LOS ANGELES—George Whipple from local NY1 whipped out a few quotes for his Whipple’s World column from the stars who attended last night's New York premiere of Lovelace at the Museum of Modern Art in Midtown Manhattan. He also filed a video report of the premiere that’s in the column.
Whipple, who refers to Lovelace as “The Sundance Film Festival breakout hit,” asked three of the movie’s top stars pretty much the same question: whether making a movie about controversial porn queen Linda Lovelace was itself a controversial and risky career move for the movie titular star, Amanda Seyfried.
“No, I don't think it was much of a risk,” Seyfried told him. “This opportunity was awesome. I guess it's helped validate someone's life and someone's voice. She had a lot to say and I don't think a lot of people heard her. And I feel like this is another chance to get it out there and she was an important voice in bringing to light domestic violence.”
Peter Sarsgaard, who plays the “evil and manipulative Chuck Trainor,” backed up his co-star’s decision by equating her choice to that of adult performers in general. "Amanda was taking the risk," he told Whipple. “I mean, they always go after the woman in something like this. That's the sad, sorry truth. No man is ever taken down for being involved in a salacious piece of material. And if a woman is, then people have opinions about it, you know. And you look at someone who's like an icon like Sharon Stone, who went through all of that and dared people to go to the next level."
Sarsgaard, of course, was referring to Stone's famous uncrossing of her legs, revealing no undies, in the 1992 Michael Douglas hit, Basic Instinct—an action that dogged her career for nearly a decade and, for a while, made her a household name.
Stone, who plays Lovelace’s mother in the movie, and, according to Whipple (and AVN’s Peter Warren, in his review of the movie), is “unrecognizable” in the part, weighed in on whether she thinks it was a “smart move” for Seyfried to take the part.
“I do,” she said, “because in these recent years she's played diverse kinds of roles and I think she's building a very interesting career. She was amazing in Les Miz and I think she's coming on as an actor.”
Lovelace, which is currently playing in the Los Angeles area in a pre-release run at Laemmle's Town Center 5 in Encino, California, with one nightly showing at 9:55 pm, is in general release August 9.
IMAGE: (l. to r.) Amanda Seyfried, Sharan Stone and Peter Skarsgaard at the July 30 New York premiere of Lovelace, held at MoMA.
