34-year-old breakout star, Omar Sy, discusses his César-winning role as one-half of an unlikely friendship in The Intouchables:

Omar Sy

This is your first lead role.
Yes, I was really excited for it. It was also the first time I read a script where the main character comes from the more underprivileged suburbs of Paris and the character is portrayed in a positive way.

It’s a script loosely based off a real story: a hard-won connection between a handicap millionaire and his ex-con caretaker. How much of your character is creative interpretation?
The two filmmakers who wrote the script had me in mind for the role of the caretaker, Driss—it was supposed to be a gift to me—so they integrated a lot of my own personality traits. Also, I went back to my old neighborhood in the suburbs of Paris, where I grew up, and spoke to my friends. I needed to soak in the atmosphere of what it’s like to be there.

Congratulations on winning the César Award for Best Actor. Is it presumptuous to assume you had some idea you might win?
I really had no idea, I didn’t expect it at all! Even just to be nominated alongside all of those big names was a victory in itself to me. I would’ve been happy for many years with just that. I was shocked.

How did you celebrate?
Well, that night I went straight to bed. I was dead, done for. Then, right after that I went on vacation.

Where do you keep the statue?
It’s on a shelf right across from my main entrance door, so the first thing you see when you come see me is that.

The Weinstein Company is in talks with Colin Firth and Paul Feig for the American remake. Who should play your character?
Actually, one that I just thought of would be Meryl Streep. She can pull off anything.

The Intouchables opens in theatres May 25.

Photo: courtesy of The Weinstein Company

French actress Melanie Laurent has proved her acting mettle to American audiences with her starring roles in Quentin Tarantino’s Inglourious Basterds and Mike Mills’ Beginners. But the 29 year-old isn’t content to limit her creative energies to performances on the silver screen. Last year, she released an album En t’attendant with Damien Rice and she has also directed two short films.

Melanie Laurent

Now, she’s taken on an even larger endeavor, with her full-length feature directorial debut, Les Adoptés, which had its New York premiere at a recent Dior Beauty-sponsored Cinema Society screening. The movie, which Laurent also stars in and whose screenplay she wrote, circles around a female-centric family whose tight-knit existence is irrevocably split by a tragic accident. Laurent is Lisa a frustrated, fledgling musician with a young son, an alcoholic mother (Clementine Celarie) and an adopted younger sister, Marie (Marie Denarnaud). Marie falls for the persistent Alex (Denis Menochet), leaving Lisa jealous and then stoically heartbroken when Marie has an accident sending her into a coma.

The Paris-born actress chatted about creative freedom, taking over for Natalie Portman and avoiding stunts on her latest film Now You See Me.

Tell me how this story came together. Was there any specific jumping off point or inspiration?
I really wanted to do something not close to me. I just wanted to invent. I was very afraid of saying a lot of personal things in my first movie. So I think in the end when I watched the movie I was like, okay, I’m so that little boy, and of course I’m Lisa and I’m a little bit of everybody in movie. But I’m really close to my brother and father and my grandfather and it’s a movie about women. And my mother doesn’t drink at all, she’s not an alcoholic. And I don’t know anyone who’s just been in a coma and I’ve never been in a hospital to see a person I really loved. So I don’t know, I think I just wanted to take a distance with life and then that was kind of amazing to just create characters and I really liked that.

Was Lisa the first character you created?
No, I think the first thing was I had an image of someone sleeping and I was like, maybe someone in a coma and talking about people who just stay around someone who’s sleeping, to talk about when you miss someone so much and you’re just waiting for her to wake up and what happens when someone is sleeping and when life suddenly changes and you have to deal with that. And then I worked on a record I did with Damien Rice and suddenly I was like, Lisa, she has to be a musician. And she has to be not sure she’s going to be good and she’s full of doubts. So I used a few things I was feeling at that moment to put things in my characters.

Yeah, I was wondering since you have that album and you were a musician in The Concert how much you had in common with Lisa.
Honestly, I didn’t write that character for me. I really wanted Natalie Portman, that was my big dream. So I didn’t write that character like, okay, it’s going to be kind of me. At the last minute with my producers we decided I was going to act in my own movie, which I didn’t want to do at first.

So you were Natalie Portman’s understudy?
Well, she did a movie… like a dancer something… I don’t really remember. I think she had an Oscar for that. She made a good choice. Next time maybe. So yeah, I wanted to create a character lost in her artistic career. When you’re an artist, there’s always a moment in your life when you think you’re not inspired and instead of doing things and instead of travel and instead of falling in love, you’re just depressed, so you don’t move, so you don’t change. So you’re not inspired. And I have that feeling many times, why am I an actor? Why am I doing this? What should I do? Do I really want to do this and this? And I think I wanted to talk also about this in my movie, like you’re lost and you’re afraid, so you’re not free because you’re scared.

In the opening of the film, we hear your voiceover describing what each character wanted to be when they were little. And you say you wanted to be the “champion of everything.”
I remember when I wrote that text, I was not supposed to play in the movie and then when we decided it was going to be me, the first thing I said to my producer was, Oh my god, should I keep that line? Because everyone’s going to be like, So you want to be champion of everything, really? And my producer was like, You know what, it’s just like do everything you want. And of course I don’t want to be champion, but I want to try many things for sure. Making that record was amazing and directing my movie was the best experience ever. And I did 30 movies as an actress. And when I was a little girl my parents always told me do everything you want in an artistic way. If you want to draw, make a drawing. Just do it. And if you want to play piano, play piano. It was a very free childhood where everything was possible.

You got into acting in a very spontaneous way, with Gerard Depardieu discovering you on a film set at age 14.
It was totally a big luck, but also at that moment when I was 14 I already wanted to be a director. The thing is making movies as an actress, you learn so many things. Like when you’re making a movie with Quentin Tarantino you’re just at the best cinema school ever. I think I was like maybe frustrated for many years because I didn’t try to direct. And since I made my movie I’m just like it’s great. Because I just know I love directing movies but I’m taking more pleasure to be an actress now.

You have a big action-heist movie coming up, Now You See Me, with Jesse Eisenberg, Mark Ruffalo and Woody Harrelson.
I’m playing an FBI agent. She’s Interpol, so she’s supposed to be lost in the middle of this big case. She’s a desk agent and suddenly she has to run after the bad guys. So we’ve been shooting outside on a bridge and a car…

Did you do your own stunts?
No, not really. I had a double. Too dangerous. They asked me to try the first time and I was like, You know what? No. Because I don’t feel like it. I don’t want to die today.

Photo: Patrick McMullan

W speaks with singer/songwriter Matt Ward, also known as M. Ward and one-half of She & Him (Zooey Deschanel completes the duo), on the eve of his eighth solo effort, A Wasteland Companion. The album stands as a literal departure from his past work (it marks his first time recording outside the studio), but never without his signature acoustic guitar thrum and wildly nostalgic voice.

M. Ward

It’s interesting that this is the first time you recorded on the road. Is the first single off the album, “The First Time I Ran Away,” a metaphor for this?
It’s more of an imagined story. I’ve always loved the idea that musicians and filmmakers and painters—really everyone in the creative arts—are capable of creating a mythology. A lot of it comes from this, trying to uncover a story that’s…

…yet to be told?
Exactly. The goal is to try to create something that could be interpreted a million different ways.

It’s storytelling. Very few songs I write are autobiographical, but having said that, I do believe there’s more fiction in non-fiction and more non-fiction in fiction. Something I’ve been rereading over the past year is Dante’s Inferno. It’s on the border of fiction and non-fiction. Dante takes a journey to hell but he has a poet as a guide, and he is basically his wasteland companion. That’s partly where the title comes from; it’s a very ancient recipe that has a backdrop of dark ends, despair, and shadows, but in the foreground it has hope and light.

I heard you taught yourself how to play guitar with just one songbook.
Yes, I learned an entire Beatles songbook when I was 15. I never had a guitar teacher, so it was sort of like Lennon and McCartney were my mentors. It was a good education.

Recording this album away from home, did you have any epiphanies along the way?
You know —and I think this is maybe a truism for life—the show and the theater that you think will be the greatest evening of the whole tour is often the worst. And the show that you’re not looking forward to, the room that you’re just not excited about, that ends up being your favorite. I feel like we live in a world of paradox.

What was the first song that you ever wrote?
I’m happy to say that it was never recorded. As a general rule, I have to write about 10 or 15 bad songs before I have a song that’s either worth finishing or worth keeping around to scavenge off of later on.

Do you remember the first song that ever made you cry?
No, but I can remember the last time that I cried at a performance and that was seeing Brian Wilson at the Sydney Opera house. His music just makes a grown man weep. It’s something about his songs, and his voice, the innocence and the journey. Also, I grew up in Southern California, and he’s created this incredible mythology there.

How do you measure the worth of your songs?
I use the passing of time as my biggest indicator. I feel like if I write a song tomorrow, I won’t know if it’s any good until I come back to it 6 months to one year from now. There’s value in a song if there’s something about it that makes me want to press rewind and play again -- usually something I can’t put my finger on.

Anytime I read about you, it always has some relation with older literature or old records or old songs. Are you ever sick of hearing your name associated with that word, “old”?
[laughs] Good question. I guess it doesn’t bother me. Maybe it should bother me more? The only thing I don’t like about it is that it sort of infers that the music that’s happening right now is of no use, which it absolutely is. That might be the only downside to having the “old” tag, that it infers that I have no patience or time or need for music that’s being made right now.

M. Ward's A Wasteland Companion album cover

If you could live in another era, would you?
It would be pretty amazing to go back to that time, any era before the turn of the century, for a day. I think about how music must have sounded to people when recordings weren’t around, when your only opportunity to experience a song was in the theater or on a street corner or listening to live music. Did people leave the theater wishing they could listen to it over and over again in their homes?

Let’s talk about your collaborations with Zooey [Deschanel]. You’re often credited for championing her musical talent.
Zooey is constantly writing, so She & Him has been alive and well. We both take a lot of inspiration from older music and older records. We have a lot of records in common that we love, but there are also a lot of records that we will introduce to each other. We are pretty productive.

How do you know when a song is complete?
It’s very much a balancing act. A lot of times, if you have happy lyrics with happy chords and happy drums, it doesn’t feel right, or true. On the flipside, if you have images of despair and sadness with sad chords and a slow tempo, nobody wants to listen to that. I don’t want to listen to that. There needs to be recognition of both sides of the world, to tell the story of dark and light.

M. Ward’s “Ultimate 5 Song Playlist”
Ramones— "Baby, I Love You”
The Ronettes—“When I Saw You”
James Brown—"I Know It’s True”
Buddy Holly—"True Love Ways"
The Beach Boys—“I’m So Young”

Portrait: Autumn de Wilde; Cover: courtesy of Merge Records

Five years after leaving her eponymous fragrance brand in the hands of Estée Lauder, Jo Malone is back with another venture every bit as beguiling as her first. Grace Timothy chats with the perfumer about her second run at the sweet smell of success.

Jo Malone

How did starting Jo Loves compare with Jo Malone’s early days?
The only thing that’s similar is how my decisions revolve around my gut instinct and the relationships I form. So although a lot of the [retail] enquiries come from people who have seen us do it once before, I don’t want to just follow the same vein again—I want to do it differently. After all, it’s a different world now.

What was your ambition upon leaving Jo Malone?
I had fought cancer and was terrified of it coming back, so I wanted to spend my time with my family and my son. I opened the Madison Avenue store just eight weeks after getting the all-clear, and I remember thinking, I don’t belong here anymore. But as time went on I realized I had to pick up my life again. I was still thinking about fragrance every day, creating notes in my head. Creative people need to be around creative things—I felt such sadness without that.

Did you consider changes industries?
I just couldn’t imagine doing anything else. Creating fragrance is the thing that makes me feel fulfilled as a human being. I have a very bad form of dyslexia so writing is difficult—fragrance is my way of communicating. Every color, emotion and memory always goes back to a note.

Jo Loves

What happens when a new idea for a fragrance pops into your head. How do you lock it down?
I sit on my own, play, and think. This morning, I’ve been working on a really different and unique project, which started with a walk around the park. I had walked past some Mahonia [a flowering shrub] and just stood there smelling it. Now I’m trying to pin it down—it’s like putting your foot on your car’s accelerator, you need that moment of bite. Like Goldilocks and The Three Bears, it’s got to be just right. That could take five minutes or five years! I guess I’m still a perfectionist.

The Jo Loves iPhone app encourages others to share their favorite scents in pictures. What do you especially love about the app?
I love the woman who said her favorite smell was her grandson, who was born the day before. To get people to share something emotional, a memory, is such a precious thing. There’s such a wonderful array of color when you look at the moodboards, too—whether it’s bacon, a pair of shoes, a glass of wine on a shelf. I always think up the stories behind the scents. I can smell dinner cooking in the background, sense the rain coming, think of who was in the other room, why it’s such a treasured memory. I’ve always worked on my own – it’s a personal thing - so this is the first time I’ve ever reached out and tapped into other people’s thoughts. It’s been humbling and magical.

Which upcoming project excites you most?
I’m approaching fragrance in three very different ways this year. The candles will come at the end of the year, and the summer will see a new fragrance that I’m working on right now. Then I’m branching out into food. Each new launch will be about taking something, twisting it, and looking at it in a different way.

If you still haven’t seen the original Shit Girls Say video—the viral send-up of a certain brand of girlish idiocy—then you’ve surely seen one of the hundreds of imitations that have clogged the Internet recently, some as hilarious as the original but most unfunny flops. Thank Canadian-born Graydon Sheppard and his boyfriend Kyle Humphrey for the meme, which has burrowed its way into the pop cultural psyche. Here, Sheppard talks about performing in drag, his prolific Twitter feed, and holding hands with Ryan Gosling.

Kyle Humphrey and Graydon Sheppard

You and Kyle started the @shitgirlssay Twitter feed back in April, eight months before the first video was posted. Tell me about the transition from Twitter to YouTube.
We had started to get more followers over the summer, and because my background is in film—I’m a filmmaker and director—I wanted to do something that complimented the feed as a fun project.

Do you prefer being behind or in front of the camera?
Oh god, I’ve always wanted be in front of the camera, I just didn't know it was okay! I had done drag and performed before, and I always kind of loved to be the center of attention.

How did you create The Girl?
I think our goal was the same with the twitter feed: to embody a woman rather than impersonate one. She’s kind of a noncharacter, very general and specific at the same time. It’s a character but we didn't want to overdo and make it feel mocking.

Your favorite one-liner?
My favorite is “That poor dog needs water.” Kyle's is the one that started it all: “Can you pass me that blanket?”

@shitgirlssay retweets Kim Kardashian and Heidi Montag. Is ‘she’ that kind of girl?
We haven't done that as much lately, but it's definitely a demographic that we’re interested in. We tend to focus on girls in their twenties—our friends and people we know. It’s definitely not shit all girls say, but it strikes a chord with our generation.

The Girl

Are certain people direct inspirations?
A lot of inspiration comes from people like Kyle’s sister, who sends us tweets all the time.

What’s something funny that Kyle’s sister has said?
A really good one was, “Ice cream makes me cough.”

Juliette Lewis was your first celebrity collaboration. Are there any others in the works?
I’ve jokingly said we want Ryan Gosling in a video, just so I could hold his hand.

What's been the most exciting moment for you and Kyle since the video?
We were on Rock Center with Brian Williams. His producer called one day out of the blue and said, ‘We just came from a pitch meeting and the first thing that Brian pitched was doing a piece on Shit Girls Say.’ His wife and daughter watch it, and his daughter is a performer as well so she brought it to his attention, I think. Also, 30 Rock did Shit Liz Lemon Says, so that's up there too.

Video: Shit Girls Say

What do you think about imitation being the sincerest form of flattery? How do all the imitations sit with you?
It’s not overwhelming anymore. At first when they started happening, we were like, Oh my God, this is so crazy! And then they just kept flooding in—more and more and more—and it just became this thing that is now out in the ether.

One of the top cosmetic doctors in Europe, Paris native Dr. Jean-Louis Sebagh is a pioneer of injectables, preserving the youth and vitality of some of the world’s most beautiful faces—models, aristocrats, and the otherwise fabulous—from his exclusive offices in London and Paris. Grace Timothy chats with the undisputed ‘Botox King’ of Europe.


In your opinion, what is the most covetable treatment of the moment?
In terms of skin rejuvenation, I am very impressed by the results that can be achieved through the combination of PRP injections (Plasma Rich Platelets) and Fraxel—this is new to my clinic for 2012. Combining these two treatments maximises their benefits, resulting in skin that is firmer, tighter, and incredibly radiant.

Which of the clinical or surgical developments of the past decade excite you most?
For me, the most exciting development has been the increasingly effective use of Botox by experienced aesthetic and cosmetic doctors. Also Fraxel laser treatment, Radio Frequency treatments (Polaris Restore and Thermage), and the more recent introduction of Fractionate treatments, such as Fractora and FaceTite.

Can any of these innovations really ever beat Botox for results?
In terms of muscle relaxation—to address frown lines and crow’s feet—and the prevention of a sagging jaw line and neck, there is nothing to date that can beat Botox. However, it’s important to note the advances of high viscosity Hyaluronic fillers like Voluma and Teosyal Ultra Deep in restoring volume to the face as part of a new Face Sculpture technique… but only if performed by a cosmetic doctor with very artistic skills!

Is an artistic career something you would have considered in another life?
I would definitely have been an interior designer or an antiques dealer—those are two of my passions away from my clinics.

You travel on a weekly basis between clinics. How do you counter the negative effect on your own skin?
I combine Botox to the forehead, crow’s feet, jaw line, and neck every five months with Fraxel laser treatment to my face and neck three times a year, plus Radio Frequency (RF) in between to significantly tighten skin laxity. I also have Meso Glow [an injection of anti-oxidant vitamins C, A, E, and Hyaluronic Acid] and I use Dr. Sebagh Supreme Maintenance Serum blended with my Rose de Vie serum and new Supreme Night Serum everyday. I get a minimum of 7 hours of sleep a night, follow a very strict diet—no gluten or dairy—and see a personal trainer three times a week, supplemented by a Pilates session and massage.

What one piece of advice do you most often give to clients?
Simple: start an age-maintenance programme on a regular basis when very young—only if [a doctor agrees] you need it—with just small touches when and where necessary. Also, think ‘restoration’ not ‘transformation.’ In the long term, you will be amazed at what is possible.

Italian artist Massimo Vitali has been photographing holiday-goers soaking up the sun on beaches all along the Mediterranean for nearly two decades.

Vitali's #3245 Vulcano mad-cettina (2011)

Captured from cliff tops or while hanging from scaffolding, his large-scale images are inviting at first, presenting themselves as idyllic, postcard-perfect landscapes. But look closer and the crowds reveal a sort of hedonism, a comment on man’s impact on nature.

Last weekend, two shows of Vitali’s work opened in New York: a selection of photos taken between 2004 to 2011 at the agnès b. Galerie Boutique; and at Bonni Benrubi Gallery, a solo exhibition of new photographs from Spain, Greece, Turkey, and Italy that reveal a shift in his work towards more sparsely populated landscapes—a reminder, perhaps, of nature’s ultimate power over man.

How did you get into shooting landscapes?
My beach pictures started as being much more about the people than about the landscape. I was testing my 8x10 camera in 1994, and Berlusconi had just won the elections. I was curious about the Italians who had voted for him, and so while testing the camera, I decided to put my scaffolding in the sea and look back at the people.

What’s your shooting process like?
I do a lot of research about my locations before shooting, so once I arrive everything is fairly under control—except the weather, which unfortunately I can't control! Most of my pictures are taken from a platform raised about 3 meters in the air, though recently I have been using the platform less. I use an 8x10 inch and an 11x14 inch plate camera. I shoot anytime of day—including the night—but I prefer the hours when the sun is high so that shadows are minimal.

What is it about the landscapes that appeal to you?
For me, landscape reflects the conflict between man and nature. The past couple years, the landscape has played a much stronger role than it has in the past, reflecting the complex relationship and balance between humans and the natural world.

Vitali's Sarakiniko Meltemi, (#4565) (2011)

Do you have a favorite location?
It's hard to say. I love every location but I find that I fall in love with the people and scenarios in each location rather than the setting itself.

Where do you like to holiday?
Any beach—I'm not fussy!

What's inspiring you right now?
In the past year or two my production has undergone some drastic changes—distance from the subjects, a much smaller number of people, the greater importance of nature… I am now planning a new change in my way of taking pictures, but you'll have to wait until next summer to see where my direction will go!

Photos: © Massimo Vitali

Anyone who has seen Ezra Miller perform in a duo of upcoming family dramas could be forgiven for feeling some trepidation upon meeting the rising indie star. In Sam Levinson’s Another Happy Day, opening this Friday, Miller plays Elliot, a recovering teenage addict with a proclivity for acid-laced barbs and self-destructive behavior. As the titular character in Lynn Ramsay’s upcoming We Need to Talk About Kevin, he embodies a devil’s spawn-like child turned anarchist adolescent who psychologically tortures his mother (Tilda Swinton) before mowing down a gym full of fellow students.

Ezra Miller

Fortunately, the only trait Miller seems to share with these troubled characters is a knack for quick-witted speech and some Freudian-Nietzschean philosophical leanings.

Here, the Hoboken-native waxes poetic on the essence of the mother-son bond, the importance of exploring dark cinematic territory, and why people shouldn’t enter into parenthood lightly.

You seem to have a penchant for dark material. Is that a fair assessment?
Yes, I would determine that to be fair.

Is that a coincidence or just the sort of thing you’re drawn to?
Coincidence, I would say, but in a way that’s cohesive and sensible in the context of what I want to explore. Sure, it’s something fairly dark, but it’s also something fairly common. We all teeter on this strange razor’s edge, and when one of us falls outside the boundaries deemed acceptable by the modern world, there’s a contradiction at play between what’s required to perpetuate the function of society—to keep trash people picking up trash and the world moving—and what’s in our innate nature. Something that’s dark is something that’s unseen; the shedding of light is simply the act of trying to understand it, and that’s what art can do.

I’m assuming you haven’t struggled with some of Elliot’s many problems: the drug addiction, the terrible family situation… How do you prepare to take on a character like that?
I really wanted to find him physically first because of how intense his sensory experience of the world is. He can’t sleep, and for anyone who’s ever suffered real insomnia, you know that when you can’t sleep your sensory experience of the world becomes even more extreme. I wanted to find that cycle.

Did you deprive yourself of sleep?
Yeah, I did. I didn’t sleep much at all on the making of this movie. Towards the beginning of film, we were putting a little bit of makeup under my eyes—towards week two we didn’t really have to anymore. I was just really tired.

He’s pretty gaunt, too. Did you stop eating as well?
I wasn’t eating a lot. I really committed to the physical emotionality of Elliot while already totally having the knowledge of what was going on with him on an emotional level. Then I just let the physicality of the character dictate the rest.

The trailer for Another Happy Day

Family is at the heart of We Need to Talk About Kevin. It’s interesting that you star in these two films in which you have fractured relationships with your mother, to put it lightly.
I think it’s the most essential relationship, to speak generally. It’s the first relationship that any of us has, even if that relationship is defined by a lacking of it. It’s almost like humanity is an angry son right now. If you just look at the physical damage to mother earth right now, whether you want to see it in some sort of spiritual reality or view it as a metaphor, the earth gives us nourishment. But because of our adolescent half maturations, we think we don’t have to protect this thing that gives us life. Within that, there’s a natural cause and effect, which we already see: war between a mother and a son. Then it’s just like, who isn’t trying not to be at war with their mother? I have a fucking fantastic relationship with my mother, and that relationship is based on us both making beautiful, sweeping efforts to not be at war.

I have to say, watching both of these films made me terrified of becoming a mother. It was some pretty effective birth control.
That’s what we’ve heard! But I’ve warned people that it won’t work—do not try to watch this movie and have unprotected sex. But yeah, I feel like people should think really hard before having children in this day and age.

It sounds like you had a lovely childhood.
I had a beautiful childhood and I would very much consider having children. But I would feel better about that decision in light of having gone through these explorations, because essentially if you’re equipped with love and focus and determination to handle a Kevin or comfort an Elliot, you’re truly ready to be a mother. The world doesn’t need more people. The world needs more righteously, fully-formed people who are allowed to be anything.

Photo: Getty Images

Last night, Karlie Kloss earned her wings as the newest addition to the Victoria’s Secret squad of Angles. At 19, the model from the Midwest was finally of-age to join the lingerie family, though she already had plenty of runway experience under her belt—from McQueen to Christian Dior couture. We caught up with Kloss backstage before the show, where reporters and photographers pooled around her makeup chair.

Karlie Kloss on the Victoria's Secret 2011 runway

Karlie Kloss: I can’t believe I have a line! It’s crazy!
W: Are you nervous?
I think something would be wrong if I wasn’t nervous—the energy is kind of crazy. I mean, this is unlike any show I’ve ever been a part of. It’s incredible. I don’t think there’s anything else in the world like it. But as nervous as I am, I think once the music starts and somebody pushes me out on the runway, I’ll just wing it. Literally.

Do you worry about wardrobe malfunctions?
There are so many contraptions and push-up everythings, so there’s not much room for slippage. We did the rehearsal yesterday and everybody had their wings and shoes on—they have some crazy ones. Mine are ten feet wide. One has, I don’t know, thousands upon thousands of Swarovski crystals. I mean, I can’t imagine the amount of time that went into creating it. It’s truly like art.

How long has Victoria’s Secret been talking to you about this?
They’ve been trying for a while, and I was a little reluctant at first. But when the opportunity came about, I thought, ‘Why the heck not?’ It’s an opportunity to be a part of something so big and so fun. It’s one big party.

How did you prepare?
I lucked out. Some girls have wings that are probably their entire body weight. I, on the other hand, have huge wings, but they’re pretty light. I’ve been working and traveling so much the last couple weeks that I haven’t had time to really do anything too particular to prepare. Just my regular fitness regime—I’m pretty physical and athletic for the most part.

Do you have a significant other that might be jealous of all of the attention?
There’s no time for boys in my life right now. I’m focusing on me. This is such a transformation process. As I look in the mirror, I’m like, ‘Wow.’ I don’t even recognize myself. Becoming an Angel, it takes a lot of work.

What do your parents think?
I haven’t talked to my dad about it. It is a little risqué, but at the same time I don’t have anything too crazy on. I have wings and a few body suits and lots of tight leather contraptions, like thigh-high boots. It’s probably the sexiest show in the world… I’ll have to ask my dad if he approves or not.

Click here to view the Victoria's Secret 2011 Runway slideshow.

Actor Santino Fontana (above) could be forgiven if his head has grown a bit in size since the opening of his latest play, Stephen Karam’s Sons of the Prophet, currently in a Roundabout production at the Laura Pels Theatre. Though Fontana made his Broadway debut in 2007 in Sunday in the Park with George and has since originated Tony in Billy Elliot the Musical and starred as Algernon earlier this year in The Importance of Being Earnest, his current work is earning career-making praise. The New York Times’ Charles Isherwood, for one, called him “one of the most promising young actors to emerge in the New York theater in recent years.”

In Sons of the Prophet, he earns such lauds, tackling a host of hot-button issues—among them race, health care, journalistic integrity—with ease and agility. Fontana is Joseph, a 29 year-old, Pennsylvania native, once a running star whose body is now victim to a host of peculiar aches and numbness, seemingly without diagnosis. At the play’s start, his father has just been killed in a car accident, leaving Joseph saddled with not only his own medical predicament, but caring for his ailing uncle and younger brother. Throw in his boss, a neurotic, exiled New York book publisher (strains of Judith Regan abound) and his genealogy (he is related to the Lebanese author of the best-selling book The Prophet) that she wishes to exploit, and it’s a miracle Joseph makes it through the play’s first 30 minutes without a melt-down.

But Fontana knows something about staying sane in the face of life’s curve balls. Here, the actor discusses the risks of taking on new plays, the occupational hazards of emotional characters (cab pummeling anyone?) and why he feels a certain empathy for Joseph’s health issues.

Your character, Joseph, has a veritable shit storm of awful things thrown at him over the course of the play, from his chronic pain, to his father’s death and his uncle’s health problems. How would you describe his handling of all of it?
I think he always plays by the rules. He always chooses what will offend other people the least. He’s always thinking of other people first because in a way he’s a protagonist who doesn’t want to be a protagonist. He doesn’t want to be in any of the situations he’s in so he wants to leave the least amount of tracks as he gets through it. And all of the decisions he makes are all about, How can I not make as much of a stir here?

He’s a protagonist who doesn’t want to be a protagonist, and yet you’re on stage for the entire show. How do you convey a character who doesn’t want to be the center of attention, yet physically is in the play?
I had a friend who came and saw it and was like, “Oh it’s so hard, you just look like you’re suffering so much.” And I was like, “I don’t feel like I’m suffering at all!” ‘Til maybe the very end. I just feel like I’m getting things done. And I think Joseph is just thinking like all of us that if you just get this one thing done it will all be better and it will all be clear. Although it’s really well written, so just when I think one thing is taken care of, this happens, oh god. So being on stage for the whole time, it’s a great gift from a writer to an actor because a lot of the work is done for me. Because I can’t get off. I can’t leave! I have to stay on stage. And the next thing that’s thrown at me, I have to handle that.

Fontana (right) and Lizbeth Mackay in Sons of the Prophet.

Despite the fact that Joseph is trying to be proactive by handling everything, it’s still some pretty heavy material he works through. Is that something that weighs on you as an actor, doing that every night?
I feel like, especially doing theater, doing eight shows a week, it’s going to affect you. I did a show where I played a kind of rebel political guy [Tony in Billy Elliot], he was always screaming and I like pummeled a cab. I was crossing the street and this cab cut me off and I punched the trunk. This is a couple years ago. And the cabbie stopped the car, got out and all he said was, “What?” And he got back in the car and he drove away. And I was like, “Who am I? I’m 5’10! Like I’m gonna’ hurt him?” But in that moment this character had bled over into my life a little bit. I’m not going home and worrying about the tragedies of Joseph, not at all, but I do notice that I’m more private than I think I normally am and I think that’s probably because of Joseph. Because I’m not as introverted as he is.

I read you received the script for this play while recovering from an injury you incurred while doing A View from the Bridge and that you weren’t even able to read it properly because of your injury. Was it eerily fateful to have this land in your lap while you were convalescing, given Joseph’s own health issues?
Totally. I mean it was a terrible time. And I couldn’t read for very long without getting a migraine and the migraines that I was getting, I had to go to sleep, there was no way to treat it, I couldn’t take medication. And I got the reading and my agents were like, “You should do this.” And I hadn’t done a contemporary play in New York and I got to the end of the play where I have those lines, “I’m not doing good, it’s been a bad year,” and sort of lost it. And went to the writer and director afterwards and was like, “Why did you cast me in this? Did you know what happened?” And they were like, “We didn’t know anything, we just heard you were a good actor.” So it was a weird experience, but I have to say, it’s also like what’s in the play, you have terrible things happen to you, you move on and you’re better off for it.

And how was it doing a contemporary play after so many revivals?
I mean I’m excited just to be in a play where I don’t have an accent, first of all, because every show I’ve done in New York, I’ve had an Italian accent, I’ve had a Northern English accent, I’ve had a posh British accent. With revivals, you’re guaranteed the script is in pretty good shape because it survived, which is a great thing, but if the play’s not working, it’s not the writer, it’s you. With a new play, the big risk is thinking, “Holy shit—is this me or is this just not a good play?” And you can’t know, it’s just a big chance. Luckily, we’ve got a great writer and a great director and the play does work.

Photos: Joan Marcus