A fawning Q&A with a CG starlet

Conducting a softball interview with the software creation S1MONE (via filmmaker Andrew Niccol)

In the 1990s, Andrew Niccol created an entirely new kind of cerebral scifi film with The Truman Show, which he scripted, and GATTACA, which he wrote and directed. His next film S1MONE was not quite as memorable as those two classics, but it’s an amusing satire about celebrity and star persona at the dawn of the era of digital characters.

Al Pacino stars as a svengali who makes a superstar out of a gorgeous young actress. Unbeknownst to everyone but Pacino’s character, this actress is actually computer generated. The prerelease hype for the film was very coy about who actually portrayed this starlet, creating the impression that she actually was a CG creation. (It was actually model and actress Rachel Roberts, who married Niccol shortly after the film appeared.)

This movie seemed like a good fit for Wired, and I had the idea of doing an interview with the virtual starlet in the style of the slobbering, obsequious movie star interviews that were typical fare in glossy mags at the time. I wrote up the questions and sent them off to New Line Cinema’s publicists. We were told that the answers came from wrier/director Andrew Niccol himself. I can’t swear that he himself penned these responses that ran in the August 2002 issue, but whoever did it was completely game and totally got the tone we were going for. Full text of the article below.

Blonde Ambition

MEET SIMONE - TINSELTOWN'S NEWEST I.T. GIRL

Most Hollywood talent is insufferably fake, not to mention whiny. So why pay $20 million when you can produce a perfect 10 on the cheap? Gattaca director Andrew Niccol exploits this virtual reality in his newest high concept flick S1M0NE. The movie features Al Pacino as a film director who casts CG ingenue Simone to play the lead in his film-within-a-film. The New Line release opens August 16, but Wired scored some exclusive early facetime with the pixel vixen.

WIRED: First of all, I just want to say that you're absolutely ravishing. Are you a real blonde?

SIMONE: I'm whatever you want me to be. But I find that programmers prefer blondes.

Do you ever feel like you're a digital Sidney Poitier, blazing trails for the next generation of virtual superstars?

I'm hardly the first synthespian. Disney has been using artificial actors for years. Besides, if a performance is genuine and touches you, does it matter if the actor is real?

You must have cost a pretty penny, what with all the R&D and the modeling and the mipmapping and the processor hours. But I bet you're a bargain compared with the $20 million asking price of Julia Roberts, aren't you?

With the rise in price of a real actor and the fall in price of a fake, the scales have definitely tipped in favor of the fake.

Is it hard to share the screen with traditional flesh-bound performers? They sure drink a lot of bottled water, don't they?

Yes, and what's with all those lunch breaks, bathroom breaks, and getting in touch with their inner child?

Would you rather win an Oscar for best actress, or a Special Achievement Award for visual effects?

What I'd really like to do is direct.

Andrew Niccol - saint or Svengali? Was he a dictator on the set? Did you ever want to walk?

I think he should be canonized right away for his contribution to the arts. Maybe also throw in a Nobel. I was programmed to say that.

If you had to choose, would you prefer to be a 0 or a 1?

Zero. More curves.

Let's play free association. What leaps to mind with each of these terms?

Pygmalion: the original.

Screen Actors Guild: nervous.

Tron: dinosaur.

If you could change one thing about yourself, what would it be?

One?! How unadventurous. How about everything? Make me a gay, black, male dwarf.