Amanda Seyfried Would Rather Talk About Emus

Amanda Seyfried’s fans were not happy with the questions she was getting on the red carpet at the Academy Museum Gala on Oct. 17. “I don’t like this reporter,” complained one commenter after video of the exchange hit social media. “This is so unfair to her,” wrote another. “Who asks someone trying to keep their shit together these kinds of questions!!” demanded a third.

Given that Seyfried and husband Thomas Sadoski recently announced they were separating after nine years of marriage, plenty of viewers assumed they knew what she was being asked about.

They didn’t. In fact, the slightly surreal conversation unfolding on the carpet had nothing to do with Seyfried’s personal life. It concerned something going on in her professional life that she can’t talk about yet. We know what it is. She knows we know what it is. But telling you what it is would spoil the surprise, so we’re not going to. (Suffice it to say, it has something to do with a just-released documentary about a certain black-turtlenecked Silicon Valley huckster whom Seyfried once played on television.)

Seyfried acknowledged that it was “really hard to do interviews right now,” although “for good reason.” Asked what people could safely talk to her about, she suggested emus, Halloween, apple pie, olives and “really good hard ciders.” To anyone unaware of the other thing going on in Seyfried’s life, however, the exchange looked remarkably like a reporter trying to coax a newly separated actress into discussing her marriage while she desperately tried to change the subject.

Even Seyfried seemed amused by the confusion. After watching the clip, she left a comment of her own: “What AM I even saying.”

Also in Rambling Reporter:

Is John Travolta writing another memoir? THR investigates. Danny Trejo stars in Pawn Shop, a controversial film tied to ICE protests.

This story appeared in the Oct. 21 issue of The Hollywood Reporter magazine. Click here to subscribe.