REBECCA'S
BATTY
by NATASHA STOYNOFF first
appeared in theTORONTO SUN
Playing nice girl among bitchy high school
babes did wonders for Winona Ryder's career in
Heathers. Same could happen for Kentucky-born
Rebecca
Gayheart, who stars in the recently
released Jawbreaker.
"It's about the cruel politics of high
school," says Gayheart, "a sort of mix between Heathers,
Carrie
and Grease. It's a really cool film. I
play the good girl fighting for justice."
And as those justice tales
go, "I start off being in the popular group, then get kicked out,
and later
get revenge on the bad girls." In
her next film, she plays it good-turned-bad in The Hangman's Daughter.
"I'm a Christian missionary going to Mexico to spread the word of God ...
until I get bitten and become this nasty
vampire."
Speaking of getting bit,
last year, when filming the horror Urban Legend in Toronto, Gayheart
had a
near-bat experience when
one flew into her bedroom late one night and perched itself.
"It looked like a rat hanging there,"
cringes
Gayheart at the memory.
"Me and my friends got a bunch of towels
and tried to scare it away. I kept thinking, if it gets in my hair
it will stick there and bite me. We got a broom and we just kept
screaming, 'Get
more towels! Get more towels!' It was
such a nightmare," she sighs.
Shooting screaming horror
scenes by day didn't help matters. "When you make a horror
film, it plants a seed of
doubt in your mind," notes
Gayheart. "Every night when I went home, I made sure the door was
locked."
But the fear just brought
out the Southerner in her, she admits.
"I used to have this really strong Southern
accent, and it comes back if I get really scared, really tired
or really drunk," she says,
"or
when I get on the phone with Mom or Dad." END
Cosmo: So tell me about your new fall television show, Wasteland.
Rebecca Gayheart: Well, it's a new series written by Kevin Williamson (Scream, Dawson's Creek). Kevin is also the producer on the show. And there are three girls, three boys. It's basically about people who should be getting ready to turn 30, but who just aren't — who are acting like they're 19 or 20. It's really fun. It's a great cast.
C: What kind of character do you play?
RG:
I play this girl who grew up in North Carolina. Went to college, majored
in drama, studied
theater, went to
New York, tried acting for two seconds, hated it.
C: So where is it set?
RG: It's set in New York City, in present time.
C: Why do they call it Wasteland?
RG:
Because we're all in a wasteland. Our generation, everyone in their late
20s who is just sort
of gliding through,
it's the wasteland we all get stuck in.
C: You play a character older than yourself, right?
RG:
Actually no. I'm 26. I'll be 27 in August. And my character was written
as 28. So it's not that far
off. She's a little
bit older. Which is nice for me. I have been playing characters who were
years
younger.
C: Excellent. So are you excited to do a series?
RG:
I am. I really am. I haven't done television in a while. And it wasn't
because I was
poo-pooing television.
I hadn't found anything that I liked enough to do it. But I'm really happy
with this. I read
it, and my instincts were go for it. So I'm glad it worked out.
I mean, basically
I'm just looking
for great roles, whether they are on television or film or the stage.
C: What did you like about this part so much?
RG:
I liked the whole subject matter of the show. I liked that it was older.
It's a mature show. I
mean, it's definitely
got some humor in it, but it's a drama. And it's something that me and
my
friends would watch.
It's something that we're all going through. I really liked that. Kevin
is a
wonderful person
to work with. He's so talented and such a great person. That really drew
me
to the project as
well.
C: Had you met him before, or worked with him before?
RG: Yeah, I worked with him on Scream II.
C: Switching gears, are you and Brett Ratner (the director of Rush Hour) married yet?
RG:
No, but we're engaged. And we've been together so long, we've earned the
right to call
each other husband
and wife.
C: You met like nine, ten years ago?
RG: Yeah. I met him when I was 15.
C: That's crazy.
RG: So it's actually 11 years ago.
C: Wow. Where were you?
RG:
I
was in New York. I was a junior in high school. Or the summer before my
junior year.
And he had just
come to New York to start his first year at NYU film school. And we met,
and
that was it. Started
dating right away. Fell in love. Kids in love.
C: But that's so weird to survive
your 20s with the same person. Do you know what I
mean?
RG: Yeah.
C: You go through so many changes.
RG:
I think we went through our changes together. We kind of grew at the same
pace. And
we're both really
independent people, so we never got that co-dependent relationship stuff
that
most people get.
Thank God we survived, because it's so nice now being in this business
with
someone who knows
you so well. Just someone to appreciate it all with.
C: When you see friends or acquaintances
who are single in Hollywood and what they go
through, do you ever just go, oh, thank
God, I'm done?
RG: Yes.
C: Do you ever feel like, oh wow, I might have missed something?
RG:
No. I'm so happy, and I'm so fortunate that I found it really young. Although
sometimes I
worry that maybe
we didn't...
C: Sow your oats or whatever.
RG:
Yeah, yeah. But now I think we're both really happy. I think it would be
very different from
me being in this
business and being single. You know, I like being taken and not available.
It
makes it very clear.
C: Would you like to have kids?
RG:
I would. I'd like to have four. It will probably end up being three. I
don't know. It's
so hard to say.
I mean, I like the idea of a lot of kids, although I haven't started yet,
so who
knows.
C: Yeah. When you have one, then see how you feel.
RG: Yeah, exactly. But kids are definitely a part of the future.
C: Do you think about raising them
in Hollywood? Do you think about that? That seems
like it would be hard.
RG:
Yeah.
I think it's going to be hard wherever we raise them. I kind of like the
idea of the East
Coast upbringing
more so than West Coast upbringing, but who knows? END