| September 1, 2015 | People

Kirsten Dunst chats with friend Julianne Moore about her upcoming film and TV roles, favorite directors, and how taxis can be a girl’s best friend when dealing with New York paparazzi.



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Kirsten Dunst began her career at the top, making her film debut at age 6 in Woody Allen’s Oedipus Wrecks. She won her first major accolade three years later—a Golden Globe nomination as best supporting actress—in Interview with the Vampire opposite Brad Pitt and Tom Cruise.

Since her precocious start, she’s enjoyed a wide-ranging film career; Dunst is one of the few actresses who can claim both blockbuster success (as Mary Jane Watson in the Spider-Man franchise) as well as art film glory. Her star turn in Lars von Trier’s apocalyptic masterpiece Melancholia garnered her a best actress award at the Cannes Film Festival in 2011.

This fall she ramps up her comedic chops as the deluded, manipulative Peggy in the hit FX series Fargo, and next spring she’ll headline hot director Jeff Nichols’s buzzed-about new supernatural thriller Midnight Special.

Julianne Moore: You have a busy fall, Kirsten! I want you to talk about your roles, starting with Peggy in Fargo. What drew you to the character?

Kirsten Dunst: The first season was outstanding. I loved the writing and the way it was shot. Then I got two episodes for the new season with [creator/writer] Noah Hawley, and I knew that whatever trajectory Peggy was going on, it was going to be one of the nuttiest characters I’ve ever played.

JM: What’s her character trying to do?

KD: She’s trying to break out of Minnesota and become a celebrity hairdresser.

JM: Maybe she’ll end up in LA.

KD: That’s her big dream.

JM: Is there tragedy looming for her? Is she going to achieve her goal?

KD: Something intercepts her goal, and she and her husband spend the series figuring it out. She’s pretty delusional.

JM: Who plays her husband?

KD: Jesse Plemons. He’s awesome. Most of our scenes are together, and we developed a great friendship.



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JM: Have you had any interaction with the Coen brothers working on Fargo?

KD: We don’t. They gave Noah their blessing. The first season, they read scripts and approved them.

JM: What’s your movie Midnight Special about?

KD: It’s about a young boy, my son, who has special powers. It reminds me of Close Encounters of the Third Kind. I think Jeff Nichols is one of the best young directors of our time. I’ve wanted to work with him for a while, so I fought to be in this movie. I love Take Shelter [Nichols’s 2011 thriller], and I really like Mud [a coming-of-age drama he wrote and directed, starring Matthew McConaughey and Reese Witherspoon].

JM: What kind of director brings out the best in you?

KD: Lars von Trier gave me the most emotionally. He knows how to put things into words in a way most people don’t.



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JM: Did he talk to you about depression [when you were working together on Melancholia]?

KD: He did, and about his own depression. He was very open with me. He did the most with saying the least, too.

JM: I actually feel the best directors are the ones who talk the least.

KD: I hate talking things over. If someone starts talking too much to me, I just want to walk away.

JM: I know! Sometimes I’m like, Shh… Your career shows quite a diversity, from Spider-Man to Marie Antoinette to Melancholia. How do you choose your parts?

KD: It’s the director every time. I’d rather play a tiny little who-cares role if the director’s great.

JM: One part you were great in was in the Walter Salles movie—I can’t think of the name…

KD: On the Road. That’s so sweet of you.

JM: You were very good. The weariness, the exhaustion, that guy coming in and out of your life, it was just heartbreaking.

KD: Thank you! I wish more people had seen that movie. It was such a fun ensemble.



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JM: Here’s a question I get a lot, and I’ll tell you my answer after you tell me yours. What movie role was the closest to your own character?

KD: When I was 16 and did Bring It On. I was that girl. It was like me being in high school as myself. It wasn’t a stretch at all. I was a cheerleader, my best friend was a cheerleader. I wasn’t in competitions, but I watched them on TV.

JM: I always say, “No one and everybody.” No one, because none of them are me, but then they all are because I have to find something in every single one of them to have a relationship with. Now we’re going to move to some questions about fashion.

KD: Let’s do it.

JM: Did the clothes help you shape the character in Fargo?

KD: In the first few episodes, I wanted people to look at Peggy and giggle a little bit—just a pinch! Not at her, but with her, just so that you’re on this girl’s side. Some of the stuff that she manipulates her husband into doing! I had red gloves because I was caught red-handed. And because this character wants to get out of Minnesota, I wanted her to have a beret to wear, or a shirt that has the Eiffel Tower all over it.

JM: Clothes are signifiers. People are telling you who they want to be with their clothes. Which brings us to Marie Antoinette and all those costumes. Did you have any input into the designs? They were spectacular.

KD: We had a genius, legendary costume designer, Milena Canonero. She always brought in accessories, and I was like, “Oh, let’s do a red ribbon around my waist like I was cut in half, to foreshadow the beheading.” She liked that collaboration, but it was her fabrics, her designs. They were fabulous. It wasn’t very comfortable, but very impressive. Oh my god, corsets are the worst!



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JM: You were the first major celebrity to wear Rodarte. How did you know them?

KD: I have worked with these stylists, Nina and Clare Hallworth, since I was very young, and they introduced me to Rodarte’s clothes. Then I met [designers Kate and Laura Mulleavy] and we became fast friends. Now we’re making a movie together, and we start in a week.

JM: What’s it about?

KD: Oh god, these girls will kill me if I say anything about it. Sorry, Julianne. If I were private with you, I’d tell you.

JM: What’s the best fashion advice you’ve ever received?

KD: I don’t think I’ve ever gotten advice. It’s more that I had really good influences. When I was 16, I was working with Sofia Coppola, who is one of the chicest women I’ve ever met. And my mom was always into fashion. She lived in Germany for 10 years and had a lot of old Kenzo in her closet.

JM: What about career advice?

KD: The influence of how I was raised was the best career advice, because being a child actress can really be unhealthy for your psyche. But my mom always sent me to normal school, so I never missed out on the prom or field trips or any of that stuff.



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JM: I knew [an actress] who wanted to hang out at the mall, which she had never done as a teenager. We were in our 20s and she had never had a normal teenage experience.

KD: That’s sad. My best friend I’ve had since sixth grade. I think that’s why I’ve been able to reinvent what I do, because there was a time when I was over it.

JM: You’ve worked with some of the biggest names in the business: Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, Jim Carrey. Who else is on your wish list?

KD: You!

JM: I’d like to work with you, too.

KD: Why do you think I said, “Do you think Julianne could do this interview?” Maybe if we put it out in the universe.

JM: That would be great. We’d have a good time.

KD: Maybe with Sofia.

JM: Who knows? When did you buy a place of your own in New York?

KD: In my mid-20s. My whole family is here, and I just needed to get independent from everything in LA. I had the best time living in New York. But it’s tiring, energy-wise.

“I love how easy it is to meet up with friends here. In LA it’s such a planning thing.”

JM: You have to make sure you have a refuge because it can be overwhelming. That’s the secret of living in New York. What do you like the most about the city?

KD: I love how easy it is to meet up with friends. In LA it’s such a planning thing. New York is kind of like, “Oh, I’m walking by your building, do you want to get a coffee?”

JM: Do New Yorkers leave you alone?

KD: The paparazzi are worse in New York because once you’re walking, you can’t really go anywhere except get in a cab. It’s weird to have people walk with you—like, when are they going to exit down the side alley? In a car, at least you’re able to get away. But yeah, I get left alone, pretty much.

JM: What are your favorite lesser-known New York City hangouts?

KD: You know where I go? I always go to The Ear Inn.

JM: Bart [Freundlich, my husband] used to have an apartment right upstairs, years ago.

KD: That’s my spot.

JM: If you weren’t an actress, you would be…

KD: Definitely something creative, like a painter or photographer or a fashion designer.

JM: Can you imagine yourself directing?

KD: I might be doing that next year.

JM: Do you have a script?

KD: We’re in the rewrite phase, and we have an actress. It’s almost all together, but I can’t fully talk about it yet.

JM: What are the charities you’re involved with?

KD: I work with The Art of Elysium. You can go to the hospital, talk to kids, do paint work. They have a program with older women and young girls, getting clothes, getting makeup, just doing fun things with kids in the hospital. I’ve known Jennifer Howell, who started the organization, since my early 20s.

Gotham: Julianne, Kirsten, we appreciate your taking the time for the interview.

KD: Thanks so much for doing this, Julianne. Let’s hang when you come to LA.

JM: I would love to!