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Home / Interviews & Articles / Uptown Girls Star Doing Just Fine, Thanks |
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This page was last updated on 1st April 2007. Page launched on 1st April 2007. Site launched on 8th February 2004.
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INTERVIEWS & ARTICLES
Uptown Girls Star Doing Just Fine, Thanks by Bob Strauss, Los Angeles Daily News Deseret News, Salt Lake City, USA, 19th August 2003
It's all hugs and giggles, Brooklyn pinkie promises and positive, positive energy around Brittany Murphy.
Apparently, this is not just an act that the 25-year-old actress, a show-biz veteran for half her life, puts on for the press.
"Brittany is like my best friend", affirms 9-year-old Dakota Fanning ("I Am Sam", TV's "Taken"), who co-stars with Murphy in the female bonding comedy "Uptown Girls".
"She's just so fun and treats everybody so nice and so special. Every day when she would get on the set, she'd say hello to everybody. You just love being around her; she's full of life".
Although he obviously comes from a different perspective, Jesse Spencer, the handsome Australian actor who plays Murphy's musician love interest in "Uptown", had pretty much the same impression.
"We got on really well; we'd jam a bit between takes and have good ol' chats about music and stuff", Spencer says of his leading lady. "It was a good laugh, we had a good time. She's a talented girl, she's got a lot of energy. I've never seen her low on energy, not once; I get tired just watching her at times!"
There are good reasons for Murphy to feel energized these days. After a dozen years of TV sitcom duty ("Drexel's Class", "Sister, Sister" and, still, "King of the Hill", where the New Jersey-raised actress provides the voice for Texas trailer tart Luanne), and notable -- if often overshadowed by showier stars -- supporting movie roles ("Clueless", "Girl, Interrupted", "Don't Say a Word", "Riding in Cars With Boys"), Murphy has really established a strong big- screen presence over the past year.
Last November, she turned her own "love interest" role in Eminem's blockbuster "8 Mile" showcase into a distinctive and intriguing characterization. Two months later, the silly romantic comedy "Just Married" surprised just about everybody by becoming the box-office hit of the new year.
Of course, both films came equipped with off-screen points of interest: rumors, never substantiated, that Murphy and the rap bad boy had an actual romance during "8 Mile's" production; and there was a relationship with "Just Married" co-star Ashton Kutcher.
That didn't last long. As anyone with working senses knows, Kutcher has been very publicly squiring 15-year-older Demi Moore around for months. And while she has acknowledged heartbreak over the breakup with the "That '70s Show's" star, Murphy appears to have rebounded quite cheerfully.
"The past year has been really interesting", Murphy notes. "I've learned a lot of lessons, but not unlike any other years. It was difficult in certain ways, but it's the same me; just different circumstances and a different cast of characters around. But I've tried to learn from the bad times, appreciate the good and move on".
"I have always believed that everything happens for a reason, and I believe that it is God's will. But it's really left me in a very happy place right now. And I can't wait to see what the next year's bringing, and the next 10 and 20 years".
Of course, it helps that she found a new guy. Although Murphy cautions that one of the life lessons recently learned was not to discuss her intimate business with the media anymore, she does let slip that "I'm very happily in love right now and it's a healthy kind of love". The lucky guy is Hollywood power manager Jeff Kwatinetz.
It seems apparent, though, that circumstances have minimal influence on Murphy's relentlessly sunny outlook. That appears to have always been something generated by a happy inside power source. Even the toughest times as a kid -- Dad was never really in the picture, and there were times when Mom didn't have much money -- she recalls fondly.
"Throughout all of that, I didn't know any different, so I feel grateful for where I came from", explains Murphy, who is still quite pleased to live with her mother, albeit in a big Hollywood Hills estate recently purchased from Britney Spears. "Really, my mom created a very healthy, happy atmosphere for me. If we were in a circumstance where we were sharing a bedroom and I was on a cot, she made me feel like Punky Brewster. I felt so cool! I put little flags up and helped decorate, and all of that really helped cultivate an explosive imagination -- which I thank my mother for endlessly".
That brings us, in a circuitous way, back to "Uptown Girls", a film about finances, yes, but more crucially about childhood and a creative sense of playfulness -- even if those two subjects aren't related at first.
In her biggest screen role yet, Murphy plays Molly Gunn. Her rock star father and her mother were killed in a plane crash when she was still a child, but they left her a fortune that, in many ways, prevented her from ever truly growing up. A basically sweet person, Molly has never needed to learn responsibility, so she's spent her entire adult life just having a good time.
When her accountant disappears with all of her money, though, Molly has to get a job. The only one she has any ability to stick to (albeit no real aptitude for) is baby-sitting Fanning's obnoxiously bright, impossibly neurotic Ray Schleine, the daughter of a neglectful music industry executive. At first, of course, the childish adult and hyper-responsible little girl don't get along at all. But gradually, they become best buds.
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