When Hollywood golden girl Jennifer Aniston was cast as a nymphomaniac in Horrible Bosses, eyebrows were raised – but now she’s back for more. The actress tells YL why the role is such a “treat” and how she craves anonymity
With Christmas just weeks away, you have to feel for Jennifer Aniston’s fiance, Justin Theroux.
What do you buy one of the most famous women in the world, whose net worth is estimated to be around £95million?
“Oh, I’m easy to buy for – the littlest things, like gestures of love,” says Aniston. “Who needs more things? I’d rather give that money to the people who need it. You know, just write me a nice card,” she adds, gesturing with her hand as she speaks, inadvertently flashing the rock of an engagement ring.
The actress, wearing a black pencil skirt and sleeveless pale pink top, is looking fresh-faced despite the jet lag.
And yes, her face does move. There are even faint frown lines, which is rare these days in Hollywood.
She’s just flown in with her Horrible Bosses 2 co-stars Jason Sudeikis, Charlie Day and Jason Bateman, for the UK leg of the film’s press tour – and is having a blast.
The 45-year-old lives on the west coast while Theroux is based on the east, shooting TV series The Leftovers.
Just as was the case during her marriage to Brad Pitt, and ensuing relationships with The Break-Up co-star Vince Vaughn and singer John Mayer, their bi-coastal set-up has been the subject of dissection.
Even the fact they haven’t announced a wedding date despite being engaged for two years, after meeting on the set of 2012’s Wanderlust, has resulted in people questioning the status of their relationship.
Aniston admits there are times when she craves anonymity.
“I do, is that terrible?” she asks. “But I think anybody under that microscope would like a day of being invisible.”
She pauses for a second, then adds: “None of it’s true. You know what your life is like and you know what happens when you go home and shut the door and hang with the dogs and hang with the boyfriend.”
Having shot to global fame as Rachel Green in Friends 20 years ago, she tries not to let the headlines and global tittle-tattle affect her, but admits “it’s taken time to thicken up my skin in terms of what people project on to me”.
“Finally, after years and years of people saying, ‘Don’t pay attention to it’, a few years ago, I finally started abiding by that,” she adds.
It was about that time she signed up to 2011’s Horrible Bosses, a comedy about three guys who plan to bump off their monstrous supervisors, but mess up.
Aniston played nymphomaniac Dr Julia Harris. Known as Hollywood’s “good girl”, her casting left jaws on the floor, which is why she couldn’t wait to return to the role of the filthy-talking dentist.
“Honestly, that role is a treat and they don’t come along very often, not for me, especially.”
In the sequel (out now), Dr Julia appears to be making strides towards conquering her demons and is even offering up her own office as an after-hours meeting place for her therapy group.
But it transpires she’s actually using the get-togethers as a way to find new partners in crime.
Aniston says: “I think she knows that everyone at those meetings is pretty vulnerable and on the verge of falling off the wagon, so for her, it’s another avenue for flirtation. She’s not well, she’s just not.”
She might’ve spouted some filth in the last movie, but she outdoes herself this time around, not least in a scene with her friend Bateman.
“After take one or two, you get over the shock of saying things, especially to one of your friends of over 20 years. You stop blushing and feeling embarrassed, and then it’s pretty fun and silly. I think we were just trying to out-squirm each other,” admits Aniston, whose own worst job, she reveals, was telemarketing. “I was trying to sell timeshares. And I stress trying – I never managed to sell one.”
Since starring in the original movie, the A-lister, who was born in California and introduced to the acting world early on by her actor dad John and godfather Telly Savalas, has appeared in the comedies Life Of Crime and We’re The Millers, alongside Sudeikis.
But it’s her upcoming movie Cake which is creating awards buzz following its debut at this year’s Toronto International Film Festival where it received a standing ovation.
Aniston plays Claire, a woman coping with chronic pain who initiates a dubious relationship with a widower while concocting hallucinations of his dead wife. Ahead of filming, the actress, famed for her honed physique, stopped working out so she could gain a few pounds, and in the movie sports a make-up-free face and unwashed hair.
It’s Aniston as we’ve never seen her before.
“It was such an extraordinary experience and the hardest thing I’d ever done creatively thus far, but on a personal and creative level, it was so important to me. I have been dying to do something like that for a long time,” she says.
In 2002, she received acclaim for her performance in the drama The Good Girl, opposite Jake Gyllenhaal, after which she became the go-to for romcoms.
She wasn’t alone in that. Texan Matthew McConaughey was doing a similar thing and has since made moves as a more serious actor. So perhaps, just as McConaughey did earlier this year for his role in Dallas Buyers Club, it’s time for Aniston to have her moment and walk off with an Academy Award.
“Yes, comedies are one aspect of what we do, but as actors, there’s an arsenal of stories we want to tell, and characters that we have inside of us, and sometimes, just certain ones get accessed,” she notes. “In the last couple of years, I’ve been having a real fun time. I think, starting with this, where I could disappear a little bit and get into a character.”
And as for the awards buzz: “That would be so lovely,” she says, clutching her hands to her chest. “But I honestly don’t think of it in terms of accolades.”