interview

Elizabeth Olsen covers the latest issue of Elle Canada. I’m not loving the editorial, but that’s mostly because I don’t think Olsen was well-served by the magazine’s stylists. In my opinion, she looks better in very clean styles and more natural, barely-there makeup. Elle Canada overloaded her with boho clothes and pink lipstick. As for the interview, she comes across a bit better in this piece than she did in her recent Times Style magazine piece. But there’s still something that bugs me: it’s a feeling of “are you really as famous as you think you are?” The way she complains about the paparazzi and the lengths she goes to in maintaining her “privacy,” you’d think she was Angelina Jolie or, hell, Blake Lively. It just doesn’t seem to match up to Olsen’s actual level of fame. Although, to be fair to her, she’s been dealing with crazy Tom Hiddleston-fans for more than a year, so maybe she does need to be careful. You can read the full interview here. Some highlights: She wants to be low-key: “A lot of the time in my life, I try not to take up space—I just want to disappear into a wall. And then eventually, when I’m around people I feel confident with, I’ll take up more space.” Moving between Marvel films & indies: “The only thing I care about is if the team is great, the script is good and the character is someone I can connect to in my gut. After that, it’s just a fun f–king job. I don’t have any regrets—I was just so happy to be working—but I was forcing myself not to give power to ‘the system.’ But the system does have power, and I’ve learned how to use it. It’s smarter than to ignore it.” She doesn’t want a social media presence: “I just have an old-school mindset. Also, girls I look up to, like Jennifer Lawrence, Rooney Mara and Alicia Vikander, don’t have it, and it hasn’t affected their careers remotely. I’d rather live as private a life as I can. I’m not trying to be a mysterious person, but I’d rather be seen as an actor from job to job. I’ve never lived my life trying to be an influencer; I’m happy keeping my own opinions for fun dinner conversation.” She won’t discuss her love life: Olsen says it’s just something that is “in her bones” and influenced heavily by her notoriously private older sisters. “From an outside point of view, people have an interest in people they’ve seen grow up. But no one in my family has ever cared to feed into that or make it more interesting than it is because, really, it’s not.” She doesn’t like fan mail either: “When I’m filming on location, our production office is listed and people send stuff. It makes me uncomfortable. I don’t want people to know what I’m up to or where I am.” She rents a house in LA & she has a roommate: “The moment I own a house, it becomes public knowledge,” she says, going on to describe the “crippling” nature of paparazzi in L.A., where, after being spotted, she won’t go home for several hours in case they follow her. “It’s pretty violating. At night when you can’t see anything because the flashes blind you, that’s really disconcerting.” [From Elle Canada] I understand just wanting to be a jobbing actress. I understand wanting to withhold part of yourself from the media. I even understand what she says about learning how to play the game and work “the system” to her advantage. But I feel like I’m hallucinating a little bit when she goes on and on about how she can’t own a house because then they know where you live and she’ll get pap’d every day. Maybe she’s really, really good at hiding out already, but there are RARELY candid photos of Olsen in LA or anywhere else. She gets photographed at premieres, media events and fashion events. She got pap’d in London when she went on a date with Tom Hiddleston last year. And beyond that… nothing. So is she really good at hiding out, or is she just not as famous as she thinks she is? Photos courtesy of Elle Canada.