Josh's Dark Side!

JOSH HARTNETT is young Hollywood's #1 heartbreaker -- ET hung with him and co-star JULIA STILES as they stepped out in LA for the premiere of 'O' -- don't miss them on ET tonight! Read on as Josh dishes with ET about the story that re-creates SHAKESPEARE's Othello in a modern-day teenage arena, and gives us the stats on his single status!

ENTERTAINMENT TONIGHT: Your reaction to having this stunning film that is finally being released?

JOSH HARTNETT: Well, The strange part of it is that it comes after a movie like 'Pearl Harbor' for me, and 'Save the Last Dance' for JULIA (STILES) ... everybody's been kind of doing all these other things, and have established themselves as these different kinds of characters. And then, to come and see something this dark is really going to throw people for a loop, I think. I think it's a good thing.

ET: Give our audience a sense of how dark Hugo (Josh's character) is.

JOSH: Well, Hugo is Iago, which is the bad-ass villain. I don't know what I can say on TV, but he's a bad dude, and if you've ever read Othello, he's an unmotivated evil man. He's Shakespeare's exploration of evil. So Hugo is an extension of that, but he's not exactly that. He has more motivation. We had to make him more reality based than Shakespeare allows to involve the audience.

ET: Apparently there was some sensitivity to this film in light of the Columbine incident. Tell us, how did they explain that to you?

JOSH: It was kind of an odd time, because I didn't think that Columbine should affect this film's release as much as it did. It isn't a film that's trying to explain why things like that happen. And we made the film a few months before Columbine happened. At the time it was supposed to shed a little bit of light on that subject. But, then it became such a hot issue.... What it could do is get people to think about it in a maybe a little clearer way, to get a little insight. But, it wasn't meant to teach people. It's a remake of Othello, plain and simple. It's a piece of art that I think people should take for art's sake.

ET: You seemed so committed to the role. Do you find that when you commit yourself to a dark character, it becomes a part of you for that time?

JOSH: That weight stayed on my shoulders for quite a while after the movie. I'm glad that's over, to tell you the truth. It was a pretty tough time, but I guess when it comes down to it, that's what you've got to do, in order to make the character really breathe.

ET: In the last three months, suddenly millions more people are aware of you now. How does that feel to you on the inside, looking out, in these past three months?

JOSH: Well I was in Africa when all that stuff went down. I was shooting a movie with RIDLEY SCOTT called 'Black Hawk Down,' and we were in Morocco for a little over a month after 'Pearl Harbor' came out, so I missed all the hype. I missed all the aftermath of the hype and all that stuff. I came back to pretty much my normal life. Things are a little bit heightened now, I get recognized more, but it's not ... it doesn't affect the way I live life, which is great.

ET: What is normal life for you?

JOSH: I go back to Minnesota. I live with my family and friends back there and just kind of take it easy.

ET: That sounds like a very sensible thing to do.

JOSH: Well, it's the only thing that I can figure out that will keep me sane, so.... (smiles)

ET: Address the rumor that you and Julia (Stiles) dated.

JOSH: No, we never dated. We're pretty good friends, but we never dated. Somebody got a picture of us up at Sundance. We were hanging out like friends do.

ET: At this stage in your life, when you go back to Minnessota, can you have a relatively normal social life?

JOSH: Well, I'm not dating right now. I have a girlfriend, so I'm kind of safe in that department. I don't have to go out and try to find a girl right now, which would kind of be a disaster, because you don't know who to trust at this point, I guess. Everything is just, it's a little bit skewed, but it's not bad, man. People treat you with respect and a lot of people liked 'Pearl Harbor,' they liked my character, and that's always nice. After this movie, I think I'll be dealing with a little bit more of a negative attitude towards me. We'll see how that goes.

source: www.etonline.com
(Entertainment Tonight)
August 22, 2001