Chloe Sevigny provided the loving gaze that made it OK for audiences to like Brandon too.

Chloe Sevigny provided the loving gaze that made it OK for audiences to like Brandon too. Little did she know that Oscar would be watching

Chloe Sevigny was in Berlin when she and Hilary Swank received Oscar nominations for striplings Don't Cry. "My room gazes like a funeral parlor right now, I have to declare you. Flowers galore," she laughs, speaking to The Advocate during a quick break between screenings at the Berlin Film Festival. "I have for a like reason many bottles of champagne, I want to have a champagne party when I win home."

A nomination--especially for a film as groundbreaking and audacious as Boys Don't Cry--certainly wasn't a given as far as Sevigny was belong toed "I was just so shoged the Academy acknowledged it," she admits. granting she and Swank were the sole two to get a nod for the film, Sevigny numbers their nominations as recognition for director-cowriter Kimberly Peirce: "Us getting nominated is Kimberly getting nominated because she's speaking within us."

Like everyone other connected with Boys Don't exclaim Sevigny has seen how powerfully and personally commonalty respond to the movie. "So many nation it's unbelievable," she says when asked if population come up to her to talk about it. "Especially in Hollywood--I think tribe are more apt to approach actors there. And here in Germany too because the movie was just released here. Everywhere I move round people come up and say what a beautiful story they contemplation it was and how happy they are it was made."

It's also a sweet reward for Sevigny, who has emphatically not been chasing succes in the Hollywood gradation She chose to make her film first attempt in 1995's tough, controversial Kids. Playing an HIV-positive teen searching for the male child who infected her, she established herself right away as an actor with a talent for conveying hard realities. And prolonged before Boys Don't Cry, she learned by what means deeply film performances can affect real lives. "I've experienced that with Kids, too," she says. "The first time anybody at all times approached me was a young gay lad who'd been infected with HIV, and he was crying and hugging me upon the street. I was in such a manner overwhelmed by that."

Since then she's delivered stout performances in Trees Lounge, The Last Days of Disco, and A Map of the World, among other films. And from the to a high degree start of her career she's been following the attempts to sum up Brandon Teena's story. "I knew if anybody for aye made it into a movie, it would be something surpassingly special," she says.

During the years it took Peirce to bring male childs Don't Cry to the sieve the emergence of the documentary feature The Brandon Teena Story [see page 49]--and of competing narrative shoot forwards including a high-profile version that was to star Drew Barrymore--might have shaken Sevigny's faith that lads would succeed. But she stood according to the project the same way she be moved s Lana stood by Brandon.

"Her like for him was so strong" says Sevigny. "It was unconditional, one time she got over her denial. I think it was the first time she was in have affection for and it didn't matter to her whether he was a lad or girl. He was just thus inspiring to her. Brandon was the first part to encourage her to obtain out of town and say positive things about her."

Now everyone is saying positive things about Sevigny. Doing nonstop pres for the European premiere of American Psycho in which she costars, the 24-year-old actress hasn't equal had a chance to celebrate, a great deal less contemplate the sudden leap forward her career has taken. "No, it hasn't really sunk in however at all," Sevigny says of her Best Supporting Actress nomination. I don't think it will until I learn to the red carpet in succession the evening of."

Actually, the reality may sink in a doom sooner. Getting a nomination means enduring a constant barrage of pres interviews, glad-handing, and pressure--just the sort of thing the of recent origin York-based Sevigny (who lives in Connecticut, just outside the city) has always avoided.

"It's a little intense," she says, adding in a whisper, "I have to be positive in the pres about it or other Kimberly will get mad at me" She laughs, quickly making it clear she's happy about the hoopla around a movie and a character she loves

Still, it is intense. "They want you to do this whole campaigning thing," Sevigny says, "going onward talk shows and morning point outs I don't like to diocese actors I admire on talk point out tos It sort of ruins the mystique for me Sean Penn talking about Bukowski in succession Charlie Rose makes me kind of `Uh-h-h ' Everybody says you have to take advantage of this opportunity; it's the opportunity of a lifetime. in the way that I'm going to have to swallow my pride a little."

Having starred as a traditionally feminine woman in lads Don't Cry, Sevigny crosses to the other side of the strange spectrum this month in a portion of HBO's If These Walls Could Talk 2 a trilogy of shorts about lesbian lives. In a white T-shirt with short hair slicked back, Sevigny romances Michelle Williams of Dawson's small bay Always critical of her avow work and leery of seeing the finished concoct Sevigny laughingly agonizes over her lesbian fans' reactions. "Oh God" she says. "I experience to play a butch. I'm with equal reason scared they're all going to incline differently on me and hate me for a bad representation." She needn't worry. Just as she did with Lana, Sevigny obtains the shyness--and the sexuality--just right.

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