Interview with Liv Tyler – G-Star campaign shoot Paris

 
February 2010 | G-Star RAW | by G-Star PR department | Photos by Anton Corbijn

How did your career get started?
I was very young and it all happened very rapidly. I was fifteen or sixteen when I got my first part. At that time I lived in NY and I was already a model. I went on a few auditions and got my first part pretty quickly after that.

Have you always wanted to work in the film industry?
My mother used to tell me I was going to be an actress when I grew up, because I was always dressing up in her outfits and performing, singing and dancing around the house. I think I just wanted to be a punk rock singer. My mom used to have Iggy Pop records that I listened to all the time. I would take the top of her four poster bed and pretend it was a microphone. I probably wanted to be a singer more than anything, just like my mother who was in a punk rock band in the eighties. Somehow I became an actress.

What do you like most about your job?
For me it is not always the finished product or the outcome that is most important but more often it is the experience of making the film that I find so extraordinary or special. It all blurs into each other. Sometimes it is the most simple little memory or the group of people that you were working with that made it magical in a way. So in that sense I would say every film has very important special memories to me. Some stick out more than others, like working with Bernardo Bertolucci on Stealing Beauty when I was seventeen. I’d just graduated from high school that summer and turned eighteen on the set. It was a really important summer in my life as a young girl. I also made a film with Robert Altman in the south, called Cookie’s Fortune. We shot in this tiny tiny little town in the middle of nowhere called Holly Springs Mississippi. The town was basically the set. I like shooting on location a lot; to be in a place where you are outside of your own world.

How do you prepare yourself for a role?
It depends on the part, but normally I read, think, dream a lot and ask a lot of questions. It is a slow process of becoming and imagining being in the world of that person.

What is your biggest worry about your work?
There are so many. There is a lot of anxiety that comes along with being an actor because you never really know when your next job is going to be or when you’ll find the right thing you feel passionate about. I think that has always existed in this job. Even in Shakespearian times acting was not considered as a real job since you would never know when you would have work again. I think it is still the way it is unless you are doing a television show or a Lord of the Rings for example. That was a nice long chunk of time. We worked on that for 1.5 years. It is just such an intense experience over such a short amount of time and then it ends and you do not know when the next thing is going to happen. Of course things continue to happen, but it is that wondering feeling that creates the anxiety.

What is your relation with fame?
I don’t have that figured out yet, I just go with the flow. It has always been my job, so I do not know anything else. I guess I saw a lot of things happen to my parents and to people I grew up around. I might there for have a slightly different view on things in that I’m the second generation of it. I‘ve seen a lot of people going through the glory and the failure, and the highs and the lows of it all, so that gave me a different kind of perspective. And I try as much as possible for the two worlds like my own and my family, and my work to not collide all the time. They are so very different and that can be stressful in itself because they are so extreme. I don’t have it all figured out. I also feel like the world is really changing and evolving and I’m sometimes feeling I’m living in the stone ages. I have a very old-fashioned view on things because I grew up around musicians. I remember I would be a child and my father or my step father, Todd Rundgren, or Steven Tyler, would go off on tour or make a record and they would work so hard. And when they would come home, they would be really normal men. They both lived in the country, had animals, tractors and a farm. There was a very big difference between those worlds and they didn’t constantly make records. They would make a record every couple of years. That is something I grew up seeing and that feels very natural to me. So in my career I would always work quite hard, make 1 or 2 movies in a row and then I would naturally take a chunk of time off to grow, reflect and get back the things that I need to be able to give in my work. I feel that the world has changed a lot whereas you are expected to work all the time and everybody wants to know what you are doing next. It is a more fast paced, more media driven world now.

Where do you live now?
Well my house that I own is in New York so I consider that my home, but I’ve been renting a house in California for a few months. Right now I’m going back and forth and exploring different places. I’d never lived in the West Coast before. I was raised on the East Coast, so I was always really curious what it was like out West. I thought it would be good for me to experience that. I’m kind of an adventurer in a way. I really like to travel. I went through a difficult time in my life with a lot of changes and I liked the idea of leaving the shores I knew behind and going to a new land, a new frontier to see what it was like. So, I’ve been doing that. I do not think I can live in the West for ever, but it is fun for a little while.

How would you describe your style?
It is funny because I’m kind of a tomboy at heart. When I grew up, I was a tomboy, but then I had this very womanly body and I was very tall. By the time I was eleven I was 5 feet 10. So it strange, I’m like a girly tomboy. I don’t even know how to describe it. In my everyday life I like to be comfortable. I would wear Converse All Stars or flats every day or little dresses or jeans. I am very simple but then I almost go into a character when I get dressed up. I enjoy or try to embrace my womanly body a little bit more. One of the things I like so much in the whole world of fashion is how creative it is and how there is so much freedom for people to create and to be creative and to come up with such kind of exiting wacky interesting scenarios and images. I am quite fascinated by it and I enjoy the process of it a lot. I love doing photo shoots and I love seeing the structure of the clothing and how things are being made. I really appreciate the art of it I guess.

How do you feel about the brand G-Star? How would you describe it?
I actually wrote down five words: unique, strong, raw, comfortable and cool. When I had first been asked if I would be a part of this campaign with them, I got this really incredible book about them and I couldn’t believe it was sort of whole world. I love how there were bicycles and there was a car and the store looked so interesting and I really liked the very raw sort of earthy not broken down denim aspect a lot and I thought it was very unique and cool, and the shape of the jeans I think is very specifically them which I like a lot. I’m still learning about them. This is the first time I have worked with them. I really wanted to go to Holland to do the shoot, because I wanted to see where they made everything and investigated a little bit more, but I guess I have to do that another time.

What does Raw mean to you?
I guess just something very real. There is nothing fake about it: real, authentic and unfuzzed.

What makes the ultimate female jeans?
A good butt is very important. I really like dark denim and I like it when they naturally wash out in lighter denim. I like it starts out really raw and dark, then slowly kind of fades. For me I like it when the waist is not too constricting, when the waist fits really well, so it doesn’t dig in any chubby parts and shows a good cute butt. Just something that looks not too…something a bit classic I guess. You should look comfortable in them, like they suit you and fit your body well.

Are you involved in charity or ecologic goals?
I do not have one specific thing that I only work with. I somehow wind up doing a lot of things. People will come to you and ask you. I work with UNICEF and with another charity called ‘keep a child alive’ more regularly and something in York called ‘free arts’. Generally anything that has to do with children and the welfare of children I’m very passionate about and want to be involved in as much as possible. I’m looking for some specific thing I could focus a little bit more intensely on. I’m always asking around and looking for that. But I do enjoy seeing all the things that are out there. I just did something recently with my girlfriend Stella McCartney for this beautiful film called Home. I can not pronounce the directors name, it is a French director, it is beautiful. That film was really amazing really interesting it is also shot from above. Looking down at Mother Nature, it was really incredible and I felt really exited to be a part of that with her. I enjoy learning as much as I can, also while being involved in those kinds of charitable things.

Where you involved in this film?
No, she asked me to co-host an event with her to bring awareness to it. I did not have anything specifically to do with the film.

What music is currently on your I-pod?
What isn’t, I have thousands and thousand of songs on my I-pod. I press shuffle all the time. Anton (Corbijn) has an incredible I-Pod, we have been listening to. A friend gave it to him. It has 8000 songs on it and it is consistently on shuffle, it’s great. I actually usually listen to whole albums. I do not like to listen to one song, but like to listen to the whole album. Like the other day I was listening to Sticky Fingers, of the Rolling Stones, my favorite album. I like a band called Band of Horses, and MGMT and I listen to Gram Parsons a lot. I try to stop myself because I listen to it so much. I try and take little breaks from it but I never get tired from it. I am a big music person so I have a lot of music.

And do you play any instrument?
I don’t. I play the auto harp a little tiny bit. And I always want to take lessons, guitar lessons and piano lessons at sometime when I have time, when I am at home, which is not that often. I would love to take a year off and do nothing but go to music school because I really love, love music a lot.

Don’t you sing?
I do a little bit. Depends on what your definition of singing is. I love to sing.

Is it a project for you, to do something with music?
I have always wanted to do a musical, to do a film where I get to sing and dance. That is something I always thought of when I was a kid. I would just love to do that.

Do you collect photography?
I do, I’m starting. I’m so lucky with my parents that there are so many incredible pictures taken of my mom, my stepfather Todd Rundgren and my father Steven. And so there is a couple of photographers I’m close to my whole life, who took a lot of these pictures. I have a few of the photos I love of Yoko Ono and John Lennon, of David Bowie and Iggy Pop. I really love those. But I’m also not really picky. I collect things that I just love. They can be in antique stores or flee markets. I have a couple of valuable photographs I really love. I have a beautiful Eve Arnold photograph of Marilyn Monroe and a couple of other ones. I’m slowly collecting things.

And when you are in New York, do you go to the galleries?
Right now I have a four year old. So I go to the Natural History Museum and science museums, but of course I love art galleries. I do not always have the time to, but I do.

What do you think of Paris? What is your favorite city?
I love Paris. Paris is so beautiful and exotic to me. I always feel so lucky when I go to Paris. I have a cosmetic contract with Givency and I usually come to Paris to work with them. It is amazing the building they have their fashion house in. It is kind of like here, an incredible historical beautiful building. I’m always amazed by the places and things I get to see and do when I am in Paris, I enjoy that. That is a lot different from America. I think it’s delicious, I like every part about it. My favorite city in the world? I do not know. I love New York, because it feels like home to me. I really like London a lot. I like Paris. I am not really such a big favorite person, because I like little tiny cities and big cities for a different reason. I really like authentic, real things in life. I have always wanted to go to Amsterdam, I have never been to Holland before. So that is a dream of mine.

Do you see yourself carry on in more independent or Hollywood films, or does it depend on the project?
Well, I do not have kind of a master plan. I think about work a lot and I’m very passionate about my work. But I’m equally as passionate about my life and so I guess I go through periods where work, especially acting can be so all consuming, that you really have to go into another world and completely into a character’s headspace and especially with a child that is a tricky thing to do all the time. I do not have a preference for independent or not independent movies. Making a movie is making a movie. I’m always looking quite intensely for things that I feel passionate about and that I love. So far in my career I never done any movies that didn’t feel a 100% certain about or that I had to do because I wanted to make money. I have never done that. Because of that, I sometimes go long stretches of time when I don’t work because I don’t find things I’m really passionate about. Right now I’m looking quite intensely for something that I really love.

Would you like to be involved in film in another role, like producing?
I love that! I mean, you always are to an extent. I’m a very involved person; and I’m a very aware person. So I always wind up being very involved in hair and make up and wardrobe and all those sort of aspects. As an actor you are not just put on the set. You’re always creating your character and their world and the things that they say. I definitely do tent to enjoy and gravitate towards those aspects of making a film. I really enjoy that a lot.

I’m learning to live again

October 2009 | Reveal (UK) | by Garth Pearce

Following her ‘devastating’ divorce last year, Hollywood star Liv Tyler has bounced back and insists there’s now only one man in her life

After the heartache of her divorce, actress Liv Tyler reveals that she’s finally feeling stronger than ever. It was a period that left her ‘devastated’ when she announced her divorce from British rocker Royston Langdon in May last year. But with two new films set to hit cinemas next year and a new contract with Givenchy, after six successful years as one of the faces of the designer company, life is on the up for Liv.

‘Everything is going well,’ she says. ‘I’m putting together a new life.’ Liv is also fitter than ever and she was rumoured earlier this year to have been doing some extra ‘work’ over a lunch date, kissing her fitness coach David Kirsch. But the 32-year-old Lord Of The Rings star insists the only man in her life is her four-year-old son, Milo, whom she had with Royston.

Liv now has a new life in California, after moving from her New York home with Milo, and says: ‘He’s a wonderful boy – we spend so much time together.’

Despite her fresh outlook on life now, Liv admits that her marriage split was a hugely painful time of her life. ‘These things happen all the time,’ she says. ‘I just hoped it wouldn’t happen to me.’ Liv and Royston wed in 2003 and she’d been prepared to put her soaring career on hold to throw herself into her marriage and become a full-time mother to son Milo, now four. But despite virtually quitting the Hollywood rat race, her marriage broke down and Liv admitted that she struggled to cope with the split. She has said in the past: ‘You go through a couple of weeks when you think: “Oh, I’m OK, I feel better.” Then, suddenly, out of nowhere, it hits you again. ‘It also brings up a lot of issues. You might feel like a failure, or like there is something wrong with you. I see a lot of people run away from it, or act like they don’t care. ‘But if you don’t let yourself mourn, it is going to come back and bite you on the ass.’

Fortunately, Liv’s frank outlook has helped her to rebuild her life and her career. Having enjoyed a big hit in last year’s The Incredible Hulk, Liv will hit the silver screen again next year in The Strangers 2 and Super. But down-to-earth Liv insists she has no desire to live life as a major international star. ‘I realised, some years ago, that it wasn’t for me,’ she says. ‘When I worked with Bruce Willis on the film Armageddon, he had three separate trailers and a lot of people who worked for him. ‘I thought it was a bit silly. Then I got to know the situation better and realised that Bruce, at the time, spent most of his life on films. ‘The entourage were his friends from New Jersey, who knew him when he was a bartender. The fridge was filled with bacon and eggs and they watched sports matches together. ‘I came in to this situation, nervous and serious, and realised that it was all to much for me. Huge stars have to live like that.’

She also saw stardom, up close and personal, from an early age. Her mother, Playboy model Bebe Buell, was a former girlfriend of Mick Jagger and Rod Stewart. Her father is Aerosmith lead singer Steven Tyler, but she was brought up until the age of 10 to think of her dad as rocker Todd Rundgren, who her mother was with at the time.

After Liv launched her acting career when she was 18, in the controversial Stealing Beauty, she was in constant demand. ‘I have always had the same approach to fame,’ she says. ‘It just does not feel real. If my mother or friend tells me that I have talent or that I look pretty to them, then that’s special. ‘But when I see myself on the cover of a magazine, it looks like a mock-up. All that stuff that was said about a star being born, when I was younger, didn’t fool me for a moment. ‘That’s said all the time, isn’t it? It is incredibly flattering, but it’s almost a pressure. I feel lucky but also separated from all of that kind of stuff. ‘If I didn’t feel separated, then there would be a problem. I would be floating in the clouds, not in reality, and I would have been a very unhappy person.’

Still very irresistible!

September 2009 | French Glamour

 
1- Fan of Mondino… without knowing it
“I didn’t know Jean-Baptiste Mondino. It was on YouTube that I discovered he was the director of some of my favorite music videos: Madonna, Vanessa Paradis, Neneh Cherry or Brian Ferry, music videos that I loved when I was younger, in the 80s. So I was really happy to work with him. Such thing didn’t happen to me in a long time!”

2- The Seine recreated in studio
“We filmed in Paris, but also in a studio! I was driving this beautiful boat, the wheel had been raised for me, in front of a green screen instead of Paris bridges! Then, black and white photos from Paris had been added. I think the result is brilliant.”

3- Inspired from Thelma & Louise
“In this second spot for Very Irresistible, I’m playing a free women, mysterious, who is fleeing in the night, and Jean-Baptiste wanted me to drive the boat with a real pleasure. So he told me to think about the final scene of Thelma & Louise where the two heroins jump from a cliff with their car.”

4- An outfit for Liv
“We can see me fleeing in the night with sunglasses, with a black leather cape. And suddenly I take off these accessories just to wear this incredible dress, black satin, with a huge back cleavage. This vamp outfit, pretty rock has been specially designed by Riccardo Tisci, Givenchy designer.”

5- Fan of “French macaroons”
“The night before the shooting in studio, Jean-Baptiste took me for a boat trip on the Seine. It was awfully cold. Our only comfort: the Ladurée macaroons!”

My Stylish Life – Liv Tyler

September 2009 | Elle (UK)

Liv Tyler, the 32-year-old Hollywood actress on books, bands and her mum and dad’s beauty tips

Do you have a style template?
I’ve learned to dress for my body shape. I feel best about my legs but have a womanly tummy, so I always feel good when I have something a little loose around my stomach and my legs are poking out. My favourite default outfit is Wolford tights or leggings with a cute shift dress. I love dresses by Isabel Marant and Iro, and Stella McCartney heels. I’m also addicted to American Vintage for gorgeous slips and tees.

Who do you go to for the red carpet?
It depends. Stella made my dress for the Met Ball. I love her clothes – they are so elegant and easy to wear. It was fun having something made specifically for me and being able to collaborate on the design. I also love Lanvin. Albert [Elbaz] is a genius. He knows how to cut for women and his fabrics are sensuous.

We’ve seen you in and out of the gym in LA recently…
I usually work out with David Kirsch in New York and I really miss him now I’m in LA. But I’ve just discovered Tracey Anderson through Gwyneth [Paltrow]. I’m not working out directly with her, but one of her girls runs a dance class in LA, which I attend three of four times a week. The 90-minute sessions fly by and my body is getting really tight.

Where do you recommend going for a night out in LA?
There’s a fun place near me called Cafe Stella where I go to eat. It’s a little French bistro on the east side of town. Otherwise, for me it’s more about socializing at home, either in the afternoon with everyone swimming or in the evening when my friends and I have dinner parties. I had one recently and made two Jamie Oliver pasta dishes. They were so popular I got texts the next day asking for the recipes.

What about when you’re in New York?
New York is very neighbourhoody so you have your favourite little place in your patch – there are some great restaurants on my street [in the West Village]. Bigelow’s is one of my favourite shops. It’s one of the oldest pharmacies in the US and stocks an amazing range of beauty products.

What’s your approach to beauty?
My mother [Bebe Buell] and grandmother were models and took such good care of their skin that I couldn’t help but learn from them. I can’t go to bed without cleansing, toning and moisturising – no matter how late it is. I use masks a lot, too. Skin Targetters Black For Light Mask by Givenchy brightens up my skin. [Liv is the face of Givenchy's Very Irresistible fragrance and Le Makeup.] My dad [Steve Tyler of Aerosmith] is also full of great beauty advice, like wear your perfume in your belly button and on the soles of your feet so that it becomes part of you.

What advice do friends come to you for?
I’m a good problem solver. I go with my gut instinct on things. For the past year, though, I’ve been reading self-help books. I’ve been through a really hard time in my life and have needed other people’s wisdom to help me feel OK. I’m also reading The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers. It’s beautiful and insightful.

What’s on your iPod?
I’ve been playing Kings of Leon for about seven years. But I’m also listening to Band of Horses, Arcade Fire and MGMT. And I’m obsessed with Gram Parsons at the moment. “Love Hurts” is my favourite track – it’s so true.

Finally, what’s the most unlikely place we might bump into you?
Naked at the Beverly Hot Springs in LA. It’s a traditional Korean bathhouse where you soak in natural hot springs and get scrubbed, massaged and cleansed to within an inch of your life. They even wash your hair. You feel clean and happy afterwards.

Liv Tyler – Styling Tricks

September 2009 | Glamour (German) | Photos by Miguel Reveriego

Our cover-star was born 1977 as daughter of model Bebe Buell and Aerosmith-front man Steven Tyler.
***
With her 4-year-old son Milo she lives in separation from his father (rock musician Royston Langdon) in New York.
***
The actress was last seen in the comedy Smother as well as the thriller The Strangers (now on DVD).

No entourage?, is always the first thought when Liv Tyler enters the set of a photo shooting. She arrives alone, introduces herself politely to everyone by name. And just as uncomplicated are the outfits she is wearing at such occasions: a casual dress, leggings, ballerinas.

Comfortable is the highest priority. But I am not going to go about in rags because of that. Leggings and tunic dresses are a good compromise. “Comfortable and practical, but as an outfit they still look styled,” explains the actress. And this is what she looks like in paparazzi photos: as prototype of a city-mom.

The unrestraint transfers to her red carpet wardrobe. She loves loose dresses and blazer or appears in a white cashmere sweater to a knee-long black skirt at a premiere. What’s astonishing about it: exactly with this simple styling she has the elegance of a Rita Hayworth. Is a certain poise the requirement for that? “Definitely.. But it doesn’t need much to make me happy: prancing with my son on the bed and to sing is enough.”.

There is not more hiding behind the secret of her beauty? After all, with her flawless face she advertises for cosmetics of Givenchy. “The fact that I’m overwhelmed with beauty-products due to the advertising contract is great, of course.. The financial independence that comes with it is even better. I don’t have to accept every role offer just to earn money.” Aside from that there is little preventing Liv Tyler from jumping through hoops too much. “A lot of times I was told by agents that I would get more parts if I lost weight. But I don’t buy into these standards. The rest of the world considers me slim and I like myself this way.”.

But without any fitness it doesn’t work out either. To get into shape after the birth of her son, she hired star-trainer David Kirsch. Her statement about it: “All Hollywood-actresses act as if they would slim down after a pregnancy without any help. Believe me: my way was exhausting, boring and very, very expensive!”.

After getting back her bikini-figure, does she have any suggestions for vacation-outfits? “I just purchased a green bathing suite by Stella McCartney. I only like bathing suites. Nothing is more ridiculous than mothers in bikinis running after their children with everything wobbling around.”

Does she hide anything under the bathing suite? After all, her male colleagues of the Lord of the Rings series have tattoos as memories. “I would never do that. Even the ‘Liv’ tattoo of at the ankle of my mom is completely wrong to me.”

Beauty Tricks

“I always wear lip-stick. I use the colour as rouge for my cheeks.”

“Even red carpet-outfits are allowed to be comfortable. I am not that vain to reduce my wellbeing for superficialities.”

“I love hot heels. But only for parties, otherwise I wear flat shoes.”

“If I wear a elegant dress, I often get compared to Liz Tyler. That’s cool. But honestly: who cares?”

Liv & Let Live

August 2009 | UK She Magazine| by Jess Henley, photos by Cliff Watts

Despite being born into rock’n'roll aristocracy, Liv Tyler, 32, has grown into one of Hollywood’s most down-to-earth stars. Here, she talks to SHE’s Jess Henley about the pain of divorce, shifting her baby weight and how she juggles her life as a single working mother.

Walking into a Parisian hotel to meet Liv Tyler, the first thing that strikes me is how much more beautiful the 32-year-old actress is in the flesh. The stunning 5ft 10in stature, the flawless skin, the huge doe eyes and full lips; her photos really don’t do her justice. Her hair is super-sleek, while her figure and long legs are honed to perfection – gone are the homely curves that gave Liv her famous girl-next-door persona. Instead, standing before me is a woman who has developed some serious va-va-voom – and she’s so friendly! “How are you doing? Ooh I love your ring! Where did it come from?” she asks as she grabs my hand and clocks my £5 diamond ring. “Marc Jacobs? That’s amazing. I do love big bold statement jewellery.”

Dressed in a simple white shift dress – “I picked it up from a small Parisian designer yesterday” – and some killer Stella McCartney gladiator-style heels, it is blindingly obvious why Givenchy has chosen her to front its cosmetics over the last six years – and why she has just been signed up for another two.

Her renewed contract also marks a fresh chapter in an eventful life. One that began as a girl who didn’t know who her real father was (singer Steve Tyler of US rock giants Aerosmith) for much of her childhood, and that saw her modeling at 14, then landing her first lead acting role at 16.

Today though, at the pinnacle of her career, Liv is sweeping aside the pain of her recent divorce from Leeds-born musician Royston Langdon, 37. (The couple met in 1998, married in 2003 at a private villa in Barbados and announced their split a year ago.) Instead, she is focusing her energy on her new single life and spending as much time as possible with her son Milo, who’s now four. she admits that her life change hasn’t been easy, and when Royston left their New York home she found it too hard to remain there without him and chose instead to relocate to California. “It was very strange to have to pack up my whole life – my son, nanny and dog – and head over to LA,” she says. “Although it is great having a fresh start, it was also daunting and scary finding a new home and a new school for Milo. It was a really tough time, but now I’ve got through it, it’s made me realise I can get through anything. It’s important to take those first few independent steps and now I have to focus on my life and my son and try and do the best job that I can.”

New Challenges

Indeed, she is throwing herself back into work too. After taking a few years off to look after Milo, she is now working on the romcom The Romantics in which she plays the maid of honour to her best friend, who wonders if her own relationship with the groom is really over. “It’s been great working alongside my friend Galt Niederhoffer, who wrote the book and adapted it into a screenplay. It’s still a work in progress, but I’ve really enjoyed producing it with her.” In June, she also started filming the psychological thriller 10A/10B, directed by Chul-soo Park.

Liv is refreshingly upbeat and confident about being able to juggle her career with spending enough time with her son – and she has made no secret of the fact that her most treasured role is that of a mother. “Milo is the greatest love of my life. Being a mother changes the way you think about things and it’s true that your whole world becomes about your children.”

The hardest part for Liv is having to be away from Milo when she’s filming. “When he was a baby it was easier to have him on set and I’d spend as much time as possible with him, but now that he’s older he needs school and continuity. He’s started to understand that I need to go away and it’s more obvious to him when I’m not there, which makes it more heart-wrenching.”

Having worked since she was 14 – it was her role in the classic Empire Records (1995) that she describes as “One of the best experiences” she’s ever had for its humour and relaxed atmosphere on set that kick-started her acting career. Her later portrayal of Lucy Harmon in Stealing Beauty, followed by her role as Bruce Willis’ daughter in Armageddon cemented her status as a star, as did that soap sud scene in One Night at McCool’s. But it was certainly the success of the Lord of the Rings trilogy that catapulted her to the A-list.

Role Models

As the face of Paris-based Givenchy, Liv’s modeling work makes a welcome change from her life in LA, and one that she thoroughly relishes. “I get loads of make-up to try, and who wouldn’t love that? And it’s great to have another job in my life aside from acting.”

And make-up is in her blood. “I learned everything from my mother and grandmother. They were both models and natural beauties so I would watch and learn from them.” Her mother is the former Playboy Playmate and rock muse Bebe Buell, while her grandmother Dorothea Johnson is the author of The Little Book of Etiquette and founder of the Protocol School of Washington. Both were huge influences when she was growing up and taught her how to make the most of herself.

At 32, and with her gorgeous wrinkle-free skin, ageing is understandably not something that concerns her – despite the pressures of youth-obsessed Hollywood. “I don’t worry about it at all. In fact, I am curious as to what it’ll be like. Ageing is part of life and it is a beautiful process we need to embrace. Botox is something I really struggle to understand and, to be honest, the idea of it scares me… having a needle in my face? No thanks!”

So how about the new svelte body? What prompted the Gwyneth-style physical overhaul? She admits to initially turning to exercise as a way of helping her soothe the pain of her marriage break-up. “It made me fall in love with exercise again and was a great avenue in which to channel my energy. When I’m working I’m naturally more slim as I’m so busy it keeps the weight off, but my body changed a lot when I had Milo.”

She adds that she really struggled with losing the baby weight after Milo was born. “Even though the baby is out, you’re still large and, despite what other people say, it’s not something that just drops off – believe me! It was such a challenge to get fit again. I had to lose nearly 30lb, so it took a lot of discipline – and it wasn’t something I’d ever had to do before.”

Now she trains with fitness guru David Kirsch in New York (who she has been reportedly dating since the pair were seen kissing after an intimate lunch), and in LA she tends to follow Tracy Anderson’s ‘Method’, which is a combination of dance-cardio aerobics with Pilates. “It’s great fun and you end up doing moves you never thought you could. I’m also forced onto the rowing machine sometimes, which is hard work and I don’t like it much at all. But it definitely gets results and is good for the whole body.”

Liv loves clothes, but prefers to dress herself rather than have the obligatory celebrity stylist on tap. A fan of her close friend Stella McCartney’s collection, Liv explains it’s the classic simple pieces that she’s drawn to and she wears Stella’s designs a lot. “There’s something about them. You can just throw on a sweater over jeans and a T-shirt and instantly look effortlessly chic.”

Having spent the afternoon with Liv, it’s clear she means it when she says she’s a woman in control and knows what she wants. Her dream is eventually to buy a place away from the city and surround herself with a growing herd of children. She confesses: “I can’t wait to live in the country somewhere, on a farm with chickens, animals and lots of babies, but at the moment I’m really loving life and its whole diversity.”

Liv’s Top Beauty Products

“I can’t go anywhere without Givenchy Phenomen’Eyes, £18.11 – it makes my lashes look so full and luscious. For a subtle day look, I love the new Prismissime Eyes colour palette in Poetique Browns, £32.79. I’ve definitely got a thing for corals at the moment, especially Vernis Please! nail varnish in Sweet Coral, £11.75, and Rouge Interdit Shine lipstick in Poetique Camelia, £17.62. And whenever my skin needs a boost of hydration, I treat it to Plasti-Scult Lifting and Firming Mark, £41.10.

Liv on Life &…

… on discovering her real father was Steve Tyler “I turned to my mom and said, ‘He’s my father, isn’t he?’ and we went out under a tree and talked and cried for two hours.”

… on her relationship with her mother “It was hard for me as a kid, because I was definitely sad and angry that I didn’t have this ‘Perfect mommy’ thing. But now I have a lot of empathy for her. I mean, going through everything that I’ve been going through the last couple of years, I really understand…”

… on Royston and their break-up “It brings up a lot of issues – you might feel like a failure or there is something wrong with you. You can’t run away – you just have to deal with it.”

… becoming a mother “After having a child, that physical feeling of going from being a girl into a woman is really something. When you carry a child and give birth, you do feel like a woman for the first time in your life. It is phenomenal.”

… Lord of the Rings “That was four years of our lives going back and forth to New Zealand – and every Christmas we’d go and promote it. It was amazing, but when that was over I felt a little empty and wanted to be a normal person for a while.”

Really Beautiful

July 2009 | Brigitte German | By Sonja Niemann, Photos by James White
 

She’s always made up, but she can hardly pretty up other people. A shame, Liv Tyler thinks. She would have a made a first-class makeup artist, she says. On the other hand, she’s useless as a celeb.

Brigitte: You’ve said your dream would be to open a spa where you could offer highly personal facials. That was a joke, wasn’t it?
Liv: Absolutely not. I’m often asked what I’d like to do beside acting and modeling, and that is my answer. Simply to have a place where women can come together, do a little sport, let themselves be pampered and prettied up. I was something of a tomboy when I was a child, always with scratched knees – really not a “girly girl.” But my mother and my grandmother were very feminine. And I used to love watching them go about their beauty routine in front of the mirror. So when I was twelve, I’ve got a whole lot of beauty tricks in store, some of which I’ve shown to my girlfriends. And I still like that. When my best friend Victoria comes to visit and goes “Oh, my skin!” I put her in the bathroom, make her a facial and even press her pimples myself…

Brigitte: Really?
Liv: …I take care of her whole face. I don’t know why, but it seems to help.

Brigitte: But mostly you’re the one whose face is really being taken care of, since you’re the face of Givenchy Make-up and Fragrances. What kind of relationship do you have with the man who always does your make-up? It becomes a truly intimate act, when someone comes so close to you.
Liv: Yes, it’s true, it’s very intimate. I’ve been working with Nicolas Degennes, Givenchy‘s make-up artist, for seven years now. Although I only meet him four or five times a year. He’s very friendly and he can have a lot of empathy with women. I think that’s an amazing quality in a man. There’s nothing superficial about beauty for him. You can see he loves women – real women too, not just models.

Brigitte: It’s been said that you like to swap beauty tricks with your father. What kind of tricks does Aerosmith frontman Steven Tyler have in store?
Liv: I’ve once said that my father and I did facials together. Ever since, journalists keep asking me about it, because they’d like me to talk about my father. But of course I’ve learned everything about beauty from my mother. Though my father really takes care of his skin. He looks good, don’t you think ? And that is, without ever having something done.

Brigitte: It’s not just that your father is a rockstar, you too can sing very well. But except for a short passage in Jersey Girl, you don’t sing. Many much less talented fellow actresses have recorded albums. Why not you?
Liv: I’ve just recorded a duet with my friend Evan Dando…

Brigitte: …the singer in American indie band the Lemonheads.
Liv: Yes. We were in a film together, Heavy, when I was 16. He’s been one of my best of friends since then. He was recording an covers album (Varshons, out in June) and he asked Kate Moss and me whether we’d like to record a duet with him. So I sing a Leonard Cohen cover with him on the CD. I really enjoyed doing it. But recording a full album? I don’t know. I really like acting. What I would love best of all would be to do a musical, a film in which I could dance and sing.

Brigitte: You began modeling when you were 14 but went on to act very quickly afterwards. Film critics weren’t very nice to you in the beginning. Do you sometimes have the feeling that beauty can also be a burden?
Liv: I’ve never really found myself beautiful. I was a teenager when I began working. The only thing I felt at the time was uncertainty, because I was so tall. Even when I was 11 or 12, I was almost as tall as I am now (ie 1.78 meters.) The boys in my class only reached as high as my breasts, and I surely wasn’t to their taste. I felt very self-conscious and I wished I was smaller, more like other women. As I grew up, I learned to accept it, I even enjoyed wearing high heels. But I’ve never gotten rid of that little complex. I always feel most beautiful when I’m in a group and don’t really stand out. But your question was about acting. I never get told: you’re too good-looking to play this role. Maybe they’ll say: you don’t have the right look. But it’s not a big deal, I’ll never let something like that discourage me.

Brigitte: You’ve played in very different films. There were blockbusters, like Hulk, Armageddon, The Lord of the Rings but also smaller, small-budget films in between. How do you choose your roles? Do you have a strategy?
Liv: No. I have no fixed plan. I know some girls are very good at this, for instance often playing in rom coms so it becomes their hallmark. But that doesn’t work for me. I have to say I don’t live in California among film stars, I only mingle with musicians. Musicians record an album, they’re much focused, then they go on tour, then they go home and stay there for a year or two. Actors on the other hand always have to be ‘there’, to be on the red carpet, to be present. That doesn’t suit me. When I’m on a project I work very hard, but when it’s over, I want to take a break and lead a normal life and just be a mother. I’m a “crap celebrity” as it was, really useless as a celeb.

Brigitte: One more question about beauty. You were never scrawny, you always were a little bit curvy, which we found great. That is, you’d eat cheeseburgers, and you wouldn’t care too much about sport. And then you went through this really tough diet and sport program with famous personal trainer David Kirsch.
Liv: There was a time in my life, when I was married, I had a baby, I had founded a family, and I didn’t necessarily want to focus on my body. But now that I’m a little bit older, I really enjoy being fit again, and I really enjoy eating too! though I must say it’s almost never cheeseburgers. I like running, swimming, riding a bike. And I have a son! Each morning, while I make breakfast in the kitchen, he comes on his tiny bicycle and goes around me, trying to make me ride it too. Have you ever tried doing that on such a tiny thing? That’s the hardest training in the world!

Beauty Tyler

June 2009 | Elle (French) | Photos by Satoshi Saikusa

Under Nicolas Degennes brushes, artistic director of Givenchy Make-up, Liv Tyler, the actress with a charming smile, wears three make-ups which are up this summer. Sunny, sparkling or rock: find out these three glamorous faces.

Sunny like Romy:
Nicolas Degennes: “Like Romy Schneider in “La Piscine”, Liv has a glowing spontaneity that I translate with a moist skin effect and an utlra-tanned sun-tanning.”

- For a Santa Fe tan: Use a colorless powder as a base, then use a sun-tanning with a big brush. To “roast” the skin, use an orange blush above cheekbones. In bonus, it gives life to the sun-tanning.
- For a wet effect: The secret is to catch the light to stimulate the water reflection. A powder composed with white pearl will create the illusion on eyelids and shoulders. On lips, it’s a transparency gloss witch will do it. Though, we have to avoid too much pearl effect, too much glitter and not wet enough.

Givenchy Make-up Le Make-Up, with Skin Drink Soft, Tan To Go n°1, Primissime Mat & Glow n°73, Miser Bright Sun n°72, Prisme Again! Blush Glow n°72, Phenomen’Eyes n°1 and Gloss n°2. Hair style by Damien Boissinot, with Shampoo Optimisateur de Couleur Pigma’Up dark hair and Gel Hair by Camille Alabane (clothes Antik Batik)

Sparkling like Tinkerbelle:
Nicolas Degennes: “Liv looks like an heroin of modern fairy-tales, I have stress on her lighting tan, her glance with a daring mix of pink on lips and orange nails.”

- For an aristocratic tan: Massage the skin with a base tan (or primer) it texture catches the light without any thickness. Exactly what we want in summer when we don’t want to be tanned.
- Strawberry-apricot duet: Uncoordinated lips and nails, it’s very modern. With your finger, smooth your lips with a pink lipstick, and lightened this look with a orange juicy nail polish.

Givenchy Make-up Le Make-Up, with Skin Drink Soft, Activ’Mine n°6, Photo Perfexion n°2 and n°7, Prisme Libre n°5, Prisme Again! n°10, Prisme Again! Visage Sun Mango, Magic Kajal n°1, Phenomen’Eyes n°1, Prisme Again! Eyes n°14, Eyebrow Show n°2, Gloss Interdit n°06 and Vernis Please! n°162. Manucure by Brenda Abrial. (Underskirt by Chanel)

Rock like Patti Smith:
Nicolas Degennes: “Liv is a rock child (her father is Steven Tyler, of Aerosmith rockband) with a crazy side that she completely assumes. In her private life, she sings a lot, she has a wonderful voice. I translate this with a strong glance and a blazing mouth.”

- For a dark glance: There is nothing better than a dark and greasy khôl, to put inside the eye, on the top like on the bottom. Be careful, it will trickle a little bit but it’s rock n’Roll. To avoid these streams, use a transparency powder on the lower eyelid. And put a lot of mascara on eyelashes.
- For the mouth: Orange. Put the lipstick with your finger to color your lips. Then correct the edges with a nude pen.
- To put a 80′s blush. Forget about the round healthy powder on the cheekbones, dig up the cheeks with brown blush, to put in diagonal from the hear to under the cheekbones.

Givenchy Make-up Le Make-Up, with Skin Drink Soft, Activ’Mine n°6, Photo Perfexion n°2 and n°7, Prisme Libre n°5, Perfect Again! n°10, Prisme Again! Visage n°13, Magic Kajal n°1, Phenomen’Eyes n°1 and Rouge Interdit n°14. Make-Up by Nicolas Degennes. Hairstyle Camille Albane by Damien Boissinot (Dress Roberto Cavalli)

Scans at our Gallery!

Liv Tyler Talks About True Beauty

May 20th, 2009 | InStyle Magazine / Celebrity Beauty Buzz
 

Liv Tyler dished some of her beauty secrets to InStyle magazine, where she said “There is no such thing as the perfectly beautiful face. True beauty comes from having happiness in your life.”

On her favorite beauty trick:
Liv learned from a makeup artist, after applying foundation and a little blush, dust your face with translucent powder, then mist with a rosewater spray and lay a Kleenex over your face for a few seconds. You’ll be left with skin that looks like you have no makeup on at all.

On having pale skin:
I tried to do a spray tan once, the whole experience was so strange – standing there naked with a mask on my face while someone sprayed me. I kept thinking, the things we do for beauty are so funny. It wasn’t for me.

Her one beauty indulgence:
There’s nothing better than getting your hair done. I practically bounce out of the salon. It’s on of those things I rarely do, but when I treat myself to it, I think, Man, I wish I could do this every day!

Source: Celebrity Beauty Buzz (interview by InStyle Magazine)

Liv Tyler: a down-to-earth sex symbol

 

May 10th, 2009 | Times Online | Edwina Ings-Chambers
 

The actress is shaking off divorce with a hot new body and a romcom in the works, but her favourite role is being a mum.

There’s something very unexpected about meeting Liv Tyler. It’s not that she’s even more beautiful in real life than she appears in pictures (which she is, by the way; disarmingly so). It’s not that she’s toweringly tall — she’s 5ft 10in and that’s before heels. It’s not that, as an established member of Hollywood royalty, she’s relaxed, well mannered and interested in the people around her — our meeting starts with her asking my PR companion how her breast-feeding is going, and she’s sad to learn it isn’t going anywhere. “Oh, but it only hurts for a couple of weeks and then it’s so great!” she cajoles, before turning to me, diet Coke in hand, and asking: “Shall we go next door and start gabbing?” It’s not even her remarkably glossy mane of dark hair or that not a single wrinkle is perceptible on her 31-year-old face (she’ll be 32 in July, she tells me). No, it’s none of that stuff. It’s that this woman, so often considered to be the voluptuous, homely girl-next-door, has developed some serious phwoar! factor.

There is no sign of squidginess on the body sitting in front of me, one that has, in the past, yo-yoed from slim(ish) to decidedly curvy. It’s quite the opposite now: she is so seriously toned that you can clearly make out delineated quadriceps beneath her black Wolford leggings. She seems more in control — even of her sexuality, which used to spill out like its own force field, just like those soap suds she wallowed in while washing the car in that famous scene from the movie One Night at McCool’s.

In fact, the girl who was unaware for most of her childhood that her real father was the rock god Steven Tyler, and who landed her first lead in a movie aged just 16, appears to have done a bit of a Gwyneth and transformed herself from “normal” to well-honed totty. Of course, for Gwyneth it was about making a point of emerging from a self-imposed hiatus as an (almost) stay-at-home mother. For Tyler, it’s a sadder story: she is emerging from the rubble of divorce from the British musician Royston Langdon, the father of her four-year-old son. Clearly, it has made her toughen up. After all, only a few months ago she admitted to being devastated when he moved out of the family home, and that it was so hard to be in her New York home without him that she had to move to California. “The hardest part is when they leave,” she said. “It also brings up a lot of issues — you might feel like a failure, or like there is something wrong with you. You can’t run away from yourself — you have to just deal with it.”

Deal with it she has. There was last year’s blockbuster movie The Incredible Hulk, following on from starring roles in The Lord of the Rings trilogy. There’s a new romcom, The Romantics, in the works, and she’s just signed on for another two years as spokesperson for Givenchy, having already held the role for six. She’s also streamlining things. “I go through phases,” she says. “But, especially when I got married and I had Milo, I wanted to nest and have a family in a way that I’d always dreamt of doing. And I love to cook — I’m such a Cancer in that way. I like to be at home and then when I work I like to work really hard.”

Now, though, she also works out hard. To escape her heartache, she threw herself into a fitness regime. She reportedly trains with David Kirsch in New York, a fitness guru who has worked with the likes of Heidi Klum. Recent pictures of Tyler and Kirsch kissing in a parking lot sparked rumours of a post-divorce love affair, evidence of our heightened fascination with the love life of Hollywood’s sexiest new singleton.

She’s also learnt that exercise should be enjoyable. “I recently got a hula hoop and I’ve been living in LA [she has said it is hard to be in her New York home without her ex]. I put my favourite song on and stand outside and hula hoop in every weird direction until the song’s over and I’m all out of breath. It’s really fun.”

She has also learnt to be at one with herself. “All you can do really is try your best and accept yourself. I’ll always have a more round stomach, but thank God I have thin ankles.”

There are dichotomies with Tyler, however. When she talks, her voice is still quiet and breathy — more like a child than a sex kitten. Despite this, she seems to be fiercely independent. “I want to be able to decide what I’m doing with my life.” She says she “really enjoys dressing up”, but admits being addicted to her sloppy tracksuit bottoms. “The moment I get home I take everything off and put my sweats on or my pyjamas — I like to be comfortable.”

She clearly loves clothes, but says she has “stopped buying fashion magazines. I mean, it’s such fun, but I don’t want to be influenced by everyone else about what’s cool or not cool; I want to be who I want to be”. So, for all the glamour, she’s a grunge girl at heart. No wonder she admits: “I still have my original pair of Converse trainers from when I was a teenager somewhere in my closet.” She also owns up to driving barefoot. “I can’t drive in heels, so I always take my shoes off. Gwyneth is the best driver in heels ever! I’ve seen her, and I have no idea how she does it.”

It’s also clear that it’s her role as a mother that influences her most, and she wants to be as hands-on as possible — which means the usual disruptions. “Milo [who calls her his princess] wakes up every morning at 5.30 or 6 — ping! — and so the hardest thing is the lack of sleep. I try and go to bed before 10 or 11pm, but it’s so hard. If I don’t get more than six hours of sleep for a few days in a row I start to really lose it and just feel so panicked and stressed. When people ask me, ‘What is the first thing you do in the morning? What’s your routine?’ I say, ‘Er, I get up. I make breakfast,’” she laughs breathily. “‘I beg Milo to try and snooze for 30 more minutes!’ Of course when they’re up, they’re up.”

She has added pressures in the motherhood arena; for her, the yummy-mummy contest at the school gate is on an altogether grander scale. “The hardest thing is taking him to school, as sometimes I’ll literally just throw my coat on over my nightgown, but the paparazzi wait almost every day outside his school. It’s so hard because I don’t want to think about what I’m wearing when I’m taking him to school. I want to get him to school safely, then do whatever I have to do.”

Still, that independent streak kicks in: not for her that dressing-up-for-the-press malarkey. “I’m an on-off celebrity,” she says. “I couldn’t live like that all the time. I don’t know how people do it. Honestly, I like a great trench coat and to throw it on over something; I don’t want to be obsessing all the time about my outfit. I love being a mother and a normal mother as much as I can, doing basic things. And I love my job and being spontaneous in life, and if you’re trotting around in heels the whole time, you can’t really do that.” Just as well she’s held on to those Converse trainers, then. Right now nothing is going to slow Tyler down.

 
LIV’S BEAUTY FAVOURITES

Givenchy Phenomen’Eyes “It’s genius. Why didn’t anybody think of it before?” £18.11

Vernis Please! nail varnish in poetique lily Great on pale skin. £11.75

Rouge Interdit lipstick in poetique iris Not red and not orange, just nice. £17.62

Skin Targeters Black for Light mask It brightens your skin. £52

Prismissime Eyes in poetique browns “You can choose the colours you want.” £32.79

Beauty icons Women with something sympathetic in their eyes

Source: Times Online