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Thursday, November 11, 1999

By GLENN WHIPP
LOS ANGELES DAILY NEWS

Last Friday was more or less a typical day in the life of Ivy League college freshman Natalie Portman.

She had been out late the night before watching a friend play jazz at a local club. She woke early to take care of some schoolwork before her 9 o'clock class and then zipped over to a local elementary school where, with some of her classmates, she's teaching dance to fifth- and sixth-graders. Following that, she had lunch with a friend, ran some errands, returned to her dorm room and crashed.

"I'm so tired all the time," Portman says, (relatively) fresh from a catnap. "I sit down, and I end up falling asleep. It's awful."

Needless to say, she's having the time of her life.

Portman's collegiate journey (she asked that we not disclose the name of her school) neatly parallels the theme of her new movie, "Anywhere but Here," a comedy-drama about the evolving relationship between a mother and daughter who try to start a new life for themselves in Beverly Hills. It reaches theaters tomorrow.

Susan Sarandon, left, and Natalie Portman play a mother and daughter who struggle with a new life in Beverly Hills in "Anywhere but Here."

Portman was 17 when she shot the movie last summer, and, like her character, Ann, she was eager to begin making her own way in the world.

"Right now, she's just completely afire with college and learning," says Susan Sarandon, who plays Portman's mother in the film.

Portman (who uses her grandmother's last name in another nod to privacy) has made quite a career for herself since being discovered at a Long Island pizza parlor at age 11. Her resumé includes "The Professional," "Heat," Broadway's "The Diary of Anne Frank" and a little-known film from this past summer, "Star Wars: Episode I -- The Phantom Menace."

Yet this daughter of an infertility-specialist father and artist mother isn't even sure if she wants to continue acting past her commitment to the next two "Star Wars" movies.

"I wouldn't be surprised by anything she does," Sarandon says. "She has an incredibly strong home life and a great sense of self-esteem. There are a lot of good actresses her age, but she has this core of dignity, health, grace and innate intelligence that's a pretty formidable package when you put it all together."

Adds Wayne Wang, who directed "Anywhere but Here": "The movie could not have been made without Natalie."

Which is interesting because Portman came close to skipping the film altogether. She and her parents objected to a love scene that had been adapted straight from the movie's source material, a novel by Mona Simpson. When it became clear to Wang that he would lose Portman if he didn't lose the scene, he rewrote it to everyone's satisfaction.

Here Portman talks about why she doesn't have a hankering for on-screen hanky-panky, how college cafeterias have challenged her vegetarian lifestyle and why all those bad "Star Wars" reviews didn't bother her in the least.

Q: So I'm guessing you've established a fairly flexible curfew for yourself as a college freshman.

A: (Laughs) You could say that. You know, you learn. Certain nights, I'll say, "I'm not going to go out." And I think I can handle a lot more than my parents imagined.

Q: Your parents have a reputation for being loving and great, but protective as well.

A: I think I have the worst combination of things to have protective parents. I'm an only child, I'm Jewish, and I'm an actress. My parents are always worried about me when I go out, because I could be potentially bothered by somebody. So to all of a sudden be independent is obviously shocking -- and liberating. I love being able to set my own curfew and make my own decisions.

Q: And have any of those decisions backfired on you?

A: Of course! My school is known for kids staying up to all hours of the morning doing work. So we stay up late, and we also party pretty hard because there's so much school stuff going on that we just have to have a release. The social aspect of all this has just been amazing. I've made so many new friends.

Q: Being a vegetarian, how are you coping with cafeteria food?

A: It's hard to be a vegetarian at college. It's hard to be a food-eater at college. The food here is disgusting. I shouldn't say that, because it's hard to feed 1,500 mouths. But there are a lot of restaurants in the area. I don't eat at school much.

Q: Everyone always says you're so "centered" and "together," which I find to be a little odd given that you just turned 18.

A: It's kind of hard to come to terms with that, because all of us know that we're not together. And especially for me, right now. It's so confusing, this part of your life, because you have to figure out what you want to do and what you want to be. Even things like choosing your classes . . . it all leads up to who you are going to be.

Q: And the wrong choice might be disastrous.

A: You're faced with that every day. You're deciding how you want to define yourself in a new situation. You don't know anybody, and you're trying to present an image of yourself to people. And you have to figure out who you are in order to do that, and that's hard and confusing. So I'm definitely not always together, although I think I know myself really well. I may not know what I want to do with my life, but I know what I like and what I don't like.

Q: And how does acting fit into the equation?

A: I really appreciate being an actress. I think I'm learning to love it more now that I'm in school. I'm learning how to control my frustrations.

Q: What frustrates you about acting?

A: A lot of things. I have a real problem with love scenes. I did my first one over the summer in this movie, "Where the Heart Is." And it was the best possible situation: I liked the director, and I was really good friends with the guy, but there was nothing going on between us. And we were both completely dressed under the covers (laughs) and we didn't have to do anything explicit . . . just kissing and stuff.

Q: And you still freaked out?

A: I was so uncomfortable. I just felt so weird being told to kiss someone that I didn't want to kiss. I almost felt whorish, being told what to do in a sexual way. I guess if I had surrendered completely to my character, I wouldn't have felt that way. But I couldn't. And I think it would be even harder if I had a boyfriend. I was thinking, "I hope I get married someday, and then how would I feel?" It would probably be worse.

Q: What else about the business bugs you?

A: The constant quest for approval. On one hand, it keeps me going, trying to prove myself. But at the same time, it can be really frustrating relying on other people's opinion of you. And then there's this aspect of acting: In exchange for doing what you do, you have to give away a big part of your privacy. People are going to start recognizing you. And people can be very strange.

Q: I assume you're talking specifically about "Star Wars" fans here.

A: Given the amount of hype for the movie, the backlash was nothing compared to what I thought it would be. I didn't have any problems because of that film. Maybe it was all that makeup my character wore.

Q: What about the critical backlash?

A: I didn't really mind. I thought the movie was fun. I thought it accomplished what it set out to accomplish, and I know a lot of kids who liked it. The intended audience got it. Sometimes reviewers are right, and sometimes they can be hideously wrong.

Q: And next summer, it's back to being Queen Amidala.

A: And off to Australia. And because I have that already set up, I'm not reading any scripts. I'm in a little bubble here. I gave my agent my phone number and told her, "I only want you to call as a friend."

Q: Have you even been to a movie since school started?

A: I couldn't even tell you what movies are out right now. It's the first time in my life where I'm not even following that. I'm just totally blind to the outside world. I read my daily newspaper, and that's about it.

Q: So it's Friday night. You're exhausted. Naturally, you'll be going out with your friends.

A: Of course I am! It's Friday night, and I've been working so hard all week. I've earned it.