Jennifer Lawrence Talks About Her Friendship With Emma Stone and Opens Up About Her Stolen Nude Photos

Actress also opens up about the gender wage gap and going "Grey Gardens" with Amy Schumer in Glamour's February 2016 issue

By Zach Johnson Jan 05, 2016 2:46 PMTags
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Think you know Jennifer Lawrence? You're probably right.

As she herself says in Glamour's February issue, "I don't feel like I'm misunderstood."

What she does feel, however, is "over-paid-attention-to." Though she's beloved by millions, she admits, "I'm not trying to be a GIF. I'm not trying to be a picked-up-on-Twitter quote. All I'm trying to do is act. And I have to promote these movies. And I am, at the end of the day, I guess, a f--king lunatic. So if you record what I'm saying, it's gonna be goofy. What do I do? What do I do? I'm just a girl, sitting in front of the world and asking them to forgive her for speaking."

Of course, she doesn't need to speak to generate headlines—she can be a bit of a klutz. "I spilled milk this morning. Last night I spilled red wine all over the rug. All I want to be able to do is just walk from one place to another without falling! It's so annoying, honestly. And now I've gone from the charming, like, 'Oh my God, whoops, I fell'—now it really pisses me off. 'Cause it's embarrassing now. So now I fall, and I'm like, 'Stop looking at me! Don't take a picture!'" she says. Lawrence explains that it's "embarrassing" to have people think she's faking her mishaps to gain attention. "When I fell the second year at the Oscars, I was just like, 'F--k,'" she recalls. "'Cause I would think the same exact thing. I know it looks like a gag. It's really, really not."

Instead, she would prefer that people paid attention to her acting career. Lawrence knew at an early age that she was destined for Hollywood. Raised in Kentucky, she convinced her parents to let her leave home as a teen to make her dream come true. "My mom always says she…wanted me to fail so that I could come home, because not failing meant me being in New York. She lost a daughter, really, at 14. I mean, she's very proud of me," she says. "She got on board when she saw how happy it made me. Because I knew. Emma Stone and I—we stayed up until, like, six in the morning talking about it the other night. We both were just like, 'I just knew.'"

Like Stone, Lawrence became a superstar overnight, but that's not what bonds the two actresses. "I love Emma. She cracks me up; she's so 'theater,'" she says. "She's so adorable."

The two went out to dinner with Adele late last year, creating a new set of #SquadGoals. "Adele and I met, like, a year or so ago. Adele and I are a bit harsher; Emma's never had a bad thought about anybody in her life. It's so weird; I don't like new people. But these two women—and Amy [Schumer]—they're really lovely. And they're so normal. I feel like I'm hanging out with my friends—my friends that don't give a f--k about what I do. Amy and I have a life plan—we were with Diane Sawyer in Martha's Vineyard for Thanksgiving. Not to brag. Diane politely threw it out, and then we're sitting at the dinner table with her family, like, 'We shouldn't be here.' Anyway, Amy's always wanted to live on Martha's Vineyard, and we saw this house, and we're like, 'This is where we're gonna Grey Gardens, and we're gonna grow old and crazy together.' That's our life plan."

Lawrence has always been a girls' girl, as her Lenny letter about the gender wage gap proved last year. The piece was written in response to the Sony hack, which revealed Lawrence had earned substantially less than her male co-stars in 2013's American Hustle. Published just before The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 2 hit theaters (and smashed records), Lawrence's essay started a major discussion about equal pay. "As women we don't know we're at a deficit because we have vaginas. It wasn't until they had a headline like, 'Even though she's a woman!' And I was like, 'Oh. I didn't know to be looking out for that," she says, joking, "How did I do it, getting a period once a month?" Humor aside, Lawrence says, "I think there was this studio mentality for a long time that women and girls can relate to a male hero, but boys and men can't relate to a female hero. But that's simply not true. And so we've fortunately proved that."

Writing the letter "was scary," she admits. "I keep going back and forth on being opinionated. I completely agree when there are actors who say, 'Actors should stay out of politics. We're not politicians.' My business is based on everybody buying tickets and seeing my movie...It's not smart, businesswise, to be opinionated. But then what's the point in having a voice at all if I'm not going to use it for what I truly believe in?"

Lawrence had already learned how to use her voice before, when she spoke to Vanity Fair in 2014 about having her nude photos stolen and distributed on the internet without her consent. Rather than apologize, she deemed the situation a "sex crime" and made people rethink the way such stories were handled. "If I was quiet, it would have seemed like I was ashamed. And I wasn't ashamed; I was enraged. Not once have I felt like I 'learned a lesson.' I didn't do anything wrong!" she says. "Even I've defended myself by saying I was in a relationship with a wonderful man [Nicholas Hoult] for five years. But even if I wasn't, even if I went on a date with a guy—it doesn't matter what the situation is. It's your body. And you can do whatever you want."

Speaking of dates, Lawrence also tells Glamour that she is single right now because she's picky. "I feel a spark very, very rarely. And it's really only about spark for me. Not really anything else. You should see some of the people I find attractive," she says with a laugh. "You'd be shocked."

"I don't, like, date a lot. I don't meet a lot of guys who I want to go on a date with. I'll find a guy attractive maybe once a year," says Lawrence, who was most recently linked to Chris Martin. "But I'm not a lonely person. Me not dating someone is not a lack of anything in any way. I feel completely fulfilled. Yes, when I spark with someone, it's exciting, but I definitely don't need that."

Glamour's February issue is on newsstands Jan. 12 and available now digitally.