Thank God Anne Hathaway Is Doing Press Again
Our girl is back and she has learned things over the pandemic
I am ambivalent about WeCrashed, the new Apple TV+ show about the rise and fall of WeWork. On the one hand, I don’t know that I need to see a show about something I have read 1,002 stories about over the last few years. On the other hand, it is responsible for Anne Hathaway’s first press tour in what feels like decades, and that is a gift.
Hathaway is playing Rebekah Neumann, the wife of WeWork CEO Adam Neumann and a certified weirdo in her own right (did you know she double majored in Buddhism and business at Cornell?). Jared Leto, who stars as Adam, hasn’t done a lick of press for the show, leaving the majority of the work to Hathaway. Fine by me.
Last night, the Devil Wears Prada star was on the Late Show with Stephen Colbert wearing a gorgeous Christopher John Rogers jumpsuit and doing a pitch perfect impression of Lady Gaga in House of Gucci (at 8:35 in the clip below).
Hathaway waltzed out onto Colbert’s stage and immediately got tears in her eyes. “Sorry, this is my first live audience… it’s so nice,” she told Colbert after taking a deep breath and clutching her hands to her heart. Being moved to tears by the power of human connection? That’s my girl.
Hathaway was crying again this morning, this time just before going live with Hoda Kotb on the Today Show. “It’s so significant to be back here with people,” the Serenity star told Kotb in her always soothing tone of voice. “And I have to say that in moments like this I really used to let my nerves get the best of me — I’m still a human being sometimes they creep up — but I just, during the pandemic went, ‘You can’t give your life away anymore.’”
Yes, Annie! The lesson to be learned from the pandemic is to not get nervous on talk shows! Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.
The most impressive feat of Hathaway’s press tour is her ability to make Leto sound like a really wonderful person to work with and not an insufferable prick. In each interview she’s given so far, she manages to talk about Leto’s insistence on staying in character for an entire six-month with complete reverence.
“I really respect Jared’s process, and I had a really wonderful time working with whoever that was,” she told Colbert.
“I was fascinated by his process… if that’s what worked for him then it worked for me,” she told Kotb.
“He came to set as Adam, and I met him as Rebekah and it was there,” she told Entertainment Tonight of their connection. “It was really fun and beautiful.”
Even if this chica is lying through her big, beautiful teeth, she is really selling it. Hathaway is always a consummate performer, one who understands that being a guest on a talk show is also a performance. This most recent run of hers is worthy of some kind of award, even if it’s just Most Likely to Remind You That You Actually Missed Her Being Around.
