I have uploaded new magazine scans of Leighton Meester on the cover of November issue of Flaunt magazine.
I’ve added new high quality event photos of Leighton Meester attends the “Flaunt Magazine Dinner Party” in West Hollywood on October 25, 2012.
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I’ve added new high quality filming photos of Leighton Meester onlocation of “Gossip Girl” on October 15, 2012.
I have uploaded new candids of Leighton Meester films a scene for TV Show ‘Gossip Girl,’ outside the Metropolitan Museum of Art on the Upper East Side on October 11, 2012.
Leighton Meester is the kind of girl who eats chocolate ice cream.
After six years of watching her fit into the finest of couture gowns on television’s “Gossip Girl,” we wouldn’t have believed it ourselves if we hadn’t witnessed it just before our interview. But, then again, Meester is on the cusp of a whole new chapter in her career, and that’s exactly when surprises should be the norm, whether they be food choices or projects.
In her new comedy, ”The Oranges,” out in limited release on Friday, Meester is in great company – including Hugh Laurie, Allison Janney, Oliver Platt and Adam Brody – as Nina, a lost 20-something who returns home for Thanksgiving and hooks up with her father’s best friend (Laurie). She’s not conniving or devilish about it like we’ve seen her be on “Gossip Girl” and in “That’s My Boy” and “The Roommate.” In fact, she even makes you root for her unlikely romance as you laugh and even question the “rules” of relationships at any age.
So, after Meester finished her tasty treat, we quizzed her about those rules, hooking up with Dr. House and, of course, the end of the chapter in her life known as “Gossip Girl.”
When you signed on for this film, was Hugh Laurie already attached or did that happen later? What did you think when you realized you’d be making out with House?
I would have signed on years and years prior because I met with Julian [Farino, the director], I would say in 2007 or 2008 … I don’t even know who they were thinking for David’s character, but I told him, “I love this part, and I love this movie.” And then he was like, “Well, you might be a little young for Nina,” and then the movie didn’t happen. So then, years later they came back and they were like, “Are you still interested in this movie?” I was like, “Yeah.” And by then, they had signed Hugh and that made it even more interesting for me. I had worked with him before [on "House" in 2006]… He as that character is so much more dry and dark and jaded and really macho. This character is completely opposite.
In the film, it’s pretty clear that his character is into because you’re making him feel more alive and not because Nina is younger. In fact, she gives a great speech at one point when he’s trying to break things off with her, saying that there are no rules when it comes to love. Did you agree with that sentiment?
I think the underlying theme of this movie is finding happiness however you can find it, and people find happiness doing weird stuff. I find happiness dancing around my living room; I find happiness sometimes cleaning. Who knows how you find happiness?
We call people selfish for wanting a certain kind of happiness, but if we prevent that then we are the selfish ones. So, at the end of the day, it’s all about finding what makes you happy, and sometimes painful change is the only way to find it. You look back at a relationship or a painful breakup or a job you didn’t like and say, “God, I am so glad that I went through that. Even if it was hard at the time, I am glad that it happened.”
My character goes through a huge change in her outlook . She’s sort of reckless in her flirtation and how she seeks validation from men and outside sources. Then she finds a true connection with David, but it might not necessarily be just about him. It’s about her and finding a pathway back to her family and peace with them, and to stop running from anything – you need to stop and face your problems, face your fears.
Speaking of outlook, how are you feeling about the looming end of “Gossip Girl?”
I’m glad. The closer it gets, the more happy I get. It’s funny because I think it was mostly just the fear of the unknown because I have been on the show my entire adult life – some of the most awkward growth periods of my life have taken place while shooting that. Now, I think I have grown up enough beyond what I am capable of doing on that show and I want to do something different. I think I had all that growth probably <i>because</i> I was on the show and I was capable of doing that <i>because</i> I had a steady work life, but personally I have grown. Creatively is where it gets tricky because you just sort of want to do something different. It’s not necessarily the people you work with because I love the people I work with and there is the comfort and familiarity of being there – it’s like being at home – but you just don’t want to be comfortable anymore.
How would you like to see Blair’s story end?
I don’t know because I feel like every time there is that seemingly happy ending, it’s not real. I feel like there should be a cliffhanger so everyone can know she has a life after.
You know if there’s a cliff hanger, you’re going to be stuck answering the “Gossip Girl” movie question for decades.
[Unlike a movie], in a show, the arc just continues and never really comes to a head during the six years you film it. Also, you have the influence of what fans like which is very strange. I think that has probably influenced the writing to some extent – who knows if it really would have gone down that road with Blair and Chuck so much if people hadn’t responded to it so much… It’s like you are acting with a knowledge that this is what people want and, when you do a movie, you just do it, and that’s the movie.
I guess everyone else’s happy ending would probably be that she ends up marrying Chuck. But I don’t know the answer.
“The Oranges” definitely seems like the first page of a new chapter for you. What’s an ideal role or direction you’d like to see your career go?
Absolutely, yeah … It’s just funny that it would be coming out at the end of my show. I think it’s perfect for me, because, if nothing else, it’s sort of a confirmation to myself that this is more down the track of what I want to do, characters that are just very different.
I have actually read quite a few good scripts lately, which is rare. I would like to continue doing movies and that’s pretty much all I can say. I don’t have an ideal role because my ideal is doing a different role every time I work. I just want to be challenged – so probably not play a rich girl for a while.
Source: Next Movie
I’ve added new high quality candids photos of Leighton Meester seen in New York City on October 3, 2012.
In her new movie, this ‘Gossip Girl” plays a Jersey girl who falls for Hugh LauriAll of the rumors you may have heard about Leighton Meester are true.
The co-star of TV’s primetime soap opera “Gossip Girl” is a serious-minded young woman determined to keep her Louboutin-loving, lighter-than-air TV character from defining her.
Exhibit A: Her turn in the sensitive, sometimes uncomfortably satirical comedy “The Oranges,” opening Friday.
“It’s a complete 180-degree turn from anything I’ve ever done,” says Meester, 26, of her new role. “This fulfills something within myself that I could never find in my series.”
In “The Oranges,” Meester portrays Nina, a self-involved Jersey girl who comes home to her parents (Oliver Platt, Allison Janney) for the holidays after five years away. While there, Nina drops a bomb by beginning an affair with her family’s fiftyish neighbor David (Hugh Laurie). He and his wife, Paige (Catherine Keener), are best friends with Nina’s folks.
“The love that Hugh and I portray is not some sort of physical infatuation,” Meester says. “It really comes across as a relationship that has respect and a real rapport.
“And that was easy with Hugh. He’s someone I’ve known and I genuinely could fall in love with.”
Six years ago, Meester worked with Laurie on two episodes of his series, “House.” That led to a friendship and a level of comfort that clearly helped when time came to film “The Oranges.”
“It’s not like we’re doing ‘Lolita’ here,” says the 53-year-old Laurie. “The consequences of these characters’ actions are taken very seriously and respectfully. Having said that, having known Leighton from her experience on ‘House’ was an enormous help.”
Born in Fort Worth, Tex., Meester lived for awhile in Florida before moving to New York as a preteen. She had a famously tough upbringing. Both of her parents had dealt marijuana when they were younger, and Leighton was born in a halfway house while her mother served time in a federal prison for trafficking.
“From that, I’ve learned that you can never judge people, because they grow and evolve,” Meester says.
She attended the professional Children’s School in New York, turning her modeling experiences into a career. She moved to L.A. at age 14 and began acting. She did guest spots on more than a dozen series, then nabbed recurring roles on a “Tarzan” re-do and the fourth season of “24” before landing “Gossip Girl” in 2007.
She’s now spent six seasons as the show’s icy, privileged Blair Waldorf — and the final season starts on Monday. But Meester says playing in “The Oranges” gave her a chance to explore where a character “came from and where she might go.”
“That is so satisfying,” Meester says. “I don’t get that with ‘Gossip Girl.’ It’s just episode after episode, for six years. Frankly, you grow out of it. Having said that, I am so grateful to have the show. It’s given me the opportunity to do this film and many others.”
The others include “Going the Distance” with Drew Barrymore, “Country Strong” with Gwyneth Paltrow and this past summer’s “That’s My Boy” with Adam Sandler and Andy Samberg.
“Country Strong” allowed Meester to showcase her passion for music. Since doing that 2010 film, she’s launched her own music career.
“The Oranges,” meanwhile, allowed Meester renew her passion for New York.
“The movie’s given me the chance to live in the city and be a part of this wonderful creative community,” she says. “It’s been great for me.”
Meester reveals that while filming the movie in Westchester, she lived with Laurie, Janney, Platt and co-star Adam Brody — all in one house.
“It was a wonderful experience,” Meester says. “We actually did become like a family. Hugh would be playing piano in the den downstairs, while I played my guitar. Oliver brought his kids in and really acted like my dad. We all had dinner together every night.
“I love being in New York. It’s where I’m at my most creative. There’s an energy here that I don’t find either back home in Florida or even in L.A. I use my time here to pursue music and movies. When ‘Gossip Girl’ ends, I’ll be willing to struggle to pursue my music career.
“When I’m not working, I’m walking my dog along the Hudson or watching a sunset on the Highline.”
Or, she admits, there is one more place she can be found: “Back at my one-room apartment to get some sleep.”
Source: NY Daily News
For someone facing major career upheaval, Leighton Meester is cool, calm, and collected. To most, Meester is synonymous with Blair Waldorf, the almighty overlord of the Upper East Side on Gossip Girl. While fans have been emotionally preparing for the harsh reality of the show’s final season, Meester’s focus is squarely on her future. In her new film The Oranges Meester plays Nina, a globetrotting party girl from New Jersey who returns home and gets tangled up in a scandalous affair with her father’s best friend, played by Hugh Laurie. We recently sat down with Meester to talk about the film, life after Gossip Girl, and Blake Lively’s wedding, obviously.
The Oranges deals with finding happiness in unexpected ways and places. How do you relate to that and what does happiness mean to you?
I think happiness comes in many forms. I think this film explores that in a really interesting and approachable way. Sometimes catastrophic and seemingly awful things have to happen before you can truly understand your growth and what happiness means. I think that a really good example is David is in a relationship that he’s not happy in, and Nina is traveling around and with all the wrong people doing all the wrong things to try to escape her home, and she had to go home to find what she truly wanted and he had to end a marriage that was comfortable in order to find happiness and things can’t always stay the same. Change is actually what brings happiness the most because if you’re staying the same and you want to find happiness in your situation and you’re not, you need a change.
Hugh Laurie is obviously quite a few years older than you. Was it at all uncomfortable approaching those romantic scenes?
No. I can’t imagine anyone else being able to play that character because he is either this really funny British dude, or on House, he’s is this sarcastic, jaded, macho badass, and he’s not either of those things in this film. He is playing a completely different facet, I think, of his own personality, which is sensitive and open and a little dark, self-deprecating and charming. I think I understand him and I think I understand that facet of this personality now and I like it. And aside from the fact that he’s charming and amazing and handsome and all these things, it made it very easy to understand why you would fall in love with him and to be able to portray that in a non-creepy way is great. I think that from my point of view I root for that love, and it’s not a love that you go, Oh, this is some older guy and some younger girl. I like that. They have a familiarity, they have a friendship. It’s completely understandable why they would seek each other out and why they would be with each other.
West Orange, New Jersey plays a pretty large role itself in this movie just as New York plays a massive role in Gossip Girl. How did working off these two locations inform your role and how were these experiences different?
I’m from Florida, so I think I understand suburban life. I’m from a small island where the streets are really small and clean, and it sort of represents the American Dream, which is you go and you live in a perfect little house on a perfect little street with your perfect little family and you live happily ever after, and that’s not really what it is. I think everyone can relate to that. Even if you live in a big mansion you’re not going to have the happiness that you expect. So I think that’s kind of what it means to live in West Orange. That’s why this movie is set there. It’s these perfect little houses where you live across the street from your best friends, and it seems like it would be your dream to live that way forever, but they’re not happy. As for Manhattan, it’s a beautiful backdrop. I didn’t grow up in New York and I didn’t grow up in the New York that they grew up in.
Few people did.
I know that there are some people who have though, and I don’t relate to that as much but I do understand it.
The last season of Gossip Girl is coming up. Have you filmed the final episode yet?
No, we’re filming the 8th episode on Tuesday and there are 10 episodes, so I have three more episodes.
That’s exciting. Do you feel any trepidation approaching the last episode?
No. I think at first when I started the season, I was like, Oh my god, this is going to be strange, but I think it’s going to be good. I’m happy and I feel like everyone who watches is probably going to be happy. And it’s just time. I think personally I’ve grown a lot. I started when I was 21, and I’m 26 now, so I’ve grown. It’s familiar and comfortable, but it’s time to change that. And creatively more than anything is where I’ve felt the need to expand. It’s going to be very strange. It’s funny how that’s been my destiny over the bulk of my 20s—to do that show in New York. I remember being 12 and being like, I’m going to go to New York and buy flowers to put in the basket of my bicycle and live in the West Village! That’s what I thought was going to happen.
Do you know how you want Blair to end up?
Ya, in a show people go, “I really like you romantically involved with that person” and it sort of influences how you see it and I think how the writers have been seeing it. People like Chuck and Blair together so they’re gonna be like, “We’re going to make them end up together.” I mean, I don’t know, I never get to know what’s happening and they’re keeping it a secret.
What do you think you’ll miss the most about being on set and being involved in that project?
The people. But I know I’ll be able to see them again because everyone is just going to get new jobs. Like when I did this movie I worked with a bunch of the same people, the sound people and stuff. I see those people more than my own family. I think I’m just really excited because it’s like the last six years of my life have been determined by the schedule of Gossip Girl. I get two weeks at Christmas because that’s how much time we have.
What are your post-Gossip Girl plans?
I mean, this was an amazing experience and if I can do movies where I feel this good from now on I would like to do that. Obviously I don’t want to play the same characters again, like a rich spoiled girl. I just want to be uncomfortable and in unfamiliar places.
I think that’s it, unless you want to talk about Blake Lively’s wedding.
Are you from Canada?
Yes! How did you know?
Your accent.
Can you comment at all on Blake’s wedding?
I think they don’t want to talk about it.
We’re not allowed. I had to ask!
I know, I know, everyone has to ask.
Source: Bullet Media
The two characters, played by Hugh Laurie and Leighton Meester, are heavily interrogated by Allison Janney’s Carol Ostroff.
I’ve added new filming photos of Leighton Meester onlocation of “Gossip Girl” final season in New York City on October 1, 2012.
Edited: Added more high quality photos to the gallery!
GALLERY LINK:
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(x025) Gossip Girl: Season 6: Filming > Filming – October 1, 2012