In an interview with the NY Times, Emma Watson talks about how she prepared for her role in Perks of Being a Wallflower and how much she enjoyed the experience. We also get our first still from the movie showing Emma as her character Sam, along with Logan Lerman who plays Charlie. Another photo shows Emma, Logan and Stephen Chbosky on the set.
From Wizards to Wallflowers in the Suburbs
NOBODY ever got through high school without being a little aimless and more than a little dramatic. Not so long ago Emma Watson discovered that for herself.
Ms. Watson was in this leafy suburb of Pittsburgh, a 30-minute drive from the glass-and-steel downtown, filming a movie that’s set at Peters Township High School. Every day she arrived at the sprawling campus, with its swim team and banners promoting reading, to experience the youthful rites that, as the Oxfordshire-bred star of the “Harry Potter” franchise from age 10 to 20, had otherwise eluded her.
“Oh my goodness, so many firsts,” she said, speaking in an excited rush during a break from filming. “I did the prom! We all get dressed up and we go in a limo, and get photographs. It’s been really fun for me to get to graduate. Eating in the school canteen; all these things that I’ve always sort of said to my American friends, ‘Oh, that looks amazing, that looks so fun, I’m jealous.’ And I get to do it for this movie.”
The film, an adaptation of the young-adult novel “The Perks of Being a Wallflower,” a beloved coming-of-age tale published in 1999, will be the next starring role for Ms. Watson, 21, and practically her first that doesn’t involve a cast of wizards and trolls. Though she earned legions of young fans as the plucky Hermione Granger in the “Harry Potter” series (and as the fashion-forward face of several luxury brands), Ms. Watson has never played a regular girl, let alone a suburban American.
Set loosely in the pre-Internet age of the early ’90s, “The Perks of Being a Wallflower,” which is due in theaters next year, is the closest Ms. Watson has come to playing a contemporary character not too far removed from herself, she said. It’s not a grown-up role, but carrying the film — helping get it made at all — is a newfound adult responsibility.
Read the rest of this entry »