She’s hoping people will talk
“Gossip Girl” star Leighton Meester is cooling her heels.
No, not the black patent heels she’ll be perched high atop for her first scene of the day. That’s hours away.
Right now, she’s passing time, barefoot, in a trailer parked off bustling Madison Avenue in midtown Manhattan.
When she gets the call, she’ll report for a 90-minute hair-and-makeup session in another trailer a block from here.
But career-wise, Meester’s wait could be just about over.
The 21-year-old actress is stepping into the high-profile, high-style role of Blair Waldorf, a scheming good girl who shares the luxe life with other fabulous Upper East Side prep-school teens, in “Gossip Girl,” debuting Wednesday at 9 p.m. on the CW (KSKN-22 in Spokane).
The series is based on the popular “Gossip Girl” young-adult novels. But its transition to TV is thanks to Josh Schwartz and Stephanie Savage, the creative team behind “The O.C.”
The show’s narrator, like the novels’, is an unidentified text-messaging guru.
Gossip Girl, whoever she is, has her finger on the pulse of this trust-fund set – the loves, ambitions, feuds and wretched excess.
As voiced by Kristen Bell (“Veronica Mars”), Gossip Girl’s blogging keeps everybody in the know, while keeping everything stirred up.
While her character can be less than sympathetic, Meester says, “I can definitely relate to her.
“Blair’s shortcomings are because of her insecurities. She feels all this pressure to be perfect: to be the most beautiful, the most popular, the most loved.”
Born in Florida and raised in New York before moving to Los Angeles, Meester got her start as a child model.
She has appeared on series including “Shark,” “House,” “24” and “Entourage.” Two seasons ago she was a regular on the short-lived NBC drama “Surface.”
As Blair, she struggles to follow a life-script she believes is already plotted out for her – the right education, the right marriage (to boyfriend-since-kindergarten Nate), the right social circle – while keeping those insecurities hidden from sight.
“The only way to play Blair, or any character, and make her human, is to find what she is inside me,” Meester says. “And I know I have my insecurities, too.”
Does that make show business harder for her to navigate?
Sure, replies Meester, when you focus too much on your competition, which “can be so fierce and discouraging.
“But I think you can grow out of that, especially if you realize the only way you find success is: Figure out what works for you and what doesn’t.”
She laughs. “The way Blair and I are not alike when it comes to insecurities is: she pays so much attention to hers!”
The birthday bunch
Actor David Huddleston (“Blazing Saddles,” “The Big Lebowski”) is 77. Singer Fee Waybill (the Tubes) is 57. Actress Elvira is 56. Comedian Rita Rudner is 51. Puppeteer Kevin Clash (Elmo on “Sesame Street”) is 47. Director Baz Luhrmann (“Moulin Rouge”) is 45. Rapper Doug E. Fresh is 41. Singer Anastacia is 34. Singer-actress Nona Gaye is 33.