moment in her film. “As soon as I saw her,” Kent tells me,
“I got that feeling I get when I know that I’m looking at the
one.” Without a celebrity lead, however, securing funding
for the film took time. “We could have chosen a more
famous actor,” Kent says, “but I wanted to choose the right
actor. Now that the film is finished, everyone is saying,
‘Who is this person? Where did she come from?’ ”
The answer is complicated. Franciosi’s dad is a heart
surgeon in Milan, and her mom is a retired teacher in
Dublin, where Franciosi was born. She
spent the first four years of her life in Milan
and then moved back to Dublin with her
mom and older brothers when her parents
separated. In the same way that Americans
send their kids to Saturday soccer practice,
the Irish enroll their wee ones in drama
classes. After her first class, at the age of six,
“I went to my mom and said, ‘I’m going to
be an actor,’ ” Franciosi tells me. “She said,
‘Yeah, sure.’ But I’m pretty good at sticking with things.”
(For a scene in The Nightingale, for instance, she swam in
a frigid river until she fainted.)
At Trinity College Dublin, Franciosi strategically
majored in French and Spanish. “I love communication
and miscommunication” and “well-structured sentences,”
she tells me. “I’m not snobby, but I love getting it right.”
But, more important, as someone already fluent in three
languages (Italian, English, and Irish), she knew it wouldn’t
“I would like to be
considered an actor,
first and foremost,
rather than a starlet
or a celebrity”
be hard for her to pick up a couple more. Meanwhile, she
was moonlighting at the Cork Opera House and Dublin’s
Gate Theatre, and in March 2012, she was cast in The Fall.
Her grades were good, but halfway through her final year,
the school gave her an ultimatum: school or acting. It was
an easy choice, even if she was within striking distance
of a diploma. She’s been told she’s welcome to return. “The
plan is that if I don’t need to, I won’t,” she says, chuckling.
In October she moved to Tribeca and began acting in
a limited series for HBO, I Know This Much
Is True. (At home, she and her Calabrian
boyfriend speak and cook Italian together.
They recently bought a pasta maker: “You
can freeze ravioli!”) But it’s been “a weird
year workwise,” she says, because she’s
mindful of what she does next. “I would like
to be considered an actor, first and foremost,
rather than a starlet or a celebrity.” That
has meant turning down lucrative projects
that didn’t resonate with her. “It’s a gut decision,” she says.
In the meantime, she’s busy exploring New York, often by
foot, on either an epic walk or a run (an exercise-lover, she
forced herself to stick with running, her least favorite sport,
until, ultimately, she began to love it). Shortly after leaving
the café, she spots McNally Jackson Books. “Oh, that looks
cute!” she says, pulling out her phone and—ever the curious
chronicler—adding it to the robust list of places she’d like
to visit.—francesca mari
I am not the target
demographic for
a tinted moisturizer. I cling to
full-coverage foundation to mask
hyperpigmentation and late nights;
anything in which words such as
natural figure prominently just
feels too risky. The onetime outlier
on my vanity was Laura Mercier’s
ubiquitous tinted moisturizer, which
I used regularly before committing
to a steady diet of primer,
foundation, and color correctors.
The daily essential Meghan Markle
has credited for her “dewy glow” has
long been a makeup-artist favorite.
“When I started, it was such a
revolutionary product,” says Monika
Blunder, the woman responsible
for the lit-from-within complexions
of Gemma Chan and Amanda
Seyfried. A fan since its launch in
1996, Blunder recalls the original as
the first sheer base to align with her
skin-first aesthetic. “When things
are too matte or plastered on, I just
lose interest.”
BEAUTY
Base Jump
SHEER GENIUS
THE NEW FORMULA FEATURES
EXPANDED SHADE RANGE.
She has a point. The arrival of
makeup-melting warmer weather
left me wondering if my full-coverage
formulas had lulled me into a false
state of security, the equivalent of
a cosmetic Snapchat filter. So I was
delighted to learn that Mercier’s
original lightweight cream was getting
an update this month, reformulated
with hydrating macadamia-nut oil
and vitamin-rich kukui seed, plus
an expanded range of 20 shades. I
decided to bring it back into rotation.
The subtle finish discreetly evened
things out, a humbling experience
that required a mental shift: Baring
your skin means baring your soul, or
at least becoming comfortable with
the idea that perceived imperfections
aren’t necessarily a bad thing.
Blunder’s advice for foundation
junkies looking to make the
transition? Use a dampened sponge
to buff out the coverage. But don’t
be afraid to finger paint, she advises,
“so you can see the luminosity—and
life—in your skin.”—JANELLE OKWODU
72
DANIEL JACKSON,
TEEN VOGUE,
2016. STILL LIFE: M
ATT M
ARTIN.
AUGUST 2019 VOGUE.COM
VLIFE
