Anna Kendrick says she felt like a ‘bystander’ to the ‘Twilight’ pop-culture phenomenon

Anna Kendrick has a confession to make.

“I’m 30 seconds late because I turned on my camera and I saw that I had chocolate right here,” Kendrick says, pointing to the corner of her mouth on our video call before joking that she should have kept the smudge intact for the occasion.

It’s the exact kind of self-deprecating candor Kendrick is known for, with her scene-stealing turns in movies like the “Twilight” series and the “Pitch Perfect” films. Life, at least in this moment, feels like it’s imitating Kendrick’s art.

But more than two decades after earning a Tony Award nomination at age 12 for the Broadway musical “High Society” and a decade-plus after landing an Oscar nomination for “Up in the Air,” this “scrappy little nobody” is branching out from playing the endearing, often musically inclined protagonist.

In Paul Feig’s 2018 dark comedy “A Simple Favor,” she portrayed a mommy blogger with a dark side and an unexpected knack for digging into unsolved mysteries. In the 2022 psychological drama “Alice, Darling,” Kendrick tapped into her own past experience with a toxic ex for the titular role.

In her latest film, “Woman of the Hour,” which marks her directorial debut, Kendrick plays Sheryl, an aspiring actor who has a close encounter with a serial killer when they’re both cast on the competition show “The Dating Game.”

The premise is so wild that it almost seems fictional, except it’s based on the true story of serial killer Rodney Alcala, who was convicted of the murders of seven women and girls and died in incarceration in 2021. Between committing crimes, Alcala competed and won a date with Cheryl Bradshaw on “The Dating Game” in 1978.

In “Woman of the Hour,” Kendrick’s character narrowly avoids becoming one of his victims, but heaviness looms over the film as it details how Alcala charmed unsuspecting young women before killing them.

While Kendrick says she’s not interested in depicting explicit or graphic violence, particularly against women, she adds that it was important that she didn’t sanitize the story.

“I think the script has so many great themes about the way that we often shrink ourselves in order to survive emotionally, financially, physically,” Kendrick explains. “There was just this kind of visceral threat of annihilation that hangs over the whole piece. I think you get older and you experience difficult things in your life and that just doesn’t feel like unfamiliar territory anymore.”

Still, Kendrick is self-aware enough to know people may be surprised that her latest project is a far cry from a cappella group hijinks.

“Even though this is a pretty extreme genre in comparison to what I’m known for,” she says, “I felt very personally attached to the material.”

For the latest interview in Business Insider’s “Role Play” series, Kendrick reminisces about being a fly on the wall while filming the “Twilight” franchise, addresses those “Pitch Perfect 4” rumors, and teases the twisty sequel to “A Simple Favor.”

On being a ‘bystander’ to the ‘Twilight’ pop culture phenomenon

It’s been 16 years since the first “Twilight” movie came out. Is there anything that you look back on now and view differently about the franchise and the time you spent on it?

I guess I don’t really view it that differently because my experience was really unique in that cast. Almost everyone else in the cast had to treat every moment like life and death, good versus evil, our eternal souls are on the line — and all I had to do was show up and make a snarky comment as I kind of pass through the frame.

So I really felt like such a bystander to it in a way that I was very grateful to be privy to this kind of cultural phenomenon without it really impacting me in the ways that I think would’ve felt really challenging and overwhelming. The fans of those books are so invested that even if you came into the franchise really late and you had one line, but you were playing a vampire or a werewolf, they’re obsessed with you. They’re picking apart every detail of your costume and your gestures and whatever, and I just didn’t have that level of responsibility.

I could imagine people saying, “Oh, I wish I could have been a fly on the wall to the whole ‘Twilight’ set,” and I am like, “Oh, I kind of got to be that.” I just really wasn’t in the thick of it.

On her ‘Up in the Air’ costar George Clooney’s small acts of kindness and those ‘Pitch Perfect 4’ rumors

George Clooney has a reputation for being a classy guy in Hollywood. What did you learn from working with someone of that caliber early in your career on “Up in the Air?”

George is so generous in every way as an actor. He was really the first person that I worked with where I would see him listening to the notes that other actors would get, and he would adjust his off-camera performance to help elicit whatever adjustment was called for. And I think that that’s just the sign of somebody really willing to extend themselves for someone else.

My first day, the first shot that I was in on my first day of filming, he said something to me kind of under his breath almost about like, “Man, do you get nervous on the first day? I get so nervous.” And at the time, I was just like, “Yeah, totally. I get really nervous.”

It wasn’t until eight years later or something that it occurred to me that he does not get nervous, but that was so sweet of him to say. For him to not just say, “Hey, it’s OK if you’re nervous” — to take it on himself as though, “Hey, kid, we’re in this together,” was just the sweetest thing.

I have to ask about “Pitch Perfect.” In April, Rebel Wilson said a fourth movie was possibly in development, and then Anna Camp said she didn’t think so. Then Elizabeth Banks said, “They’re always talking about it.” So please tell me: what is going on? Do you have any updates on your end about a fourth movie?

Well, I have no earthly idea. Frankly, I’m hearing some of this from you. I’ll say that sometimes on the group chat that we all have, we sort of lament that everyone is so busy and working all the time, which is wonderful, of course. But it means that we’re almost never able to get all of us in a room at the same time whenever we try to find a date that would work for everybody.

So it does sort of feel like, oh God, would it take another movie to ensure that we were all actually in the same place at the same time again? So I don’t know. I guess selfishly, that’s almost the main reason that I would wish for such a thing.

One of your other big movies is “Into the Woods.” What did you learn or observe from working alongside people like Meryl Streep and Chris Pine? That’s a mega cast in general.

It’s always hard to put into words what you learn from working with people because they’re not sitting you down and having a talk with you. But I’ll say that Meryl very much has that Clooney thing of being exactly what you want them to be, exactly what you’d hope for, and being really, really generous.

If anything, I think it was interesting to see people who were so established and so talented and had so much experience watching how almost every single person was feeling insecure about singing.

It was very sweet. It really was this level playing field because Sondheim’s music is so difficult that it really felt like any hierarchy that might have formed just never had a chance to take hold because everybody was kind of equally terrified about singing the songs.

I feel like you being a Tony nominee at 12 puts you in a certain category, though.

Oh, God, no. I was absolutely terrified, particularly because, I don’t know how interesting this is, but because my vocal range is much more naturally in the realm of the character Little Red. So, trying to sing Cinderella in a legit soprano voice was something that really scared the crap out of me. So yeah, we were all floundering and just holding onto each other for dear life.

On the ‘Simple Favor’ sequel having even more plot twists than the first film

People are also really excited about the “Simple Favor” sequel. Obviously, you can’t say much about the movie, but what was it like going back to work with that team? Did you feel any pressure for the sequel to succeed or be good? There are a lot of sequels that are notoriously not great.

I haven’t seen it yet, but based on what we were filming, Paul has really managed to make something that is more insane and twisty than the first one, which is quite a feat.

And I was very, very grateful that the first thing that I was acting in after directing was with a team that I had worked with before, because I was nervous that the next film that I acted in, people might think that I suddenly was really nosy and opinionated because, oh, she directed one movie and she thinks she knows everything now.

But because I’d already worked with Paul, the director, and John Schwartzman, the DP, they already knew I was nosy and opinionated. They just attributed it to my flawed personality rather than some new development. So I already knew that they were willing to put up with me.

In your book “Scrappy Little Nobody,” you detail the effort that you put in to go to auditions when you were younger and trying to make it as an actor. Are there any roles that people would be surprised to learn that you auditioned for?

Oh God. I don’t know. I hear stories like that, and if anything, I’m always like, there were so many years where I couldn’t even get a callback for “American Pie 7” or whatever that I wish I had some really sexy story about some huge blockbuster that I was this close to.

But no, mostly it’s just a graveyard of embarrassing auditions for embarrassing gigs.

On the ‘Bridgerton’ star that she has a ‘talent crush’ on

You previously said that women are the most generous scene partners. Who are some female actors that you’re itching to work with next?

Oh God, this is always so embarrassing.

I think that you should manifest it.

I am slightly obsessed with Claudia Jessie from “Bridgerton.” She’s such a scene-stealer, and yeah, I think I’ve just got a real talent crush. That was the first person who came to mind.

Are you a “Bridgerton” fan?

It’s one of those shows that I’ll put on and continually be like, “Should I go to the next episode? Where is this going to go? I feel like this is going to lead somewhere heartbreaking.”

But yeah, that Shondaland, they’re really excellent at keeping you absolutely hooked in because even if something terrible happens, it’s like, I can’t look away.

Where does your “Lip Sync Battle” with John Krasinski rank in terms of career highlights? There was also a J.Lo cameo in there. I feel like I needed to mention this important part of your career.

It’s so funny. John directed me in a movie years and years ago, so he asked me to do his episode of “Lip Sync Battle.” It’s one of those things that just seems so silly and fun. It was the first season, so nobody knew what the show was yet. So he asked me to do it, and it just seemed like such a silly, fun, easy ask.

And then the more that it became like, “Oh, do you want pyrotechnics? Do you want to pop out of the floor?” I was like, “Wait, sorry, what is this, a legit stage performance?”

So I started to be like, “Goddammit Krasinski, what have you roped me into?” And then when they were like, “Hey, for that J.Lo song, I think we could get J.Lo to come.” I was like, “Well, then I take it all back. I’m a big fan of you asking me to do this.”

This interview has been edited and condensed for length and clarity.

“Woman of the Hour” is now streaming on Netflix.