When I meet Julia Roberts and Ayo Edebiri to discuss their new film, After The Hunt, I'm instantly struck - and quite disarmed - by their immediate warmth. Moments before, I'd finished my third coffee of the day while running through my questions, wondering what to expect from these incredibly talented Hollywood heavyweights. But, as I bounced into the Claridge's suite buoyed by coffee and excitement, I was greeted by a casually standing Julia Roberts and a smiling Ayo Edebiri, and both graciously shook my hand while assuring me that it wasn't as sweaty as I'd just announced it was. Affable and open, they inquisitively asked me about my name, and their relaxed demeanour meant I almost forgot that I was sat opposite two A-listers.

In that moment, I also knew that we were in for a fun ten minutes. The pair have a natural ease with one another, and throughout the interview they laugh about briefly living together before filming, how press tours affect their sense of style, and how they managed to crack their 'serious' co-star, Michael Stuhlbarg.

After The Hunt, directed by Luca Guadagnino, follows Alma (Roberts), a college professor who is forced to reckon with her own lines of loyalty and trust when her student (Edebiri) accuses her colleague (Andrew Garfield) of sexual assault. The acting from Julia and Ayo is impeccable, and their onscreen chemistry is undeniable. The bond between them is evident when I meet them on a surprisingly mild October afternoon in London, and they tell me about the process of portraying complex characters, as well as their go-to music for releasing tension.

After The Hunt aims to interrogate our belief systems around truth, trust and loyalty. Why you were both drawn to the film?

JR: I think the answer is in your question, right? All that conversation goes on in one's own head when you read a piece of material. As we started conversations with Luca [Guadagnino] about it and his way of looking at things, and his infinite curiosity in people and why they make the decisions they make, why they hide certain things, or the posturing of people - it's all so deeply fascinating. And to play a character who... everything is done in very calculated measures. Nothing is spontaneous, really, until the unraveling starts. But yeah, I think the short answer was in your question, and the long answer I just made longer than it needed to be!

AE: I agree, completely. I could add on, but I don't know how important it is!

The viewer is constantly assessing who they trust, or who they don't, and why. The characters also go on those journeys - how did it feel to play these complex individuals, and how hard was it to portray those nuances?

AE: I think there's a toughness to it... because they're just complicated and in these quite dark places - in their minds, and in their hearts in different degrees. But at the end of the day, you're finding central truths to this person that you're embodying. There was something oddly freeing about that, for me definitely, because I can also be quite analytical. There was something about portraying these characters who find themselves quite intelligent, but they really are working from their basest emotions in a lot of ways. There was something that was really freeing about that.

This is the first time that you have worked together - how was that experience?

AE: [Sarcastically] Awful. Toxic.

JR: [Laughs] All five of us really.. on paper, we're five super different people but in the room, it was astonishing. I mean, I was really surprised. We even - Michael Stuhlbarg is a very serious person. We broke that man. We broke him right open!

AE: [Laughing] He's so funny! And so weird, and amazing.

JR: We have found out things about Michael, and his hopes and dreams, and thoughts - I mean, honestly, our work is done here now.

AE: Oh, yeah.

You also lived together for a few weeks before filming, didn't you?

JR: Yeah.

AE: [Laughing] The way that this sounds!

JR: It's getting longer! 'You guys spent a year together?'

AE: [Laughs] 'You guys all boarded a box cart on a train, and train-hopped across the country for a year?'

Just to get into the nitty gritty of each other's personalities! How was that experience?

JR: We were rehearsing, and living.

AE: Yeah going through the text and just talking.

JR: And talking, yeah. Getting to know each other. It's kind of - have you ever heard of the Evelyn Wood speed reading course? It was a way of learning how to get through text really, really quickly. And I felt like all of us living together for that year in Corsica...

AE: Ha!

JR: It was the Evelyn Wood speed reading course of getting to know each other. Especially as we were going to be in this really intense, very short shooting schedule. We had to be on task at all times, and I think that was our shortcut to it.

The film's soundtrack is very intense. What songs or music do you guys listen to when you want to release tension?

AE: For me I like to listen to a lot of jazz, especially anything that's really like drum-heavy - that's helpful for that. I have different playlists also for different types of, like, is it coming from more of a sad place? From an anxious place? That'll change it. But I think sometimes stuff without lyrics is helpful for me because I can work through all my thoughts.

JR: That's good. I can only think of Taj Mahal right now. I don't know why. I don't know why! That's just gonna be my answer.

In terms of the styling for the film, there's a lot of monochrome - even today you're wearing black and white!

JR: We didn't even discuss this.

AE: We didn't even plan this.

JR: One's the angel... and one's not.

AE: Well [pointing at Julia's outfit] I think this is quite angelic!

JR: You do? Thank you.

I love that you're still in sync. The tie is beautiful, too.

JR: Thank you, it's Zara London.

AE: No, ZARS London!

JR: [Laughing] Oh, not Zara. ZARS London.

In your personal style, how do you feel like you are able to express yourselves with fashion?

JR: [Takes breath] Hmm. Taj Mahal? [Laughs] Personal style. It's a tricky question, because we have been on this long press tour, and even though - I think I'm going to speak for both of us for a moment.

AE: Please! Start.

JR: Stop me if I overstep. Even though we both have very strong ideas and things that we really like and that we enjoy, we have these incredible people who are bringing us all these beautiful things to choose from, and life becomes very easy in that way. And so then I go, 'Wow, do I have personal style when I'm home?' Sometimes, it's just what's on the floor next to the bed that I wore the day before. Levi's and a good top is sort of my go-to! But your personal style - I forget what it is when I have all this incredible, beautiful help on the daily I also forget how to do my hair.

AE: Yeah, you forget everything!

After The Hunt is in UK cinemas now.

Hugh Grant is one of the most talked-about people in the world. And from his candid words about the new Bridget Jones movie to his thoughts about Taylor Swift's Eras tour, the actor is known for speaking his mind.

This week, it was Grant's own acting credits that got him talking, as the 64-year-old looked back at his most iconic roles in a video with Vanity Fair.

This unsurprisingly featured 1999 romantic comedy Notting Hill, seeing Grant star as William Thacker, a London book shop owner who falls in love with Hollywood movie star Anna Scott (Julia Roberts).

While reminiscing about the project, Grant voiced an issue he has with his character, and his surprising comments have gone viral.

"Whenever I'm flicking the channels at home after a few drinks, and this comes up, I just think, 'Why doesn't my character have any balls?'" Grant explained of Notting Hill.

"There's a scene in this film where she's in my house and the paps come to the front door and ring the bell, and I think I just let her go past me and open the door, and that's awful," he continued.

"I've never had a girlfriend, or indeed, now wife, who hasn't said, 'Why the hell didn't you stop her? What’s wrong with you?' And I don't really have an answer to that. It was how it was written and I think he's despicable, really."

Grant later went on to open up about working with Julia Roberts, praising her "brilliant" acting skills.

"Probably all the time with Julia, as with any brilliant actress, you're just thinking, 'Oh, Christ, they're really good. I'm not going to be as good as her,'" Grant recalled in the interview.

"And she is great at emoting, and she's got that kind of quality where it looks like her skin is wafer thin. You can sort of see her soul."

Well, that's that.

Notting Hill, the classic '90s rom-com, is one of the greats. Starring a young bumbling Hugh Grant, Rhys Ifans and - of course - Julia Roberts, it's the hit of nostalgia that never ages. And while Julia is the perfect person to play Hollywood star Anna Scott, in a new interview she explained that she very nearly turned the role down.

Julia Roberts was recently interviewed by Notting Hill's writer, Richard Curtis, for British Vogue. The actor is the cover star for the February issue, and Julia describes how the iconic role was one of the 'hardest' of her career, as it involved playing a film star. 

"Honestly, one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do was your movie [Notting Hill, 1999], playing a movie actress. I was so uncomfortable! I mean, we’ve talked about this so many times, but I almost didn’t take the part because it just seemed – oh, it just seemed so awkward. I didn’t even know how to play that person."

Julia was starring in a lot of high-profile films in the '90s - think My Best Friend's Wedding, Hook and, of course, the iconic Pretty Woman. As a huge Hollywood star herself, we can imagine the role hit a little close to home. 

The Sleeping With The Enemy actor also didn't take too kindly to her chosen wardrobe for the film, which we can assume was a little more movie-star-centric than what she eventually ended up wearing. Julia explained that she 'loathed' the wardrobe choices so much that she requested to wear her own clothes instead for the scenes. 

"We had issues about your costume in that film, didn’t we? Where you…" Richard continued before Julia jumped in with "Loathed…" 

And Richard explained: "Loathed being dressed as a movie star. The clothes you’re wearing in the scene where you came back to Hugh and said, “I’m just a girl…” – am I remembering right that they were the ones you rocked up wearing in real life that morning?"

To which Julia replied: "My driver, lovely Tommy, I sent him back to my flat that morning. I said, 'Go into my bedroom and grab this, this and this out of my closet.' And it was my own flip-flops and my cute little blue velvet skirt and a T-shirt and my cardigan."

Well, now you know!

Julia Roberts has shared her thoughts on Matthew Perry's death , five weeks after the Friends star tragically passed away at his home in Pacific Palisades, California. In the weeks after his death, a number of his co-stars - including Matt LeBlanc and Courteney Cox - shared tributes to Matthew, and Jennifer Aniston recently urged her followers on social media to support causes close to the late star's heart.

Now, Julia Roberts - who had a cameo role on Friends in the 90s - sat down with Mahershala Ali to discuss their new film, Leave the World Behind. During an interview with Entertainment Tonight, the interviewer asked the Notting Hill star how she felt about the news of Matthew's death given that they had worked together for the episode The One After the Super Bowl in 1996.

"All good thoughts and feelings," Julia said. "They were all so welcoming to me as just a kind of a one-off character and it was a really fun time. A sudden passing of anybody so young is heartbreaking. I think that it just helps all of us just appreciate what we have and to keep going in a positive way as best we can."

Mahershala also added: "It's beautiful he could sort of be honoured in that way [in the film]. Or the show sort of be honoured, coincidentally, at this time. So it's kinda nice that it has a little space in there."

Leave the World Behind, a thriller, was released on 24 November.

As for why people were eager to hear Julia's feelings about Matthew's death, it's because the two of them reportedly dated around the time she made her Friends cameo. In his 2022 memoir, titled Friends, Lovers, and the Big Terrible Thing, Matthew revealed that he and Julia had shared a 'three-month-long courtship' back then.

They had a romantic relationship on screen and off screen - and now Matthew Perry has revealed the real reason he called things off with Julia Roberts.

The Pretty Woman star dated the Friends actor in the mid-90s after Julia made a cameo on the American sitcom - but Matthew, who finally joined Instagram back in 2020, has said breaking up with her was all to do with his insecurities, not about disliking her.

The actor, who has openly talked about his struggle with alcohol and drugs while he appeared on Friends, opens up in his new memoir: Friends, Lovers and Big Terrible Things - of which The Times has published an excerpt. 

Matthew, who is strangely related to his former co-star Courteney Cox, writes in the book: "I did let her in, both figuratively and literally, and a relationship began," he said, about spending New Year's Eve with her family.

"We would already be a couple by the time we started filming the Friends Super Bowl episode."

However, as he was struggling with addiction he let his insecurities take over, revealing in his book: "Two months later, I was single. Dating Julia Roberts had been too much for me. 

"I had been constantly certain that she was going to break up with me. Why would she not? I was not enough; I could never be enough; I was broken, bent, unloveable."

He went on to say how he thought about the break-up at the time:  "So instead of facing the inevitable agony of losing her, I broke up with the beautiful and brilliant Julia Roberts. 

"She might have considered herself slumming it with a TV guy, and TV guy was now breaking up with her. I can't begin to describe the look of confusion on her face."

Friends ran from 1994 to 2004 - making Matthew and his co-stars household names all over the world, but the fame and attention was too much for the Whole Ten Yards actor, and at one point Matthew says he can't remember filming three of the series.

The Friends reunion, AKA The One Where They Get Back Together, saw the whole cast back on the set and they spoke about their favourite memories. 

It was shown on Sky last year, with around 5 million people tuning in from the UK alone to watch it. 

Emma Roberts is often associated to as Julia Roberts’ niece, or the daughter of Stalked By My Doctor actor Eric Roberts.

However, the We’re The Millers star didn’t “aspire” to be like her famous relatives, and was determined to pave her own way in the film industry when she was a child.

Asked if she felt a pressure to follow in the footsteps of the Pretty Woman star, she told Tatler magazine: “I never aspired to be her. I love her so much, I love her work, but I’m just doing my own thing”.

Emma – who made her acting debut in Blow aged 9 years old - believes experiencing the highs and lows of the business at an early age helped to prepare her for her career, and grow her "thick skin".

The 30-year-old shared: “I felt so much rejection at such a young age that it created a thick skin around me. If I’d started acting at 20, the rejection would have cut much deeper. When you’re 12, there’s still this magical wonderment to the whole process, whereas when things don’t go your way later on, you think it’s a deep reflection of you. I didn’t realise back then that I was in control of my life.”

Though Emma knew at a young age she wanted to pursue a career as an actor, she has her sights set on something even bigger - her production company Belletrist. The star hopes her latest venture can not only shift the stereotype around her and the movies she is cast in, but open doors for fellow actors too.

She explained: “I always wanted to be involved in [film and TV] projects in a more creative way and now I’m doing it. I can decide who I want to be around, for how long and in what capacity... This stuff didn’t even occur to me until my mid-twenties.

“[Belletrist] is a place I can create roles for myself that I don’t see out there. I’m also casting people in roles that they might otherwise not be seen in. My favourite parts have been ones that people don’t expect – when [the writer, director and producer] Ryan Murphy cast me in American Horror Story, for example. People saw me as this nice, teen girl and I couldn’t get older, edgier roles at the time. He gave me that opportunity and I’d love to do that for others.”

'It's been hard'

Emma Roberts and partner Garrett Hedlund have reportedly split after three years together.

The former couple may have called time on their romance one year after they welcomed their first child together, but are dedicated to co-parenting their son Rhodes Robert Hedlund, although it has been "hard".

A source told PEOPLE: "It's sad, and they are trying their best to co-parent. It's been hard."

The news comes shortly after the pair celebrated their son's first birthday together back in December with a rodeo-themed birthday.

Emma shared a photo of her beaming with joy at her son at the bash, which saw the mother and son co-ordinate in matching red gingham shirts.

She captioned the photo: " I can't believe you're 1."

The 30-year-old actor - who is Julia Roberts' niece - started dating Garrett in March 2019, and one year later they announced they were expecting their first child together.

The Scream Queens star gave birth during the coronavirus pandemic, which was said to be "a lot harder than expected" for the new mum.

A separate source previously told the publication: "Having a newborn in the pandemic has been a lot harder than either of them expected, but they're really, really trying their best to figure things out.

"Garrett totally stepped it up after Emma was still recovering after giving birth. He made sure that their house was stocked with things that Emma liked and needed so she felt comfortable. She's just starting to get back into a more 'normal' routine."

Emma and Garrett have yet to confirm or deny reports their relationship has ended.

Pretty Woman might just be one of the most famous rom-coms of our time. The 1990 film tells the story of a prostitute who is given a life of luxury by a wealthy client, and the pair end up falling in love.

But Oscar-winning actress, Julia Roberts, who stars in the movie, has admitted that she doesn't think it would be made in 2019.

During an interview with The Guardian, Julia said: 'I don’t really think you could make that movie now, right? So many things you could poke a hole in.'

But she continued: 'I don’t think it takes away from people being able to enjoy it.'

It is reported that as many as eight actresses turned down the role before her. In 2007, one of those actresses, Daryl Hannah, said: 'They sold it as a romantic fairytale when in fact it's a story about a prostitute who becomes a lady by being kept by a rich and powerful man. I think that film is degrading for the whole of womankind.'

Julia also admitted that she wasn't all that keen on starring in Notting Hill. Wait - what?!

'I did not want to do that movie,' she told the publication.

'The pitch of it sounds awful, right? Do you want to come and play the world’s biggest movie star and then fall in love with the bookshop owner? No!'

However, once she met the film-makers she changed her mind and is pretty happy that she did, adding: 'it’s this great little jewel of a movie.'

Well we're certainly glad she changed her mind.

Pretty Woman wasn't meant to be a rom-com...

The cast of Pretty Woman have been reunited for the first time in 25 years. To celebrate the classic movie's anniversary, the TODAY show over in the US managed to bag an exclusive interview with Julia Roberts, Richard Gere, Hector Elizondo (hotel manager Barney), Laura San Giacomo (Vivian's best friend, Kit De Luca), and director Garry Marshall.

Here are 5 things we learnt from the Pretty Woman reunion: 1. It wasn't meant to be a rom-com. Pretty Woman was scripted as a dark tale called ‘3,000’ - a reference to the price Julia Robert's character, Vivien, was to be paid. 'Richard's character threw my character out of the car, threw the money on top of her and drove away and the credits rolled,' the actress said of the intended ending.

2. Richard Gere didn't want the role. He turned down the part when it was first offered to him. 'Well, there wasn't a part,' the actor explained. 'There was just nothing. The joke was [it was just] a suit. You could put a suit on a goat and put it out there, and it would work.' 3. Julia Roberts convinced Gere to take the part. Richard still wasn't sure - until Julia passed him a Post-it note. 'We're getting to know each other. We're flirty-flirty, nice-nice. ... And [Garry] calls up and is kind of like, "How's it going?"' Richard explained. 'She turns it around and she pushes it to me, and it said, "Please say yes!" It was so sweet, and I said, "I just said yes."'

4. It was all about Julia Roberts, naturally. When asked what his favourite scene from the 1990 movie was, Richard said: 'Well, it was basically any scene where Julia was walking - which was fun for all of us. In that outfit. Yeah, it was all about legs.'

5. Why wasn't there a sequel? 'We made a pact a long time [ago] — when we did it,' director Garry Marshall shared. 'We said, we're not doing Pretty Woman 2' unless we all do it together.'

Got a craving to watch Pretty Woman now? 'Course you do. Here are the 7 best moments from the brilliant film.

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