Jennifer Garner, from nerdy to cool
LOS ANGELES, California, United States of America — “If you told me when I was 13 that I would be walking the red carpet when I turned 30, I would have told you, ‘No way! That would be totally so cool!’” exclaims Jennifer Garner.
A self-proclaimed geek when she was in junior high, Garner, now 32, describes her teenage years as “the most awkward, uncomfortable years of my life.”
She tells us as we interview her at the L’Ermitage Hotel in Beverly Hills, “I wore big dorky glasses, was tall and reed-like (she is 5-foot-8 tall) and gangly looking. In the high school yearbook where they choose the prettiest and the most likely to succeed, I didn’t get voted anywhere at all!”
Effervescent, funny and ebullient, Garner (”Daredevil,” “Pearl Harbor,” “Catch Me If You Can”) reminds us of a young Geena Davis or Julia Roberts.
The nerdy girl from Houston who was raised in Charleston, West Virginia, in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains, has indeed gone a long way. She is a Golden Globe awardee for best actress in a drama series for her performance as secret government agent Sydney Bristow in the top television show, “Alias.”
Happy geeks
Dressed casually in a white top and blue denims and wearing no make-up at all, Garner looks younger than her 32 years, especially with her hair pulled up in a ponytail and accented with bangs.
In her first major solo starrer, the comedy hit, “13 Going on 30,” she portrays Jenna Rink, a nerdy 8th grader in 1987 who gets her wish for adult fame and popularity when she wakes up one morning to discover she’s 30 years old, the editor of a top fashion magazine, has a swanky Manhattan apartment and a hunky star ice hockey player for a boyfriend. Complications arise, though, as she finds herself still unhappy and wanting to get a second chance at first love.
Asked what she liked to do when she was 13, Garner, the second of three daughters of a retired chemical engineer dad and a former college professor mom, recalls, “I was very much into ballet, theater, the marching band, the chorus, and swimming. I played the piano, sax and violin. I had great girlfriends but we were not part of the hip and cool group. But we really did not care. We were happy nerds!”
She adds, “I didn’t wear cool clothes ever. I just wanted to grow up, learn how to drive, carry a conversation and wear contact lenses!”
Sleepover
She admits that when she was debating about whether to do the Gary Winick-directed “13 Going on 30″ movie or not, “I asked around the ‘Alias’ set what they thought I should do. One of the crew members told me, ‘Jennifer, please, when the camera’s rolling, you’re 30, but when they say cut, you’re 13!”
To prepare herself for the role, Garner had to join a sleepover composed of 13-year-old girls. She recalls the night: “It was so much fun! We did the Ouija board. We called up spirits and that caused a lot of screaming. We made prank calls to boys in their class. But I was like ‘Hey guys, this is embarrassing!’ We ate so much junk food in the middle of the night that it gives me a stomachache just thinking about it.
“The funny thing was, I joined them to make some (cinnamon crackers filled with melted marshmallows and a chocolate filling), then I went back to the couch and went to sleep. When I woke up, the girls were laughing at me because they thought that was the funniest thing they ever saw!”
Director Winick (”Tadpole”) admits one of the reasons why he wanted to do the film was because of Garner. He confesses, “Jennifer was a huge reason why I wanted to do this movie. She is both vulnerable and strong which makes her perfect as Jenna Rink. Her performance in this movie
exceeded my expectations.”
Physical comedy
Variety writes of Garner’s performance: “Garner grabs attention with equal measures of giggly girlish exuberance and anxious-adolescent befuddlement. It’s not terribly surprising to see that, after three seasons of acrobatic butt-kicking on TV’s ‘Alias’ and her Elektra-fying super-heroics in last year’s ‘Daredevil,’ the fetching actress is exceptionally adept at physical comedy. What is surprising, and delightful, is the full-tilt energy and resourceful expressiveness she brings to conveying the illusion of an ungainly adolescent trapped inside a mature adult’s body.”
Garner points out that it was her director, Winick, who helped her transition to physical comedy because “he gave me free rein.”
Hollywood Reporter notes, “The pace is quick, thanks not just to Winick’s direction but to Garner’s physicality as she romps through scenes at the breakneck speed of a teenager rather than a sophisticated New York woman.”
Divorced a year ago from Scott Foley, her former co-star on the TV series “Felicity,” Garner has moved on with her life since the split and is dating Michael Vartan, 35, a fellow actor on “Alias.”
Since “13 Going on 30″ is also about second chances, we ask her what she would change in her life if she got another chance.
The down-to-earth Garner replies, “There are things that happened that I wish hadn’t happened. But ultimately, you just have to let it go and go forward.
“So I would probably say, no, I wouldn’t change anything in my life because I learn from everything that happens to me, good or bad. As my mother would say, ‘You are responsible for your own happiness.’ So thank goodness you can’t go back and change things.”
Does she ever want to go back to being 13 again? Garner quickly replies, “I wouldn’t want to go back to being 13.” She pauses and then adds, “But I would love to go back to living with my mom.”
Source: inq7.net