Stop telling Abigail Breslin she’s all grown up
“For the past four years, since I was like 13, every single article that has come out, it’s ‘Abigail Breslin is all grown up!’ ” the 17-year-old actress tells The Post, laughing. “I always joke with my friends [about it]. Every time they see me, they always say, ‘Oh my God, you’re all grown up!’ ”
Still, she sure does look mature, as her red carpet appearance this week proved. Other teen stars may hit the town in micro-minis or even sans pants, but there was the adorably gawky girl from “Little Miss Sunshine,” looking slinky in a floor-length gown of alternating sheer and metallic panels as she promoted her new film, “August: Osage County.” You’ve come a long way, baby.
“I was like, ‘Abby, Abigail Breslin.’ And he was just completely shocked, like ‘What the hell?’ ”
Over the years, Breslin has rubbed elbows with some pretty big players: Harrison Ford (“Ender’s Game”), Helen Mirren (“Raising Helen”), Bill Murray (“Zombieland”), Halle Berry (“The Call”). But the cast of “August: Osage County,” out Friday, takes the cake. The dramedy about a dysfunctional family includes Julia Roberts, Margo Martindale (see page 52), Ewan McGregor, Dermot Mulroney, Benedict Cumberbatch and Meryl Streep.
“[Streep’s] kind of known as being the greatest actress of all time, so it’s really intimidating to go into a table read with her and say your lines,” gushes Breslin, sitting on a couch in a suite at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel. Draped in a long maroon dress with bad girl boots and a biker jacket, she’s clutching the oversize pillow in her lap. “It is just crazy because you know that you could never match up to [Streep], so you’re just trying to keep up the slightest bit.”
A native New Yorker, Breslin was raised in the same Lower East Side apartment she still calls home today. Her dad works as a telecommunications consultant; her mom is a film producer. She has two older brothers, Ryan, 28, and Spencer, 21, the younger of whom started acting before Abigail did, when he was discovered on a city playground and ended up in movies such as “Disney’s The Kid” and “Meet the Parents.” Abigail’s break came at age 5, when Spencer’s agent needed a little girl to go in for a part in “Signs.” Breslin booked that role, but says she now has “no recollection” of filming it.
But it was playing subversive beauty pageant contestant Olive Hoover in 2006’s “Little Miss Sunshine” at the age of 10 that made her a household name. Not your typical little princess, Olive was a color-outside-the-lines girl with a knack for burlesque. An Oscar nod, for Best Supporting Actress, made Breslin one of the youngest nominees ever.
“I think that you’re not even normal being a regular teenager who doesn’t act!” says Breslin, who is home-schooled and will graduate in June. “You have so much stuff going on in your mind. I’m coping more with that, dealing with my friends and life in general — the whole growing-up process.
The movie end of it seems the most normal to me because that’s where I’m most comfortable.”
Yet she was comfortable enough when she posed seemingly topless in a racy photo shoot — in one shot, she’s in a bubble bath; another shows her not-so innocently sucking on a lollipop — by controversial celebrity photographer Tyler Shields for his recent photo book, “The Dirty Side of Glamour.”
“That’s a big misconception. I was not topless. I was completely covered at all times during the shoot,” says Breslin. “I just wanted to do it. I love Tyler. He’s one of my best friends. I love working with him.”
So was she trying to send a Miley-esque message about breaking free from the perfect little girl image that society has impressed upon her?
“I was not trying to send a message to anybody about anything,” she says. “It was just something that I wanted to do, and I didn’t think of it as being necessarily that shocking. I’m almost 18, so it’s not like I’m a little girl. I’m not really an adult either — I’m not saying that. I’m just saying I’m not 10.”
“I’m just with my friends and we don’t even talk about the movies that I make or the people who I work with,” she explains. “We talk about the guys we like or the people that we’re friends with.”
The difference, of course, is that the world cares which guy Abigail Breslin likes. Last month, US Weekly claimed Breslin is dating 25-year-old Jack Barakat, guitarist for the pop-punk band All Time Low. (And, every mother’s worst nightmare, he also used to date former Hugh Hefner plaything Holly Madison.)
“We’re really good friends,” Breslin demurs.
Turns out, the actress is also getting into music herself. She’s currently working on an album, with a planned release of next year. Her first single, an acoustic holiday track, is titled “Christmas in New York” and out now.
“I write every day almost and go in and record. It’s all very personal and very like this section of my life and being 17,” she says. “Every time I play my friends a new song, it’s always so fun for me because they just know the stories behind all of them, so they’re like, ‘Oh my God, I can’t believe that!’ ”
Breslin wrote the Christmas song while filming “August” in Oklahoma.
“I just missed being home, and I wrote it about being homesick and missing the everyday rituals of being home and being with your family,” she says. “[And] I just love [Christmas] so much, I can’t even describe the joy that it brings me. I literally just get so excited when September comes because I know that it’s coming.”
She’s been reblogging Christmas countdowns on her Tumblr for months.
Despite the new endeavor and plans to attend college (The New School is her top choice), Breslin’s not putting film behind her.
“Acting is my main focus all the time,” she says, then suddenly interrupts herself.
“Whoa, why did I just have a really bad New York accent all of a sudden?”
After a short giggle, she picks back up.
“Music comes second, but it’s still a big passion of mine.”
“That’s such a rare thing to happen and so I don’t, really. I just want to make movies that people can feel connected to in some way,” she says. “And I know that what I’m doing isn’t brain surgery and it’s not rocket science. But if it can kind of make somebody feel something for two hours, then that’s all I care about.
“[But] I mean, I’d never turn it down . . .” she says with a laugh.
So does she have any advice for other young stars, say Quvenzhané Wallis, last year’s 9-year-old Oscar nominee? Breslin clutches the pillow she’s holding.
“I’m still figuring things out!”
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