Thandiwe Newton

[scriptgirl]

Outtakes from her British Vogue Shoot. Credit Regan Cameron

 

[scriptgirl]

GEtty. Happyness premiere

 

[scriptgirl]

Getty

Thandie and her folks

 

[scriptgirl]

Filmmagic:

 

[honeyisle]

For some reason I don't like this dress on her. It does nothing for her. In the age of divorces nice to see her parents still together.

 

[gormenghast]

These lovlies are from wireimage

 

[style_savy]

Thandie Newton @ "The Pursuit Of Happyness" UK premiere in London, Jan 8
hqcb.net

 

[wheneveriwakeup]

Love how easy-going and effortless her style is. She is just elegance in the flesh. So much infact, that I didn't even wince when I saw her in UGGS!

 

[scriptgirl]

Rex/Sipa

 

[cosmocat]

Radio interview
http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/womanshour/01/2007_02_mon.shtml
Tnkas so much for all the lovely updates, really like the above look.

 

[scriptgirl]

More pics of Thandie in Beverly Hills in July. Credit Clasos and Korpa

 

[kochie332]

Jan 10, 2007
Our Pick

THANDIE NEWTON in Phillip Lim

Newton dressed the part of a minimalist at the London premiere of The Pursuit of Happyness. The actress skipped the jewelry, kept her makeup natural and still looked beautiful in a black and white Phillip Lim dress.

Click to Buy the Look

Dress:anthropologie.com Belt:elaineperlov.comShoes:nordstrom.com
instyle.com

 

[kochie332]

here is the dress from the runway

style.com

 

[scriptgirl]

Credit IPJ.

 

[mnis]

thankyou for all the pictures
Thandie makes such great choices for the red carpet,the white dress is gorgeous

 

[scriptgirl]

From Metro Uk:

Actress Thandie Newton was born to a Zimbabwean mother and British father and grew up in Cornwall. She was 16 when she made her first film, Flirting, and has since had success in Mission: Impossible II and Crash, where she played mouthy Christine Thayer. She plays opposite Will Smith in her latest movie, The Pursuit Of Happyness, released nationwide on Friday.

You play another unlikeable character in The Pursuit Of Happyness. Why do it?
Because it’s a really good film. I saw it for the first time recently and I was so alarmed by finally seeing my performance in relation to the rest of the movie. It was the same with Crash. I came in isolation and did my bits really quickly, one after the other. It really wasn’t my character’s story but I was worried about her being demonised. I said to the director: ‘I don’t know if I can do this.’

Will Smith comes across as a super-nice guy. Is he?
I didn’t get to know him. Working with him was special, even though part of me was pretty bummed out because I had to shout at him in all my scenes. At the end of the day, when we’d been horrible to each other, it was very hard to then just be sweet and nice.

Had you met Will before?
No but there was one time I could have met him. I was working on the [1998] film Beloved in Philadelphia. That role kind of knocked me about and I found it hard to let it go. I’d had a massage in the hotel and got into the lift. I looked an absolute state and in those days I was shy. Will and [his wife] Jada got into the lift on their way up to see Oprah Winfrey in the penthouse. I knew who they were and they probably knew who I was. But I just pretended they weren’t there. I think I closed my eyes, pretending I was in a post-massage reverie. I’ve had shame flashes about it ever since.

Don’t you famous actors say ‘hi’ to each other automatically?
It’s funny you say that. The other night I went to this pasta place in New York and George Clooney walked in. It was as though we were old friends. I’d never met him before. But he is the most charming, lovely man, a complete sweetheart. He even bought me and my girlfriend dinner.

Is it true that people can’t differentiate between the real you and your Crash character?
Totally. Crash was very controversial and people got really angry. Black men in particular have a problem with that role. There was one guy recently at the Black Entertainment Television Awards in the US and he said: ‘You’re her, aren’t you?’ I knew he meant Crash. He said: ‘I know you’re an actress and everything but if you’d just shut up, none of the sh*t in the film would have happened.’

Sometimes you see people and think: 'Well, how much time can they really spend with their kids?'
Are you supposed to be flattered that he thought your character was a real person?
People do say that. But playing another role like that in The Pursuit Of Happyness was an issue. Just because I get it and I feel sympathy and compassion for my character, it doesn’t mean everyone else does. I wondered whether I could play another unsympathetic role but knew I had the Eddie Murphy film Norbit coming up.

What was Eddie like?
He’s very sweet. Very quiet. Quite shy on set. We had nice times. We ended up talking about this and that. We’re both parents. And we giggled. He found my English background very funny. And if I’m in the presence of someone who’s either very shy or needs to be brought out of their shell, I just become an absolute idiot. The English toilet humour just whips around the place. Whatever it takes to break the ice.

You have another film coming out this year, Run, Fat Boy, Run. Is it a good time to be you?
It is a good time but now I want to have a break.

The Pursuit Of Happyness is about a man who keeps going despite horrendous obstacles. What keeps you strong-willed?
Being a mum.

Your friend Cate Blanchett said you would say that.
She and I are similar in that we’re able to take our careers very seriously but also it’s absolutely not a question that the kids come first. Sometimes you see people and you think: ‘Well, how much time can they really spend with their kids?’ But with Cate, she’s got that balance so right.

When you don’t work, do you miss it?
I miss the idea of it. But then it’s that first day of getting up at 5.30am to go to set and I remember why it’s OK not to do it as well. It’s like any job. There are those days that make you realise why you put in the hours.

Your son in The Pursuit Of Happyness is played by Will Smith’s real son [seven-year-old Jaden] and you were only 16 when you made your first film, Flirting. Do you think being a child actor is potentially detrimental?
I don’t know. I was thinking the other day about Jamie Bell and Billy Elliot. That was a huge showcase for him, then he tootled along getting on with life and now he’s back. The same with Mischa Barton. I remember her doing childhood roles. There are so many things that kids do. Doing a film is like going to camp in a way. It doesn’t have to suddenly be: ‘Right, you’re an actor now.’ I remember Flirting. I didn’t expect to make another film. I thought: ‘Well, this is cool. I’m a dancer but I’m not doing anything else this summer and, crazily, they want me to do it.’ So I went and did that in my summer holiday and went back to school.

How did it turn into a career?
Another offer came along and again it fell during the summer holiday, so I thought: ‘I’ll do it again.’ By that time, I’d given up dancing and gone more into academia

 

[scriptgirl]

from coming soon.net
Actress Thandie Newton must really like yelling a lot, because she's had a lot of chances to do it in her last two movies, the surprise Oscar winner Crash and the upcoming drama The Pursuit of Happyness opposite Will Smith. Smith plays the real-life Chris Gardner, a down on his luck salesman trying to land his dream job as a stockbroker, and Newton is his unsupportive wife. It's a pretty dark and dramatic role for the actress, because in some ways, it makes her the antagonist of the film.

ComingSoon.net talked to the beautiful and talented actresses about the role and about the surprise success of her last movie.

ComingSoon.net: Why did you feel you had to have this role?
Thandie Newton: For the story, the overall story, and also I didn't want someone else to play this role and for them to be able to justify what a b*tch is that left her child. I wanted her to be a sad, messed-up woman who committed slow suicide by leaving her child, and I knew that was me that could do that. Once I read it, I knew I had a responsibility. Sure someone else could have done it, but I didn't want to take the risk of this being left.

CS: Did you get a chance to meet or talk to Chris Gardner's real ex-wife before doing the movie?
Thandie Newton: No, she didn't want to have anything to do with the movie. She had other things going on I guess. It wasn't about that family. It wasn't about Chris Gardner making a movie about his life. It's a story that had been bought by 20/20 and that's how it happened. Chris Gardner wasn't looking for a way to have his life made into a movie; it was an accident. The movie is very separate from them as a family, and the character I play, Linda, I don't even know actually what Chris's wife is like, because the character was fictionalized. So we had free reign to create her but place her into this slot that the movie needed. The character, for the purpose of the movie, needs to bring them down so low so that he would have somewhere to climb from for the rest of the film, and that was really hard for me. When I first the script, I thought, "No way" because I would want to explore the sadness that this woman is going through, the pain that she is going through, and what would make someone self-destruct to such a degree that they would leave their child. I think that is a slow form of suicide, and I'm a mom and that's all that there is.

CS: Did you talk to Chris about what happened to his wife and her story? I thought they actually got back together at some point after this movie.
Newton: Well, it was so long ago, so I think they are both still living out their storyline right now. They had another child in a brief interlude. I was around Chris a lot during the rehearsal period, and I didn't talk at all during the rehearsal process. I didn't even want to see him actually. It wasn't a conscious choice. I was finding it hard because I felt I was battling with the story, which wasn't going to allow this woman's story to come out, and also, I just desperately didn't want the character to be this awful woman. I honestly felt like I was there for all of womankind. I was the one opportunity in the story to reveal that there are greater forces at work, deeper, darker and sad things. It's funny on how some people just watch the movie, and they see me playing such a b*tch, really unsympathetic; and some people really do feel the pain. It's whatever you bring to it. That's really the best kind of movies, where the character really taps into how you feel. "Crash" was very much like that. People would come out of it raging angry and some people crying and happy. It's whatever touches in your history, your family, your personal history.


CS: Since the character of Linda is fictionalized, how did you go about creating her?
Newton: I read the role in the book, and it doesn't say enough about why a person would do this. There has to be a hint as to why or how she could leave her child and that must be some psychological breakdown depression. I spoke to Gabriele on the phone, and I said, "This is my problem with the story" and he absolutely agreed. We need to rehearse. We need to find moments where we can reveal the depression and the instability. I couldn't believe how much time and energy they were putting into this part of the story. I rehearsed for one week, every day with Will and Gabriele, to try and find the moments where you saw their relationship falling apart, the misunderstandings. There are so many things that had to be involved and I do think we managed to do it. I really do. It's that social situation. It's his lack of work opportunities. It's the fact that they put all their savings …it was a moment in time where it just broke the back of their opportunities as a couple. That was there whether I tried or not. There's one line in the story where I say, "You said it was going to be okay even before I got pregnant". We tried really hard to quickly communicate huge things.

CS: Is it harder to find your character when playing an American?
Newton: Each character I play the accent is going to be quite a different American accent. Just when I thought I can do an American accent, I get a role where the woman is based from San Francisco, so I have to do a whole lot more work now. I come to each one as if it were a whole different country, because when you are in America, there are so many different worlds. To make that believable, I couldn't use my "Crash" accent. It wouldn't have been right. There was a woman working in the costume department who had the most fantastic voice, fantastic accent. She lived in San Francisco all her life, a black American woman, so I just interviewed her over a couple of days and listened to her and talked to her, and that's how I got that accent.

CS: Is doing an American accent always an extra obstacle?
Newton: The funny thing is, bless their hearts, but the producers on our movie were so concerned about it. I think it's because if I put on a little bit of eye makeup, I can look nice and demure, and it was the idea to entirely strip away all that civilized and be someone who is just low in class, never had any opportunities, just depressed. It was more about that and the only way they can draw attention to their concern. It was never a problem, and I really, really enjoyed working on that accent because it was something different for me.

CS: Did you create a back story for her?
Newton: No, I didn't. I just wanted to know where she was from. I imagine that she had a troubled time growing up, as most people do, but I think if you are in a lonely part of America, it's tough, because you are right up next to people making a good living. There are different lives just living and finding each other. It was about that and where she is from. Like I said, I was with this woman and that was very helpful. Just having a view into a typical young person's life growing up, black and in San Francisco.

CS: What was it like working with Will?
Newton: I was bummed out that the one time I work with Will, we just shout at each other all day, and it was one of those movies where we were already getting into it. Not that we didn't get along in between, but when you shout at someone all day, you can't look them in the eye at the end of it. It was really raw and intense, and it was for hard for them to go out and have a good time. On the other hand, I really felt privileged to be around someone who… you think you know what Will can do. He is so known in the world. He's revealed so much of himself through music and everything. His TV shows have gone and on. And yet here he delivered something new, and he went deeper. I think he brought a lot of his own personal stuff to the story. It was a huge challenge and I think that one of the reasons why I wanted to do the movie because I was really in awe just to champion someone like him. He doesn't have to do this. He doesn't have to take the misery every day to play this role, but he wanted to be challenged, and I think that's very admirable.


CS: Would you ever consider working with your kids the way Will did with Jaden?
Newton: I was amazed that Will had so many roles on this film. He was an actor. He was playing someone who is already living was going to honor that. That's another layer to the performance and he's being a dad and being an acting coach to his son. Unbelievable. I wouldn't seek out an opportunity for that, but neither did Will. It was an accident.

CS: What do you think an outsider like Gabriele Muccino brought to the movie?
Newton: It's interesting. I was talking to Will about it and Will was hugely instrumental in Gabriele being the choice. I think the studio execs were perplexed about it, because many well known American directors could've been the director of this film. Will had a very strong instinct that a non-American should make a movie about the American dream. That's what the movie needed, and I think he was right. I know I've done that, played a role where because I'm not American, there's more of a truth to it which can make it painful in a way because you are not trying to be loyal, so it's harsher as a result, more truthful. That's what Gabriele did and Will was adamant that Gabriele was going to bring his vision brought to the screen. There was going to be no meddling from the powers that be, and the way to achieve that, which was so clever, was always letting Gabriele having the last word on everything. There were days I would be like, "I don't think I should be doing that" and Gabriele and Will would just give it up. That's a tough thing to do when you are a big star, but also someone who has proven themselves many times and what you know is right. He is a very clever guy, Will. He really knows what he is doing. As a result you've got Will in an uncomfortable place and that's what partly makes this movie. The characters find themselves in uncomfortable places, and that always gives an edge to a performance I think. That's what great directors are, and that's the difference. When they make you do something that you don't necessary want to do and then you watch it, and it's the questioning and challenge and discomfort that gives the film that extra something.

CS: Obviously, Will is being given a big awards push for the movie, but do you think they might do the same for your supporting role?
Newton: I'm just glad to be sitting here right now, really, and for the film to have turned out so beautifully. I could be really political about it, and if there's lots of supporting actresses out there that delivered very strong roles, it's probably unlikely, because it's a very small role that doesn't have that nice tying it up at the end. I don't come back. If it's a lean year, than who knows? But it's not hugely important to me. I had an amazing year last year. "Crash" did really well, but I'm always surprised about what happens. Sometimes you can really predict things but that's not what it's all about. I know it's a cliché but it really isn't. After "Beloved," I was so gutted that the film didn't have any attention, I just thought, "I don't know anything," so I don't have any expectations.

CS: It must have been nice to see "Crash" get the picture award after that long journey it took.
Newton: Oh, listen, I'm very, very proud, and I will weep and weep (with joy obviously) if anybody is celebrated in the way that I feel I was celebrated. It's always wonderful when someone you think is great gets recognized.

The Pursuit of Happyness opens on Friday, December 15.

 

[scriptgirl]

Here is an older article: From Telegraph UK
Why Newton favours gravity over fluff

Last Updated: 12:01am BST 05/08/2005

Thandie Newton's film career has been marked by her quest for quality, rather than a pursuit of the fast buck. She talks to Chris Sullivan about her role in 'Crash' and her spell as 'that girl in ER'

Thandie Newton had just flown in from Los Angeles to make Crash when its director, Paul Haggis, asked her a decidedly awkward question. "It was one of those feet-shuffling moments," says the actress. "I looked at my co-star, Matt Dillon, and he looked at me and Paul, unable to get his words out. Paul had just asked if I had any protective underwear, implying that we were going to take this scene a lot, lot further than it said in the script. This entailed Matt, who plays this extremely aggressive policeman, molesting me up against a car while my well-to-do black husband [Terrence Howard] looks on, emasculated and helpless.


Thandie Newton in Crash: 'It's an amazing film'
"I was very emotional and jet-lagged and tired," adds the mother of two girls, aged five and seven months, "so I just burst into tears and ran off. The normal me would have argued, but I did it eventually, and I think my state of mind helped the scene."

And it is this massively emotive scene that sets the tone for Crash, Million Dollar Baby writer Haggis's wonderfully accomplished new feature that carefully tackles racism, bigotry and preconception throughout the class divide in latter-day LA. "It is an amazing film," says the down-to-earth Newton. "And we all did it for hardly any money, because it was such a brilliant script."

The "all" refers to a quite astonishing ensemble cast that includes Don Cheadle, Jennifer Esposito, Sandra Bullock, Brendan Fraser and big-name rapper Ludacris - all of whose lives intertwine and inextricably collide.

"The film is driven by coincidence and preconception," says Newton. "Each character, whether they be rich, poor, black, white, Mexican or Iraqi, suffers these preconceptions about the other as a manifestation of personal frustration. You see the characters' motivation and see that behind the belligerent cop is a man in pain, behind the frustrated housewife is a woman who feels let down. Racism is just one part of the much bigger puzzle that the film offers."

With a degree in social anthropology from Cambridge, Newton is more than equipped to assess the subtexts of Crash. She was born in Zambia to a white artist father and a Zimbabwean mother, a princess of the Shona tribe. The family fled to Penzance in 1977 to escape the country's volatile political climate. Newton trained as a dancer and was 19 when she starred in her first film, Flirting, opposite Nicole Kidman. By 23 she had appeared in Young Americans with Harvey Keitel, Interview with the Vampire starring Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise, and Jefferson in Paris with Nick Nolte.


With Matt Dillon in Crash: the actors
worked 'for hardly any money'
Since then, her career (apart from roles in Mission: Impossible II and The Chronicles of Riddick, which she attributes to "being skint") has been marked by her unerring search for quality and not the fast buck. "If you reach dizzy heights really fast it tends to run out really fast," she laughs. "I intend to be doing this for a very long time and want to sneak up on people from behind and do great work."

Newton confirmed her integrity by turning down the role of Alex Munday in the big babe blockbuster Charlie's Angels, in favour of the low-budget It Was an Accident, scripted by her husband, writer-director Oliver Parker. "Someone actually questioned whether it was the right move," says Newton feigning shock. "I was like, duh… It was a no-brainer."

In 2003, Newton joined the cast of ER and again only just avoided superstardom. "I did it because I liked the storyline about the whole Aids programme and it was well written, but what I did find annoying was that after, maybe three episodes it was, 'She's that girl off ER.' "

Following her performance in Crash, Newton is very much in demand and is about to start filming Pursuit of Happiness, playing Will Smith's wife. I ask if she is prepared for fame. "I am looking forward to relaxing and knowing that I will work again," she answers, breathing a sigh of relief. "But the question should be, is fame prepared for me?"

 

[ShoeGal4Eva]

she looks so fresh and ovely in that lim dress

 

[scriptgirl]

Looks soo much better with that belt than without it.