Famke Janssen doesn’t like to talk about her private life. I know, because I can practically hear the drawbridge go up when I ask her if being six feet tall limits one’s romantic options. Damn. I thought I was being clever.
“I don’t talk about my life in that way,” she says sweetly, but firmly.
Fair enough. I quickly decide not to ask her about the five-year marriage to director Todd Williams (he allegedly left her for the younger Gretchen Moll in 2000) or the period spent dating Ben Affleck. In the circumstances I won’t take it personally. Read through any amount of interviews with the Dutch actress and you’ll find her happily discussing her work but little else.
Today, however, in the run up to X-Men; The Last Stand, we have a dilemma.
“I’m not allowed to discuss the specifics of the movie until the release date, either,” she adds.
Okay then. Erm, she has size ten feet. Can she talk about trying to buy heels?
“Yeah,” she says, warming slightly. “That’s a tricky business. They had to make my shoes for Goldeneye. They just don’t come that big. But you know what? I never wear heels except for doing press. I’m the kind of person who wears Converse sneakers all summer long.”
After a couple of false starts, Ms. Janssen doesn’t seem quite so reticent. She talks about growing up in Amsterdam being the only brunette sister of three – “If we went somewhere like Greece, no one would ever look at me”.
She talks about the Brontes and her desire to write. (She graduated from Columbia University’s creative writing programme in 1986, but since then, it’s been work, work, work…)
She even comes around to talking about X;3.
“I will miss Jean Grey and the X-Men,” she says. “I’ve always done what I wanted with her. Er, it’s tricky figuring out what I can say about this movie without giving anything away, but I’ve always loved the darkness she had about her. That foreshadows what happens in the third film, but we also just threw out the rulebook for her.”
X-Men; The Last Stand, one of the popcorn season’s lavishly budgeted three-quels (already M;I-3 is testing the franchise’s worth, while The Fast And The Furious; Tokyo Drift vrooms into cinemas soon), sees Famke’s Jean Grey reborn as the Dark Phoenix. With no control over her increasingly gnarly powers, she becomes a threat to Professor Xavier’s entire posse and herself. The film also borrows from Joss Whedon’s Amazing X-Men, when, sparked by the discovery of a cure to suppress mutations, the X-Men and Magneto’s evil Brotherhood line up for a final showdown.
“Yeah, everybody is out for this one,” says Famke. “And I’ve loved working with them. They’re a fantastic group of people and we have all become very close. We’ve done three movies over the course of six years and then, as you have to imagine, we shoot the movies for six months and then all do press together. I can’t believe it’s all over. It’s been a great time in my life.”
It hasn’t, however, all been plain sailing at the X-Men franchise. Bryan Singer, director of the first two films, left during pre-production to take the reigns of Superman Returns. Matthew Vaughn, Singer’s replacement, would walk out just before the shoot commenced in August of last year. Fans were less than thrilled when Fox hastily hired Brett Ratner, the casual labourer behind Rush Hour and Rush Hour 2 to take charge. The dread words ‘troubled production’ spring to mind.
“Well, it wasn’t as bad as it sounds,” explains Famke. “I got involved with the franchise in the first place because I wanted to work with Bryan. But we all knew Bryan wasn’t going to do it when we signed on. Then, there were scheduling problems for Matthew for whatever reason. But it’s not troubled by X-Men standards at all. These movies have always been a little bit difficult to make. They are never fully prepped by the time we start shooting. So it’s just a typical chaotic X-Men shoot. You never know what you’re going to get.”
One might easily say the same thing of a Famke Janssen picture. She’s played a Bond babe (Goldeneye), a monster (The Faculty), a psychiatrist (Hide And Seek) and enjoyed flirtations with the frat pack (Made, Love & Sex). She claims, however, that her heart lies in the indie sector, that high profile gigs in movies and television (Ally McBeal, Nip/Tip) are purely a means to an end.
“There are a lot of great directors I’d like to work with, but what I really love is working with a first time director with new and interesting and independent material. That’s where you find good work.”
Perhaps also, her haphazard career strategy has helped her maintain the quiet life she seems to crave.
“Yeah,” she says. “You know, I’m just not into the celebrity thing. I live in New York, not LA. I live with my beautiful dog. I have a fantastic life. I travel wherever I want. I have better things to do than celebrity.”
X Men; The Last Stand is released May 25