Hard to believe but The Runaways has only just hit over in the UK.  It goes to show how frequently the production companies and US distributors have no real control as far as making sure things come out on similar dates overseas. Kristen Stewart recently did some UK press and mentions Twilight. (photo credit: Tina Gill)

“It’s tough being Kristen Stewart. Her performance as the indecisive, lip-biting heroine, Bella Swan, in the Twilight films has seen the 20-year-old American actress emerge as a rather reluctant poster-girl for 21st-century teenage angst.

She has lived out much of her teens under the media spotlight: she had just turned 17 when she made the first Twilight film and, on its release, became an overnight sensation.

Meanwhile, Stewart’s on-screen (and off-screen) relationship with her co-star Robert Pattinson has turned her into a regular on the covers of gossip magazines.

It’s not surprising that she has struggled to cope with the media attention, and her discomfort when dealing with interviewers has opened her up to accusations of being surly and defensive. I have not found her so on the previous occasions we have spoken.

She can be unnervingly silent – she thinks carefully about each question and often has many stabs at a reply before settling on a finished sentence – but she is intelligent and engaging. In truth, like many women her age, she’s probably just a little bit embarrassed.

‘I am quite shy and people think I’m aloof,’ she explains, sitting opposite me in a suite at a sumptuous Beverly Hills hotel.

‘I get that all the time: “She should not be in this position because she can’t handle it,” and, “She is stuck up and doesn’t want to talk to anybody. She is miserable, and if you are so miserable stop doing it.”

But do you have a choice? I want to be an actor, I am just not very comfortable talking about myself.

‘When I did the first Twilight movie they were like, “Now you have to go and do media training,” and I was, “Screw you! Do you think you are going to wrap up all my little insecurities and throw them out the window?

Do you think you are going to put soundbites in my mouth? I’ll do your course, but that’s not going to happen.’

And she is, indeed, refreshingly soundbite-free and unashamed of her insecurities.”

Read the rest on the UK Telegraph. The reporter’s opinion of Kristen very much mirrors what our own personal experience has been with her since 2008, she’s somewhat awkward, but one-on-one she’s great, she cares about fans and getting it right,  thinks about her answers before speaking resulting in pauses you could drive a truck through, and is refreshingly honest (after the excruciating pause)not just coming out with the same old studio programmed line.

Kristen Stewart filmed Welcome to the Rileys (a film that is getting lots of positive buzz from the critics that saw it at various film festivals) in between New Moon and Eclipse. The costume designer, Kim Bowen, talks about working with the film’s stars. She seems to echo what others have said about Kristen on the Twilight films, that she is very concerned with doing the right thing for the character and that she cares about her projects.

“Kristen Stewart’s investment in the character:

“Kristen is a very invested actress. She has been doing the Twilight films, and it was very important to her to play this character with a real dose of reality. I don’t think she wanted anything frivolous out of it, I don’t think she wanted to be glamorous. That wasn’t important to her, she wanted it to be real.”

“Kristen is a very courageous actress. She wanted to be fully that character of Mallory. She didn’t care about looking beautiful; in fact she thought quite the opposite. She had the make-up artist cover her with bruises and cold sores. Kristen looked a wreck half the time. She didn’t have any desire to be physically perfect.”

See a larger write up and listen to the podcast at Inside the Backlot.

Kristen Stewart talked to the UK’s Daily Mail to promote The Runaways, which just came out on DVD. She talks about her Twilight experience and media perception. The way the reporter describes Kristen’s reaction is the one that we have always personally had with her, that she trips over her words because she is so wrapped up in really wanting to say what she means the right way, not that she is arrogant or doesn’t care.

“It was tough because I only had a really tiny window of free time, but I wanted to make the movie. And I didn’t want to get any older because I’m already older than Joan was when she was in the Runaways,” says Stewart. “I just crammed it in, and hoped that it would work. And it did. It’s nice to switch to movies like this between Twilights, but I’m excited to go and do the next couple of years of Bella’s life.”

She arrives for our interview looking elegantly sophisticated in a black mini-dress with her dark hair pulled up behind her head in a bun. Yet she confesses: “When I dress up, I have to have a lot of help. I was in a T-shirt until a few minutes ago.”

Like the teenage Joan Jett, Stewart has a sullen, almost surly look, which proves to be misleading, because she willingly attempts to answer questions, thinking carefully before she speaks but sometimes finding herself unable to articulate her thoughts.

“It’s impossible to always get across what I’m trying to say, but, if I just stay honest, then I’m not going to look back on any of these interviews and wonder what I was trying to do or be,” she says.”

See more in the Daily Mail. Kristen is currently filming On the Road in Canada