MICHELLE ON HER SEX SCENE WITH RYAN:
"We never rehearsed anything, and those were really dark days. We shot the beginning of our relationship first, and it was fun and alive. Then we did the sex scenes and it was . . . toxic. Ryan and I had stopped relating to each other as Ryan and Michelle. Those scenes took forever. I had a long drive from set to home each night, and I would roll down all the windows and turn up the music as loud as I could and hang my head out the window like a dog and scream. It was my escape."
RYAN ON HIS SEX SCENE WITH MICHELLE:
"You mean the trying-not-to-have-sex sex scene? It was hard . . . a lot of times actors can trick people into thinking something is happening when it’s not happening, and we had to call ourselves out on anything that didn’t feel honest. Actors become very professional and proficient about watching out for each other’s light and not stepping on each other’s lines. All of these things are artificial, and you have to strip that away if you’re going to achieve a sense of intimacy. In real life sex is messy, and we wanted to get at that wonderful messiness."
MICHELLE ON DAWSON'S CREEK:
"Dawson’s Creek allowed me to make choices based only on desire. I was so lucky to get Dawson’s. I was auditioning for pilots twice a day. You get used to a rhythm of rejection . . . Dawson’s probably saved my life. I did it for six and a half years, and it gave me financial security. A project like Blue Valentine took years to get off the ground, and I was able to stick with it. I first read the script when I was 21, 22, and it became my reason for being for the longest time. When I ran into Ryan, he said, “What about that movie?” I was surprised; I thought Blue Valentine existed only in my head. Until he said that, I was worried it wasn’t quite as good as I had thought. He validated my reaction."
RYAN ON HIS NON-CANADIAN ACCENT:
"As a kid I decided that a Canadian accent doesn’t sound tough. I thought guys should sound like Marlon Brando. So now I have a phony accent that I can’t shake, so it’s not phony anymore. I’m going for the Madonna thing, the Lady Gaga thing—a phony accent that becomes your trademark."
[more at W Magazine]