They don’t think women should read, and
it goes further than that. They are deeply
suspicious of intelligence. Breaking the
washing machine is not just them break-
ing something Belle spent hours working
on; it’s symbolic. They’re trying to break
her spirit and push her into a more
“acceptable” version of herself.
Did you face that growing up? Did you
have people telling you to stay a cer-
tain way, focus on certain things?
Oh my God, the amount of positive feed-
back I would get from looking pretty and
putting on a nice dress and smiling nicely
and doing all of that was enormous ver-
sus [the affirmation I would get for]
studying for months and reading some-
thing interesting and talking about it.
That would barely get a side glance.
There’s been some criticism of the
Beauty and the Beast story that Belle
is a woman in an abusive relationship.
She is held captive by the Beast and
he’s terrible to her at first. What do
you say to that?It’s such a good question and it’s some-
thing I really grappled with at the
beginning: the Stockholm-syndrome
question. That’s where a prisoner will
take on the characteristics of and fall in
love with the captor. Belle actively argues
and disagrees with [Beast] constantly.
She has none of the characteristics of
someone with Stockholm syndrome
because she keeps her independence; she
keeps that freedom of thought. I also
think there is a very intentional switch
where, in my mind, Belle decides to stay.
She’s giving him hell. There is no sense of
“I need to kill this guy with kindness.”
Or that “I deserve this bad treatment.”
Or any sense that she deserves this. In
fact, she gives as good as she gets. He
bangs on the door, she bangs back.
There’s this defiance that “You think I’m
going to come and eat dinner with you
and I’m your prisoner—absolutely not.”
The other beautiful thing about the love
story is that they form a friendship first.
There is this genuine sharing, and thelove builds out of that, which in many
ways is more meaningful than a lot of
love stories, where it was love at first
sight. They are having no illusions about
who the other one is. They have seen the
worst of one another, and they also bring
out the best.
Why is the Beast worthy of being saved
and redeemed...but Gaston is not?
That’s a good question. [Laughs] I think
she can see in Beast that there’s someone
that has been fundamentally good that
has been damaged and that just needs
rehabilitating. He is just in need of love,
whereas Gaston is someone who has had
nothing but love and admiration and easi-
ness and because he’s never suffered, he
doesn’t have any empathy. He’s essen-
tially a narcissist, and it’s very difficult to
intervene in that. He’s about building
himself up while pushing others down.
With Beast, you can tell he’s being unkind
because he’s unkind to himself.
It’s a defense mechanism...
Yeah, he doesn’t see himself as very
worthy, and that kind of
reflects how he interacts with
everyone and everything.
Whereas Gaston really thinks
he’s worthy of everything.
Worthy of much more than he
is getting right now!
You’ve been making movies
for 16 years now. After the
Harry Potter films, you weren’t
sure you wanted to continue
acting. You went to college,
and then had a choice to
make. What made you decide
to return to acting?
The Perks of Being a Wallflower.
I went to college and I was gen-
uinely like, “Well, I’m going to go study
and then I will see what happens.” Then
[Perksauthor and director] Steve
Chbosky sent me the script and it just
reignited this [passion]. I was like: “I( Clockwise from left )
InThe Perks of Being a
Wallflower; with Ban
Ki-moon at the U.N.; in
Harry Potter and the
Deathly Hallows—Part 1FEBRUARY 24/MARCH 3, 2017 EW.COM 29BEYOND
BEAUTIFULTHE PERKS OF BEING A WALLFLOWER
: SUMMIT;
HARRY POTTER AND THE DEATHLY HALLOWS: PART I
:
JAAP BUITENDIJK/WARNER BROS; AT UNITED NATIONS: STEVE SANDS/WIREIMAGE