Anne Hathaway Is Vogue’s August Cover Star!

0:05This is The Run Through. I'm Chloe Mel, and joining me for this special Monday episode is Vogue's Deputy Editor Taylor Antrim. Hi, everyone. Today, Vogue's latest cover is Out in the World, featuring the beautiful Anne Hathaway, styled by Tabitha Simmons and photographed by Annie Leibovitz. Taylor, you were one of the key players in this story. Key, yes, indeed. Right at the heart of things, the beating heart of the Anne Hathaway cover. The aorta of Anne. I don't think we need to get into aortas. Tell us what went down. Well, we all fell ahead of our heels for Anne Hathaway. I mean, I think that's the headline here.

0:48Well, what do you want to know, Chloe? This was a really fun cover to work on. She is wearing some fresh off the runway Givenchy on the cover. All Sarah Burton in this cover portfolio, which is really exciting because this was Sarah Burton's big return to a creative directorship after leaving Burberry. And the whole issue is the idea behind it was power women and the power of women return. And so it's a whole spotlight on female designers. And Anne exemplified to a lot of us this idea of a woman in charge of her own life. Yes. I mean, this is a fairly strange indie movie called Mother Mary, which is coming out by the end of the year.

1:28But like if you want a portrait of like an incredibly powerful, like indomitable vision of Anne Hathaway, that's what this movie has. So it is an incredible performance. She really throws herself into it. And in this cover story that Maya Singer, who's going to come on and talk to us about it, wrote, Anne talks about just like the incredible amounts of preparation she had to do. She had to train herself to be to basically be like a global pop star because she has these highly staged sequences where she's performing sort of, you know, Lady Gaga-esque pop songs on stage. And yeah, it's something else.

2:04I mean, I watched it sort of with my jaw on the floor. Hmm. Interesting.

2:11That's a common idiom, you know, I guess you just made it sound very. What would you like me to say? No, no, that's fine. That's fine. I watched it agog. A gape. I watched it agog, a gape, and a gasp. Without further ado, let's hear from Maya. Yeah. The run-through will be back in a moment.

2:44Hi, I'm Rebecca Ford, senior awards correspondent at Vanity Fair and co-host of Little Gold Men. Oscar season is upon us. Little Gold Men takes you behind the scenes of the race for the biggest prize in Hollywood. There's a hundred wrestlers in the room, but only one can be Oscar nominated. Whether you're a movie lover or an industry buff, Little Gold Men from Vanity Fair has everything you need to know about this year's Oscar race. Follow and listen to Little Gold Men wherever you get your podcasts.

3:25Maya, we are so excited to have you on the pod. We are thrilled to have you here. We're here to talk about the August issue cover story, which is the immortal Anne Hathaway on the cover. But one thing I like to do as we get into these sort of like behind our cover story chats is I go back to my emails and text chats to see about how the whole thing started. And I found it. I was like, hey, Maya, are you available for the August cover? It's Anne Hathaway, blah, blah, blah. And I would say your enthusiasm was high for you, but you're not going to scream, oh, my God, this is the assignment of my dreams.

4:02You were like, tell me how you responded to the idea of profiling Anne Hathaway. I mean, I think – no, I'm not an effusive person. That's what I was – I was like, better you say that than me. I mean, it's funny because Anne actually is a person who sort of brings out effusiveness. Totally. I will say I'm not dodging your question. I do think that that is one of the funny things is that like the first thing really that like, you know, our initial interaction was this kind of like very jarring experience for me because I am a little aloof and a little deadpan. And like she comes in with like a lot of loving and like effusive energy and just sort of greeted me with like this big embrace.

4:53Oh, my goodness. And, you know, when I was just like. Taylor's nightmare. I'm not anti-hug, Chloe. I'm not. And like I'm not either. But it was just like a little bit like, oh, my goodness. Because that isn't normally how people that you're, you know, interviewing. Totally. You know, it's like there's usually a little bit of like kind of sizing each other up. Like, you know, are you here to destroy me? Right, right, right. Going on. And she didn't have any of that. One of the next things that basically happened between us was that she sort of like looked and saw like my tote bag. And there was like a sketch of like a photograph of like the filmmaker like Chantal Ackerman on it.

5:29And she was like, oh, my God. Like I just watched the movie of hers like for the first time. Yeah, what movie was it? It was the film, one of her like really early films, it might even be her first film, called Soit My Vie, which means like Blow Up My Town. But it was just like this very strange thing because she was like, oh my, like I'd never even like heard of Chantal Ackerman until like two days ago. And I watched her movie for the first time like last night. And like all of a sudden like here you are with your tote bag. That's crazy. And I was sort of like, oh my god, yeah, that's totally crazy.

6:02Like suddenly like I'm this person who's like, you know. She sort of sets the terms, right? Yeah, it's like she's like, this is how it's going to go. It's like she creates a permission structure. Oh, that's sweet. Is how I would put it, you know, to be a little bit more like you can be kind of bubbly and like and around her and excited about things in a way that maybe in like your normal kind of like jaded New York life, you don't get to be. The other thing that was sort of hanging in my head when I contacted you, and this speaks to your piece, which I think is very thoughtful and very psychologically rich about her, is like the nominal peg for this cover story is a movie called Mother Mary that I had seen a few weeks before and you had not seen.

6:42So what I was coming to you to say was like, would you like to profile just this extremely effusive, you know, we all love her celebrity in a movie that is like one of the strangest things I've ever seen, right? And so I was sort of like, good luck, Maya. But the filmmaker is David Lowery who is a really interesting filmmaker who does not make commercial sort of straightforward movies. I'd seen pretty much all of his movies and I knew you had too. So I kind of knew what you were – I knew that you knew what you would be getting into. One of the things that I actually said to Anne almost like right away when we sat down to like do the proper like interviews, I was like I'm really bad at being like a celebrity interviewing journalist in the sense that like I actually don't particularly like pying into people's like private lives, which usually is like what kind of comes with the job.

7:38Right. And the thing I like doing is talking to people at their work. Oh, she must have loved hearing that. Yeah. You know, and like actually like, you know, a couple months ago I did an interview with Denzel Washington and Jake Gyllenhaal. Yes. For us, for the Othello. Yeah, about Othello. And, you know, and I think that we had a great time because, you know, we spent like an hour and change like talking about Shakespeare. And I think for them, that was also very gratifying. I do believe actually wholeheartedly, and I said this to Anne, that I think people show themselves through the work. And often you can find out a lot about people in the way that they talk about the work.

8:29And then also you get to like a comfort level with people and you can observe them and spend time with them that way. So what did you learn? I mean, I think that what came out of it is right off the bat, you know, and talking about it being a film that people wouldn't necessarily think about being a quote unquote Anne Hathaway film. Definitely not. Can you summarize what people do tend to think about as an Anne Hathaway film? Sure. I mean, I think, you know, when the Naples Ultra probably of like Anne Hathaway films is like in the public imagination is probably still The Devil Wears Prada. Yeah.

9:09Where, you know, that sort of plucky and but very intelligent heroine that, you know, the viewer really identifies with and is kind of going on the journey with. Mixed with Princess Diaries, right? Isn't that her other like major, major pop cultural moment? And like nothing could be friendlier or more approachable. It's sort of glamorousness meets approachability with her, right? Yeah. Mixed with some theater kid chutzpah. Yeah. And, you know, although she has done, you know, daring and like kind of more abrasive parts, you know, like Rachel getting married and stuff like that. In the past, that's not the stuff I think that jumps to people's mind like right off the bat.

9:55And Mother Mary, in talking about that part, really became quite personal in terms of how she talked about the challenges that she faced in going into this part. and how I think in particular it really forced her to let go of a lot of like her perfectionism and just be a little bit more in her body because the role entailed. We should say what the movie is about. Yes, we should say what the movie is about. She plays a like a global pop star sort of, you know, as I say in the piece, like a kind of Lady Gaga, Taylor Swift hybrid. There are other sort of elements thrown in there. And Jack Antonoff and Charlie XCX were like writing these songs for her and she has to perform, you know, choreography and she has to sing these songs.

10:55In elaborate costumes. Like elaborate costumes, you know. And so all of this, she has to be a credible global pop star. Totally. And she spent a good amount of time training with choreographer Danny Vitale. And, you know, really that, as she put it, like she had to learn to accept being a beginner. And the idea that being a beginner and going into that studio every day and not being good wasn't the same as being bad. Why do you think she said yes to that role? And you also talk about in your piece about how recently she's been in these quite sort of, you know, challenging movies. There was Eileen not too long ago, which was a very unusual movie.

11:39And Maya, you have these scenes with her in Jack Antonoff's studio here in New York where she's recording her vocals. And she's sort of challenged by the singing, but she's a real singer. We know that from Les Mis, right? So maybe you can talk a little bit about what that was like in that studio. I mean, I asked her about that. I was like, you know, I said that I associate her with being a singer because of Les Mis. And she talked to me about the fact that she just felt like she was a singer within certain limitations. Oh, okay. And that part of that was, I think, for a long time, she has felt like maybe she's been kind of singing slightly with, like, the wrong voice.

12:19Oh, interesting. Like, and the way that she put it to me is that she's kind of been singing up here. Yeah. And what she has discovered in the process of working, you know, and training for this role is, like, she's kind of actually, like, down here. Mm-hmm. And that, you know, opened up, unlocked a lot of other stuff. I mean, like literally, like physically in her body, like unlocked a lot of stuff. But then there's like another part of that training, which is just like actually, I mean, it's fascinating that I didn't put into the piece because there just wasn't room. It's quite technical training that she talked to me about in terms of like how to do pop singing.

12:57And there was a producer that Jack Antonoff connected her with who has like some funky name like kook, I want to say. It's in my notes, but I don't have it in my brain. Who was like training her on like how to do like all the kind of things that you hear in like pop music, you know, and how they vocalize, which is interesting. And she, you know, but it's like it's a real art. It's like its own language, pop music vocalization. But did you get the vibe from her that she was sort of tired of doing the kind of girl next door rom-com-y type roles that we know her from way back when and that she wants more challenges?

13:41Like why these movies that she's been in that are a little darker? I don't know if I would say it as plainly as like she's tired. I think that she wants a mix. Yeah. You know, one of the things that she said to me is like one of her great dreams and the things that she's looking for as a producer trying to develop is, you know, to find her own version of like a Miss Congeniality, like that kind of, you know, 90s like. People love that movie. Yeah, exactly. Like a 90s romantic comedy, kind of a little slapstick, that sort of thing. so it's not just that she's going in this direction but I think you know the way I would put it is she did this movie Armageddon Time with James Gray a few years ago she was in with Jeremy Strong who's a close friend of hers and that was a transformative experience for her as an actress where it's like she kind of started to use a different muscle.

14:47And, you know, it's like when you like start to feel something new in yourself and you're like, oh, like, let's let's I want to play with that a little bit more. I think that's what's going on. It's just sort of like, like, let's see, like, and what happens if I what happens if I work with this director? Like, let's, you know, do they do they kind of push me a little bit more in this direction? And what about that director? You know, what happens with this new muscle then? Because it's not that she wants to stop doing the other stuff. She was very, very clear about that.

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15:57Yeah, we have to ask you what she may or may not have said about Delworth's Prada 2.

16:07I mean the only thing that she really said to me was that it was happening and you know and then I made like a bunch of wisecracks about how like I should get hired to like you know do punch-ups given like you know my unique position. Yeah. As a Vogue correspondent. As a Vogue correspondent. Like such filmmaker. And she did not take that bait.

16:31but she's also in the next Christopher Nolan film which is the big you know next film after Oppenheimer she is like insanely busy right now I have to say reading about all the projects she has and knowing she has young kids it seems really stressful to juggle all of that and yet she was the most frequent texter tell us about that because it's crazy it seems like well I want to be like very clear about this because she is a very frequent texter. And then when she's on set, like, or busy with other stuff, like, it goes very, very quiet. So I think I caught her in a window where she was like, ba-ba-ba-ba-ba.

17:09And then... What was she texting you about? We were just texting about it. I mean, like, honestly, Taylor, you're just like very lucky that you didn't get like a 10 ,000 word piece about like Anne Hathaway and I just talking about like movies that like she'd been watching in the Criterion Collection, because like that easily could have just been the entire story. I do feel lucky I didn't get that. Like we, like, there was a lot of us just like going back and forth about like films that she was watching. Oh my God. And because that was, you know, that was definitely a point of connection between the two of us.

17:45Gosh, what else were we talking about? The Knicks. Yes, the Knicks, the Knicks. Tell us about the Knicks things. She's a huge basketball fan. And I think she was extremely disappointed that I wasn't watching them during the playoffs. Well, she got Chantal Ackerman, but she came everything out of you, right? She kept like—she would just be like texting me. She'd be like, are you watching? And I'd be like, watching what? Sounds like a conversation with Chloe.

18:15She'd be like, the game, the game. Wow. Yeah, I mean, she was like a delightful, was a delightful back and forth. And she's, and delightful on the sense that she was also just like, you know, curious about like me and like my life. And, you know, in that way, it just felt like very, very human and kind and not at a certain point, just like not about sort of, you know, doing a story. We should talk about the pictures for a moment. She worked with Annie Leibovitz for this shoot. One thing Anne said about Annie is like she feels like she that Annie has seen her grow up. Oh, that's nice. That she actually was like, maybe you should interview Annie for the piece because she has like seen she has like shot me so many times.

19:03Annie always has like a point of view or a really sort of worked out concept for these shoots. It's never just like pretty pictures of the of the subject. And she shot Anne at the Metropolitan Museum at the John Singer Sargent exhibition. I love that. Yeah, it was really beautiful. I mean, she and she styled as a real life Madame X in front of Madame X. And it's a fun moment. Exactly. So it's always this like really kind of thought through references that are embedded in any portraits. She also shot her in front of Amy Sherald's painting of Michelle Obama at the Whitney. And so it was sort of – and then also in Central Parks.

19:47It was sort of scenes around New York. It was like a day out with Anne Hathaway in New York. But there are these moments in front of art that just felt very sort of intentional and very Annie. So – and then the fashion, Chloe, did you know this? All the looks that Anne Hathaway is wearing are – Designed by women. Nope. Designed by Sarah Burton for Givenchy. A woman. Yes, but not multiple women. It's all Sarah Burton. And I mentioned that because Anne Hathaway took great interest in that idea, Sarah Burton being the newly appointed creative director – or not that new. I guess it's her second collection that's coming.

20:21Newish. And called Sarah and wanted to talk about the clothes. Of Givenchy, yeah. Called Sarah and wanted to talk about the clothes. Oh, really? Yeah, it was really like Anne Hathaway does her homework. This is something that Aaron, her stylist, actually mentioned this to me, that, like, she does not – She's not passive about anything that she wears. Like she is very active and interested in like why am I putting this on my body? Yeah. Anna Winter revealed that to me. This is a tough story. Anna Winter, Anne Hathaway, Annie Leibovitz. I know. Anne Hathaway goes by Annie to her friends. And so it was never clear who you were talking about exactly.

21:03But Anna was telling me about how Anne Hathaway and Sarah Burton connected. And so that went into the editor's letter. That must have delighted Anna. Delighted. She was very pleased about the whole thing. My son and Anne's son go to French class together, which is a big discussion in the halls of the Allianz Francaise. But I was intrigued to hear that both boys go to Little League because my five-year-old definitely couldn't follow a baseball game. I mean, it couldn't actually. He's so unathletic. Both of Anne's boys go to Little League, not your son. No, but that's in my story. Right. So they're baseball boys.

21:44They're baseball boys. But I just was curious about the contrast, as always is interesting in these stories, of her on this extremely intense Mother Mary shoot in Cologne versus her just schlepping the kids to Little League on Saturday morning. And I thought her quotes about her husband, Adam, were so lovely and thoughtful about what a good cook he is and sort of how he – it seems like he is the rudder keeping their homeboat aloft. That is – on course, something like that. Yes, he is the rudder keeping the homeboat aloft. You know, listen, I will defer to Bradley Cooper on this one because obviously nobody knows family dynamics better than anybody who's COVID potted.

22:36Truly. I mean, he basically sounds like he wishes he could have a marriage like their marriage, you know?

22:47That is the impression I got. He was just like, it's like an emblematic relationship was, I think, the word he used. And so I'm sure that what, you know, any relationship where somebody has just traveling and, you know, on sets where there's like going to be crazy 12-hour days and like all of this stuff and you have little kids and whatever. I mean, there's going to be crazy tradeoffs with that and negotiations. and obviously they have figured that out in some way. As I say, I am not a journalist who prize. So, you know, we did not get into the weeds on that. But clearly, like, when she's in New York, she makes a real effort to just kind of be like mom.

23:43and one thing you know just was like a real fly by night moment that I caught in a conversation that she was having with like Jack Antonoff was he was kind of asking about like you know the whole Knicks thing on whether they were going to go to any of the playoffs games that's what they're called playoffs I know football has playoffs and she kind of was like I don't think so. She's like, because boys are like old enough now where like if we go, then they're going to want to go. And I just think like, it's just like not a normal kid thing to do to like just be going to, you know, like playoff games.

24:29Because of who your mom is and all the photographers around. Exactly. And just, you know, if it were just like a normal basketball game, like, yeah, maybe. But I just, you know, I think that she's like keenly aware of wanting to kind of keep things pretty grounded. And not always, but like to the extent possible. Maya, thank you so much. Maya, this was great. Thank you for coming in. Yeah, of course. All right, that's it for the show. We will see you guys soon.

25:11The Run-Through is produced by Chelsea Daniel, Alex DePoma, and Stephanie Kariuki. It's engineered by Pran Bandy and mixed by Mike Kutchman. Chris Bannon is Conde Nast's head of global audio.

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