Joshua Jackson swung by the Chelsea Lately studios in LA to chat all about his TV series Fringe and how it’s filmed in Vancouver. His being in Canada disrupted a great setup he and girlfriend Diane Kruger shared, which was splitting the year between Paris and LA. Nonetheless, he and Diane wear rings to show their commitment, and he also chatted about how she cuts his hair. He’s also trying to learn French for her, though it doesn’t seem to be coming easily.
Sony Pictures has offered Jessica Biel one of the two female leads in director Len Wiseman’s Total Recall remake. Though, discussions have yet to begin.
At this time, it is unclear which of the two roles she will take. In the original, Sharon Stone played Lori, the dutiful wife (and spy) of Douglas Quaid (played here by Colin Farrell). The other female character was named Melina, as played by Rachel Ticotin, who helped Quaid join the Resistance in the fight for the production of air on Mars.
Last month, it was believed that Kate Bosworth and Diane Kruger were in the lead for these two roles. Those actresses are still being considered for the other female lead.
“Total Recall” comes to theaters August 3rd, 2012 and stars Colin Farrell. The film is directed by Len Wiseman. (Source)
The always lovely Diane Kruger attended the 2011 Green Auction: A Bid to Save the Earth last night in New York City. Head over to the gallery for the latest additions.
“By hosting the Green Auction, Christie’s is taking the lead with innovative ways to raise crucial funds and awareness for the preservation of our planet, and we are happy to be a global catalyst in such a noble endeavor.” – Edward Dolman (Chairman of Christie’s)
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Sony Pictures is casting up its Total Recall remake, which Len Wiseman will direct with Colin Farrell starring in the role originated by Arnold Schwarzenegger. There are two major female roles in the film, and several top actresses are vying for them. First, there is the role of Lori, who started out the 1990 Paul Verhoeven-directed original as the happy homemaker wife of Douglas Quaid, only to transform into the bride from hell. That’s the role that really launched the star of Sharon Stone (who would star in Verhoeven’s Basic Instinct) and I’m told that Kate Bosworth and Inglourious Basterds’ Diane Kruger [Kruger's reps said she opted out of the reading] are reading this week for that role. Those readings began yesterday.
There is also the role of Melina, which was originated by Rachel Ticotin, playing the woman who helps the protagonist get to the bottom of the futuristic scandal on Mars. I’m told that Eva Mendes and Paula Patton are reading for that role. Studio insiders warn me that list is not inclusive, and I’ve heard that Jessica Biel could be in contention for Melina, Eva Green too, and that Mendes is also being considered for the Lori role. Neal Moritz is producing. (Source)
Growing up in Algermissen, a small town in Germany, Diane dreamt of becoming a ballet dancer. She had won a place at London’s Royal Ballet School, before a leg injury led her to change tack and model. After five years that bored her and she moved into acting. Her parents divorced when she was 13 and she has not spoken to her alcoholic father for 17 years.
Acting, she says, offers an emotional outlet similar to that provided by ballet. “When you’re a kid you don’t really know what’s going on,” she says, “but I think it’s a way of excising pain. Those two, three hours a day get it out of you. I think that when I modelled that’s what was missing. Being German, I think we don’t really express a lot of things.”
It is tempting to place Kruger alongside Penélope Cruz and Marion Cotillard, European actresses who have found Hollywood success in the past decade, but she is quick to point out that she has had to approach it from a different angle. “Penelope has been very lucky to have Pedro Almodóvar,” she says, referring to the writer-director who made Cruz a star. “She made a career out of Spanish language films and then made the shift into playing a Spanish or Mexican person in American movies. When I started producers would say ‘we like her, but lose the accent’. I don’t think anyone thinks the German accent is as nice as the French or Spanish one.”
She can appreciate the irony that, having perfected a glossy mid-Atlantic drawl for many movies, in Inglourious Basterds and Unknown she has been required to put on European accents again. It doesn’t seem to worry her. Indeed, one gets the impression of a confident and driven woman just starting to relax. “I don’t have to work just to work anymore,” she says. “More interesting parts come my way, so I can afford to say ‘I don’t want to make that’.” Her dream director is Frenchman Jacques Audiard (A Prophet, The Beat that My Heart Skipped), but of those working in the US she is most excited by Black Swan’s Darren Aronofsky. “He makes my kind of movies,” she says.
She can also acknowledge the cost of starting her career in a frenzy of publicity. “Everything happened really fast,” she says. “I was away for two and a half years, I missed friends, some of my relationships suffered. I thought it was amazing but I also felt a little bit like I’d lost myself. I didn’t know where home was, I didn’t know what I was doing.”
The topic is off-limits, but one suspects this is a reference to her brief marriage and divorce from French director Guillaume Canet (now married to Cotillard). For the past five years, Kruger has been in a relationship with Canadian Joshua Jackson (best known as Pacey from Dawson’s Creek). “Definitely kids one day,” she says. “But no more marriage.”
In May, she begins shooting Farewell, My Queen, about the last days of Louis XVI’s court at Versailles. She plays Marie Antoinette, and laughs at the fact she’s portraying another of history’s famous women. “Everybody has feelings about these big, iconic women. Everyone has ideas of what they should be like or look like. You’re always setting yourself up.”
Diane Kruger finds doing stunts a “pain in the ass”. The German actress stars alongside Northern Irish star Liam Neeson in new movie Unknown, and admits although she has a stunt double she did have to do some of the hard work.
She said: “I rescue Liam from a sinking car. I’m not afraid of water, but it’s very tiring work diving down and under, breaking the glass and pulling him out.
“They had a stunt double there for me, but after doing it for two days, you get to the point where you might as well get your close-up. It’s a pain in the a*s anyway. So there ends up being one shot that made it into the movie, and I’m glad it’s there. You can see it’s me, and it lends realism to the scene. I felt like it was an accomplishment for me to pull that off.”
Diane also reveals Liam – who doesn’t do his own movie stunts – was “a little scared” while the pair were involved in one particular driving scene, requiring the director Jaume Collet-Serra to stick up for her.
She joked: “I did my own driving during the action sequences in the film, and I know Liam was a little scared in the back seat. But the director said I was a good driver. He stood up for me.”
In her latest film, Diane Kruger starred alongside Liam Neeson as a refugee cab driver in Unknown. She shared with us how her upbringing gave her a unique perspective on shooting the film in Germany.
Parts of the film Unknown were shot on location in Berlin. As a native German, how have you noticed the city change since the wall came down?
Diane Kruger : Berlin is still going through a transition since the Cold War — both in what used to be East and West Berlin. I can still sense the confusion and the struggle for identity there in the streets. There’s a pulse to it. In the film, I play an Eastern European immigrant — a refugee from the civil war in the Balkans. Since I’m from Europe, I know the Bosnian/Yugoslavian war is still very much on everyone’s mind. In Europe, it’s still talked about and remembered. Being born in Germany myself, I know many immigrants from the war-torn countries. So, the role in Unknown registered for me.Besides working with Liam Neeson, what else drew you to the part?
DK : It’s obviously a character with a backstory and not your regular-girl companion role. I enjoyed the fact that it’s action-oriented and an interesting thriller. That gave me a chance to try some things I hadn’t tried before. I get to save Liam in the story, so it’s nice to play a woman with some resourcefulness.How do you end up saving one of Hollywood’s top stars?
DK : I rescue Liam from a sinking car. I’m not afraid of water, but it’s very tiring work diving down and under, breaking the glass and pulling him out. They had a stunt double there for me, but after doing it for two days, you get to the point where you might as well get your closeup. It’s a pain in the ass anyway. So there ends up being one shot that made it into the movie, and I’m glad it’s there. You can see it’s me, and it lends realism to the scene. I felt like it was an accomplishment for me to pull that off. I did my own driving during the action sequences in the film, and I know Liam was a little scared in the back seat. But the director said I was a good driver. He stood up for me.
Diane Kruger reckons starring in Inglourious Basterds made Hollywood realise she is a tough girl. The German born ex-model said her role in the Quentin Tarantino World War II film – where she plays a straight talking German actress secretly working with the Allies – has helped her avoid being typecast as a romantic interest for male leads.
Speaking about her latest role as a Bosnian taxi driver in action film Unknown, she said:
“I feel like before ‘Inglourious Basterds’, in America, they would’ve probably offered me the part played by January Jones in the film, because that’s a more obvious part for me to play. So I loved it that they offered me this. It’s cool to think they said, ‘Illegal Bosnian immigrant taxi driver – let’s get Diane Kruger!’ I’m not sure that would’ve been the obvious thing before. I think I was perceived as such a European, dainty, pretty actress.”
Diane also revealed her character – who helps co-star Liam Neeson’s character when he wakes up after an accident to realize no-one recognizes him and his identity has been stolen – has had a traumatic past.
She added to Britain’s Independent newspaper: “Obviously, this is not the kind of movie that is going to go into any deep detail. But we learn that she’s watched her entire family be assassinated. And I just thought it was interesting in a movie like this – a genre film – to have a little bit of a social background.”
I’ve been going through the gallery replacing many of the photo shoots with high quality untagged versions. Now we can all enjoy the gorgeous photo shoots of Diane without the site tags displayed! I hope to be able to replace ALL photo shoot images with untagged versions eventually.
In the meantime, enjoy some of my favourite shoots of Diane tag-free! Head over to the gallery for the latest additions.
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The actress – who has been dating Jackson since 2006 – said that he encourages her to “ask more questions”, rather than accepting everything at face value. The Daily Star quotes Kruger as saying:
“Josh is someone who is very grounded. He is very curious and is someone who always reads and is very politically engaged. He awakened the urge to ask more questions. You can take so many things for granted, because you read them and think it must be true, and he’s not like that.”
She added that he has also inspired her to work on other parts of her personality, saying: “That’s my thing in my 30s. I want to work on ‘me’ much more… Getting older, I realised I didn’t know anything. I felt incredibly stupid.
“I’ve always been very self-righteous. I’ve always been like, ‘I speak three different languages, I’m so accomplished’. And everyone tells me, ‘You’re so pretty’, and then it was a big realisation that I don’t understand anything, that I feel like I’m not cultured enough, that I’m stupid sometimes.”
