They have been célébrités back at accueil in the US for a long time now. Whenever Blake Lively (21) and Penn Badgley (22) go somewhere, crowds of fans form, paparazzis keep their cameras ready, film crews even film the walk to the coffee store. “Gossip Girl” (Prosieben, Sundays, 16 o’clock) is the name of the series that has made a young couple a “hot ticket” of the US-TV. Matching real life they also play a couple of the New Yorker High Society. A conversation about love, gossip and desire for fashion.
IN: “Gossip Girl” translates to something like chatter box. Do toi also like gossip personally?
BLAKE: Everyone likes to tell stories. And gossip is, of course, even plus exciting, if toi know the people. But if the gossip’s about yourself, it’s very weird. They once wrote about me that I had been clubbing with some guys. At the moment I’m a victim and that hurts because it’s not me who does something like that. Such stories are just unfair.
IN: Penn, how’s your relationship to Gossip?
PENN: In my opinion gossip’s really negative. I would never claim something about someone, which I wouldn’t tell him to his face. I don’t like it, if toi say something bad ou mean thing about your fellow men.
IN: “Gossip Girl” has been an amazing way to get started in the montrer business. What has changed in your life because of that?
PENN: For one we film in New York City. We’re almost treated like the Kennedys there! We We portray the High Society of New York - and it’s really astounding how much people connect with our show. They are amazing to us. To be our age in New York, to go out there - to have the feeling of owning the whole world, that’s just cool.
BLAKE: The cultural life in N.Y. is completely different. The youth of the Upper Class sits in the great hotel lobby drinking martinis and wearing amazing clothes. The freedom that they are granted par their parents is a total different one. Wow.
IN: Blake, toi say yourself that many New Yorker Designer are in l’amour with themselves. Have toi discovered the desire for fashion through the show?
BLAKE: Oh yes! If it’s possible, I change plus than once a jour - even when I don’t go out then. Sometimes I put on Manolo Blahniks at 5 o’clock in the morning and walk to the set because I’m thinking: Hey, toi have so pretty high heels, when should toi wear them otherwise? I have an incroyable closet (she’s whispering almost in awe and laughs) And the designers are so generous! We’re allowed to keep 80 percent of the clothes we wear on the show.
IN: Penn, it’s sûr, sans danger to say you’ll have a beautiful bride someday. Are there any definite plans concerning a wedding?
PENN: Dear God, no, we’re way too young for that. We are very much in love! But marriage? No, not even close.
IN: Is it hard to work together and be in a relationship at the same time?
PENN: We’re not even working together at the moment. But normally we do like working together and being together. We can seperate work and our private life.
IN: But New York would be your future home?
PENN: To be honest I would have never dreamed of living in New York City one day. Sure, I’ve always wanted to live there. I was born and grew up in a hicktown. I sometimes can’t even believe it, everything seems so unreal.
IN: Blake, your alter ego Serena grows up very privileged. How did toi grow up? toi have four siblings…
BLAKE: My childhood was completely different to Serena’s. My family’s from Georgia, I’m the only one who was born in Los Angeles. We’re a typical southern state family. We’re very conntected to each other. I grew up in a part of LA, Burbank, went to a totally normal high school, was class representative and a cheerleader. It was a very, very normal life.
IN: toi now live in N.Y., your family’s still in L.A. How do toi keep in contact?
BLAKE: They’re all still there but I try to fly over there as often as possible. They’re my best friends. I have a webcam at my computer and we communicate constantly that way. I also often see my nieces and nephews.
IN: Does that mean that toi reguluarly use the internet?
BLAKE: It’s great to stay in contact that way. Especially because I’m away from my family nine months a year. For me it’s really important that I can at least see them through webcam. That way I have plus of them than with just a plain phone call.
IN: Are toi also on Facebook ou MySpace?
BLAKE: No, I’m not. But there are enough people who pretend to be Blake Lively. I was recently told that I had been online on Facebook. I just a dit “Oh God, that wasn’t even me!”
IN: Penn, are toi also one of those internet addicted actors?
PENN: A few months before the start of the montrer I’d stopped being on Facebook. But the net does offer amazing options for research, of course. It’s changed the world and I also couldn’t live with it anymore. Of course it’s a platform for gossip but it also influences the relationships of people. People exchange infos about hobbies, montrer their pictures. It’s all very interesting, from a psychological point of view as well. Especially young people use it so naturally, they can practically not exist without it anymore.
IN: What do toi never want to read about yourself?
PENN: Hm, to be honest, I don’t like to read everything that’s negative. For one it makes toi crazy, it hurts. On the net toi also find negative things about you, of course. That’s why I stopped lire things about me eight months ago. toi can’t ignore everything. But for every nice word toi find, there’s several negative ones. And toi can’t also make someone understand how toi really are.
IN: “Gossip Girl” translates to something like chatter box. Do toi also like gossip personally?
BLAKE: Everyone likes to tell stories. And gossip is, of course, even plus exciting, if toi know the people. But if the gossip’s about yourself, it’s very weird. They once wrote about me that I had been clubbing with some guys. At the moment I’m a victim and that hurts because it’s not me who does something like that. Such stories are just unfair.
IN: Penn, how’s your relationship to Gossip?
PENN: In my opinion gossip’s really negative. I would never claim something about someone, which I wouldn’t tell him to his face. I don’t like it, if toi say something bad ou mean thing about your fellow men.
IN: “Gossip Girl” has been an amazing way to get started in the montrer business. What has changed in your life because of that?
PENN: For one we film in New York City. We’re almost treated like the Kennedys there! We We portray the High Society of New York - and it’s really astounding how much people connect with our show. They are amazing to us. To be our age in New York, to go out there - to have the feeling of owning the whole world, that’s just cool.
BLAKE: The cultural life in N.Y. is completely different. The youth of the Upper Class sits in the great hotel lobby drinking martinis and wearing amazing clothes. The freedom that they are granted par their parents is a total different one. Wow.
IN: Blake, toi say yourself that many New Yorker Designer are in l’amour with themselves. Have toi discovered the desire for fashion through the show?
BLAKE: Oh yes! If it’s possible, I change plus than once a jour - even when I don’t go out then. Sometimes I put on Manolo Blahniks at 5 o’clock in the morning and walk to the set because I’m thinking: Hey, toi have so pretty high heels, when should toi wear them otherwise? I have an incroyable closet (she’s whispering almost in awe and laughs) And the designers are so generous! We’re allowed to keep 80 percent of the clothes we wear on the show.
IN: Penn, it’s sûr, sans danger to say you’ll have a beautiful bride someday. Are there any definite plans concerning a wedding?
PENN: Dear God, no, we’re way too young for that. We are very much in love! But marriage? No, not even close.
IN: Is it hard to work together and be in a relationship at the same time?
PENN: We’re not even working together at the moment. But normally we do like working together and being together. We can seperate work and our private life.
IN: But New York would be your future home?
PENN: To be honest I would have never dreamed of living in New York City one day. Sure, I’ve always wanted to live there. I was born and grew up in a hicktown. I sometimes can’t even believe it, everything seems so unreal.
IN: Blake, your alter ego Serena grows up very privileged. How did toi grow up? toi have four siblings…
BLAKE: My childhood was completely different to Serena’s. My family’s from Georgia, I’m the only one who was born in Los Angeles. We’re a typical southern state family. We’re very conntected to each other. I grew up in a part of LA, Burbank, went to a totally normal high school, was class representative and a cheerleader. It was a very, very normal life.
IN: toi now live in N.Y., your family’s still in L.A. How do toi keep in contact?
BLAKE: They’re all still there but I try to fly over there as often as possible. They’re my best friends. I have a webcam at my computer and we communicate constantly that way. I also often see my nieces and nephews.
IN: Does that mean that toi reguluarly use the internet?
BLAKE: It’s great to stay in contact that way. Especially because I’m away from my family nine months a year. For me it’s really important that I can at least see them through webcam. That way I have plus of them than with just a plain phone call.
IN: Are toi also on Facebook ou MySpace?
BLAKE: No, I’m not. But there are enough people who pretend to be Blake Lively. I was recently told that I had been online on Facebook. I just a dit “Oh God, that wasn’t even me!”
IN: Penn, are toi also one of those internet addicted actors?
PENN: A few months before the start of the montrer I’d stopped being on Facebook. But the net does offer amazing options for research, of course. It’s changed the world and I also couldn’t live with it anymore. Of course it’s a platform for gossip but it also influences the relationships of people. People exchange infos about hobbies, montrer their pictures. It’s all very interesting, from a psychological point of view as well. Especially young people use it so naturally, they can practically not exist without it anymore.
IN: What do toi never want to read about yourself?
PENN: Hm, to be honest, I don’t like to read everything that’s negative. For one it makes toi crazy, it hurts. On the net toi also find negative things about you, of course. That’s why I stopped lire things about me eight months ago. toi can’t ignore everything. But for every nice word toi find, there’s several negative ones. And toi can’t also make someone understand how toi really are.