Blast Magazine (November
1998)
It’s been over a
year since we last saw Sandra Bullock on the big screen. She tells Blast what
she’s been up to…
Sandra
Bullock knows how fickle fame can be. Speed, the very film which catapulted
Hollywood's No 1 box office actress to dizzy heights, ironically also led to
her downfall. After the sinking of last summers disappointing sequel, Speed Z:
Cruise Control, it looked like the actress, who can still earn
S11
million a movie, had gone into hiding. This couldn't be further from the truth.
The incredibly bubbly, vivacious Bullock may have moved away from the glitz and
glamour of Tinseltown to a quiet suburb in Texas, but she s been busy working
on three new films which you II be able to see on the big screen over the next
few months. First up is Hope Floats which she also co-produced, then Practical
Magic, with Nicole Kidman, and finally she provides the voice of Miriam, Moses'
sister, in the DreamWorks animation epic, The Prince of Egypt.
Bullock's
no slouch in the business department. When she agreed to make Speed 2 with
Twentieth Century Fax, they paid her back by helping her finance a low budget
feature. The result is Hope Floats, a tear-jerking project close to Sandra's
heart.
Nodding
her head, Bullock explains: 'There has been the least amount of pressure put on
me with this film because the studio let us completely alone. I think they
probably felt they owed me one after the disaster of Speed2.
'I
know I'm still blamed for the failure of that film, but it was a great relief
in the sense that everybody backed off and let me to concentrate on a smaller
movie I felt passionate about. It's so rare when I came to a project saying:
"I love this film. I love what it says":
Smoothing
out her hair, she adds: 'The best thing that came out of the biggest box office
flop in history was that people didn't care about my image anymore. I had
failed as America's sweetheart and that was the best gift I could've received:
With
her peaches and cream complexion, Bullock looks a lat younger than her
34
years. Her trademark cleft in the chin is ever-prominent. She wears a tailored,
navy trouser suit, which accentuates her curves.
After
a string of hits, including While You Were Sleeping and A Time To Kill, Bullock
became known as 'the adorable girl-next-door which she believes limited her
choice of roles. She laughs off suggestions that she's famous for being too
nice. Her large brown eyes open wide: 'I hope I'm not known for that, because
that's a hard thing to
try
and live up to! I have my bad moments like everyone else, hut I'm not going to
throw my attitude around at work, because there are people there, like the crew
for example, who work 10 times longer and harder than I do.'
This
is a typical Sandra Bullock remark. She's also known for being so laid hack she
s almost horizontal, and for putting other people's needs before her own. It's
highly unusual to see an A-list actress stop off at Starbucks (a famous
American coffee housel, on her way to the set to get cappuccinos far the cast
and crew. This is second nature to
Bullock
and very much a part of her personality.
Harry
Connick Jr., her
ca-star in Hope Floats, had never met anybody like
Bullock before. He explains in his sexy, Southern drawl: 'Sandra may put butts on seats in
the theatres, but she sure doesn't act like a movie star. She has no airs and
graces about her and
is definitely one of the most talented and gifted actresses around. She's also one of
the most down to-earth celebrities I know-- she II put the fire out an your
house before hosing down her own!'
In
Hope Floats, Sandra plays a woman who discovers on a national talk show that
her husband is having an affair with her best friend. She moves back to her
home town with her young daughter (Mae Whitman, One fine Day, where she
eventually gets back with old teen love, Justin (Harry Connick Jr, Independence
Day. Directed by Forest Whitaker (best-known for his brilliant portrayal 01 an
IRA hostage in The Crying Camel, the movie is guaranteed to tug at your heart
strings--so don't forget your tissues!
Bullock
fell in love with the role because she could relate to her character, Birdee. She
explains :'Certain things have happened in my life. which have enabled me to
relate to her feelings. This movie is my sort of thank you card to certain
people I know. It's all very personal, but I think those people know what they
are'
Rumour
has it that Grammy-winning crooner Connick woo the role of Justin after he
serenaded Bullock at the audition. Letting out a sincere, beauty laugh Bullock explains:
'It's a fallacy. In his final screen test, he auditioned his pants off. We were
waiting for his agents to make a deal and we started to talk about music and a
certain lyric I like from the song Fly Me To The Moon. I've always felt that
it's never sung right.
'Well,
Harry promised to sing it fur me and I'm thinking "Yeah, whatever!" We
were on the set and he just started singing the introduction and it was
absolutely beautiful. The entire crew stopped. And I'm thinking: "I'm
producing this movie, time is money!"
At
the higher end of the movie budget scale is Practical Magic, a movie Bullock
can't wait to talk about: 'Working with Nicola Kidman on Practical Magic was
great. I couldn't have picked a better actress to play my Sister. When we were
deciding who to cast, I suggested Nicole, before I had even met her.'
Their
on-screen relationship soon developed into a deep friendship away from the
cameras. Kidman tells people that Bullock has a wicked sense of humour and she
has this ability to look at the funny side of bad situations.
Bullock
is a firm believer in never having regrets. If she could turn back the clock,
she still would have spent five months in the middle of the Caribbean, shooting
Speed 2. She smiles: 'My movies are a visual diary because I look back un
things I did and
I
know exactly what I was thinking of the day certain parts were timed, It's kind
of documented, I really had the best time of my life making Speed 2. It was like
going on a five month excursion which turned out to be the biggest emotional
and physical challenge I've ever experienced How can you regret something like
that?'
Article by Tiffany Rose
© 1998 by UCI Cinemas
typed out by the webmaster
of The Famous Sandra Bullock Page