Kristen Stewart has said that she would “kill” to work with Lars von Trier. Stewart confessed to her love for von Trier to the Guardian while discussing Allen’s Cannes-opener, Café Society.
Speaking at a press event for Cafe Society, Stewart was asked which film-makers she was keen to work with and said: “I love Lars von Trier. It’s hard for me to think of those things and I’m reluctant to say [who] because they follow you around. Seems horse before the cart. But I would kill to work for Lars von Trier.”
Since breaking out in David Fincher’s Panic Room in 2002, Stewart has continued to align herself with a strong array of directors, including most recently Woody Allen and Olivier Assayas, who both have films at the Cannes film festival starring the Twilight actor.
The Danish auteur fits the bill: he’s a Palme d’Or winning and Oscar-nominated film-maker - but he’s also among the industry’s most controversial figures, following his Nazi jokes while promoting Melancholia at Cannes in 2011.
Female actors have done well by working with von Trier: Emily Watson earned an Oscar nomination for his 1996 drama Breaking the Waves; Björk won at Cannes in 2000 for her performance in Palme d’Or winner Dancer in the Dark; ditto Kirsten Dunst for 2011’s Melancholia.
Currently, Stewart is drawing raves for her performance in Assayas’ ghostly horror, Personal Shopper, in which she plays a fashion PA trying to exorcise herself of her dead twin. The Guardian’s Peter Bradshaw called her “tremendous” in the film.
The film marks her second collaboration with Assayas, following 2014’s Cannes competition entry Clouds of Sils Maria. Her role in that drama earned Stewart a César award (France’s equivalent to an Academy award) for best actress, making her the first American actor to net the honour.
