Cameron Diaz has the last laugh
Affable, chuckling actress stars as Miss Hannigan in Annie movie
NEW YORK — Cameron Diaz loves to laugh. In fact, the 42-year-old giggles so much she sometimes doesn’t recognize her own guffaws.
“What was that?” Diaz asks after she chuckles oddly during an interview promoting the movie version of the musical Annie.
The cackle is Diaz being her very goofy, deprecating self, a trait that’s remained consistent over her 20-year career.
A definite change of pace for her is singing in Annie, however. It’s a new adventure, and she gives it her best warble.
In the movie, Diaz plays Miss Hannigan, the cruel foster home ruler of orphan Annie (Oscar nominee Quvenzhané Wallis).
When Annie connects with a wealthy Daddy Warbucks-type mayoral candidate by the name of Will Stacks (Jamie Foxx), things get complicated.
The musical is updated but some of the classic songs — Tomorrow and It’s the Hard Knock Life, among them — remain the same.
Besides commenting on her new laugh, the always amiable Diaz offers her considered opinions: On the intimidation factor of co-starring in a classic musical:
“Yes, it’s Annie, but it’s a completely different movie set in modern times,” says Diaz of the latest production.
“We’re giving performances for a generation that’s going to see it for the first time. It’s the only Annie they’re going to know.”
On being compared to Carol Burnett’s Miss Hannigan performance in the 1982 movie Annie:
“Carol Burnett’s (Hannigan) is drinking because she didn’t get married,” noted Diaz.
“And now, my Miss Hannigan is drinking because she doesn’t have fame, an epidemic in our society today.” On portraying a bad person in Bad Teacher and Annie:
“Any time you give me permission to yell at children, I will take it,” says Diaz, giggling at her joke.
“It’s fun yelling at kids. In between, I always made sure they were warm, and they were looked after.” On being nasty to the waif Wallis as Annie:
“It wasn’t difficult because she just laughed at me,” recalls Diaz. “I am supposed to be mean and I’m supposed to be scary, and she didn’t buy it. I would ask her, ‘Can you just act like you’re scared of me for once?’” On the singing and dancing preparations for Annie:
“We rehearsed for three months on the weekends,” Diaz reports. “I was filming Sex Tape in Boston and was coming down to New York.” On shooting Annie in New York:
“It was mad cold,” she says. “There was one day when we all showed up, and everybody in the cast couldn’t speak. We had this cold thing. We all lost our voices. We had to re-do the whole thing.” On the luck reference in Annie:
“I work my butt off, but I feel lucky and I feel blessed,” Diaz says of what luck means to her. “I don’t feel like I’ve got anything because I was only lucky and only blessed. I got it because I worked my butt off for it, too.”