Was Emma Watson A Good Belle

Is pirouetting into cinemas this Friday, and ahead of the release we sat down with Emma Watson and fellow cast and crew members to discuss Disney's latest live action remake.

Watson has spoken a lot about her love of strong-willed and independent Belle, and it turns out this iteration of the character is linked to the role she's best known for - Hermione Granger in the

It's interesting, actually, the last day that we finished on set was the anniversary of the day I was cast as Hermione, she said.

Emma Watson As Belle By Gwendy85 On Deviantart

Someone had sent me an email to say that. I felt this strange sense of completion or full circle. I did feel they were spiritually linked in some way, for sure.

It's true that like Hermione, Belle is educated and bookish - in this iteration of the story she's not just an assistant to her inventor father but even invents things herself, including a donkey-powered washing machine in order to allow herself more time to read.

But of course, the fact that she's so interested in literacy and she loves books and the fact that she's so independent-minded – all of these things made me feel close to her and made me feel I could find a way into her and understand her, for sure.

Emma Watson Cast As Belle In Disney's Beauty And The Beast

Talking of her own love of books, Emma went on: I think it helped at times when I felt very confused by the world around me, and at times overwhelmed by the world around me.

It's helped me make sense of things. At other times, books have served as an escape. At other times, books have served almost as a friend.

For me, they're utterly sacred. I think when I was younger, I probably took them for granted a lot more than I do now.

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There's something about being forced to read something when you're at school that takes all the fun out of it. But when you don't have to anymore, then that's all you want— well, that's what I've found, anyway. That's all I want to do.

The Beast in our movie is highly educated, he said. In the animated film, he's illiterate. That really informed every scene with Dan, because he could really go toe to toe with her.

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Emma Watson Reveals Why Belle Was The Perfect Role For Her

As Disney aficionados know, a live-action version of Beauty and the Beast hits theaters on March 17 — nearly 26 years after the original animated film was released. spoke with the original voice actress behind Belle, Paige O'Hara, about the upcoming movie andhow it feels to have Emma Watson step into her shoes.

Perfect casting, O'Hara tells .If I was producing [the movie]I would have cast her as my number one choice, absolutely. I think she’s going to be amazing.

Belle isnot your average Disney princess. According to O'Hara, she is one of the only princesses meant to be in her 20s, as opposed to late teens. Plus her brown hair and bookish quality made Bellea departure from herregal blonde predecessors. This ties into Watson's personality well, according to O'Hara.

Emma Watson Joins Disney's Live Action 'beauty And The Beast' As Belle

[Watson] isvery very smart, and she's got a real warmth about her too and a quirky odd sense of humor, O'Hara explains.I think she's gonna be great.

Watson and the team behind the remake have made some changes to Belle's original character and storyline. In this version, it's Belle who is the inventor — not her father, Maurice. And Watson believes that acommon critique of Belle's (that her relationship with the Beast is glorified Stockholm Syndrome) doesn't hold up when you look at her motivations and personality.

To learn more about changes made to the original, read our full review.Beauty and the Beast arrives in theaters nationwide on March 17.writers accomplished that by giving the Disney princess an empowering new backstory in the 2017 remake: she's an inventor, just like her father. But her wardrobe also helps bring the message across.

Reasons Emma Watson's Version Of Belle In Beauty And The Beast Is Better Than The Original

Belle's look in the opening scene has some major upgrades, costume designer Jacqueline Durran told WWD. Instead of heeled pumps, she wears boots. Her apron doubles as a tool belt. She occasionally tucks her skirt into her waistband so she can freely roam in her bloomers.

From the start, Watson didn't want her Belle to be a corseted, impossible idea of female beauty. So they removed the corset from her iconic yellow ballgown, and replaced it with a flexible bodice. Nothing she wears is inhibiting, Durran explained. She can do whatever she would want to do in any of her costumes. She rides a horse.

Though active-friendly, the dress is still an intricate and delicate piece—it took 10 people and 238 hours to create. They tested multiple yellow fabrics before finding the right shade, embellished the gown in feathers, gold leaf and glitter, and completed the look with hand-painted 18th century heels (that are comfortable enough to run in), Durran previously told

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. The team also replaced most of the cage under Belle's voluminous skirt with layers of organza so it was lighter and easier to move in.

Even Watson's environmentally conscious style played into the costumes. According to Durran, Belle's deep red cloak—from the snowy Something There sequence—was crafted from eco-sustainable and organic material. Leftover blocks from the stage set were recycled and used to print patterns on the cape.

Erica Gonzales is the Senior Culture Editor at ELLE.com, where she oversees coverage on TV, movies, music, books, and more. She was previously an editor at . There is a 75 percent chance she's listening to Lorde right now.

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She’s about to star as the heroine of Disney’s Beauty and the Beast, but post-Potter she has received more plaudits for her activism than her acting

I t may seem strange that one of the most anticipated films of 2017 should be a live-action remake of a Disney cartoon about Stockholm syndrome, but Beauty and the Beast has already built up the kind of fan base that is normally reserved for rebooted sci-fi franchises and adaptations of erotic bestsellers. When the first trailer went online in November, it was viewed a record 127m times in 24 hours, beating the previous leaders in that particular field, Star Wars: The Force Awakens and Fifty Shades Darker. Stranger still, 27m of those views were on the Facebook page of the film’s star, Emma Watson.

That figure might suggest that the 26-year-old who played Hermione Granger in the Harry Potter series is now a bona fide superstar. But Watson’s celebrity status is slightly more complicated. As a Hollywood player, she isn’t going to give Jennifer Lawrence or Scarlett Johansson sleepless nights, but as an actor-activist she has the kind of influence that would have been unimaginable a generation ago.

Role Of Belle Proves Pivotal For Actress

For proof that Watson isn’t yet an A-lister, you just have to glance at her filmography since she hung up her Gryffindor robes. Broadly speaking, she has taken supporting roles in ensemble projects, such as Simon Curtis’s My Week with Marilyn and Darren Aronofsky’s Noah, and above-the-title roles in films that vanished without trace. Alejandro Amenábar’s repressed-memory chiller Regression didn’t recoup its $20m budget, and Colonia (AKA The Colony) pulled in a grand total of £47 in its opening weekend in the UK. Meanwhile, she turned down the title role in Kenneth Branagh’s Cinderella, and accepted then dropped out of La La Land, thus handing Emma Stone