Mia Kirshner Up Close
With a book out in October and her role as serial womaniser Jenny Schecter dominating television screens across the UK and US, Mia Kirshner has been a busy lady. FemaleFirst grabbed a few minutes to chat to her about life, lesbians and of course, The L Word.
How would you describe your character Jenny on The L Word, are you anything like her
No way, not a chance - She is extremely complicated, maddening, passionate, difficult, loyal and also completely disloyal, just a contradiction.What can we expect from the next season of The L Word
Well the UK has just released Season Four on DVD, but the next series (Five) is my favourite season so far as Jenny is the most confident that she's ever been and you can expect a grander, more outlandish and outrageous character.
When The L Word began did you ever think it would be as successful as it has been
No not at all, in fact, I don't think any of the cast members did, you have no idea what the success of the show would be so it's really just been a wonderful time for us all.
Do you think Jenny will ever settle down
No, not a chance, I think she will always be changing and doing the thing which you least expect her to do. She is definitely predictably unpredictable.
You have been voted as one of the most hated characters in the series, do you enjoy playing this kind of role
Great! I think she's a character that inspirers reactions with people which it think is testament to creative writing so yes, I think that a character should be like that.
Jenny is a writer and has released a novel on the show, similarly you are about to release a book in October, can you tell me a little bit about the book itself
First of all, it is just as coincidence and is actually a very special book for me so please don't draw comparisons because it's something I've worked on for seven years.
Basically I would do The L Word and then go to work on the book which is about displacement in countries such as Burma, Chechnya, Malawi and Mexico. What I would do is to go to these places and get people such as child solders, sex workers and women that had been through forced labour and rape to write about their lives. It feels very much like a paper documentary and each chapter has its own graphic novel done by some of the worlds best comic book artists such as Joe Sacco. There are lots of short stories based on events that happened to people in my own writing but it's definitely a collaborative book.
How did you find the writing process when you were working on your book
Pretty painful, I didn't want to write for the book initially, it was never my plan to write but when I was describing to my publisher what I had been through in my life such as being pulled over by the Thai Military Police and searched they said to me "Look, you really need to write about what you saw."
At first I was really resistant because as an actor there is some cheesy-ness which comes with that and it takes away from the seriousness but I submitted a sample and then they agreed to publish the book. I realised that it's not easy to write but it is actually surprising how much you can get done when you're writing and not procrastinating, but once you've started you can't stop, and I've come from a family of writers so I have always written since I was young.
Working on The L Word and writing the book has been and odyssey really. I was lucky enough to be able not to have to work whilst we weren't filming the L-word so I could focus on the book and the money from the L Word paid for the book too.
To what extent was the book inspired by your family members who were displaced during the Second World War
Very much so because I come from a background of holocaust survivors where many people in my family were killed and we don't know our personal history and I grew up thinking that it is important for the survivors to document what happened to them because I think we can learn a lot from these experiences and I actually think that writing and putting books together is much more of a skill than acting is. Its just funny that the acting stuff came first.
When you started acting you found yourself in a lot of sexually provocative roles, is that they type of character you enjoy playing
I think the characters you choose reflect a part of life that you're interested in, particularly with me in the past as that is something I wanted to explore I don't know now whether it is something that interesting to me.
After ranking highly in various magazine's 'Sexiest women' polls, how do you cope with male attention
I didn't even know I was in any of these polls! I don't really think of myself that way, I don't think most women thinking they are sexy. I would like to think that I'm modest, I think it's important to feel sexy but not to base how sexy you are based on what people say in a poll. I think it's important to do things for your body and mind which make you feel sexy and then other people will think you're sexy too. I think that people often dress for a man or a woman and I really think you should dress for yourself, from the inside out and the people who I think are sexy have a lot of self-confidence and feel good about themselves.
The L Word Season Four is available to buy on DVD now.
FemaleFirst - Ruth Harrison