Feature: Kristen Bell for Real Simple Magazine

Kristen Bell was open about the messy parts of life—depression, addiction, parenting—way before it was cool. She is a fan of vulnerability and seems to have empathy in her DNA; you’d sooner expect her to end world hunger than star in hit TV shows (Veronica Mars, The Good Place) and films (a little thing called Frozen, among others). But in fact she is trying to end world hunger: She helped launch This Saves Lives, a snack company providing nourishing food to kids in need. She also cowrote a children’s book, The World Needs More Purple People, to help teach young readers acceptance. And she and her actor husband, Dax Shepard, cofounded Hello Bello to make affordable, high-quality baby products accessible to all. From the moment she got famous and had a giant megaphone handed to her, Kristen has hollered into it about stuff that matters, and in so doing, changed the Hollywood game for the better.

ASHLEY C. FORD: What was your reaction when REAL SIMPLE said you were a game changer?

KRISTEN BELL: They could have put me on the Biggest Up-and-Coming Losers list for 2023 and I would have been excited! REAL SIMPLE was my first magazine subscription as an adult, and by adult I mean 18-year-old girl living in New York City.

ACF: You seem to move through your many roles—actor, producer, CEO, parent—with a preternatural confidence. Do you ever doubt yourself?

KRISTEN BELL: It’s only recently that I realized I might be qualified for any of this! I often feel underqualified, whether for an acting scene or a parenting moment. When I feel wonky about my day, I tell my husband, “I like doing this, but I don’t really know what I’m doing.” And he goes, “All you need to do is get the project to the finish line.” When I think about it like that, I realize I might actually be good at it. [More at Source]

03 / 14 / 2023

Feature: Kristen Bell and Kirby Howell-Baptiste for the LA Times

The friendship meet-cute between Kirby Howell-Baptiste and Kristen Bell barely registered the first time they crossed paths. Howell-Baptiste was filming a guest spot on Showtime’s “House of Lies” — which featured Bell — and knew her lines so well, the scene the two shared didn’t take long to complete.

Bell’s face twists thinking back on it: “I was about 13 months pregnant.”

“We genuinely met for an hour when we shot the scene,” Howell-Baptiste adds. “It was very quick. I was in and out.”

Their story really starts, as they both tell it, six years later on “The Good Place.” Bell played Eleanor Shellstrop, the self-centered and foul-mouthed deceased protagonist of the NBC afterlife comedy. Howell-Baptiste joined the series in its third season as a bubbly neurosurgeon, Dr. Simone Garnett, who makes an impression on the ever-indecisive Chidi (William Jackson Harper). The following year, in 2019, Howell-Baptiste joined Bell in Hulu’s revival of “Veronica Mars,” the cult teen detective drama that was Bell’s breakthrough role.

“We killed someone together between ‘The Good Place’ and ‘Veronica Mars’ — we were both at fault. In order to keep the secret, we have to keep this going,” Bell teases.

There’s a reason Bell is making quips about crime. The pair are currently starring as crooked coupon buddies in the crime comedy “Queenpins,” written and directed by husband-and-wife duo Aron Gaudet and Gita Pullapilly; it’s now in theaters and drops later this month on Paramount+. Bell and Howell-Baptiste play coupon-loving friends: Bell is Connie, a former speed-walking Olympian who copes with an unfulfilling marriage and infertility by couponing; Howell-Baptiste is Jojo, a friend and neighbor trying to find success as a coupon influencer. The friends break bad … nicely, turning their enthusiasm for savings into a Robin Hood-esque scheme bilking millions from corporations to deliver deals to fellow coupon clippers. [more at source]

09 / 24 / 2021
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