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and critical flops (Serving Sara, Bad Boy,et al.)
And you do that little thing with your fingers in your mouth?
Hurley is an irreverent delight in a role that seems written specifically as a commentary on her public image.
(She was five months removed from her official split with Grant.)
But … is she good enough or bad enough forBedazzled?
But this was a really big studio film.
They want you to play the devil with Brendan Fraser!
Its very exciting when you drive through those big studio gates for the first time.
It was a long time ago now, just over 20 years.
So much has changed and so much has happened since then.
BecauseAustin Powersis a very funny movie, and it also had a lot of heart.
It became very successful, of course, and they went on to make two more.
I think it helped a lot.
I do think things always have a knock-on effect.
BeforeAustin Powers, you were doing mostly TV, dramas, and period pieces in England, right?
I did a lot of that.
I started off working on the BBC, doing mostly period pieces.
I was in the pilot of theYoung Indiana Jones Chronicles; I did a little bit of theater.
Then I started to get much nicer parts.
You said onLarry Kingat the time that the role inBedazzledhorrified you at first.
It was also a remake.
And Brendan and I ended up having such a good rapport.
We were very well cast against each other.
He was playing a massive nerd, and I was this very manipulative person.
The whole thing sounds absurd to talk about.
At that time, I was like,I cant believe you didnt give it to them!
Wow.I dont know why they wanted me.
So it is out there that you were up against Uma Thurman, Julianne Moore, and Madonna.
[Long pause.]
]There were other people who wanted the role.
But I was thinking of who was the baddest, most beautiful woman in Hollywood.
And I came up with Elizabeth.Thank you, I think?[Laughs.]
And then you have Hollywood glamour bad, which means theyre naughty and manipulative and cunning.
InGossip Girl,I did a season where I played a character calledDiana Payne, who was definitely bad.
I did four years onThe Royalson E!, playing yet again that jot down of character.
Thats the sort of bad that I can play quite well.
Youre American why do we make good villains?
If youre not English, you may not necessarily get that.
And you could be right.
Do you remember noticing that at the time?
We organized it and put it into years.
My son found this absolutely fascinating; he took months and read every single thing.
Hed show me things and we were absolutely shocked at the sort of things people used to say.
I dont know if somebody could say that sort of thing now.
At the time, because it was the norm, I suppose I didnt really bat an eyelid.
It wasnt meant as a put-down, I dont think.
I dont think he was meaning to be offensive.
By the way, he never patted me on the head or the bottom.
But it was much more of that time.
And Brendans character is a nerd whos terrified of girls, whos never had a girlfriend.
That is just the conceit, and that was my part to play.
Would it work in real life?
What do you think?
Probably!I think you and I both know that we probably could turn a nerds eye that way.
Is that true?Yes.
What he needed was the pinup.
He needed the woman he looked at in magazines and went Cor!
So we went,Lets do slinky dresses, slinky eye makeup.
Lets be this fantasy woman that hes seeing on adverts for cars.
Versace made some costumes.
Fendi made some costumes.
Patrick Cox made some costumes.
We got some beautiful stuff.
Do you have any of it still?All of it.
Do you have a costume room?No.
And this is something my son tells me off for.
You gotta get them out, they could have moths!
Tell me about your relationship with Brendan on set.
You said in some interviews that you would torment him on set.
How so?Yeah, I did a bit.In the best possible way.
Hes such a great guy and quite shy in real life.
And at the end of filming, he gave me this little Victorian silver bell.
I think of Brendan every single day.
It just says, Ring and Ill be there, or something else so sweet.
It was lovely to see him again.
Are you following theBrendan Fraser renaissance?The thing is, Brendan never really went away.
Sometimes that happens with actors you dont happen to be doing massive jobs that everyone knows about.
Having him now back at the top is just fantastic.
He never deserved to leave it.
He was and is a brilliant actor.
Thats a Hollywood story.
Theres a lot going on inBedazzledin terms of tweaks and CGI and special effects.
It was all shot on film, not digital yet.
And there was a man putting a wind machine on me.
I walked off the set, and he said, You know what?
I was like, Oh my God.
You clearly have a wheelhouse.Its hysterical, isnt it?
When Im 80, am I going to be in a catsuit getting my hair blown out?
But one critic wrote, On closer inspection, humanistic theology and spiritual smokescreens turn it into a monster.
Quite literally, Elliot conquers Satan and earns his salvation with his own strength.
And God is just another guy in the park with a few good ideas.
And not walking down the path with the devil is probably a good idea.
But Im not sure I thought about what Christians would think.
I didnt get quite that far in my thinking.
But actually, there was nothing for them to object to!
Whats a Faustian bargain you would make?I dont think I could give up my soul.
Then I had my baby and retired for eight years.
I didnt work at all.
I moved back to England, and I startedElizabeth Hurley Beach,which I still do.
I never saw my son.
Im going to wait until hes 8.
And I certainly didnt want to leave him becauseI was a single mother.
So you stepped back for that whole time?
When did you decide to come back?I didnt work for eight years.
Youve left the leading-lady age group and youre looking at mom roles.
Its just not as young-centric as it used to be.
Thats contributed to the fact that since Ive gone back to work, Ive worked nonstop.
I have tons of projects and I couldnt be happier.
I didnt expect that to happen.
And now youre making several Christmas rom-coms.
This is a woman my age who never found her man or had children.
Theres so much fabulous TV and movies available at home.
This has a lot to do with streaming.
It tended to be that young people went to the cinema and older people tended to stay home more.
TV movies used to have a really bad connotation; they werent as glamorous.
But its opened up a whole new avenue for my generation of women.
I think thats a sign of the times.
Im benefitting from it and Im loving it.
Im having a great time now, but I loved it then.
