director) and three brothes. She was fiercely competitive even as a child, gravitating toward track, soccer, basketball – any outlet for the “kinetic energy I’ve had most of my life.”

She recalls an incident in middle school when her coiled physicality served her well. “There was this girl, and she would do this thing where she would grab girls by their hair and flip them. This one time, she was totally approaching our group and I was like, ‘NO! You wanna fucking do this?’ Thinking, I’m never going to be able to back this up.” Stewart laughs. “I was a midget. I had short man’s complex. And I definitely felt I had to protect my fellow tiny girl who didn’t have as much punch as me. But actually, it did end things.”

A self-described tomboy through middle school, the fresh-faced, fashion-ambivalent Stewart struggled after she turned 13 and “all of a sudden, it wasn’t cool to be one of the boys anymore.” She’s never forgotten a particularly rough adolescent moment when a male friend announced, “loudly, in front of our whole group, ‘ Kristen’s not a girl. What is she?’ And I just died. It was a totally clichéd, very real insecure breakdown moment, when I was like, I fucking hate myself”

Stewart winces at the memory. “So many people say, ‘Oh it must have been so easy for you.’ You think because I’m an actor that I didn’t have a normal progression of self-hatred?”

“I HAVE AMAZING RADAR FOR A CERTAIN KIND OF BULLSHIT.”

That same I-hate-myself year, she formally left school to build her career ( she had started with a nonspeaking TV role at the age of 9), coming of age before our eyes in films like Panic Room and the Twilight series. “I was 17 doing Twilight. It was the first time I travelled alone. I was like, Finally”. She relished the autonomy because she never felt like a kid in the first place: “When I was younger, I really wanted to be with the adults, to be addressed as a grown-up. I was the most open, forthcoming, confident little kid. I’m still trying to get back to that.”

Precocious, she resented any form of coddling. “ I have always been like, I’m fine, I’m fine, way before I was.” In retrospect, she might have handled things that bothered her differently. “There were things that I didn’t tell my mom when I was like 5 that if I had just gone, ‘ I’m so freaked out about this,’ she could’ve been like, ‘ Don’t be, that’s not a big deal.’ And I would’ve been like, ‘ Oh, gotcha.’ I’m gonna be urging my kids, ‘Tell me what happened, talk to me.’ Knoowing that there could be one thing that I could so easily take care of for them but they just need to tell you.”

Through her “ goal was never to be hugely successful in terms of money and recognition,” her teenage work cannon-shot Stewart on the A-list. With global success and exposure came a whole new level of bullying and shaming.

“When I first met Kristen, we were doing New Moon,” recalls actress Dakota Fanning, who also played musician Cherie Currie to Stewart’s Joan Jett in 2010’s The Runaways. “Everyone gets picked on and misunderstood. But it’s on such a big scale with Kristen. Back then, it was perceived that she didn’t care. But knowing her, I knew she cared so much. It upset her, people thinking they new who she was.”

“Between ages 15 and 20, it was really intense,” Stewart seconds. “I was constantly anxious. I was kind of a control freak. If I didn’t know how something was going to turn out, I would make myself ill, or just be locked up or inhbited in a way that was really debilitating.”

She utters the last word with exasperation and explains she is only just now, after 16 years in the business, learning to manage the speding train of her brain, to erect healthy emotional boundaries, to know what she doesn’t know.

“At one point, you just let go and give yourself to your life. I have finally managed that and I get so much more out of life,” she says. “I’ve lived hard for such a young person, and I’ve done that to myself – but I’ve come out the other ends not hardened but strong.  I have an ability to persevere that I didn’t have before. It’s like when you fall on your face so hard.” She claps her hands together. Smack! “And the next time, you’re like, Yeah, so? I’ve fallen on my face before.”

“The thing about Kristen is, whatever she does, she lives it, eats it, sleeps it,” explains Fanning. “It’s never, ‘Oh, that might be cool.’ She is all in.”

With her latest film, this month’s American Ultra, a cartoon- violent stoner crime caper directed by Nima Nourizadeh ( Project X) and costarring Jesse Eisenberg, Stewart brings her trademark intensity to comedy for the first time. She’s not worried about being funny so much as celebrating that “ this is the first film that I’ve done in a long time that’s just fucking fun.”

Eisenberg has known Stewart since she was 17, when the two were cast in 2009’s theme-park dramedy Adventureland. “Kristen is more self-aware that most people you’ll meet, regardless of age,” he says. “She’s in a profession where you are made to question yourself, women more than men. She’s always been very intuitive. We share dismissal of pretentiousness. And we both take what we do very seriously.”

Those she is trying to wean gratuitous drama from her world, Stewart hasn’t entirely abandoned her emo underbelly. She still reads and writes poetry. She still weeps when she listens to Van Morrison. “I used to be embarrassed about how I cry all the time,” she says. “Now I think it’s a gift to feel things.”

While it still irks her to be misunderstood – “I’m always saying shit I don’t mean. Like, Oh, God, that came out wrong. That sounded dumb” – Stewart has reached a sort of peace with her public image. More critically, she has reached a peace with herself.

“I needed to be slapped down few times to learn that lesson. But I wouldn’t trade it, to be honest,” she says, smiling. “I’m really proud that I am able to move forward and not fall into every mental crater. That’s a new thing for me. Age has made me smarter and calmer. And it’s fucking awesome.”

Her dinner finished, Stewart gazes at the Atlanta skyline. She flicks her current wave, sewn in for Billy Lynn, off her forehead with some annoyance. In the film, based on the novel by Ben Fountain, she plays the sister of Iraq veteran Billy Lynn ( newcomer Joe Alwyn), who’s on a victory tour back home in Texas.

“I cut my hair off when I turned 23,” she says. “The effect was astounding.” When asked to elaborate, her words can’t come quickly enough. “My hair was such a crutch. I looked quote unquote ‘sexy’ no matter what. I could hide behind it. As soon as I didn’t have all that hair, I had to let my face hang out. I felt more confident than I had in a really long time. And it felt really good. I t was like not having your Iphone for a couple months. It was the same feeling of release. It sounds so obvious, but it’s like the hair really did make me feel like a ‘ real girl.’ Like I’m pretty, I’m feminine. I don’t know why I valued that so much, as if that’s something to prove.”

Stewart takes a fortifying breath, presses on. “Every single guy in my life, men that I respect,” she says, pointing to her extensions, “are telling me, ‘God, Kristen, you look great right now.’ It’s like, Wow.

“Maybe to most people long hair is prettier,” she concedes. “But then what? Is your main goal in life to be desired? That is boring as fuck.”

It’s getting late and Stewart has an early call in the morning. And she slides off her bar stool, a palmetto bug skitters past her heel. She jolts, then peers at the thumb-long insect, tilting her head for closer inspection. “We don’t get roaches that big in California,” she marvels. A waitress approaches and inquires if Stewart is going to “stomp it dead?”

“Oh, no,” Stewart gasps, brow knit. “I mean, why would I?” Instead, she gently brushes it to the side with the toe of her shoe. Then she straightens and strides past, not bothering to look behind her.

Choice words:

On Responsibilities: “My plate is never clear. I do like pressure. I’m constantly putting myself in just the most unbelievably uncomfortable situations to see if I can get through them.”

On playing pretend: “I feel like that’s the only way that I’m good at anything. I’m a pretty good golfer. I just do the best impression of Tiger Woods that I can, and all of a sudden, my swing is dead straight.”

On the best advice she’s received: “Patti Smith told me to always take care of my teeth and lungs.”

On her idea oh Hell: “A dinner party with the wrong people. The airport, which sucks, because it used to be one of my favourite places in the world to sit and people-watch.”

On songwriting: “I play guitar and the drums, but I haven’t combined the whole poetry and music thing. I think I’m just intimidated and if I don’t do something really well, I don’t want to do it.”

On who she envies: “I am so envious of people who dance. I was in a drag bar in Seoul with Isabelle Huppert, who danced. I didn’t. And I was like, Get your ass up. Dance. I just couldn’t.”

Source

Kristen on the August Issue of Marie Claire

 

 

It is a humid dusk in midtown Atlanta, and Kristen Stewart is perched on a too-tall bar stool at Saltwood Charcuterie & Bar in the Loews Hotel, her petite legs swinging free as she talks about girl prison. Not a literal Orange Is the New Black penitentiary—more the psychological and social incarceration all women feel at various points in their lives, when we are expected to smile, please, endure, accept, be grateful, acquiesce, apologize, bend over, be happy. Stewart, 25, knows all about girl prison: how a woman can be punished for not falling in line, for not reflecting what the culture deems she should, for not being, "I believe the operative words are, accessible, easy, and uncomplicated," she says with an exaggerated roll of her eyes.

Stewart, in town filming Ang Lee's military drama Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk, is not, and has never been, any of those things. She spent years being taken to task for striking doleful poses on the red carpet, or not shining in talk-show settings, or daring to have desires beyond those the public prescribed to her because they believed they had the right to shape her persona since she was a young girl in a series of blockbuster films based on best-selling books. Finally, she decided to embrace the rebel labels thrown her way and say, "Fuck it all!"

"I lit my universe on fire," she admits with a sly smile, "and I watched it burn." Stewart drops her head, tugs at the hem of her simple black sweatshirt. Fans away a mosquito. Yanks a fallen tube sock from its cotton pool in her Converse sneaker. "Speaking very candidly," she says at last, lifting her chin and swallowing a gulp of her vodka tonic, "it was a really traumatic period in my early 20s that kick-started something in me that was a bit more," she pauses, then settles on the word, "feral."

On reaching peace with her public image: "I'm really proud that I am able to move forward and not fall into every mental crater. That's a new thing for me. Age has made me smarter and calmer. And it is fucking awesome."

"Age has made me smarter and calmer. And it is fucking awesome."

On her appearance and cutting her hair: "My hair was such a crutch. I looked quote unquote 'sexy' no matter what. I could hide behind it. As soon as I didn't have all that hair, I had to let my face hang out. I felt more confident than I had in a really long time. And it felt really good. Maybe to most people long hair is prettier. But then what? Is your main goal in life to be desired? That is boring as fuck."

On apologizing: "Lately, I've been doing less of the 'I'm sooooo sorry.' And more of the 'No. Fuck. Jesus.'"

On the best advice she's received: "Patti Smith told me to always take care of my teeth and lungs."

On her success at a young age: "Between ages 15 and 20, it was really intense. I was constantly anxious. I was kind of a control freak. If I didn't know how something was going to turn out, I would make myself ill, or just be locked up or inhibited in a way that was really debilitating."