NEW YORK - Kirsten Dunst says her role as Claire in Cameron Crowe's new film, "Elizabethtown," was one of the best female parts she'd read in ages.
"She is honest and upfront to a fault," Dunst tells W magazine in its September issue, on newsstands Aug. 19. "She doesn't have a lot of fear. She's dorky and doesn't care, and in that way she's cool."
Dunst plays a flight attendant in the romantic comedy, costarring Orlando Bloom. Bloom's brooding character meets Claire while on a flight home to Kentucky.
"Kirsten is a really positive person," Bloom says. "In the film she brings my character back to life. She's perfectly cast because she is that light."
The 23-year-old actress also plays the lead in Sofia Coppola's upcoming Marie-Antoinette biopic. She predicts the French press will be especially rough on the film, which co-stars Jason Schwartzman as Louis XVI.
"And I'm not sure whether historians are going to love our movie," she says, "but we don't care."
Dunst, who began acting and modeling when she was 3, has more than 30 films to her credit, including "Interview With the Vampire: The Vampire Chronicles," Coppola's "The Virgin Suicides" and the "Spider-Man" movies.
But Dunst says she's no workaholic.
"If you don't live your life, then how can you act?" she says. "You have no experience except the last experience on a movie."
---
BALTIMORE - A breach-of-contract lawsuit brought by Van Halen against the Baltimore Orioles seeking at least $2 million from a failed concert deal will go to trial, a lawyer for the rock band said.
U.S. District Judge William Matthew Byrne Jr. last week denied the Orioles' motion for summary judgment, and a trial in District Court in Los Angeles is "imminent," according to Howard King, who represents Van Halen.
A trial was to have begun this month, King said Wednesday, but the judge became ill. A hearing on the Orioles' request for summary judgment was held in July, King said, and Byrne handed down the denial on Aug. 4.
The band contends in the lawsuit filed in August 2004 that the baseball team sought to have it perform the first-ever concert inside Camden Yards and then backed out of the deal.
On the Net:
---
HAGERSTOWN, Md. - A judge has approved a deal enabling people to get refunds on the Evanescence album "Anywhere but Home" if they bought it at a Wal-Mart in Maryland.
The agreement signed Wednesday in Washington County Circuit Court partially settles a lawsuit filed by a local couple who claim the copy they bought at Wal-Mart contained explicit lyrics but didn't carry a parental advisory sticker.
New York-based Sony BMG Music Entertainment and its Wind-Up Records subsidiary agreed to offer the refunds in exchange for dismissal of the claims filed against them last year by Trevin and Melanie Skeens of Brownsville. The record company didn't acknowledge any wrongdoing.
The Skeens are still suing Wal-Mart Stores Inc., of Bentonville, Ark., claiming the retailer deceived consumers by selling the album without a warning label.
The refund offer applies to albums purchased before Jan. 1 of this year. Those seeking a refund must provide proof that they bought the album at a Maryland Wal-Mart store.
---
NEW YORK - "Monday Night Football" has a season-long partnership with Grammy-winning singer Tim McGraw for special musical halftime highlights throughout the 36th season of the ABC series.
NFL highlights from the weekend's games will be set to McGraw's single "I Like it, I Love It." Each Monday, the lyrics will be rewritten to fit the halftime highlights.
McGraw and his band are recording a new version of the song to be used for "Monday Night Football."
"We are flattered that a star of Tim McGraw's magnitude wants to dedicate one of his songs to halftime 'Monday Night Football,'" producer Fred Gaudelli said in a statement Wednesday. "We are thrilled to be working with him."
On the Net:
http://www.timmcgraw.com/home.php
The Augusta Chronicle ©2012 Morris Communications, LLC. All Rights Reserved.