Christine Aylward: Was there a point in time when you were little where you knew you
wanted to be in this industry?

Natalie Portman: It's weird because I feel like I always sort of wanted to be an
actress. I don't really remember like a specific point. Just
ever since I was, you know, I can't remember wanting to be
anything. It was always to perform, and that's just me being an
obnoxious little hammy kid, I suppose.

Christine Aylward: And do you remember the first movie you ever saw, or the first movie
you saw that really, really stayed with you?

Natalie Portman: I don't know about the first movie I ever saw, but I know the first
movie that I just wanted to watch over and over and over again
was "Dirty Dancing." I mean, I've definitely said it before, but
that was the movie that I was like, "Wow. This is amazing. I
can't get enough."

Christine Aylward: So how many times did you watch it?

Natalie Portman: Oh, I've seen it hundreds of times, hundreds.

Christine Aylward: I love that movie also. I had the soundtrack and sang all the songs.
That's so interesting. You were always performing. Do you
remember how old you were when you saw your first movie?

Natalie Portman: I don't know. It wasn't really like a big deal. It wasn't something
that was withheld from me and then I got to do or anything like
that. I feel like movies were always around and on.

I definitely saw a lot of theater growing up, which was really
lucky. My parents would take me to plays all the time. Even when
we couldn't afford anything else, we would stand on line at the
TKTS in New York and get the half-price tickets and go see
theater. That really, I remember waiting outside of Lily
Tomlin's dressing room in Washington, D.C. when I was like five
years old and was so excited to meet her, and seeing Gregory
Hines when I was living in New York when I probably must have
been nine or ten. That was my real . . . that was sort of the
family outing.

Christine Aylward: So when you started acting at such a young age, can you talk about
that a little bit? About your first experience as a child when
you were acting?

Natalie Portman: Well, I started when I was ten years old. I started auditioning.
Actually, I remember today that they had auditions for young
Cosette in "Les Mis" on Long Island, where I grew up, when I was
ten years old and we were away on vacation. Because Debbie
Gibson, who was like my number one pop star when I was seven or
eight years old was in "Les Mis" at the time and was from Long
Island, and she wanted to give a chance to little girls from
Long Island. They had a huge open casting call, and we were
away. I was furious at my parents for being away at that moment.
My dad's partner's daughter, Jessica, actually got it. She was
the one they chose. So this girl that I grew up with got this
thing, which was amazing, and sort of made me realize that it
was possible that someone living where we were could do
something professionally.

So then I really was going out on auditions and stuff. I did
some weird off-Broadway stuff, like two different sorts of
musicals. Then I got the part in "The Professional." That's when
I started being in films. But I was much more stage-oriented
when I was a kid. I loved singing and dancing, and that was
really my sort of passion.

Christine Aylward: So "Dirty Dancing" was one of the first movies you saw that you just
watched over and over and over again. Do you remember any other
movies that you just loved that kind of made you fall in love
with film?

Natalie Portman: I wasn't really watching any of the classic films or the foreign
films as a kid. I was really into the movies of the time. I was
watching all those John Hughes movies, like "16 Candles" and
"Breakfast Club" and "Pretty in Pink," all the Molly Ringwald's.
I would see stuff that came on TV, and yeah, I think all of that
stuff. It was never, again, like when I was a kid, I wasn't a
movie fanatic. I was a theater nerd. I was really into plays and
musicals and stuff.

Christine Aylward: So when you think about filmmaking, are there certain people who
really, really inspire you professionally?

Natalie Portman: Yeah, definitely. As an actor, people like Cate Blanchett and Kate
Winslet, who are just constantly doing interesting, different
things and really flexing their acting muscles by trying and not
being snobbish about anything. Just really doing big comedies to
small independent dramatic roles to all different kinds of
characters, and not really worrying about the size of the part
or just how the challenge is the more interesting thing.

Also really paying attention to new directors, directors from
other parts of the world. Nicole Kidman also really does that.

Then in terms of actual filmmaking, now that I'm starting as a
director, I definitely take a lot of inspiration from the
directors who, first of all, female directors, which I know, I'd
rather not make it male or female, but they're so rare that when
you see people like Sophia Coppola who really has a very
particular voice and really has created her own creative
filmmaking, that's definitely inspiring when you think about,
"Oh, I don't know if I can do it." And to see someone who
preserves that sense of self and that femininity and all of that
within the directing and writing, that's really exciting.

There are lots of amazing female writers coming out too that are
exciting. But I mean in terms of directors that I think are
really incredible right now and inspire me are Michael Haneke
and Alfonso Cuarón and there are many who are doing really doing
interesting stuff. David Gordon Green.

Christine Aylward: Are there certain things that you go through when you're preparing
for a role to prepare for that role? What's the process that you
go through to prepare for a role?

Natalie Portman: The process is really different for every role, and I try and make it
very tailored to the role, because sometimes you have to do a
lot of research and reading and preparation, whether it's
learning a new skill or an accent or something like that. I
mean, obviously playing Anne Boleyn, it was constant reading and
watching documentaries and previous films and doing accent work
and learning horseback riding. I mean, that one was very, very
intense, very specific preparation.

Then something like the last film I acted in, which is currently
called "17 Photos of Isabel," this Don Roos movie. Maybe it'll
change again, but that one I really just worked with the text of
the script and thought about it and felt it out and practiced
the script and stuff, but it was a contemporary character, a
fictional character, so it was much more a work of imagination.
Yeah, there are different exercises you can do, but it sort of
varies for me from thing to thing.

Christine Aylward: What is the hardest part about acting or the most challenging?

Natalie Portman: Well, I mean, I think I enjoy it so much that the actual process of
doing it isn't hard. It's the after stuff. It's like when you
have to go around and promote a film and talk about it all the
time, and it's like a little self-conscious or something and
talking about yourself. That's the part that you're like, "Oh,
now I understand why you get paid."

Christine Aylward: And what's your favorite part?

Natalie Portman: Being on set and working with other actors and having a director
really, really engage with you and give you modifications and
exploring that part is just amazing. It's really my favorite
thing.

Christine Aylward: When you think about collaboration on the set, who would you say that
you collaborate most closely with?

Natalie Portman: I collaborate most closely with the other actors and with the
director. Sometimes you have uncooperative directors or actors,
meaning that they don't want to engage, because any level,
whether it's . . . if a director's giving you notes that they
like you or they hate you, it's helpful. It's always helpful.
But the ones that are difficult to handle are the ones that
don't talk to you. There are some that just don't give you
feedback, and that's really, really challenging. But usually you
really get to have a very intimate relationship with the other
actors and your director.

Obviously, the whole camera team and DP are extremely important,
and all of the creatives in terms of your hair and makeup and
costume. It's definitely helpful. But when you really get into
the acting part of it that, that part, it's not quite as
intimate, I guess, with those people.

Christine Aylward: You know one thing that kind of - not growing up on film sets - the
first film set I went to, the one thing that was kind of . . . I
don't think you realize as an outsider, is just the family of
it, where you're just part of one big family.

Natalie Portman: The best ones are. The best sets are like families, but it doesn't
always work out that way. You find, actually, that when you go
out on location, it becomes much more like that, because
everyone's living together and working together, so you get much
more of a family feel. Whereas if everyone is going back to
their own homes and lives and everything, it's a little bit more
like a job. It also varies in different countries. There are
certain countries that you get much more a family feeling on
set.

Christine Aylward: What compels you to get involved in a project? I know that's kind of
a hard question, because it's probably so many different things.
But when you think about projects that you get involved with,
what are some of the key elements?

Natalie Portman: Well, I think it can be really anything that gets you interested. I
just want to make sure I'm going to be challenged the whole
time, because I know if I'm not given obstacles, I get kind of
lazy. I don't really engage in the way I want to. So if I know
something is going to constantly be throwing challenges at me .
. . not in like, I want to have fun. I always want to enjoy what
I'm doing. But something that is going to be . . . that's part
of the fun, I think, is getting all the challenges of it.

Christine Aylward: What would you say to someone who was dying to be an actor? Is there
any advice that you'd give them in terms of how to pursue that
career?

Natalie Portman: Well, the thing about being an actor is that it's so unpredictable,
which is great, and there is no path. Like if you're going to be
a doctor, it's like you go to college. You do pre-med. You go to
medical school. You do your residency. It's like a very
prescribed course.

But acting is not like that, and there are a million ways to do
it. But I think that the thing that's really important to ask
yourself if is you really love the actual acting, which means
that you will do it in Kentucky at a regional theater or in a
Hollywood movie. I think those people are the ones that really
get the most joy out of it, because they're going to . . . it's
not a matter of ego. It's a matter of just really loving what
you're doing.

So, yeah. I think doing, actually acting is the best way. So if
it's in your school plays, in your community theater, and then
trying to go out and do it professionally. There are many
routes. You can go to open calls. Yeah, but I just think really
loving it and enjoying it is important. It's hard. There's sort
of no way to prescribe success really in this field.

Christine Aylward: One thing we've definitely heard from everybody, whether they're a
director or a writer or an actor is just sheer complete
determination, persistence, this is the only thing, this is what
they had to do.

Natalie Portman: Yeah, definitely. But the thing is, is that being - I don't know -
you meet people who are extremely talented and extremely
ambitious who never make it, and you meet people who are not
that talented and not that ambitious who do make it. So there's
no formula. I guess that can keep you from being discouraged,
because it's not personal. If it's not working out, it's not
like you're on downs, and it's just it has so much to do with
luck, unfortunately.

Christine Aylward: So tell us about life as a director and what your favorite parts are
of being a director.

Natalie Portman: Well, I don't know if I'm really a director yet. I've made two short
films, which I think most Americans at this point have done with
YouTube. But it was really an incredible experience, especially
having lived so long on the other side of the camera. The
writing part was really fun and the editing part was really fun.
The actual directing part was really, really challenging, and
the actual shooting of the film, because there are just so many
people that you're bringing together and coordinating. It's
almost like conducting an orchestra, I imagine.

You're responsible for everyone's experience and everyone else
doing their jobs right. You don't want to micromanage. You want
to trust, but at the same time you have to make sure that
everyone is doing what they are supposed to be doing. It was
really exciting and hard and fun.

Christine Aylward: As a director, just a similar question, Natalie, who do you
collaborate most closely with when you're in that process of
being a director?

Natalie Portman: As a director, I definitely found that I collaborated most closely
with my DP and my first AD, and then of course the actors. Yeah,
a first AD is, I think, even as an actor, I've realized this,
the first AD is sort of the most crucial component on the set. I
think if you have a good first, you're going to have a good
experience. They really run the show.

Christine Aylward: You wrote your shorts, as well, so you went through the process of
developing the story, dissecting the story, writing the story.
So how did you go about that process in terms of writing? Tell
us a little bit about that.

Natalie Portman: Writing, I think everyone probably has a different process, but my
experience is that I have an idea for a story in my head for a
very, very long time, and little things sort of glom onto it. I
don't write any notes or anything down, and then after a couple
years, it comes out in one spurt. It just sort of like molds
itself in my head and then it just comes out. So that is what
happened with both occasions.

Then once I get my first draft out, I send it out to ten people
I trust, which I know a lot of writers don't do. This is not a
normal process. A lot of people really tinker with it a lot, but
I do my crazy first draft and then get people's feedback and
then start doing all this very, very detailed work, using the
feedback and then it sort of inspires me, because it gives me a
weird kind of perspective that I don't have because I think this
story is in my brain so long that you get too close to it.

Christine Aylward: You really just don't write any notes. You just have it on your brain
and then you go and you just write a screenplay.

Natalie Portman: Yeah, but I mean, I've only written two shorts, and now I'm working
this adapted screenplay, which adapting is completely different.
On the adaptation, I've written hundreds of pages of notes about
how I want to do it and have my whole book marked up. I mean,
it's a very different process than writing my shorts, which were
both just my own ideas. But the shorts, one was 25 pages and one
was 5 pages or 10 pages. That kind of stuff I can keep in my
brain. I think a larger thing I would probably have to structure
a little bit more carefully.

Christine Aylward: Have you had any really pleasant surprises in terms of projects that
you've worked on, you just had this pleasant, ah, surprise and
just everything turned out great?

Natalie Portman: Yeah. No, a lot. I think one of the biggest surprises was working on
"Cold Mountain." I only worked on it for ten days, but it was
one of the most meaningful experiences. Also as a director,
Anthony Minghella, who directed, was so unique as a director. I
got so much from him, both as an actor and . . . I mean, he used
to tell me to say my lines as poetry, like find the beauty in
the actual words, which you never hear about or think about. As
an actor, it's always about your motivation, but actually to
find the beauty in the words was like a whole new way of
thinking about texts for me to be speaking as a poet and
remembering that we're poets as actors.

Also his directing technique, sometimes when the shot would be
on one actor and not on the other, he would tell the actor that
was off camera different lines to say, so that it would really
surprise you, because something I think a lot of people are
surprised about when they come to a movie set is how many times
we do it. We'll do the same scene all day long. We'll spend a
whole day on one scene. So there's so much repetition it can get
very practiced. It can get very desensitized. So to sort of
shock you back into the scene, he would have the other actor say
something different to you like, "I think your baby's going to
die," or something like that that it makes sense to the scene
but is not the actual line. It's sort of speaking the sub-text.
That was really amazing.

I mean he was so engaged, and also, he would always be in the
room with us, and I think that's really important. Directors
leave a lot now, because there are monitors. I did it too, when
I was directing. You want to see what the camera is getting, but
at the same time, the director is always a character in every
scene, because the audience is experiencing the scene through
the director. He's observing, the camera's observing as the
director. So there has to be some connection to that person that
the actors have to make, I think, for the audience to feel that
connection. There's an acknowledgment of someone watching you
that I think is really important. It was ten days of work in
Romania, but it was really, really influential on me, as both an
actor and now trying to direct.

Christine Aylward: Are there any other stories like that? Any other memorable on set
experiences like that?

Natalie Portman: Well, Zach Braff was actually a big surprise, because I sort did that
movie, honestly, I did "Garden State" because I wasn't getting
other jobs. I had the script and I was lie, "Okay. This is an
interesting character I could do something with. This could be
fun." I went not expecting anything, like I thought it could be
a straight to video movie. I had no idea.

Zach was really great. It was his first film, but it taught me a
lot about the dynamics of making a film on such a short
schedule. We shot the whole film in 25 days, and it was super
low budget. I think it was like $2 million or $2.5 million. He
would just do everything so quickly, and as soon as he got it,
he would just move on. A lot of directors always want a safety.
They won't be happy with just one take. But he was like, "Why
are you getting a safety?" Like everyone talks about a safety.
If the first shot gets ruined, he's like, "You have just as good
a chance of it all getting ruined. So if you have it, just move
ahead. If it gets ruined, we'll go back and reshoot it."

So that was really important, just to when you have it, move on,
especially . . . I mean, if you have a huge budget movie, it's a
different deal. Take as much time as you want. But I think a lot
of directors can get stuck on something and become obsessive-
compulsive about getting something really, really exact to the
point where they don't even remember what they want anymore.
They just get sort of caught up in doing 80 takes of something.
It was great to see that energy, because I feel like the energy
of the actual filmmaking is preserved in the final movie.

Christine Aylward: Getting back a little to . . . well, let me just ask you, is there
anything on the art and the craft side? I know that it's tough
with the acting because it's talking about preparation. Anything
that you think I may have missed that you want to share from the
art and the craft of the profession, and what you do that you
think we should cover?

Natalie Portman: Well, I guess I could tell you about an influential experience. So,
when I was 19, I got to do a play in Central Park with sort of
like a dream team cast. I couldn't believe that I was allowed to
be part of that group. It was Mike Nichols directed "The
Seagull" in Central Park, and it was Meryl Streep and Kevin
Kline and Philip Seymour Hoffman and John Goodman and
Christopher Walken and Marcia Gay Harden and Debra Monk and
Larry Pine. It was an amazing, amazing group of people.

Getting to watch everyone work, particularly Meryl and Phil, was
so amazing because Meryl was so detailed. She would on her car
ride in from Connecticut, because we were obviously rehearsing
in Manhattan, she would write folk songs. She would find old
Russian tunes and write folk songs and then come in and teach
them to the rest of the cast so that if she wanted to one night,
on stage, break out into song, she would have that. It created
this sort of fabric and culture of where we were and brought us
together. It's true. It's like all of those things. I mean, it's
so detailed, to start thinking about what songs do they all
know? It gives you such a sense of place. When you're doing
Russia, 19th century or whatever, it gives you such a specific
sense of place. She would do that. She was just so playful of
just the possibility of throwing something in, the possibility
of changing something every night, having a different little
flair every night.

Phil, I would always sneak over his shoulder during rehearsals
to see what he was doing. I remember - I hope I'm not revealing
his secrets - and it's something that I've done since, is he
would write questions for himself and answer them, obviously
after, about his character. It seemed like a really useful tool,
because I've never had any proper training, so I sort of have
just picked everything up from people I see. When you're
preparing, just to keep asking yourself questions about the
character. If you can't answer it right away, then you just keep
writing these questions. Even that sort of soul searching as the
character is interesting.

Christine Aylward: That seems like a great exercise to go through for the screenwriting
process also. It's just keep asking questions about character.

Natalie Portman: Yeah, I think it's a really good tool, too, just to learn something
from everyone you work with. Like every person you work with,
steal from them. Yeah, stealing, I think stealing from people
when you're acting is really easy because it's always going to
be funneled through you. So it's not plagiarism. No one will
ever know, unless you're really, really good.