Celebrity
Emma Stone Reveals The “Total Garbage” Acting Advice She Once Received
The star has been receiving Oscar buzz for her role in Poor Things.
Emma Stone has proven her naysayers wrong — and she’s proud to admit it. On Jan. 4, the actor revealed the “total garbage” advice she received early in her career while speaking at the 2024 Palm Springs International Film Awards.
Stone was honored with the Desert Palm Achievement Award for her performance in Poor Things, which has been receiving major Oscar buzz. During her speech, she recalled meeting a sexist studio executive who indicated that women had more limited time to have successful acting careers in comparison to men.
“When I first moved to L.A., I went to one of those general meetings that they sometimes send you to, and an executive told me that for male actors, it’s a marathon, not a sprint,” she said. “And in his eyes, for women, it was a sprint, not a marathon. And that was 20 years ago.”
That sentiment aged pretty quickly. “I realize that advice is total garbage because the majority of the women that I look up to in this industry, many of whom are in this room, have proven that as time goes on, life and work only get more interesting and more fulfilling,” she declared.
Stone’s Role In Poor Things
Poor Things, directed by Stone’s The Favourite collaborator Yorgos Lanthimos, centers around Bella Baxter, a woman who is brought back to life with only a child’s brain and seeks to gain the worldliness she lacks.
To prove her point that roles can get more fulfilling over time, Stone spoke about her character Bella, saying she was unlike “anyone that I had ever read about.”
“She’s a woman who is immune to external expectations and impervious to judgment and shame and playing,” she said. “Bella was challenging because I had to try to unlearn those aspects in myself, and it’s also what made her an absolute joy to play.”
Stone stars alongside Mark Ruffalo and Willam Dafoe, who presented her with the award. She is up for Best Actress categories at the Critics Choice and Golden Globe Awards, where she also received a TV nomination for her role in The Curse. With this momentum, an Oscar nom is looking likely.
