Life Lessons from Anne Hathaway

Welcome to Life Lessons. This week, to mark the premiere of Anne Hathaway’s new AppleTV+ drama WeCrashed, we’re flipping through the pages of the actor’s cover story for our September 2011 issue. In it, Hollywood’s favorite doe-eyed drama queen—then fresh off of shooting The Dark Knight Rises—talked to Chelsea Handler about The Jersey Shore, Salman Rushdie, and her fear of being a fraud. With multiple Oscar nominations and a Best Actress win under her belt, Hathaway has cemented her status as a master of the silver screen. Recently, she made waves for giving Kelly Clarkson a run for her money in an epic “Since You Been Gone” song battle. So sit back, grab a pen—you just might learn a thing or two.

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“I wanted to be in New York. My feeling about growing up in New Jersey was, ‘How come I’m not in New York?’”

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“I think that when actors are living very public lives, it affects your ability to get lost in their performances.”

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“I just get really excited when I talk—and especially when I talk to people who are fun to talk to—and I jump in at the end of every sentence and nobody ever gets to finish a thought. I’m working on it.”

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“You just have to take a deep breath, jump into the deep end, trust your director, and go.”

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“Not living up to the expectations of the director is pretty terrifying. Being exposed as a fraud—that’s pretty terrifying. Then I think there’s a vanity aspect of it. All of a sudden, you walk on the camera, and your ass looks horrible . . . The last one I can live with, but the other two are way more important.”

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“You said, ‘Make sure you savor the first laugh. You have no idea how much you’ll be waiting for it, and everything is going to fly by after that.'”

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“I was at my best friend’s wedding just two days ago, and I watched this person who I love like a sister, who I feel as close to as I do my family, commit herself to a man who she loves, and I watched how happy it made her. I thought, “Weddings are important because they celebrate life and possibility.”

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“That’s how I see myself as an actress. I may not be the best in the world, but I love my craft more than just about anything, and I will give everything I have to it, whatever the cost . . . I feel like such a jerk when I say  ‘my craft,’ but I do feel that way.”