I recently attended the TRON: Legacy junket here in Beverly Hills. It was my first junket for RopeofSilicon and quite an eye-opener if I may say. I did a couple of one on ones that I will be delivering soon, but it was one of the round table sessions that floored me the most.
Olivia Wilde walked into a room filled with ten film journalists last Friday and, as my pals Curt and Cris Kirkwood of the Meat Puppets used to say, “charmed the pants right off of us”. And it wasn’t the first time. We had all watched the film the night before. Believe me she did the same thing in the film as well. There’s a three-week moratorium on me giving a review of TRON: Legacy but I don’t think Disney minds me saying that Olivia has big screen talent.
This could be a breakout year for Wilde. She’s already had global success on the small screen playing Thirteen in Fox TV’s “House”, the show that overtook CSI: Miami as the world’s most watched TV show a couple of years back, and now she has both Tron and the Jon Favreau directed Cowboys and Aliens coming out on July 29, 2011. If anyone wonders whether Wilde can make the jump, TRON: Legacy should dispel any doubts. Not only does she dazzle the big screen but also she holds her own with a couple of truly great actors, namely Jeff Bridges and Michael Sheen. A couple of actors Wilde said, “Always bring their A-game.”
But it was her performance in the interview room that truly convinced me Wilde is going be around for the long haul. She handled every question from the borderline obnoxious (“Should we call you Princess?” and “Are you a shoe person?”) to the serious (“Would you like to talk about Haiti?”) with humor, thoughtfulness and an utter lack of pretense. She didn’t just answer questions, she thought about them and then gave appropriate responses. When I asked her a particularly pointed question that stumped the TRON: Legacy writers (Adam Horowitz and Edward Kitsis) minutes before, Olivia knocked it out of the park like she was taking batting practice. I can’t give her entire answer here as it contains spoilers, but she ended with my favorite line of the day, “As an activist myself, I think everybody should be a revolutionary.” She meant it, too. Gotta love that.
Of course it makes sense that Wilde is more than just a pretty face. Her parents are Leslie Cockburn and Andrew Cockburn, one’s a “60 Minutes” producer and the other is an author and journalist, not to mention Andrew is also the brother of Nation columnist Alexander Cockburn and a distant relative of novelist Evelyn Waugh. Intellectualism runs in her veins. She’s also an activist is a board member of Artists for Peace and Justice, which provides education and health services in Haiti, and the ACLU of Southern California. Her work in Haiti lead to the question about that tortured country. She hit that one out of the park, too.
Wilde explained to us that things there are tough and getting tougher because of the recent cholera outbreak. She then went on to say that there is corruption and dysfunction in relief effort but that some charities are doing good work and that she advised everyone to do their research and find out who the good charities are and donate to them if they can. If only the politicians in DC where so honest and well spoken maybe we cold get more things done around the world.
The thing that was refreshing was that she didn’t talk about Haiti until she was asked about it. She knew this was a Tron junket so she didn’t try to mix politics with pop culture. She only answered those questions when asked.
Which brings me to her performance in TRON: Legacy. This is a breakout role in my opinion. I thought she was good on “House”, but in this film she is a revelation. If you were looking for a new actress that can both hold the screen and kick butt at the same time, Wilde fits the bill. And her smile is especially infectious.
If it all sounds like the woman is a little too perfect, maybe she is. Then again, maybe she has ugly feet and flunked math in high school. Maybe her enthusiasm for this movie was a ruse and she dissed all of us as soon as she left the interview room. All I know is what I saw. And what I saw was a young woman who seemed to be enjoying life and happy to let the public in on it. What I saw was a star in the making.
Tron probably won’t be the film that cements her status. After all she is only third on the billing card. But with all the hype behind this picture and her next flick, the aforementioned Cowboys and Aliens, I think it is only a matter of time before Wilde makes top billing. And I think it will pay off handsomely for whoever does it.
TRON: Legacy hits theaters on December 17, for more on the film click here.
