The movies that almost broke Emma Stone: “I truly felt psychotic the entire time”
As an audience member, it’s often easy to forget that there’s a whole lot more to a project than just the film itself. According to Emma Stone, additional bits like press tours can often be more exhausting and all-consuming than the role itself.
This is an understandable position when you consider just how much goes into press runs around any given movie. And for ones with bigger budgets and mainstream appeal, much like many of those Stone is involved with, there’s a hefty amount of marketing and promo that goes into making sure people will be buying cinema tickets come release day.
As someone who has been involved in the biggest Hollywood movies of recent years, Stone knows what it’s like to feel wrung out at the end of a promotional cycle, which is precisely how she felt with the press tour after playing Gwen Stacy in The Amazing Spider-Man and The Amazing Spider-Man 2.
As far as a reboot goes, those movies were pretty underrated. With Andrew Garfield stepping into some pretty massive shoes as the titular hero and Stone putting her own spin on the franchise’s beloved heroine, the films sought to bring a fresh and modern perspective to the stories, with the narrative focus shifting from the glossy, mainstream sheen of earlier versions to something darker and more nuanced.
Like Garfield, Stone remains proud of her work on the films, despite the mixed reviews they received after. However, she also noted how exhausting it was doing such a high-profile superhero movie and then having to travel to do an extensive promo run in the build-up to release. Recalling the experience to Vogue, she said it was so intense that it affected her mental state.
“I will say the press tours for these films…I don’t know how people do it,” she said. “I remember it being nine countries in two weeks. You’re functioning in a state of jet lag previously unknown to you. I felt truly psychotic the entire time. I’m half dead.”
That said, while she felt a new level of tired, the experience wasn’t all bad, and in fact, she’s also discussed how much fun she had on set, as well as the fact that she was able to work with a lot of great people for the first time while also rising to new challenges, which is why, even after considering the strain that came with promoting the films, she only has fond memories.
As she put it herself, “I mean, I really loved doing Spider-Man. I loved everyone I worked with. I met Andrew there. I met Sally Field, and Marc Webb was wonderful. It was really a special time in my life. The recurring theme is the people, more than the film itself, [that sticks with me]. And so I have only, like, the fondest memories of this whole experience.”
It’s anyone’s guess whether Stone would do another of those movies, but given that the space is fairly saturated and that she’s no longer with her on-screen love, as well as her success elsewhere in more versatile spaces, signs would point to probably not. But even still, at least she can look back and see it for what it was without the lingering stress of the “psychotic” endurance that came afterwards.
