It was about a year ago that the pop culture hail storm that rained down on then-Oscar nominee Anne Hathaway reached the peak of its ferociousness. She had collected a few awards (or “weapons against self-doubt” as she referred to them) by that point, and for as many think pieces as there were about why Jennifer Lawrence is a humble, honest star, there was an equal amount proclaiming the opposite to be true about Hathaway. The actress took a step back from the spotlight after a banner year, which also included “The Dark Knight Rises,” but Hathaway resurfaced this past week at the Sundance Film Festival with a new movie and a message.


Don’t worry, internet. Anne Hathaway knows that you’re not very fond of her.



When MTV spoke with Hathaway, she explained why “Song One,” the low-budget story of a woman connecting with the music idol of her comatose brother, was the right project to follow up her enormous 2012. The project had been a long time coming, and the elements lined up at just the right time.


Also, spending time among friends didn’t seem like a bad proposition after the whole internet turned against you.


“We had been working on the script for almost two years before we actually started shooting. All of the elements came together in that moment,” Hathaway said. “I don’t want to bring up a sore subject or anything — I think my publicist is probably like ‘No, no no’ — but I had just taken a little bit of a beating from the internet. It was the greatest thing in the world to get to work with my friends and get to go to work every day and bring Kate’s vision to life, which is a vision that I believe in. I felt like it was really cool. I felt like I had a secret.”


You have to imagine that with most recent Oscar winners, each subsequent project has to offer something special in order to earn that actor’s time. For Hathaway, “Song One” brought something new to the table in a number of ways.


“There are elements of the movie that people have never seen before. They’ve never seen a movie directed by Kate Barker-Froyland,” she said. “They’ve never seen Johnny Flynn star in a movie. Even though Jenny Lewis and Johnny Rice have written music for other films, I don’t think it’s ever been so prominently featured. There are a lot of things to discover in this film, and I’m excited to watch people discover it.”