People: She’s no longer the poor little Ricci girl
Though she’s been acting since she was 7, Christina Ricci considers herself a late bloomer.
“I feel like it took me a really long time to get to where other people are when they’re 22,” the “Penelope” actress says. “Which is funny.
“I always had to pull off this ‘smart, older thing’ but I think that was just based on the fact that I was insecure and how young I was. And now that I feel older and more mature and able to handle things, I’m acting a lot more childlike.”
Ricci still had her baby teeth and was appearing in a Christmas play when she was spotted by an agent who thought she’d be great in commercials.
But it wasn’t long before she hit the movies – and was transformed through them into the shy, contemplative woman she is today.
“Work was always a sanctuary for me,” says Ricci, whose film credits include “The Ice Storm,” “Sleepy Hollow,” “The Opposite of Sex” and “Monster.”
“It was someplace I went where I was good at something and I was told every day that I was good at something, so it was incredible for my self-worth.”
Like most young women, adolescence was difficult for her.
“I was very self-conscious when I was a teenager and it was just at the age – when I was 15, 16, 17 – that I was doing more adult movies that dealt with sex and sexual issues and I’d be doing an interview and somebody would be asking me about sex or my body or about being held up as a sex symbol,” she recalls. “And I was just, like. `Oh, God, I just want to go into a hole.’
“It was very difficult for me because it was very embarrassing for me and the way I dealt with that was by being very glib and shocking, a little jaded and world weary and cynical. I think that really was me trying to protect myself because I felt so uncomfortable.”
In “Penelope,” she plays a woman determined not to let a facial deformity direct her life. That kind of resolve resides in Ricci herself.
“I’m really ready now to have an adult life and to be successful,” she says, softly. “I think I was somewhat afraid of being successful before and one of the things that’s in this movie is that the only thing that’s standing in your way is yourself.
“I think I’m finally in a place where I don’t feel like that, and my dream is to just have a career that I can look back on and think, ‘Wow, I did some amazing movies. And got to work with amazing people and meet the great minds of my time and just have the most incredible experiences that make a life.’ “
Some things still are hard for the 28-year-old, such as driving in L.A. traffic.
“If I get nervous about my car and about driving,” she says, “I think, ‘I’m Elizabeth Taylor and Elizabeth Taylor would not care about how she was driving. … I pretend I’m Elizabeth Taylor and it totally gets me through whatever car anxiety I’m having. It’s really amazing.”
The birthday bunch
Author Tom Wolfe is 78. Author John Irving is 66. Singer Lou Reed is 66. Actress-comedian Laraine Newman is 56. Singer Jay Osmond (The Osmonds) is 53. Singer Jon Bon Jovi is 46. Actor Daniel Craig is 40. Singer Chris Martin (Coldplay) is 31. Actor Robert Iler (“The Sopranos”) is 23.