BEL’S RINGING IN THE CHANGES FOR A BITE OF THE BIG APPLE...
Bel Powley had to learn how to ‘tawk’ like a proper Staten Islander for her latest role.
In a sort of reverse Pygmalion, the 28-yearold star of independent films, from west london, spent time living in the New york City borough to pick up the local dialect for her part in Judd Apatow’s new picture The King of Staten Island. It stars Saturday Night live comedian Pete Davidson, in a semiautobiographical role, as Scott, a manchild pothead suffering from anxiety and depression years after the death of his fireman father. Powley plays Scott’s long- suffering girlfriend Kelsey. The actress grew up in Shepherd’s Bush, but when I spoke to her recently she was in east london, at the house she shares with actor Douglas Booth. During lockdown, the couple have been dedicating themselves to ‘cooking and eating’ — and watching old films, such as Roman Holiday with Audrey Hepburn, and Funny Girl with Barbra Streisand. Before the coronavirus crisis, Bel had been in the U.S. working on the second season of award-winning Apple TV series The Morning Show, with
Jennifer Aniston and Reece witherspoon. Shooting had barely begun, before the production had to shut down. She admits she knew nothing about Staten Island before embarking on the film.
‘I probably couldn’t have even pointed it out on a map,’ she said of the most derided of New york City’s five boroughs — a rep she thinks is grossly unfair.
Staten Island women are ‘strong and ballsy’ Powley told me, admiringly. Her Kelsey has been dating Davidson’s Scott since they were kids at school. But unlike Scott, Kelsey wants more out of life than just sitting around rolling joints with the gang.
‘Hopefully, everyone’s got a bit of Kelsey in them,’ she said.
Powley enjoyed spending time on the Island where Davidson, his family and closest friends still live. ‘every day one of his mates would be playing the random pizza guy, or they’d be extras, and his mum and sister were around all the time,’ she told me, adding that Davidson would sometimes throw parties . . . with a bouncy castle.
It was quite a linguistic journey from Holland Park comprehensive, where Powley went to school. She told me she worked on her accent by watching reality show Made In Staten Island, which was all about Mob-like families.
‘There were a couple of female characters in there that I tried to draw some of Kelsey’s look, accent and manner from,’ she said. The Islanders hated that programme, incidentally; and petitioned MTV to cancel it, complaining that it perpetuated the notion that the place was ‘a cesspool of gangsters and meatheads’. And soon enough, the show got whacked.
Getting the chance to work with Apatow was a ‘dream come true’ for Powley. She’s a big fan of his movies, such as Superbad and Knocked Up, and of lena Dunham’s TV series Girls, on which he was an executive producer and writer. Her partner Douglas Booth was already friends with Pete Davidson, after working with him on the Motley Crue Netflix film The Dirt. So when she heard about Apatow’s new project she contacted the SNl star directly — only to discover she was already on their shortlist.
Powley underwent a ‘pretty terrifying audition’ to get the role because Apatow’s all about improvised comedy. ‘ Don’t worry about the lines; just make it up as you go along,’ she was told before she went in. Afterwards, she feared the worst, until she got a text from Davidson saying, ‘you killed it!’
I first spotted Powley when, aged just 16, she appeared in Polly Stenham’s play Tusk Tusk at the Royal Court. Then I saw her in the Broadway production of Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia, which was seen by every casting director on the continent — one of whom cast her in the scorching coming-of-age gem Diary of A Teenage Girl. That was followed by a hilarious portrait of Princess Margaret in A Royal Night out, a picture that imagined what Princess elizabeth and her sister got up to on Ve Day.
And in The King of Staten Island, she steals the film right out from under the noses of Davidson and her other high-profile co- stars — including Marisa Tomei, Bill Burr and Steve Buscemi — with a flawless performance. She got the biggest laugh (from me) for a line that’s, sadly, too rude to repeat.
So where did her comic chops come from? Her parents are funny, she said; and she insisted her sister Honor’s even funnier than she is. Some of it’s just the way she’s made — ‘People tell me I have quite big features, and a very expressive face’ — and some of it is down to Friends. ‘when I was a teenager I just watched Friends, along with the rest of the world. It’s one of the funniest shows ever made,’ she declared.
So naturally she’s looking forward to resuming work with her idol Jennifer Aniston (Rachel in Friends) on The Morning Show. She admits she’s totally ‘starstruck’. ‘There was no moment when she would ever make anyone uncomfortable,’ she said, sincerely. ‘She’s really, really lovely.’ That’s what I’ve heard, too — of Aniston and Powley, who plays Claire Conway, a researcher who beds the much older weatherman.
The King of Staten Island is available to rent at home digitally from today.