Журнал Andy Warhol's Interview Россия Interview № 3 | Page 196

194/ ENGLISH SUMMARY
The Cannes-2007 best director, artist (whose
work costs as much as a Picasso), surfer and pa-
jamas lover.
Naomi Campbell first met Schnabel in 1985 in
Paris, in the home of designer Azzedine Ala ï a. Ju-
lian became her first acquaintance from the art
world and spurred the then 15-year-old model’s in-
terest in modern art. The artist now accepts Naomi
at his home as an old friend.
NAOMI: Julian, you are always in pajamas!
I’m sure you’re very comfortable in them. You even
went on stage in them at Cannes to receive your
award for best director (for the film The Diving Bell
and the Butterfly.—Interview). Do you really wear
them every day? Or only when you’re being photo-
graphed?
SCHNABEL: First of all, in Cannes I was, of
course, not in pajamas. That is, I wore them on the
street, but I wore a tuxedo to the awards.
NAOMI: Since the films Basquiat, Before Night
Falls, and especially The Diving Bell and the But-
terfly, most people see you as a filmmaker. Do you
think cinema is a more complex art form than
painting?
SCHNABEL: Cinema is easier to talk about, be-
cause a film is always a story, even the making of the
film is itself a story. Painting is an art that is rather
more mute, but at the same time something unbe-
lievably powerful, sometimes incomparable with ci-
ne ma. It is frequently said that cinema is a combina-
tion of music, photography and art, but this is not so.
Cinema is cinema. It has a lot of its own aspects, dif-
ferent people with different skills work on it. Paint -
ing is a completely separate practice, and some
things are impossible to convey other than through
painting. And I like that. It’s about temperament—
the quality of the objects, the history that these ob-
jects are connected with, and in the feelings that the-
se objects invoke. Once I was talking with the actor
Bob Hoskins, trying to understand how a young ac-
tor could play a great role and become famous. I told
Bob that as an artist there are always objects around
me with which I have a certain connection. This
connection keeps me on track. He said that he
doesn’t know anything about that, but when you hit
that certain note, paint that stroke or do that thing—
at that moment everything changes. It’s something
that goes beyond, and you move closer to the divine
light. When this happens, it is already more than art.
This is not a commodity—it is precisely what people
are searching for. I’m an artist—that’s what I am.
NAOMI: Then how do you want to be remem-
bered? As a painter?
SCHNABEL: Well, I am sitting here and now,
I’m in no rush to be remembered! (Laughs.)
NAOMI: No-no, I didn’t mean that, God forbid.
What do you consider yourself to be?
SCHNABEL: I have been painting since child-
hood. Whatever perspective I have as a film director
comes from being a painter.
NAOMI: One more thing. I know that earlier
you were crazy about surfing. When did you first get
on a board and why did you suddenly lose interest in
surfing?
CATE
BLANCHETT
p. 124
by SERGEY MAZAEV
She is known in her native Australia as a stage
actress, and by her friends and neighbors as
a caring mother of three sons. The world remem-
bers her for the films Elizabeth and The Lord of
the Rings. The actress tells Sergey Mazaev how
she combines three diverse identities.
Cate Blanchett has one of the most amusing re-
cords in cinema: no one before her had ever received
an Oscar for playing another Oscar winner. This
happened in February 2005, when pregnant with
her second son, the actress received the high honor
for her role as movie star Katharine Hepburn in
The Aviator. She has been successful since the very
beginning of her career; directors who for years
had been searching for the right person for leading
roles have chosen her after seeing her photograph.
Director Gillian Armstrong, who introduced Blan-
chett to the international audience in 1997 in the
film Oscar and Lucinda, said, “There are many
beautiful actresses. But when you look at Cate,
it seems like you travel to different worlds.”
Musician Sergey Mazaev, who earlier saw Cate
Blanchett only in the movies, met his favorite actress
at a presentation by watch company IWC in Gene-
va, and immediately spoke with her about his favor-
ite role of hers.
BLANCHETT: Hello, Sergey. You really don’t
look like a rock musician.
MAZAEV: I don’t look like a rocker now be-
cause I gave up drugs 10 years ago, and I’m very
happy. But let’s talk about you. I can’t believe after
The Curious Case of Benjamin Button...
BLANCHETT: Oh, you saw it?!
MAZAEV: Everyone saw it!
MIUCCIA
PRADA
p. 128
by ALIONA DOLETSKAYA
The most influential woman in the fashion
world avoids the status of celebrity. Interview
finds out what is really important in her life.
I thought that I knew everything about Miuccia
Prada: prophet and visionary, founder of intellectu-
by NAOMI CAMPBELL
BLANCHETT: It was a beauty. David Fincher
is a really fearless film director.
MAZAEV: They say he’s a tyrant.
BLANCHETT: He is not a tyrant at all. He’s
a perfectionist. This works for me, he is a fiercely
intelligent person.
MAZAEV: Have you seen his The Girl with the
Dragon Tattoo?
BLANCHETT: No, I still haven’t gotten over
the Swedish version. I want it to subside so I can
watch Fincher’s version with a clear head.
MAZAEV: Benjamin Button is more than
a movie for me, and you are more than an actress
in that movie. Your role is my favorite.
BLANCHETT: Oh, thank you. That role was
a real gift. I grew up with my grandmother, and
I think there was a lot of her in the role.
MAZAEV: I grew up with my grandmother as
well.
BLANCHETT: It’s a gift of fate, isn’t it?
To grow up around people with a skip in generation.
MAZAEV: That’s right. I have my little son,
he is two and a half and I’m 52, so I am like a grand-
father. This is a completely different feeling. I want
to play football with him, so I stopped drinking, and
only smoke occasionally. But let’s return to the in-
ter view. How is the shooting for The Hobbit going?
Were you glad to get back to the world of Tolkien?
BLANCHETT: I read The Hobbit when I was
a girl, but I don’t remember my character of Gal-
adriel being in it. When Peter Jackson proposed last
year that I work with him again, it was a real sur-
prise. When I shot the first film (in The Lord of the
Rings trilogy, which came out in 2001–2003.—Inter-
view), I spent three weeks on the set, but now it re-
ally seems like that was another life—I didn’t even
have children then. When I did both parts of
The Hobbit, I came back for a week and discovered
that the entire team was the same.
MAZAEV: It’s like a reunion of a big happy
family after a long separation.
BLANCHETT: Exactly. My husband and I are
running the Sydney Theatre Company, and it’s
been fantastic to have this sense of community that
you can build on. In film shoots this is hard to do,
because you work intensely for three months, and
then you move on to the next project and this feeling
of kinship evaporates. But with The Hobbit I had
the chance to continue something from before.
MAZAEV: Tell me about your work on produc-
tions of Chekhov—in Australia you are mainly
known as a stage actress.
BLANCHETT: We decided to go on tour in Eu-
rope, and of course, I would very much like to visit
Russia. However, it’s scary to bring a Russian play
to Russia. To come with your own samovar to
Russia—that’s a big responsibility.
p. 80
SCHNABEL: I still surf! I’m going to Hawaii
next week.
NAOMI: There are such waves there! You’re not
afraid of being banged up?
SCHNABEL: That has happened many times.
The ocean is much more powerful than we are. It’s
also astounding. You can’t find a better way to see
the world, travel to different shores. I have been
surfing since I was 15, and now I am 60, but I still
ride to keep young.
NAOMI: You don’t look 60! What do you feel
when you catch a wave?
SCHNABEL: It’s something that’s all encom-
passing. For professionals it’s also an art form, some-
thing that generates deep feelings. Surfers are like
Masons. They are united by something in common
that is irreplaceable. And I have a generally long-
standing mystical connection with the water.
NAOMI: Yes, I remember you said once,
“If I need rain, it starts to rain.” Does it really start
every time?
SCHNABEL: When I filmed Before Night Falls
and I wanted it to rain, it always did. And when
I needed the rain to stop, it stopped right then.
Other directors, Terry Gilliam, for example,
frequently complain about the weather, it’s always
going wrong for them. I’m a lucky man, knock
wood.
JULIAN
SCHNABEL