FOR THE LOVE OF AUDREY

by Jennifer Graham

"Would like a tissue?" Someone asks Jennifer Love Hewitt

It's nearly midnight, and she's jumping up and down to warm herself in a bracing Montreal wind. "No, I'm sure Audrey Hepburn's nose ran sometimes," she replies, giggling. "Maybe not in her movies, but I'm sure it happened!"

Sartorially speaking, she is head-to-toe Audrey---black Capri pants, sweater and ballet slippers. But between the scenes she's shooting for THE AUDREY HEPBURN STORY, the 21 year-old widely known as "Love" comports herself more like a pep-squad president, determined to energize the crowd. In this case, that would be the two dozen crew members outside the lakeside mansion that's standing in as the set on 1954's SABRINA, which starred Hepburn, Humphrey Bogart and William Holden.

"Where does a sheep gets its hair cut?" Hewitt calls out. "At the baa-baa shop!" Moments later, she's back filming a tearful break-up scene with THE OTHERS' GABRIEL MACHT, who's playing Holden, with who Hepburn had an ill-fated love affair. "There are actors who keep doing the further adventures of themselves," says the TV-movie's co-producer and director, STEVE ROBMAN, who also directed her as Sarah Reeves on the Fox drama PARTY OF FIVE from 1995 to 1999. "But Love has enough talent to fit her personality into a role that isn't herself."

Robman's claim is more controversial than it sounds. Audrey Hepburn remains a globally cherished icon, most famous for film classics like the star-making "Roman Holiday," for which she won an Oscar, and "Breakfast at Tiffany's"; Hewitt is a teen idol who earned her marquee status from a TV drama and two hit slasher movies, I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER and its sequel. The criticism even extends to blood type. Hepburn made wispy cool; Hewitt says her curvaceous figure has prompted women to "come up to me and ask, 'Who's your doctor?' And I'm like, 'Um, no doctor necessary.'" In any case, she's wearing a minimizing bra for the role. No wonder Audreyphiles feel Hewitt is hardly a velvet glove fit---and has no business thinking she is.

Interestingly enough, Hewitt almost seems to side with her naysayers. "I believe [Hepburn] could never, ever be copied," she says of her idol, who died in 1993 at the age of 63. "I had such a fear what people were going to say about me playing her. Then I said a really big, fat prayer and decided to go with my gut instinct, which was my favorite person on the plant."

Hewitt who is also coproducing this three-hour, $7 million dollar bio pic, chronicles Hepburn's life from 1935, when she was 6 years-old, in prewar Belgium to 1961, when she filmed BREAKFAST AT TIFFANY'S.

ERIC McCORMACK (NBC's WILL & GRACE), who plays Mel Ferrer, Hepburn's first husband, thinks Hewitt is up to the challenge: "Let's just say I get the impression she saw SABRINA a lot of times." But he acknowledges that she's making a gutsy movie: "How many times have we seen somebody work their butt off with makeup and a voice and a limp, and the reviewers say they just didn't buy it?"

THE AUDREY HEPBURN STORY also happens to be airing soon after Hewitt's PARTY OF FIVE spin-off, TIME OF YOUR LIFE, was yank from the schedule after having been skewered by critics and ignored by viewers, though Fox plans to give it another chance this summer. "People obviously still like her," says TIME coproducer Chris Keyser, "but for some reason they have not connected to her show." Hewitt remains philosophical: "You have your minute and when you're the big, hot thing. Then a week later people are like, 'Well, now we've got another hot thing.'"

Not that all is bleak: she will soon play Sigourney Weaver's daughter in the film HEARTBREAKERS has another year on her Neutrogena print-and-TV endorsement contract, and recently clinched Blockbuster and People's Choice awards. As Susan Lyne, ABC's Executive Vice President of TV movies and miniseries, says, "In favorite actress category, [surveys show that among 12 to 24 year-olds] she is over Jennifer Aniston, over Cameron Diaz, over Julia Roberts."

How does one trump Julia Roberts? Grow up outside Waco, Texas, with big brother Todd and speech pathologist mother Pat (who divorced Danny Hewitt when Jennifer was a baby). Stay best friends with mom; in day she'll end up a partner in your company and your roommate. Move to Los Angeles when you're ten and quickly start landing TV and movie roles. Join PARTY OF FIVE at 16, then drive the ticket sales of two movies. And right around you play your favorite actress, ever, in a TV movie, start your own production company, LOVE SPELL ENTERTAINMENT.

"I know this sounds dorky, but I've always wanted an office," says Hewitt, back on the AUDREY set. "My dream growing up was to be a secretary. Then this whole acting thing got in the way. But I still bring post-its with me to work and I just write people messages: 'So-and-so-called.' It's very exciting." Here she pauses for more late-night giggling---then pretends, for a moment, that she is the interviewer, assessing her.

"She was nice enough, but a bit odd," Hewitt quips. "Is it Audrey---or is it just her? I guess we'll find out when we see the movie!" Either way, Love carries on.

Story: © 2000 TV Guide - a News Corporation Company. All Rights Reserved.
Image: © 2000 Robert Greenwald Productions Inc. in association with Endemol Entertainment,
Love Spell Entertainment Inc. and The Audrey Hepburn Estate (Licensed by Sean Ferrer and Luca Dotti). All Rights Reserved.