Oscar winner Emma Stone had to audition for ‘The Favourite’

Emma Stone.
Kevin
Winter/Getty

• Emma Stone had to audition to get the role of one of the main
  characters in “The Favourite.”
• Director Yorgos Lanthimos said he did it so he was confident
  Stone, the only American actor on set, could pull off a
  convincing English accent.
• “I just didn’t want her to feel uncomfortable while we were
  doing it or make a fool of herself,” he told Business Insider.
• Stone said she did not feel insulted having to read for the
  part, as she also was able to find out “if you like the
  director.”

 

After winning an Oscar for her performance in 2016’s “La La
Land,” Emma Stone is on track to getting her third nomination in
four years when her new movie “The Favourite” opens on Friday.

But in a surprising revelation, despite being one of the biggest
stars working today, Stone said she had to audition for “The
Favourite” director Yorgos Lanthimos to get the role of the
scheming cousin, Abigail.

While sitting in a New York City hotel room across from her
director, when the topic was brought up Stone said the main
reason was so Lanthimos could hear her English accent, but then
she playfully directed the question to her director to explain
why she did have to come in.

Read more:


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“It was making sure that we would be able to work creatively free
without the accent being a hindrance in the way that we wanted to
work,” Lanthimos told Business Insider.

Lanthimos said he and Stone had a few sessions with a dialect
coach and noted that he worked with her the same way he worked
with all the actors during rehearsals. The director even played
down that it was really an audition, but Stone spoke up to say
that it definitely felt like one.

“It was taped and at a casting office,” Stone said.

(L-R) Rachel Weisz and Emma Stone in “The
Favourite.”
Fox
Searchlight

But the actress also added that this was very different than in
the early days of her career where she had to drive around to
casting calls to get a job.

“If I do need to read something now it’s more of a chemistry
thing,” she said. “I didn’t find it insulting. You learn too as
an actor if the role fits and if you like the director.”

Lanthimos said that Stone’s English accent (she was the only
American actor in a movie set in 18th century England) passed
with flying colors from the dialect coach and his English
friends.

“I just didn’t want her to feel uncomfortable while we were doing
it or make a fool of herself,” Lanthimos said of Stone taking on
the role.

Fans of Stone’s work have nothing to worry about. The Oscar
winner gives a fantastic performance playing one of two wicked
cousins (the other is played by Rachel Weisz) who fight over the
attention of Queen Anne (Olivia Colman) during her reign in the
early 1700s.