“The Idea of ​​You”: the return of Anne Hathaway, the unloved

Anne Hathaway celebrated her 40th birthday on the set of this romantic comedy which she describes as “so personal”. Explanations…

Adaptation of the eponymous novel by Robinne Lee, published in 2017, The Idea of ​​You follows Solène Marchand (Anne Hathaway), a forty-year-old who, at the suggestion of her ex-husband, agrees to accompany Izzy (Ella Rubin) to a Coachella concert. And there, the unthinkable happens, she meets Hayes Campbell (Nicholas Galitzine), singer of August Moon, a boy band at the top of the charts. And Solène and Hayes begin a romantic relationship.

“I didn’t direct at the time, but I received a lot of romantic movie scripts in my 20s. Then, in my thirties, I was so focused on my family life, motherhood and finding my way as an actress while also having a really rich personal life. So, I hadn’t noticed that it had been a very long time since anyone had sent me a romantic script. So when [The Idea of You] arrived in my hands, I found the character so beautiful and the world of the film so incredible,” Anne Hathaway told journalists at the press conference for The Idea of ​​You.

In the pages of New York Times, the actress clarified the reasons for her interest: “Solène perhaps does not look like the most complex character I have ever played. No accent, no particular approach – I love the characters’ movements in fact. But Solène seemed familiar to me. I recognized aspects of myself in her, as well as traits of friends or women I admire. She had an inner richness, coupled with the idea that she had been someone who sought to please others when she was younger. I was excited about the idea of ​​playing someone who has moved past that phase of their life.”

The “Hathahaters”

Because there are people, known as Hathahaters (i.e. who hate Hatha[way]), who regularly and violently criticize the actress and her work. This online harassment has taken on such virulent proportions that Anne Hathaway explained to Vanity Fairin 2013, after winning the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for Wretched that “many producers didn’t want to give me roles because they were worried about how toxic my identity had become online.”

She added that “humiliation is such a hard ordeal to go through. The key is to not let yourself get stuck. You have to stay bold, and that can be difficult because you tell yourself that if you don’t draw too much attention to yourself, it won’t hurt. However, if you want to do that, you don’t have to be an actress.

The Anne Hathaway hate movement began in 2013, during the promotion campaign for the Oscars, with her detractors accusing her of lobbying for the award. Her acceptance speech was violently mocked, with internet users lambasting everything, from her dress to her lips, to the very content of her speech.

And, further proof of this generalized detestation, the magazine Living room even interviewed Terry Pettijohn, a psychology professor who did not hesitate to say, in all seriousness, that “when things are going well, we prefer actresses with rounder faces.” However, the actress’s “mature face” is said to be “more popular when times are tougher”! And the criticism picked up again around the time of the release of The witchesin 2020, so much so that Anne Hathaway had to apologize for her “fatphobic” character and stressed that she in no way condones discrimination.

If she readily says that it was Christopher Nolan who saved her career from ending by choosing her as Catwoman in Rise of the Dark Knightreleased in 2012, a little more than six months before the famous Oscar ceremony, today, she is well enough to accept the role of Solène, a woman who “had not necessarily allowed herself to fully explore who she was as a person.”
The Idea of ​​You is broadcast on the Prime Video digital platform from May 2.