Hilary Duff:

21st Century Cinderella

by Lynn B.

As TV’s popular, award-winning “Lizzie McGuire”, blonde actress/singer Hilary Duff helped a lot of young fans cope with the awkward years of middle school. Hilary played Frankie Muniz’s love interest in the teen spy film Agent Cody Banks and The Lizzie McGuire movie saw Duff’s TV character take a student trip to Europe that put her in the arms of a hot rock star. The pop rock world must have rubbed off on the 16-year-old actress in real life since she carried on her singing career and saw her debut album “Metamorphosis” go triple platinum!

Hilary’s new film A Cinderella Story is a very up-to-date high school version of the classic fairy tale and her prince charming is no toad. Cutie Chad Michael Murray is the love that Hilary’s character Sam yearns for but feels that she can never attain.

We asked the star if she believes in “Happily Ever After” and leaned that she’d sure like to…some day. Since she’s only 16 now and very career-oriented, she’s ready to wait for her “forever” guy. We wanted to know why Cinderella? Why now? We also chatted about her singing career, her older sis Haley, her leading man, most embarrassing moment and other “Hilaryisms”.

AGW: Okay, so there’s no hot and heavy Prince Charming in your life right now but do you look forward to the excitement of that kind of love?

Hilary: Well, I'm kind of like Sam (her character) in a way. You're very cautious and you don't want to put yourself out there to get yourself let down or hurt or something. But I guess if you really care about someone and they really care about you too, then you sometimes just go for it and let everything go. Have fun with it. It can be exciting.

AGW: There is so much competition among young female stars today. How do you cope with that?

Hilary: It is so competitive. There are so many great movies coming out every single day and like great projects. I don't think about it as being competitive like, 'I better get this. If I turn this down, so and so is going to take it.'

AGW: Are you super hands on as far as your career business decisions go?

Hilary: I don't really think about it too much. I have a really great team around me that helps me. Of course, sometimes I think, 'Oh well, I should probably do this or that,' but it's really fun for me. Even though I do work hard, I still have a good time and try to not make it competitive.

AGW: Do you consider your success in the business kind of a fairy tale come true?

Hilary: Yes. I don't think that I necessarily relate to this story. But definitely, I feel lucky, very lucky all the time. Why is this me and why do I get this? You know?

AGW: You’ve been taking your music career very seriously lately. Are you torn between rockin’ out and acting?

Hilary: Sometimes. They're such different feelings. When I'm on tour, I'm in a new city every single night, and the energy and the crowds and the kids and the screaming and them knowing every single word of my music and being onstage is such an energetic feeling with a big payoff. Working on a movie, things are a little more slower paced. But sometimes if I'm in the middle of touring, I'll be like, 'Man, I really wish that I was working on a movie right now.' Or if I'm working on a movie, I'll be like, 'Oh, I wish that I was touring right now.' I just love them both so much. It's hard to choose which is the best.

AGW: How about doing a musical on stage or movie musical and combine both?

Hilary: I've never really thought about doing a play. I know so many people who are like, 'It's awesome. It's great feeling’. But I don't know if I'm really that big. I think that you have to kind of be big for that. I'm not saying never because there's so many things that I'd like to accomplish and I want to keep challenging myself. But a musical film, yeah. I would definitely do that. Actually, I have a movie that I just filmed called Raise Your Voice and I got to sing in that movie and perform and a little bit.

AGW: What’s the scoop on that one?

Hilary: It's with Rita Wilson and John Corbett and Oliver James and Rebecca De Mornay and it's about a young girl. It's actually very dramatic. I get to sing a little bit in the movie, but it's a different kind of thing, it's not like a musical.

AGW: This version of Cinderella is very modern. Did you ever consider doing it the old-fashioned way in a fantasy world?

Hilary: No. There was never that. I feel like that there've been so many remakes of 'Cinderella' and there's never really been like a modern day, high school version of it. I love that about it. I love that the characters are very different. Each character kind of had a twist to it and especially Sam. She was a very ambitious person and even though she was put down throughout the whole movie and torn down and told that she was nothing, she still had goals for herself and she had dreams that she'd accomplish herself. Then the boy came which is great. But it's a good message for girls.

AGW: Sam needs BFFs. In real life what is the greatest thing about your friends?

Hilary: My friends are really great. And they're really supportive. I don't think that they really care anything about this stuff. I don't really have that many friends. I try and stick to a small group of people, and they go on tour with me and they come and travel with me and stuff like that. They know how hard it is for me to work sometimes and not just get to have that completely normal life.

AGW: And do they have to sacrifice a lot to be your pal?

Hilary: I feel so bad sometimes when they're like, 'Lets go to the movies,' and I'm like, 'It's Saturday, and it's 7:30 P.M. and there's so many people at the movies right now.' Like going to my favorite restaurant, it can sometimes get hard. I just can't go to the mall. But they're so supportive and they understand.

AGW: Do you ever manage to disguise yourself in public?

Hilary: Basically, you can't. Like, I've tried everything. My hair really gives it away too. But I'll put it all up in a baseball cap and pull it down low and I try not to wear like sunglasses because if you wear sunglasses, if you see someone who walks into the room with sunglasses, aren't you going to look at them and think, 'Who's hiding under there?' So why would you do that?

AGW: Have you had a weird fan encounter?

Hilary Well, I mean, there's been quite a few and it gets kind of scary sometimes. One time I was coming out of the premiere of Cheaper By The Dozen, the after party and there were a lot of people around me like security and stuff because there were such big crowds outside and this man came up to me and tried to kiss me. And there were so many people around, and he just kind of snuck his way in.

AGW: And I’ll bet he wasn’t even hot either!

Hilary: [Laughs] No. He wasn't. He was like homeless and he was like, 'I just want to kiss my girl.'

AGW: Ewwwww. Okay, back to the film. Talking about who IS hot. How was working with Chad Michael Murray?

Hilary: Chad was great. He's very charming and very nice and a great actor. We've actually remained friends since the movie and he's in Australia right now working on another movie, but he's a great person.

AGW: Let’s backtrack a bit. You started acting very young. How did you get the “bug”?

Hilary: Well, I think that I did my first commercial when I was about six years old. And I didn't really know if I wanted to do it yet. I have an older sister named Haley and she wanted to be an actress. So I wanted to be an actress. It's really funny the way that some people don't kids enough credit for like really being driven and really wanting to do things so badly. When I was six and I filmed that commercial, I just thought that it was fun but I went back to school for a little while and then when I was ten, I met this girl who was our neighbor and she was like, 'You could get real movies and stuff like that.' I was like, 'What?' Then I just begged my parents to come out here and do it. Then you just get this feeling of wanting to accomplish something, and auditioning and stuff like that. My parents just really supported it and my mom worked really hard and sacrificed so much and we made it happen.

AGW: Your Dad doesn’t live in L.A. how often do you see him?

Hilary: Oh, I get to see him every three weeks. He'll come out to visit and he's going to come on tour a little bit this summer, but he has his job there. And we go back for all the main holidays. We keep a good, tight knit family even though it's kind of long distance.

AGW: Are there any similarities between your own life and Sam’s Cinderella story?

Hilary: Definitely, for sure. Before I got my TV show, it was such a struggle. It was going on hundreds and hundreds of auditions and maybe not getting any callbacks. My mom prepared us really well for handling rejection and not taking it too seriously. But I feel very lucky and I feel very blessed.

AGW: You mentioned your sister and we’ve talked about competition in this business. Are you two okay working together? Will you do more in future?

Hilary: She's going to be going on tour with me this summer for a little bit. She's going to be doing half of a show and I'll be doing a full show. We're both so busy right now. So it just depends on what the right timing is, and I'd like to find a really great project do with her and she's so talented and she's really off the wall. So I want it to be something great.

AGW: You graduated high school. Do you plan on doing to college?

Hilary: Definitely. That's something that I want to do out here on the West Coast somewhere, probably. But I'm going to take a little bit of time off. I think that maybe on tour this summer, because I have a little time off during the day when we're on the bus driving and stuff, I could do college entrance tests. I’m not sure what I’ll study yet. I don't want anything to do with film school or the business or anything like that.

AGW: When you were younger in school, did you have any embarrassing moments like Sam does in this film?

Hilary: No. I stopped going to (public) school in the middle of fourth grade. I had a tutor for four years. Everyone grows up with the peer pressure, and kids being mean to each other in school. I think that's such a horrible thing, but I never really dealt with it in a high school way.

AGW: Back to music. Can you talk about your single and why you picked that song?

Hilary: I wanted to do something with my sister and we had a whole list of songs that we could do. And my sister, our favorite movie is Romy and Michelle’s High School Reunion and that was in that movie. So we were so excited about that. 'Oh my God, we can do this song!' So we did it and it's also such a good message, talking about jealousy and how people are very negative and you can rise above it and stuff. So we had so much fun shooting the video together too.

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