W takes a look at Hollywood's hotest of the hot—from
the most adored actress and gutsiest studio to the chicest
decorators and the most starry-eyed psychics.
The Actress:
Jennifer Aniston may be coming back for one more season
of �Friends� (and that seven-figure paycheck), but she�s
already made the leap to big-screen stardom.
By Kimberly Cutter
Photography by Michael Thompson
W Magazine
February, 2003
Were
Jennifer Aniston�s life a movie, she�d be on the verge of
some very big trouble. After all, as every filmgoer knows,
it�s always just at that glowing, warm-fuzzy moment when
the heroine seems to have found success, true love and a
generally soft-focus, montage-like existence that you can
be sure all hell is about to break loose.
To recap: The actress recently agreed to a
10th season of �Friends,� thereby making the show�s 26 million
fans very happy and some NBC executives positively ecstatic;
she�s contentedly married to Hollywood�s number-one golden-streaked
princeling, Brad Pitt; she�s banished her wicked (or at
least, very ill-mannered) memoir-writing mother from the
proverbal kingdom until further notice; she�s won over the
fire-breathing critics with her turn as a windbreaker clad
Madame Bovary in The Good Girl, and she�s bought herself
an enormous mansc in Beverly Hills, where she and Mr. Pitt
plan to raise somewhere between two and seven children,
depending on whom you ask. In movieland, storm clouds would
be gathering fast.
Of course, Jennifer Aniston�s life is not
a movie, and instead of heading for a third-act reversal,
she just keeps leaping from mountaintop to mountaintop.
While many small-screen stars move on to roles in KFC commercials,
watered-down spin-offs and straight-to-video flops, she�s
nabbed coveted starring parts opposite two of Hollywood�s
biggest box-office deities, Jim Carrey and Ben Stiller,
thereby finding herself in the tiny golden circle of first-name-only
stars like Cameron and Julia and Reese.
�Jennifer just has �it�,� says Tom Shadyae,
who�s currently directing her in the Carrey film Bruce Almighty
�If you look at the handful of A-list actors that exist
in Hollywood, you realize that the thing they all share,
in addition to being beautiful and talented, is this amazing
relatability. When you watch Jennifer, she manages to amaze
you and make you feel like she might be your next-door neighbour
at the same time, which when you consider how much money
she makes and who she�s married to, is pretty incredible.�
All of which helps to explain why, despite
letting herself be dragged back to Central Perk for another
round of lattes next season, Aniston is just about ready
for life after Rachel. �I mean, I�m completely terrified
about �Friends� coming to an end, but I�m also dying for
it to end, you know? She says cheerfully, sitting on the
terrace of the modest Hollywood Hills �love nest,� as it�s
invariably described, that she and Pitt will soon surrender
in favor of the $13.5 million six-bedroom French Normandy
number they recently purchased. It�s a crisp, clear December
afternoon, and the actress�who�s dressed in faded Levi�s
and a tight charcoal-grey turtleneck sweater�looks terrific,
her fabled honey-toned hair tumbling casually around her
shoulders.
�The weird thing about The Good Girl was that
suddenly all these people were like, �Wow, look what you
can do!�� adds the 33-year old actress, who had previously
earned raves for her roles in Office Space and Wendy Wasserstein�s
The Object of My Affection. �Like I�ve been doing sh***y
work for the last nine years or something. Suddenly they�re
like, �Hey, she�s really an actress,� as if I were just
some bulls*** comedienne before.�
�People who do comedy are always underrated
because they make it look so easy,� says Aniston�s agent,
Kevin Huvane. �So it was exciting to see Jen challenge herself
with a film like The Good Girl�which is pretty much the
antithesis of �Friends��and get sort of recognition she
deserves. I don�t think there�s any limit to what she can
do.� 
The film has opened up a �whole new horizon�
for her she says. �It feels like this new set of opportunities.�
For instance, she�s been thinking about doing a Broadway
musical. �Singing scares me, so I think that might be fun.�
Which is not to say that she�s about to forgo
her comedic roots. Despite the Oscar buzz swirling around
her dramatic turn in The Good Girl, she�ll return to comedy
in both Bruce Almighty and a new project by Meet The Parents
writer John Hamburg. �It�s a pretty big departure for her,�
Hamburg notes. �She plays this wild woman who draws Ben
Stiller out of his shell�someone who�s very loose, which
is not the way Rachel is at all.� Hamburg chuckles. �I mean,
I�m not asking Jennifer to wear a prosthetic nose or anything,
but it�s very different, and she�s very conscious of that.
I remember when she first came on the set, she said, �If
you feel like I start doing a Rachel thing, just tell me,
okay?��
As is true of many comic performers, Aniston
developed her breezy charm to cope with a difficult childhood.
Born in the San Fernando Valley to struggling actors John
and Nancy, she spent her kindergarten year in Greece before
the family relocated to New York�s Upper West Side, where
her father found work playing the sexy devil Victor on Days
of Our Lives. But as the marriage disintegrated, Aniston
found herself trying desperately to ease the tension. �I
was always the mediator,� she says. �I was always trying
to smooth things over and get everybody to laugh.� Despite
her best efforts, her parents divorced when she was nine,
and she spent the rest of her childhood living with her
mother and unwittingly honing her comedic timing with a
steady after school diet of sitcoms. �God, I loved �Joanie
Loves Chachi,�� she says with a grin. �We didn�t have a
VCR, so I used to sit by the TV with a tape recorder when
it was on, and then go to sleep singing along with the theme
song.�
Her goal, in those days, was to be a soap
star. �General Hospital� was my favorite,� she says, �because
their makeup was always perfect, and the hair, and the clothes�I
loved that.� Aniston takes a drag of her Merit cigarette,
�looking back, of course, I realize it wasn�t a good thing.
I was always reading those beauty magazines and wanting
to become this unattainable thing. The one day, you�re in
it�you�re the girl in the pictures, and suddenly you realize
it�s all smoke and mirrors, airbrushing, lighting, stretching.
No wonder people are killing themselves. Starving themselves.
Popping pills. They�re all trying to achieve something impossible.�
That may seem easy for her to say�especially
if you believe the press reports about how Aniston lost
30 pounds to become Rachel, �It was actually 10,� she says
with a laugh.� I mean, I was huge, apparently.� She rolls
her eyes. �The idea that I got �Friends� because I got thin
isn�t true at all.�
Almost as soon as the word �Thin� comes out
of her mouth, Aniston checks herself, �I got healthy,� she
says. �I don�t think I got thin. I think I got healthy.
I eat food now.� She pauses, and it�s clear that food has
not always been a simple issue in her past. �Like a year
before I met Brad, I started getting to a place where I
was sick a lot, and my energy was low and I wasn�t happy,�
she continues, �so then I started taking vitamins and exercising
like a fiend, and maybe went too far on that, because you
get in that Zone diet thing and you get kind of addicted
to that. But now I am kind of in a happy medium where I
just do what I do. If I can work out, I do, but I don�t
go crazy. I�m just healthy.� The past few years, she adds,
have brought a sense of self-acceptance with regard to her
body, which leaves room for indulgences like a �killer�
homemade Thanksgiving sandwich with plenty of mayo and stuffing.
Aniston glances out toward the Pacific sunset
and shakes her head. �But I mean, I just don�t get why anyone
still about this stuff,� she says. �Who starts the intrigue,
you know? Who starts the fascination? Let me tell you, it�s
not the actors. Never is there an actor who says, �I want
to be everywhere! I want to be so disgustingly everywhere
that people are saying, Okay, that�s enough. We�ve seen
enough of her.��
In
Aniston�s case, despite the fact that her life has been
pondered and repondered from every conceivable angle, the
public thirst for her remains unquenched. �It�ll be interesting
to see if it dies down at all once �Friends� is over,� says
the actress, who was once approached in the sauna at L.A.�s
Burke Williams Spa by fans requesting a group photo and
who recently had to have a police escort shuttle her home
after being swarmed by paparazzi while out shopping. �At
the moment, there are those days when you drive out of your
driveway and there�s a car parked at the bottom of the hill,
just waiting for you, and you look at them and think, �This
is what your life has come to? You�re going to follow someone
to the market and to the doctor and to get their hair colored?
This is how you�ve chosen to spend your day?��
Paparazzi aren�t the only ones who�ve sought
to profit to profit from Aniston�s personal life. In 1999,
her mother published her memories of Jennifer�s childhood�including
the gory details of the divorce�in a stomach-turning tell-all
called From Mother and Daughter to Friends. �I don�t think
my mother understood how it would make me feel to have all
that stuff broadcast,� says Aniston, who is clearly still
emotionally bruised by the experience. �But then, of course,
when I told her, she still didn�t get it,� she continues,
her tone twisting slightly in anger,� or she just didn�t
care how I felt.�
Still, Aniston seems certain that the two
will reconcile eventually. �It�s just a matter of time,�
says the actress, who credits �years of therapy� with helping
her understand the situation. �I don�t need an apology because
I already know the truth, and if I approach her with an
expectation of an apology it could just lead to disappointment,�
she says. �I just, at some point I�ll just have to let go
and decide to forgive her, which I can�t do yet.�
She shakes her head sadly. �The bummer is
that we were so dirt poor when I was growing up, and now
there�s plenty of money, and I feel like we should be able
to enjoy it together.�
Indeed, Aniston says she�s still routinely
floored by the paycheck she takes home every week for �Friends.�
�That�s not something I�ll ever get used to,� she says.
Not that she and Pitt aren�t having an awfully
good time trying. In addition to the Beverly Hills house�complete
with waterfall pool�the couple also purchased a sprawling
oceanfront estate in Santa Barbara that Aniston refers to
as Brad�s baby.
�Brad�s a land man,� she explains. �He wants
land, land, land.� And land isn�t Pitt�s only domestic interest
either. He and Aniston have been renovating the Beverly
Hills house since they purchased it in June 2001 and are
still �not quite there yet,� she admits. �We were just going
to do the floors,� she says dryly. �But Brad has such an
incredible eye, and he gets in there and sort of says, �Well,
how high can this ceiling go?� and �What�s behind that wall?�
�He definitely has strong opinions about aesthetics,
and I admire that so much,� she goes on. �It�s hard, though,
because the one thing I thought I could do well was put
homes together, but it�s something that really matters to
him, so we�ve learned to make decisions that we both feel
good about. And I actually think our marriage is even better
now because we�ve been through this stuff. We�ve settled
in; we�ve survived the whole house-construction aspect,
and that�s a big thing. It�s not always easy. It takes work.�
And yes, even the occasional dustup. �We do
fight,� admits Aniston, a self-confessed �conflict avoider.�
The she clarifies, �Well, we have discussions. I am not
a fan of fighting when it is screaming. I like accomplishing
something.
But I don�t trust a couple that says they don�t fight.�
Nevertheless, she remains in awe of what she refers to as
her husband�s general kindness. �He�ll hate me for saying
that,� she chuckles, �but when you grow up in a family where
people are not always very kind to each other, you realize
how important that is.�
Asked how it feels to have found the love
of her life, Aniston offers a rather cryptic answer: �Is
he the love of my life? I think you�re always sort of wondering,
�Are you the love of my life?� I mean, I don�t know, I�ve
never been someone who says, �He�s the love of my life.�
He�s certainly a big love in my life.� She pauses. �And
I know that we have something special, especially in all
this chaos. In this nutty, brilliant, wonderful, hard business
that we have, it�s nice to have somebody who�s anchored
and knows you, really know all of you.�
That sort of unconditional acceptance, Aniston
adds, seems gradually to be helping her to come to terms
with herself as well. �If there�s one thing I�m proud of,
it�s that I�ve finally gotten over not liking myself,� she
says. �It took me 10 years to really notice, Wow, you�re
not really nice to yourself, are you? You really don�t like
yourself very much. And then it took a long time to get
to the point where I do like myself, but I actually do now.
I�m a pretty happy person these days.� She smiles that sad,
beautiful smile. �I think too much, but otherwise, I�m happy.�
