French teens keen on Kristin Kreuk
The star of Smallville is much better known to young French viewers as Laurel Yeung on the Vancouver-shot Edgemont

Lynne McNamara
Vancouver Sun

Wednesday, January 14, 2004

Kristin Kreuk may be a big star in North America with her role as Clark Kent's gal pal, Lana Lang, in the WB's hit Smallville, but in France, she's revered as Laurel Yeung on the Vancouver-shot teen soap Edgemont.

In fact, 51 per cent of 18-to-24-year-olds in that country are hooked (it beats Friends in the ratings) and spend copious hours on-line speculating about the the lives and loves of Edgemont's characters.

Edgemont is where it all started for Kreuk -- in the bowels of the cavernous CBC studios in downtown Vancouver -- after she was chosen from scores of teen girls recruited from local high schools by the show's producers.

Now, five years later, Kreuk, 21, has been doing double duty in the cast of Smallville for its first three seasons (with at least four more to go).

But now Edgemont, in spite of success in Europe, half a million viewers in English-speaking Canada and about to go on the air in Quebec, is wrapping for good.

Just before the holidays last month, I met up with Kreuk in the labyrinthine halls of the CBC as she shot her final scenes for the show.

She ushered me in to her dressing room (which, coincidentally, was my dressing room in another era, when Terry David Mulligan and I were hosts of a CBC TV nostalgia series; but that's another story) to talk about her life, so far.

No wonder she's a Neutrogena girl -- what a complexion, what gorgeous eyes, a pleasing combination of her heritage (a Chinese mother and Dutch father, both local landscape architects).

Kreuk cringes, recalling the Edgemont tryout.

Producers had called several Vancouver high schools looking for talented teens and although Kreuk had spent some time at Vancouver Youth Theatre and Arts Umbrella and had done some musical theatre in high school, it was her first formal audition.

"Ooh," she sighs at the memory, "I remember going for the audition and I didn't tell very many people about it because I was like, 'I'm not going to get it.' So, I went to the bathroom to change 'cause I thought I should wear something nice to an audition, even though I had no nice clothes, because I'm me and I don't -- or I didn't -- I do now," she chuckles. "And my friend came in and she was like, 'What are you doing, where are you going?', and I'm like, 'Un-oh. I'm going to an audition.' "

Amazingly, Kreuk doesn't actually remember hearing that she had the part.

"That's really funny, you'd think I would. I remember everything around it, but I don't remember that moment."

But she does recall meeting with executive Michael Chechik and talking about the show.

"And I was like, 'Oh my god, this is so weird,' " she says, her voice rising. "I didn't know what I was doing."

"My very first interview, sitting down and doing it, and I didn't know what the hell was going on. Oh, and I was so, so closed off. And I didn't talk to anybody and I was so scared," she whispers, "and just over these past five years, I've found a way to do this, and I'm hopefully a better actor than I used to be. It's crazy. It blows me away."

Shooting starring roles in two shows at the same time could lead to major fatigue but, luckily, while Smallville shoots weekdays from mid-July to mid-April, Kreuk is able to film her role on Edgemont in six 12-hour days (Sundays) each fall.

"You're out by 7:30 and you still have an evening," she says cheerfully. "But you're working on the other show, and you just get really tired."

So, I tease, is she sad, or secretly relieved to be wrapping this role?

A deep laugh follows.

"I'm ready to move on, but I'm kind of torn. I love this character, and I think that's where a lot of it comes from. I like her a lot -- she's been psychotic this year!"

And French teens are eating up the angst.

"I was in Monaco doing publicity at the television festival for Smallville and everyone asked me about Edgemont, as well," Kruek said. "It's just as big as a lot of the shows out there. It's pretty amazing. I was totally shocked. I'm like, 'Wow!' "

In Europe people care a lot more about the characters, she says.

"It's really interesting to see. I think in North America we're a lot more about, 'Blow things up!' " she hoots, smacking her fists together.

Originally, because of her Edgemont contract, it was doubtful that she'd be able to take on the Smallville role.

"And then it all worked out. Thank goodness. That would have changed my life," she laughs.

No kidding.

"I've changed so much," she shrugs, adding, "It's not that I've changed necessarily, but I've found parts of myself that I didn't really know were there. And the first year, when I think back, I'm like 'Holy ----!' "

Often, finding the kind of professional and financial success that Kreuk has experienced so early in life can be damaging.

"You have to keep grounded, and I think the fact that I'm in Vancouver makes a huge difference. And I have great friends and a great family. And I'm not surrounded by the business. That makes all the difference in the world, 'cause it's so easy to get caught up in it. If you were living in L.A., it'd be like 'Bull----, bull----, bull---- ... you're this, you're that, you're wonderful, get caught up in this tornado, get caught up, get caught up, get caught up," she chimes. "And the minute it's all gone, you fall and you've got no one to catch you because you let yourself get swept away, when it's all 'Pouff!' " she throws up her hands, "and it's all made up and none of it's grounded or real."

Even in her short time in showbiz, Kreuk has seen the dark side of it.

"Kind of sad, in this business, when you think you have to not trust anybody. You go into it, you meet people, and you can't trust them until they prove themselves to you.

"And as long as you accept that ... The minute you're not hot anymore, people are just going to go, 'Okay, bye!', and if you're not ready for that, then you're going to get hurt and screwed up."

(Gary Coleman, Corey Feldman, Todd Bridges, are you listening?)

"Because you don't know who you are at 16 or 17. You still don't know who you are at 20 years old," she giggles. (Her birthday, another thing we share, is a few days later.)

In spite of stardom, Kreuk says, her personal life is pretty much the same as it was. She still sees old friends from school, and others she connected with in gymnastics.

"I've made some new friends that are actors, but not very many. I try to keep my world as stable as I can. My friends are awesome -- they've done amazing things with their lives and they've come so far and I'm so proud of them. And I can live through them," she jokes.

"I hear their stories and people are off in India, travelling, going on spiritual journeys and people are working at the UN and I have another friend who's gone to college. It's just so cool to watch these people, so cool to watch these people grow.

"I look at my life sometimes and go, 'I live such a strange, odd, LIFE!,' " she says, doubling over in laughter.