Working mom : Part2
Working mom : Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 / Part 4
Page 2 of 4
Freundlich isn't worried.
"Getting her for the movie was like having Michael Jordan on my pickup basketball game," he says. "And getting actors like Julie and Billy Crudup and Maggie Gyllenhaal, who don't usually do romantic comedies and approach it as a character piece, I think that brings an originality to it. The paradox is what makes it more interesting also makes it more of a challenge to market. Studios know how to market a Julia Roberts romance. This is a little different."
Moore's road to acting was a little different, too.
She didn't have a childhood marked by brutal parents, or a splintered family, or a learning disability. She didn't even spend hours in musty movie theaters, dreaming of future Oscar speeches. Instead she was born Julie Ann Smith in North Carolina and grew up, moving a lot, as the daughter of a military judge and a social worker; during high school she joined the drama club, because she liked telling stories.
"We had this wonderful teacher who, instead of having us do 'Barefoot in the Park,' would have us rehearsing 'Tartuffe,'" she says. "Who knew from Moliere in the 11th grade? But she always made things challenging and interesting and one day she said to me, 'You know, I think you're talented and you can study this, you know, you can make a career out of this, people do this.' And that had never occurred to me."
It had never occurred to her parents either, who -- Moore recalls -- were "shocked and appalled" that she wanted to be an actress.
"But ultimately they were OK with it, which looking back on it, I can't quite believe," she says. "And once I started doing it, I realized I liked it and while I didn't seem to be able to do anything everyone else could do, this was something I was good at. It wasn't a big revelation -- Ah, this is what I want to do with my life. I don't think I ever even truly expected it to work out. It was just step by step."
After graduation from Boston University, Moore moved to New York where her career progressed, incrementally. "You don't start out thinking, I'm going to be a star!" she says. "You think, I hope I get an agent. Then, I hope I get an audition. Then, I hope I get a callback. Then, I hope I get a job. If you think too far ahead it's just overwhelming. It's better just to keep on going, bit by bit, one foot in front of another."
Moore worked off-Broadway, landed a gig on "The Edge of Night" in 1984 and then moved on to more than three years on "As the World Turns," where she won an Emmy. But she saved most of the melodrama for the tube.
"I was pretty straight-laced growing up," says the actress who still peppers her conversations with "wow" and "oh my gosh." "Even when I was on my own and wilder, I was still pretty straight-laced. I spent my 20s basically working and coming home and going to bed early and then getting up and getting ready for work again. I look back on all this clubbing my friends did and what was I doing? Cleaning my apartment, probably."
Page 2 of 4
Freundlich isn't worried.
"Getting her for the movie was like having Michael Jordan on my pickup basketball game," he says. "And getting actors like Julie and Billy Crudup and Maggie Gyllenhaal, who don't usually do romantic comedies and approach it as a character piece, I think that brings an originality to it. The paradox is what makes it more interesting also makes it more of a challenge to market. Studios know how to market a Julia Roberts romance. This is a little different."
Moore's road to acting was a little different, too.
She didn't have a childhood marked by brutal parents, or a splintered family, or a learning disability. She didn't even spend hours in musty movie theaters, dreaming of future Oscar speeches. Instead she was born Julie Ann Smith in North Carolina and grew up, moving a lot, as the daughter of a military judge and a social worker; during high school she joined the drama club, because she liked telling stories.
"We had this wonderful teacher who, instead of having us do 'Barefoot in the Park,' would have us rehearsing 'Tartuffe,'" she says. "Who knew from Moliere in the 11th grade? But she always made things challenging and interesting and one day she said to me, 'You know, I think you're talented and you can study this, you know, you can make a career out of this, people do this.' And that had never occurred to me."
It had never occurred to her parents either, who -- Moore recalls -- were "shocked and appalled" that she wanted to be an actress.
"But ultimately they were OK with it, which looking back on it, I can't quite believe," she says. "And once I started doing it, I realized I liked it and while I didn't seem to be able to do anything everyone else could do, this was something I was good at. It wasn't a big revelation -- Ah, this is what I want to do with my life. I don't think I ever even truly expected it to work out. It was just step by step."
After graduation from Boston University, Moore moved to New York where her career progressed, incrementally. "You don't start out thinking, I'm going to be a star!" she says. "You think, I hope I get an agent. Then, I hope I get an audition. Then, I hope I get a callback. Then, I hope I get a job. If you think too far ahead it's just overwhelming. It's better just to keep on going, bit by bit, one foot in front of another."
Moore worked off-Broadway, landed a gig on "The Edge of Night" in 1984 and then moved on to more than three years on "As the World Turns," where she won an Emmy. But she saved most of the melodrama for the tube.
"I was pretty straight-laced growing up," says the actress who still peppers her conversations with "wow" and "oh my gosh." "Even when I was on my own and wilder, I was still pretty straight-laced. I spent my 20s basically working and coming home and going to bed early and then getting up and getting ready for work again. I look back on all this clubbing my friends did and what was I doing? Cleaning my apartment, probably."