MAKING THE MOSTOFA SECOND CHANCE

With four films in 2017 and as the lead of a brand new show, Alicia Silverstone is back on the screen, and how

Alicia Silverstone is in multitasking mode. Having recently returned from Montreal, where she was filming a horror film directed by the Austrian team of Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala, this May morning, she is collecting belongings from the floor that she wanted to bring to the set of the low-budget comedy Judy Small. “Script. Wallet. Shoes. When I’m in a rush,” she says, “I pack crazy.”

Hollywood may be reluctant to give women second chances, but Silverstone, now 41, seems to be everywhere. Last year alone she appeared in four movies, including playing a bespectacled mom in Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul, and a desperate mother in The Killing of a Sacred Deer. She radiated Silverstonian charm as a doting daughter in the recently-released Book Club, and returns to a starring role this June in her new television series, American Woman.

“The character was so appealing to me because she goes though so much. She’s being knocked down and she gets back up,” says Silverstone of the character. “She’s a very complicated person,” adds Silverstone, the daughter of an immigrant couple from England. The Blast from the Past (1990) actor worked as a model from age 8 to 12, and used her paychecks for acting classes. After being discovered at a Los Angeles-based summer acting workshop, she secured an agent, a Pizza commercial, a guest spot on The Wonder Years, a failed pilot called Me and Nick, and a central role in the psychological thriller Crush (1993). Just 20 minutes into the film, director Marty Callner realised he had found the heroine for a trio of Aerosmith videos he was directing. The videos would not only reboot the band’s flagging popularity, but transform Silverstone into a MTV video star. Film critics, audiences and movie executives alike fell in love with Silverstone. Not yet in her 20s, she and her production company were bequeathed a $10 million development deal to produce two films at Columbia Pictures. Then, it all changed.

The deal resulted only in the negatively reviewed crime comedy Excess Baggage (1997), and Silverstone was excoriated in the media. In 1996, her appearance at the Oscars set off a round of cruel body-shaming The paparazzi hounded the Batman and Robin actor, then only 19, for having put on weight, scorning her as having turned from Batgirl to ‘Fatgirl’.

Navigating her way through such unsteady waters, whose advice was it that she sought? “People I’d talk to? That would be nobody,” she says. “Now I talk to everybody about everything — but I was so isolated then.”

Silverstone’s personal life can still spur headlines. On the Friday before Memorial Day, Silverstone filed for divorce from her husband of nearly 13 years, Christopher Jarecki. The subject was put to her delicately. “I think that you’re asking why am I so confident and feeling so happy when I’m going through a divorce,” she said. “I don’t know if it’s common or not common, but I’m in an incredible place in my life. I’m a devoted mom. I love the people in my life. My career couldn’t be better.”

This character (from her new show American Woman) was so appealing to me because she goes through so much, she’s being knocked down and she gets back up. It’s like she’s crawling out of a hole. She’s a very complicated person.

ALICIA SILVERSTONE ACTOR

PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK Alicia Silverstone was seen in The Killing of a Sacred Deer and The Diary of a Wimpy Kid: The Long Haul, last year