Nanaimo actress ready to lighten up
Jodelle Ferland open to comedy after impressive string of dark roles
Michael D. Reid, Times Colonist
Published: Monday, July 23, 2007
Girls will be girls -- even on the bustling set of a Hallmark Hall of Fame movie.
As twilight nears on a balmy summer night on the banks of the Cowichan River, Jodelle Ferland
is in a playful mood. Scurrying about like a field mouse, she's itching to sneak up on co-star
Ridge Canipe (The Bad News Bears) and tickle him.
Her girlish laughter punctuates familiar movie commands -- "Rolling" and "That's a cut!" --
that echo through the mosquito-infested wilderness as calmly efficient Hollywood veteran Tony
Bill (Flyboys) directs scenes for Pictures of Hollis Woods.
Jodelle, 12, plays the artistic orphan who finally finds the home she always longed for in the
film adaptation of Patricia Reilly Giff's Newbery Award-winning novel. The prestige production,
set to air on CBS-TV on the U.S. Thanksgiving weekend, also stars Sissy Spacek, Alfre
Woodard, Judith Ivey, James Tupper and Julie Ann Emery.
Locations from Ladysmith to Mount Prevost and downtown Victoria are being passed off as New
York State.
The Nanaimo-born actress has made a name for herself playing traumatized youngsters. They
include her portrayal of Sharon, Radha Mitchell's disturbed daughter haunted by a smoky ghost
town in the arty, video game-based horror film Silent Hill; Jeliza-Rose, a heroin junkie's
abandoned daughter who plays with severed doll's heads in Terry Gilliam's Gothic freak show
Tideland; and a spooky tyke who haunts a health care centre in Stephen King's mini-series
Kingdom Hospital.
Coincidentally, Jodelle also played Carrie as a girl in a 2002 remake of the 1976 horror classic
that launched Spacek's career.
With all that darkness, no wonder she says she's ready to lighten up.
"I don't mind if I keep getting those kinds of roles but it would be be nice if I could do comedy,"
she says.
Meanwhile, playing Hollis Woods is a welcome challenge.
"It's a fun movie to do. It's not exactly a comedy, but it's not horror either."
The Vancouver-based actress who got her start doing commercials for everything from Barbies to
Chryslers, has amassed an impressive list of credits.
In addition to roles in TV shows -- including Cold Squad, Dark Angel and Supernatural --
Jodelle became the youngest nominee in the history of the Emmy Awards at age 4. She was
nominated for Outstanding Performer in a Children's Special for her movie debut as Desi, a girl
who tries to communicate with her dead father, in the Showtime movie Mermaid.
(Another Pictures of Hollis Woods coincidence: She was up against Woodard, nominated for The
Wishing Tree.)
More recently, she shot scenes for the Jessica Alba comedy Good Luck Chuck and as superstar
chanteuse Celine Dion as a little girl in a CBC-TV movie Celine.
"It was cool because I've never played a singer before," she says. "It was lip-synching, but it was
really neat."
She'll also soon be doing reshoots for the Paramount thriller Case 39. She plays a 10-year-old
girl who is apparently being abused by her parents. She has nothing but praise for Renee
Zellweger, who plays a concerned social worker.
"She's Renee," smiles Jodelle, echoing an earlier answer -- "He's Ridge!" -- when asked what
makes her co-stars special.
"Renee's so generous," she continues, recalling how Zellweger would buy special coffees and
other treats for the crew.
"She got people to come to set with those massage beds one day, and everybody got massages."
It's easy to see why Jodelle doesn't seem to mind being misted with mosquito repellent
considering her experience filming Tideland in Saskatchewan. She got a swollen lip from a bug
bite and Terry Gilliam had to work around her for two days.
Despite Gilliam's reputation as an eccentric taskmaster, she says he was a nice guy with a great
sense of humour.
"Some people say he's absolutely crazy but I don't think so," says Jodelle, laughing. "He's a
little funny sometimes."
Watching Jodelle slip into character with apparent ease, there's no reason to doubt her claim
acting comes naturally.
"I just think of it as fun, or a challenge," says Jodelle who, like Hollis, loves to draw.
Her mother, Valerie, says Jodelle has had an innate talent for acting since she was in diapers.
She'll never forget the fateful day when Jodelle, almost two, started reciting dramatic
monologues her two older siblings -- Marisha, now 20 and an esthetician, and Jeremy, 22, a
musician -- had been practising.
"It was a real X-Files moment because it was impossible, right?" recalled Valerie. "I was in the
basement doing laundry and I could hear these monologues. But the kids were at school so I
snuck towards the stairs and looked up and there she was sitting on the hardwood floor in her
diaper doing a monologue. I kid you not."
Honoured on several fan-driven websites -- including a Russian fan forum -- Jodelle takes her
fame in stride.
She appears amused by those Silent Hill posters featuring her face -- minus her mouth --
plastered worldwide.
She remembers having to pass several in New York's subway system to find one not defaced by
graffiti.
"I wanted to get a picture of myself by the posters but there was always a smile or a frown or me
sticking my tongue out drawn on it," said Jodelle. She was eventually photographed with one
hand on her mouth, the other on her poster face.
A survivor of international press junkets, Jodelle has also learned a thing or two about how to
floor a nosy journalist.
When I ask her to describe her biggest career challenge, she giggles, then deadpans: "When
they ask that kind of question."
And what does this diminutive actress do when she's not facing the camera?
"I audition," she says, flashing a Cinemascope smile.
mreid@tc.canwest.com
© Times Colonist (Victoria) 2007