LOS ANGELES - Anne Hathaway and Helena Bonham Carter aren't obvious choices to play sisters. Hathaway's a tall brunette who looks like she just came from a Vogue fashion shoot. Carter's shorter with a freestyle hairdo that looks like she just rolled out of bed.
But the actresses do play sisters - the White Queen and Red Queen - in the new Tim Burton movie "Alice in Wonderland" opening nationwide Friday. Their approaches to the roles were as different as their looks.
Hathaway designed her character from the inside, making the White Queen a pacifist vegan who's into rock music. Film legend Greta Garbo and the band Blondie were inspirations.
"The pacifist thing was in the script. My character has taken a vow of nonviolence. But, it's also in the script that when she talks about it, she hits a bug. It gave me the idea that she's taken this vow against her will," Hathaway says.
She decided that while the White Queen would appear to be an adorable, loving person, she would have a hidden murderous streak that comes out when she's around weaponry.
Garbo was Hathaway's model for how the character moved effortlessly across the screen, and the music of Blondie was for the bad girl streak.
"I imagined her in mosh pits. She wouldn't be hitting anyone, but bumping into people really hard," Hathaway says with a smile.
Hathaway also brought a bit of her own past to the role. When she was in the fifth grade, a teacher made her memorize and recite "Jabberwocky," the famous nonsense poem by Lewis Carroll, who also wrote "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland."
She begged Burton to let her recite the work during the film's final battle sequence. He assured her it would never be in the movie, but she just wanted to do it for her own "sense of completion." The poem was recited but, as promised, didn't make the final cut.
Carter's approach to her character started on the outside because of the mounds of makeup and special effects needed to make the Red Queen a big-headed tyrant.
It took two and a half hours in the makeup chair every morning. That was no big deal because Carter spent four hours a day getting made up for the remake of "Planet of the Apes," another film directed by Burton, her domestic partner.
"He likes putting makeup on me. Likes to deform," Carter says. "I love it. I always like looking as different as I can."
She's accomplished that with the Red Queen through a gigantic wig, garish makeup and - enhanced by a special camera - a head so big she looks like a living bobblehead doll.
Carter's 1-year-old daughter was surprised after seeing the Red Queen's outlandish appearance.
"My daughter just went 'Mommy!' That must be what I look like at home. My son just didn't want to look at me," Carter says.
The special effects-modified character is more in line with roles Carter is getting these days. The 43-year-old London native says as she's grown older, there have been fewer opportunities to play sex symbols and more to play villains. She's OK with that.
"Whatever is well written, and if there is someone behind the camera that knows what they are doing, then I'll act in anything," Carter says.
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