Variety has been working with I Heart Radio’s podcast to provide content for the Emmy season, which will probably be kind of sad anyway (the Emmy season, I mean). Zoe Kravitz is getting some heat – I guess – for her Hulu show High Fidelity, and maybe she’ll end up with an Emmy nomination for it. Thus, she took part in Variety’s podcast. She ended up chatting about all kinds of things, including High Fidelity and her gender-switch lead character, Robert Pattinson as Batman and how she actually thinks she was very unstylish as a kid. Some highlights:
On the “Rob” character in High Fidelity: “When I watched this movie and read this book years ago, I always identified with the Rob character, but I romanticized him. And then, of course, looking back you’re like, this guy’s an a–hole. He’s a misogynist a–hole. Why would I think that was cool, and why did I think that was sexy, and why did I think that was interesting? To come back and play his character from a different point of view, it wasn’t like, “Oh, I’m playing this really cool, sad, f—ed up person who just can’t get it together. And we love that about her.” It was more, “I think I was this person at one point in my life. I’d like to think that I’m past that now. It’s these really uncomfortable growing pains when you have to figure out who you want to be.
Her style really wasn’t cool: “One of my best friends the other day started sending me all these old photos from 2005. It really sent me into this crazy spiral because I thought we looked really cool at the time, and looking at these photos, I was just like, “Dude, what? What?” My friend said, “I think we were playing a game where we would get dressed in the dark with no mirror. And then anytime we caught our reflection anywhere, we would take a shot.” It just looked so messy.
Being 31 & married: “I’m married, and less bad choices — I would like to think. You know, life is an ongoing struggle, so of course, there’s always work to be done. But there’s that first step where it’s like, I’m an adult. Oh wait, I have so much more work to do.
Whether she’s spoken to the other Catwomen, like Michelle Pfeiffer or Halle Berry: “I spoke to Michelle. We sat at the same table at the Golden Globes, and I’ve met her a bunch over the years because of David E. Kelley. She’d always been so nice. I had just gotten cast so I was really nervous to be around her, and she was so sweet. She just gave me a big hug and said, “You’re going to be great.” That was really just amazing. Both Halle and Anne [Hathaway] were really sweet on Instagram and Twitter. [They] sent really sweet, encouraging messages when that was announced. So I feel supported by my girls.
On Robert Pattinson as Batman: “First of all, he’s just a really good actor. He started out as this kind of teen pop sensation, and then I think we all kind of saw through his work that there was a lot more going on. He’s a really interesting artist, and that is very much Batman in a way. We have the illusion of Bruce Wayne, and then we have Batman in the shadows that has a lot more complicated things going on. So just in that, I think he’s perfect for this role. He can relate in that way, and he looks good in the suit, man. He looks good in the suit. That’s a good jaw line. But he’s just a great actor and he brings so much to everything he does. I think that it’s a really hard role because people are expecting a lot. Also it’s restricting in a lot of ways. You’re wearing the suit, and you can’t see their eyes, and you can only move in a certain way. So you have to get really creative in terms of how can you portray a multidimensional character? He’s way up for the challenge and has really interesting ideas already. I think he’s perfect, perfect casting.
That’s nice that all of the other Catwomen were supportive. Can I just say? I really enjoyed Anne Hathaway as Catwoman. I always felt like “Justice for Anne’s Catwoman” because there were so many other conversations about that last Nolan-Batman film, but Anne knocked it out of the park. I have a feeling that Zoe’s Catwoman will probably just be… different. I haven’t gotten a real vibe of what this new film will be like, but I bet Zoe and Rob have really great chemistry for some reason (he has great chemistry with most leading ladies).
As for what Zoe said about going back now and re-watching High Fidelity and re-reading the book… yeah. I watched High Fidelity for the first time in like ten years and I was struck by how much sympathy I had for all of his exes as opposed to having sympathy for “Rob.” It wasn’t that way when I first saw the film in my 20s! It’s really wild to go back and watch those kinds of movies now and see how your perspective has changed so much and how it influences how you read the characters. Rob deserved to be alone, he was terrible.
Photos courtesy of WENN.
The best realization is that John Cusack is also Rob IRL, but sadder because he’s a man in his 50s who still hasn’t figured out how to have a relationship. Zoe got it and she’s 31!
Yes! I used to be a huge Cusack fan until he just became not likable. He’s really become a snotty, bratty curmudgeon. I have had the feeling for years the reason he was so believable in the movie was because he was playing himself. And, I watched this movie back in the day and never once felt sympathy for him. He behaved like a jackass and brought it all on himself. I was like….”Your exes should be thrilled they got the hell away from you.”
You don’t know what you’re talking about………he’s been in a relationship with a famous Indian writer: Arundhati Roy……..they wrote a Book together……….
https://www.amazon.com/Things-that-Cannot-Said-Conversations/dp/1608467171
Thanks for the info, Laureen.
Caroline and Mustang Sally need to apologise.
Arundati Roy and John Cusak are in a LTR?? Wow, that dude is really……. lucky?? Playing above his level?? However you want to put it….. Hoping he is just happy to be supporting her genius…….
They do not need to apologize lol
John Cusack is a huge douche
How do you know they’re in a relationship? Legit question. I knew they wrote the book together, but I’ve never heard they were a couple.
Ummmm… what? They know each other, they have collaborated. Nowhere have either of them suggested that they are romantically involved and there are no photos or articles that suggest as much. Males and females can collaborate, they can know each other, be friends, visit Snowden together, and not be romantically involved.
lol they are not in a relationship .. he lives in Chicago and she lives alone in Delhi
from Vogue UK in 2017: https://www.vogue.co.uk/article/arundhati-roy-interview
“Roy is emphatically a writer in and of the world. The stories are field notes, drawn from close study. She even used to teach aerobics. “I still have this gang of weightlifter friends from those days. I had dinner with them recently.” (You couldn’t imagine such a thing of, say, Jonathan Franzen.) “That is the life in Delhi for me,” she says. “I just say hello to people, stop, have a smoke or a coffee, drift around, talk about stuff.” Once, offered a place on a writer’s retreat, she reacted with comic alarm: “Retreat? No! I want to go on an advance!” She lives alone in an apartment in a smart enclave near the Lodhi Gardens. Her friendship circle is wide and idiosyncratic, including the likes of a Hollywood actor, frontline activists and local intelligentsia, as well as the humble characters of Old Delhi whom she encounters on her daily walks through the city – “all these quirky, crazy people. Most people in Delhi like to say they hate Delhi,” she says. “But I love Delhi.””
And what exactly makes John Cusack a douche? I haven’t heard from him in years, just googled him and he’s huge on civil rights and is quite outspoken about it. And not only that, apparently he is in a relationship with the extraordinary Arundhati Roy.
I read the book when it first came out, but had never seen the movie. I tried to watch it at the beginning of the pandemic and only got through the first 10 min. He was a jerk and I didn’t find it charming at all.
I really enjoyed her show. I’m hoping it is coming back for another season eventually?
I’ve liked Anne Hathaway in almost everything she’s done, including her Catwoman- she’s a good actress.
100%
I hate that people dislike her – I believe – for her work ethic
I’m having dejavu. Have we read a similar byline? So weird, I don’t like dejavus; they throw me off lol.
The book is hilarious and and a great read. I told my book group back then that I didn’t buy into his introspection/need to reevaluate all his relationships, but a tedious self-involved jerk isn’t really misogynist. Plenty of women are just as self centered in relationships.
My take on the first viewing of John Cusack’s High Fidelity was that Rob was a jerk who didn’t realize how much of a jerk he was until he went on this self-discovery thing with the former girlfriends, treating the current girlfriend badly while doing it.
Loved Zoe as Rob she brings so much more charm to this role than John Cusack did, even when she’s being insufferable. Really hope there’s a season 2!!
I mean the character even says it himself, “I am a f-ing a**hole”.
But I agree with the assessment above, that he makes these realization on his journey of “what went wrong” and the part he played in everything.
Zoe is so, so beautiful.
It’s a great book to read when you’re going through a break up!
The TV series was great, kept the spirit of the book/movie, but for today’s audience. Zoe & the rest of the cast were all perfect.
That was the point of the movie. Rob is a self-absorbed jerk. We were never meant to sympathize with his character.
I cannot wait for her Catwoman!!! She is gonna kill it. She has cat eyes naturally and those cheekbones. I’m so stoked to see the new Batman.
Rewatched the High Fidelity film with Cusack and jeez Rob was *such* a douche. He slut-shamed all his exes while being a player himself, and he had no problem turning from deeply-in-love to that-b**ch-how-dare-she-reject-me in 2 seconds flat. Hated him (and I liked that movie when I first saw it!).
The Zoe Kravitz High Fidelity is better in every way. Not only is Rob genderbent but the Jack Black character is played by an amazing Broadway actress, an African American woman named Da’Vine Joy Randolph, who knocks it out of the park every scene. If I could nominate anyone for an Emmy it would be Randolph.
I also loved loved loved Anne Hathaway as Catwoman, and think I will like Kravitz’s Catwoman too. In general, I love Catwoman and I think every actress who’s played her has been pretty good to fabulously great.