NEWSWEEK: Newsweek's Annual Oscar Roundtable Brings Together Biggest Names of 2007: Clooney, Day-Lewis, Jolie, McAvoy

NEWSWEEK: Newsweek's Annual Oscar Roundtable Brings Together Biggest Names of 2007: Clooney, Day-Lewis, Jolie, McAvoy

On Prospect of no Oscars: "Nobody is going to cross the picket line," Clooney says.

"We're all going to George's house," says Angelina Jolie.

NEW YORK, Jan. 20 /PRNewswire/ -- If the Oscars come around and there's still no resolution to the writer's strike, "The world will end. It's fact. It's official. I was told so. [laughter]," James McAvoy tells Newsweek at the 11th annual Oscar Roundtable. "Nobody is going to cross a picket line. Nobody would even consider it. Would you want to be the only person at the awards?" George Clooney -- the class clown-says. "We're all going to George's house," Angelina Jolie adds. McAvoy, Clooney, Jolie, plus Daniel Day-Lewis, Marion Cotillard and Ellen Page participated in Newsweek's annual event, moderated by Senior Editor and Movie Critic David Ansen and Senior Editor Devin Gordon.

(Photo:

http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20080120/NYSU003 )

Highlights include:

Clooney on getting involved in political campaigns:

"You know, Michael Moore -- and I like Michael a lot -- but that speech he gave at the Oscars was polarizing. It became Hollywood versus the heartland, and I always find that it's best not to raise the rhetoric at that point. I've been a big supporter of Barack Obama since his Senate run and I'm a friend of his, but I said to him, "I stay completely out of it." I don't show up at those things. And believe me, it's not because his group doesn't say, "Come on, help us out." It's just not the attention you want. I worry about that a lot, because you don't want to do harm."

Jolie on capturing the essence of Mariane Pearl and the symbolism of working with a diverse cast in "A Mighty Heart":

"She never came on the set. She was going to come the first day, and she walked in on me in a costume fitting for her wedding dress. I think she just realized in that moment that she could not see any of it. She said it looked absolutely exact, and then we had dinner, and then she said she was going to leave the next morning." On the cast diversity and political aspect of the film, Jolie told Newsweek, "Just having all those actors at the table was a nice balance, because during this time when our country is at war and there's so much happening, to be in India and Pakistan with Indian and Pakistani actors, who usually also don't work together and don't cross each other's border, to have them asking us questions about politics, to actually have open discussions about 9/11, about Muslim culture, American culture, sharing food, sharing ideas, writing each other's kids' names down -- that did something for us. It was really exciting to say, "God, that Pakistani actor or that Indian actor is one of the best actors I've ever worked with," and I don't often think of actors beyond, you know, the list we're all used to. I think that is very symbolic of what the piece represented."

Day-Lewis on acting with his 10 year-old co-star in "There Will Be Blood":

"He was just a great companion. He was my partner. I miss him a lot, actually. His mom was a state trooper, and his dad was a cowboy. They didn't know anything about the movies. There was a moment, which could have gone awry at the very beginning, when his mom quite rightly thought, "What kinds of people are going to be involved with my son?" She wanted to see what I was going to be like, because she knew he would be spending a lot of time with me. So she rented a copy of "Gangs of New York." [Laughter] And there was a flurry of phone calls. And the studio dispatched a copy of "The Age of Innocence" very quickly."

Cotillard on what she did to pass the time while getting makeup done:

"I slept all the time. We had almost 30 days of heavy makeup. I wanted to kill everybody, and especially everybody wanted to kill me. So they put me in a bed, and they did the makeup while I was sleeping. It was very funny because there's a guy who came to shoot video of me almost every day getting this done. And I saw the video, and they were doing things to me and I can't believe I didn't wake up. It was acrylic painting and latex and prosthetics, so there's glue and all that. Sometimes I had nightmares, and I would wake up with a big scream and cry. One day I was crying while I was sleeping, so the makeup artist's assistant had to spend four hours with tissues around my eyes, so the salt from my tears didn't spoil the makeup."

McAvoy on his experience with the paparazzi:

"I've only ever had anybody waiting outside my house once. We got in our car and we were followed, and it was very weird and disconcerting. We thought we would just go about our daily life and just ignore it, all that kind of thing. I think because we had once read that Clive Owen said just ignore it. Like, do whatever Clive Owen does -- he's a solid guy. We were going into town to buy something for the house, and we went into a parking lot that costs 10 pounds Sterling an hour, and on seeing the price of the parking, the paparazzi went, "F--- that." They left us alone. So the lesson is, if you're being chased by paparazzi, don't drive fast. Just find a really expensive parking lot, and you will be fine."

Clooney adds, "I just found out about 10 days ago that I must live 300 or 400 yards from Britney Spears. I found out because I came home at 10 at night and there's all these helicopters over my house with these spotlights on ... I thought someone had broken out of prison. Like something out of "Die Hard." I get my baseball bat, which is what you always do in every film ... and I called up my assistant, who I thought was in the guesthouse, and I said, "Are you OK?" And she said, "Yes." ... And I go out and I'm running around with a baseball bat in my robe. And it turns out it's paparazzi over at Britney Spears's house. So now I have to move. [Laughter]

Page on the movie that was the impetus for choosing to be an actor:

"It wasn't until I was about 15, when I shot a film with this Canadian actress named Molly Parker, who I just absolutely adored and looked up to, and became inspired by. For the first time, I felt something different. I felt myself being overcome by something I can't necessarily explain. But I wanted to keep feeling that and finding out what that was and learning more about it."

(Read entire roundtable and watch the video at www.Newsweek.com)

http://www.newsweek.com/id/96123 - There Will Be Oscar's

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