MISS BLUE EYES BLEDEL
by Anne Ichikawa
Alexis is one of the shyest, most private celebrities around, but that doesn’t mean she won’t enter a break-dancing contest.
Alexis Bledel is jumping on a trampoline. With me! No, I didn’t win a “Jump on a trampoline with Alexis Bledel” raffle — we’re at the Ellegirl cover shoot in Malibu, California. This particular Saturday morningos wet and overcast, and the garden overlooking the Pacific Ocean has a pool, some fake deer (yes–fake deer) and a huge glorious trampoline.
Blessed with a Snow White complexion and a set of piercing blue eyes, the Gilmore Girls star arrived at the photo shoot five minutes earlier, looking a bit sleepy, wearing white pants and sporting a wet ponytail. Plunking down at a table with a cup of coffee (how very Rory Gilmore), she rubbed her eyes and sat quietly. Some awkward moments of coffee-drinking silence passed, until I said “Hey, um…there’s a pretty cool trampoline outside! Neat-o, huh?” Ooh–was that dorky? But like a dog getting a whiff of bacon, she suddenly perked up: “Really? Let’s go!”
A minute later, I was jumping on a puddle-filled trampoline with Alexis. Anf for all of you wondering if she’s like her character, Rory, the answer is “not really.” Rory would never ger her white pants dirty. Obviously.
“I’m not like my character,” says Alexis. It is the day after the shoot and we’re having breakfast at a resturant in the L.A. neighborhood of Los Feliz, near her house. Over and omelet and a cappuccino, she talks about her verbose a precocious alter ego, Rory: “She’s a very sweet and overly ambitious girl. She is basically the mode I would go into if I was trying to get out of a physics test or gym class.”
“But it’s not like you’re a bitch or anything,” I say.
“No!” she laughs. “I’m just normal, I think.”
The 24-year-old may be normal in her own eyes, but to others she’s definately not. After all, her current success is due to people thinking she isn’t normal. As a shy child happily raised in Houston by Spanish-speaking parents (her mother grew up in Mexico, and her father is from Argentina) modeling was the furthest thing from her mind. But at 14 she was discovered where all unkown future stars are found–the local mall. Through high school, she modeled around the world, lending her angelic face to fashion spreads and print ads.
“When I was modeling as a teenager–which is probably the most sensitive time of a person’s life,” she astutely states, “I just ignored it when people said to lose two inches off my hips. I had more jobs than I could take because I was in high school, so why would I even want more jobs?” Makes sense.
Alexis just gets it. She understands what is important and what isn’t. She didn’t freak out when someone politely told her to lose weight. And though she is girlishly charming, she prizes practicality and simplicity over glamour and frivolity. For instance, she likes doing research (on politics: “I’m in the process of gathering information before I make and educated opinion about it. It’s important to investigate”), can’t stand inefficiency (“It’s a pet peeve of mine, when you’re on a job and things are running inefficiently–that can drive me crazy”) and “Be streamlined” is her current life motto. “I hate having so much stuff. I’m like a stuff magnet,” she regretyfully enthuses. “It comes into other parts of life too. I just try to keep things simple and not complicated and [to] try to be happy with what I have, so I’m not always looking for something.”
Being a TV star wasn’t something she was looking for, that’s for sure. While studying film at NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, Alexis still had an agent from her modeling days who would send her on auditions. “I thought maybe it would be some extra money,” she casually explains. “I didn’t know it was going to be six, seven years of my life! I should’ve done research,” she adds.
From happily enrolled college student to first time actor? Sounds like a fairy tale come true…that could cause some Mylanta moments. “I was completely overwhelmed,” Alexis admits. “At the time, I was just like, What
do they want from me? I was working 18-hour days, and weekends too. I didn’t even know the basics about acting! There would be a scene where I’d have to cry and I’d be like, How do I do that?”
But she’s gone from How do I do that? to anchoring one of the smartest shows on television, as well as playing a prostitute in 2004′s morally bankrupt movie Sin City and Lena in The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. She has described her Pants character as being “extremely shy and an artistic type with a very active inner life.” Her next movie is the indie film I’m Reed Fish, due out in 2006, in which she plays the childhood sweetheart of a wavering fiance: “My character isn’t going to marry him because he’s not into it, which I really like because so many girls stay in relationships that aren’t working, and she’s just like, ‘I’m not going to marry you!’ When I read that scene, I really wanted to do it.” Not bad for a firl who never thought about acting.
However, don’t expect Alexis to get all Julia Roberts on us. Describing herself as “low-key,” she prefers to play smaller supporting roles, because she doesn’t like being the center of attention. She also doesn’t like having details of her personal life out on public display; she speaks lovingly – but cautiously- about her parents and younger brother, Eric, but stops herself when she starts to reveal too much (“Actually, my brother doesn’t like it when I talk about him”).
Former Gilmore Girls actor Milo Ventimiglia (Jess Mariano) is her longtime steady, and though she doesn’t talk about their relationship, her blue eyes immediately brighten when I mention that his new show about college life in NYC, The Bedford Diaries, is excellent (“It’s good, right? I think it’s going to be like Sex and the City for college kids”).
“Things are very personal to her and she really protects her right to privacy more than anything. She doesn’t ever talk about her relationship,” says Sisterhood co-star and good friend Amber Tamblyn. “She’s so shy that people might mistake her as being not nice. But she’s completely the opposite. She’s the pearl inside the shell.”
Of course, as the writer of this story, it would be to my advantage if Alexis were more of a hyper blabbermouth who blurted out things like “Milo has three nipples!” or “I used to throw stones at puppies” (neither are true), but no dice for me today. “I think if you put things out there, it’s an invitation for all that tabloidy stuff to happen,” she says. “If I can avoid it, I will. I do as much as I can already.”
As our interview ends, it’s clear that Alexis is as “low-key” as she describes herself. However, I suspect that she possesses a streak of goofiness and silliness that probably only her friends and family get to see. “I got her to enter a break-dance competition,” laughs Amber. “She wanted to win a T-shirt for her boyfriend, so I encouraged her to do it. She did a couple of moves, like a headstand and a back spin–she hurt her back–but it was awesome.”
It’d be unreasonable to tell you, though, who exactly Alexis Bledel is, because unlike Rory Gilmore, Alexis is a real person — not a character. In her own words: “A character is so much less than a person–it’s like a fourth of a person.” So what would she write about herself? “If I were writing a story about myself,” she slowly says. “I’d put very little about myself in it. I find in cover stories, the writer seems to praise [the subject], which I find a little odd.”
Sorry Alexis. I hope I wasn’t too nice, but ya know–writers have to report the truth. However, picking up B.O. over bad breath? Are you a freakin’ idiot? (See below)
Would you rather….
We couldn’t resist playing our favorite game with Alexis.
EG: Okay, Alexis. Would you rather have to skip everywhere or hop everywhere?
Alexis: Skip, unless I had to trampoline like we did yesterday.
EG: Would you rather go bungee jumping or skydiving?
Alexis: Skydiving. Bungee jumping, with that jerk at the end– I can see that being unpleasant.
EG: Would you rather be trapped in a room with a bunch of elepants or a bunch of camels?
Alexis: Are they baby elephants?
EG: No.
Alexis: Okay, elephants, but I’d rather have them be baby elephants.
EG: Would you rather eat five worms or be covered in worms?
Alexis: Um…I think I’d rather be covered in them than have to eat them.
EG: What if they were cooked?
Alexis: Okay, then I’d eat them.
EG: Would you rather have to be in a crowded room naked for 30 seconds, or have your parents catch you making out with your boyfriend?
Alexis: I think the parents thing is less embarrassing!
EG: Would you rather have to wear Coke-bottle glasses or have braces for the rest of your life?
Alexis: Glasses, because I already have to wear them.
EG: Would you rather fall in love with someone who turned out to be an alien or a robot?
Alexis: And alien–there’d be more travel opportunities, and he would have a soul and whatnot.
EG: Would you rather have bad breath or B.O.?
Alexis: Like, permanent?
EG: Yeah.
Alexis: I think B.O.
EG: Would you rather have to wear a T-shirt that says KICK ME or I’m TOO SEXXY?
Alexis: Wow! Both of those are terrible! I think the I’M TOO SEXXY one would be better, because I don’t like to be kicked. I have a particular sensitivity to being kicked.
EG: Would you rather eat hot dogs–
Alexis: Hot dogs. I love hot dogs.