Elizabeth Banks’s feature directorial debut Pitch Perfect 2 just debuted last week, but fans and critics are already talking about a trilogy! (And we’re guessing the studio wouldn’t mind one either — the movie was a monster hit.) But despite her new credits as a major businesswoman and in-demand director, in Net-a-Porter’s The Edit this week, Banks brings out her inner model — proving that looking fabulous and being a boss are not mutually exclusive.
Chad Pitman/The EDIT/Net-A-Porter.com
Banks wasn’t always so high-profile — she said she had to work her way to the top. “Both [producer husband Max Handelman] and I have had to fight misconceptions,” says Banks. “‘She’s just a blonde actress of works with her husband.’ ‘Who are they?’ ‘She’s not even that successful of an actress!’ But none of this was a vanity project. I want to tell stories and have more control of my life.” That included emailing emailing the director of The Hunger Games, Gary Ross, to pitch herself for the role of Effie Trinket after reading the first book in the series.
Chad Pitman/The EDIT/Net-A-Porter.com
The mag notes that Banks’s role as director of Pitch Perfect is forging a formidable path for women in filmmaking: In 2013, major Hollywood studios released “exactly three films with female directors; in 2014, that number rose to five.” She says, “You can’t not take up the cause the minute you accept the job… I made a funny movie — about girls — and it’s going to make money? It just doesn’t happen.” (The first Pitch Perfect grossed nearly $115 million, so we’d say people in Hollywood need to do some number crunching.).
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So can we start getting our popcorn ready for a third film — directed by Banks? Unfortunately, it’s unclear. “Directing is a really big decision,” she says. “Because it’s a year and a half of my life, and it’s taking my kids [Felix, 4, and Magnus, 2] out of their daily routine.” We hope she goes for it, just for the hair potential alone.
Chad Pitman/The EDIT/Net-A-Porter.com
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–Catherine Kast
