Cameron's cool as she gets cruel

by BAZ BAMIGBOYE, Daily Mail

Last updated at 12:23 16 September 2005


Cameron Diaz is despicable, no two ways about it. Not in person, I hasten to add. But in a new movie opening in London in November called In Her Shoes, the actress gets caught with her sister's mister and behaves in a generally shoddy way.

She plays Maggie and her screen sibling Rose is played by that great unsung actress Toni Collette. "Maggie creates chaos and Rose would always clear it up. But Maggie's reached a new low," Cameron explained.

Mercifully, this is just the movies. In real life, of course, Cameron's a cutie - although she did confess to not being perfect.

"I can be pretty self-centred at times but I don't think to the point where I create chaos and ruin other people's lives," the actress said when we met at the Toronto International Film Festival, where the movie was being premiered.

Cameron's beau Justin Timberlake has a film being screened at the festival, too. It will be shown this weekend - but by that time Cameron will be arriving in Sydney to promote In Her Shoes with Ms Collette and director Curtis Hanson.

Cameron admits that Maggie's not a pretty sight. "She's reached the gutter," she agreed.

Make-up artists created powders and creams to make her skin look blemished.

"I didn't want her looking like the totally gorgeous Cameron Diaz you normally see," director

Hanson said.

The movie has been connecting at the deepest levels at the two screenings I attended, leaving women (and a few men) sobbing into their Kleenex, particularly when the sisters find their grandmother - a marvellously understated (for her!) Shirley MacLaine - at a retirement home in Florida.

"All three women are lonely in their way and all three have to be brave enough to face change," Cameron said. The star cut her usual $20million fee in half to help with the film's budget.

She did something else that was very generous: She allows Ms Collette many of the film's best moments and the chance to be a best actress Oscar contender. And - who knows? - Cameron could wind up as one as well.

Miss Diaz heads to London in November to prepare for a romantic comedy called Holiday.

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