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Jewel's shy but polished
By BRUCE KIRKLAND
Toronto Sun, Sept 12, 1999
TORONTO -- Her voice hushed, her smile a little
tentative and her pale cheeks aglow with girlish
blush, Jewel charmed Toronto yesterday as she
took a Ride With The Devil.
The Ang Lee movie, which just played as a gala in
the Toronto film festival, marks the singer-poet's
film debut. Her remarkable performance opposite
male leads Skeet Ulrich, Tobey Maguire and
Jeffrey Wright is being touted as at least a
revelation, probably a shock.
Jewel had never acted in anything before, if you
don't count one night playing Dorothy in a charity
performance of The Wizard Of Oz in New York in
1995. Otherwise, she is seen on stages to deliver
music and poetry, not dialogue.
"It's a little different," Jewel told a Ride With The
Devil press conference yesterday about performing
a character, not a song. "It's a real different
medium."
She admitted she was terrified of being stripped of
the confidence she exudes as a singer. Asked how
she overcame that fear, she glanced at director Lee
and whispered: "Ang!"
Lee told reporters that Jewel was suggested for
the major role by the movie's casting director.
"I met with her and she was exactly right for the
part. Then we spent a few months working together
and, by the time I had to make the decision, I felt
she was the best choice I had.
"And it was a pleasure to work with her."
Jewel is known for her optimistic songs on two
multimillion-selling albums, her debut Pieces Of
You and the follow-up Spirit. Her third release, all
holiday songs, is scheduled for November.
'Something different'
This film attracted her because of the evocative
writing in James Schamus' script. "The role was
something different from the southern belle," Jewel
said.
The tough-minded farm girl she plays must have
seemed familiar, too. Raised on a farm in Alaska,
Jewel knows that world. But repeatedly yesterday,
she seemed reluctant to elaborate, choosing her
words carefully, speaking so quietly that even a
microphone had difficulty picking her up.
She shrugged off suggestions that she brings a
powerful female presence to an otherwise
male-dominated war movie. Ride With The Devil is
a U.S. Civil War saga in which Jewel plays a
Missouri woman caught up in the lives of a group of
pro-Confederate guerrilla fighters played by her
co-stars.
Schamus told the press conference that Jewel had
one talent -- horseback riding -- that she did not
get to use, which he found amusing. Especially
considering that some of her co-stars, such as
Maguire, kept falling off his steeds.
"The real irony is that the best rider in the film is
probably Jewel and we had to put her on a mule,"
Schamus said. Jewel laughed and confided: "I can't
show my face to my father."
'Hands full'
Jewel is also absent from the lush period music on
the soundtrack. "I didn't have anything to do with
the music," she said. "I had my hands full as an
actor."
Lee took Jewel through her panic period.
"Obviously, I had never worked with a director
before. I was horrified," she admitted about
showing up on set the first day. "I didn't know what
I was doing. I didn't know where to focus, where
to look, what to do. I didn't know anything about
it."
But help was steps away on set: "Ang was my life
preserver which I clung to desperately. My job was
to please Ang."
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