Lady Gaga’s face-off
Thepopstar revealsher insecurities
‘I won’t get a nose job!’
From the moment Lady Gaga met her AStaris
Born co-star Bradley Cooper, she knew their special connection would be the driving force behind an iconic love story.
“Bradley came to my house to talk about the role and before I knew it, I was feeding him leftover pasta,” the music superstar tells Woman’sDay.
“We just had an instant synergy. He asked me if I would sing a song called ‘Midnight Special’ with him and as soon as he started to sing, I stopped immediately and said, ‘Oh, my gosh, Bradley, you have this incredible voice!’”
In AStarisBorn, the 32-yearold pop diva turns actress to play a struggling singer who has all but given up on her dream when she meets her soulmate, a seasoned musician who helps her achieve her career goals.
“Bradley helped me find so much strength to be vulnerable because I trusted him,” Gaga adds. “In the very beginning, we shook hands and he said, ‘I believe in you and accept you as an actress.’ I said, ‘I believe in you and accept you as a musician.’ That was really what held us together with such strength.”
In the film, Gaga’s character is insecure about her big nose and feels unfit to be a star. “This absolutely happened to me too,” she confides. “It was suggested to me that I should get a nose job before my first single came out and I said, ‘No, I love my Italian nose and I’m proud to be Italian.’ I didn’t always love who I was, but I learned to maintain my authenticity and I’ve really embraced who I am.”
However, that didn’t come easy when Gaga shot to superstardom with first hits “Just Dance” and “Poker Face”. She confesses, “There were times early in my career where I wished there was someone to help nourish me psychologically and handle the change because when you become famous, everything changes. You’re no longer just a free being – in many ways, you belong to the world. The topic of mental health is an important one to be discussed around this film.”
Edgeofglory
Gaga – born Stefani Joanne Angelina Germanotta – has never shied away from talking about her troubled childhood, when she felt like an outsider and was bullied, in one instance bring thrown into a rubbish bin. Her intimate confessions and heartfelt song lyrics have attracted a legion of fans who relate to her struggles and call themselves her “Little Monsters”.
What would she say to her younger self if she could go back to the girl in the trash can? After thinking for a moment, Gaga replies, “Your feelings are valid and it hurts to be bullied. But if you can love yourself and just hold on to even one spark of light in your heart, hold on to it for dear life and watch it grow. It’s like a garden and maybe there is only one rose now, but eventually it will bloom into a field of flowers.” While early reviews of
AStarisBorn predict Gaga will soon add Oscar nominee to her long list of career accomplishments, she’s also returning to her first love as she takes up a residency performing in Las Vegas, following in the footsteps of her close friend Sir Elton John.
“I’m godmother of Elton’s children, so I watched him and started to cry because he’s so magic on stage,” she says. “I have worked for 10 years now in this business and am excited to reinvent what it means to be in Las Vegas at this age.
“I will be focused and ready to put on the show of a lifetime because I want to give back to the fans. I want them to feel the heart and soul of what I
believe in – love, acceptance and the endless journey of trying to understand who we are.”
Since ending her engagement to ChicagoFire actor Taylor Kinney in 2017, Gaga has kept her love life relatively private, but she appears tight with her boyfriend of one year, Hollywood agent Christian Carino, who accompanied her to the Venice Film Festival premiere of AStar
isBorn. However, she downplays their plans for the future.
“I have dreams of being a mother, I have dreams of having a family, and I have dreams of doing more films and making more music,” she says. “But I am very happy exactly where I am today and I’m not obsessed with career expansion any more. I’m much more inspired with the idea that somebody believed in me and that is why I made this movie – because 100 people can be in a room and even if 99 people don’t believe in you, if one person does, your whole career can take off. I’m just grateful to be here.”