TORONTO – If Blake Lively wanted a role as far from the patrician Serena van der Woodsen she plays in “Gossip Girl” as she could get, she found it with Krista in “The Town.”
An unwed mother who likes to party, Krista has serious dependency issues with OxyContin, alcohol and sex.
“I’m on a TV show that goes 10 months out of the year,” Lively, 23, said at a Four Seasons Hotel press conference at the Toronto International Film Festival.
So when there are any roles that fit into her free time, “You have to ask: Is it something that you really want to do, or do you just want the time off?”
Krista, she added, is “a terrific part, a part that I was wrong for probably in more ways than I was right for, but I selfishly really wanted to play it because I just loved it so much. So I pursued the part and here I am.”
Lively had her Boston accent down when she auditioned for Ben Affleck, the crime drama’s director who also plays Krista’s ex-boyfriend.
When the audition finished, Affleck, who had never seen “Gossip Girl,” asked her, “What part of Boston are you from?”
There was another kind of authenticity Affleck wanted as well.
“Before we actually started shooting, he did so much work in finding all these wonderful resources for us,” Lively said.
“There were women that we got to spend time with, the places that these people go, to go around the North End, read magazine clippings. He had this well of knowledge for us to tap into if we wanted, all of these resources.
“He was so diligent about really understanding the people and the roots, where they come from, and also just their attitude. That was such an important thing: How they would respond to a detective vs. one of their friends.
“Then when we were on set it was just such a comfortable world that we were just able to step into and lose our-selves.”
