Not far from her home in New York City, on a sunny day in early March, Scarlett Johansson pops in for her Parade photo shoot after dropping off her 5-year-old daughter, Rose, at school. (This interview and photo shoot occurred before the coronavirus quarantine.) A little later, she’ll pick up Rose and return to the uptown apartment she also shares with her fiancé, Saturday Night Live co-head writer and “Weekend Update” co-anchor Colin Jost. Oh, it’s pretty much just a typical weekday (when such days were possible just six weeks or so ago), though “typical” is a relative term when you’re an acclaimed, world-renowned actress, and your new movie, Black Widow, is shaping up to be a fall smash. Indeed, with all due respect to one of her baseball heroes—Hall of Fame-bound superstar Derek Jeter of her beloved New York Yankees—Johansson is the one delivering big hits these days. At 35, the former child star is the top female box-office draw in the world, having brought in more than $14 billion in global ticket sales. She’s proven herself a master at comedy (Sing), action (Lucy) and awards-bait drama (her impressive Oscar-nominated 2019 twofer of Marriage Story and Jojo Rabbit). And she’s done it while winning legions of fans as the Russian-KGB-assassin-turned-crime-fighting-Avenger Black Widow in seven Marvel movies. With Black Widow, she finally gets to star in her own.
A Born New Yorker
Growing up in the bustling and bohemian Greenwich Village neighborhood of Manhattan with three siblings (including a twin brother, Hunter), Johansson was exposed to culture and activism at an early age by her mom, Melanie, a homemaker of Jewish Central European ancestry, and her dad, Karsten, a Denmark-born architect. “I was really aware how important it was to be an active member of society and be politically active and socially conscious,” she recalls, adding that her grandmother was part of “every tenant and block association. I used to go with her to meetings.” Hunter, she notes, went on to start an organization that provides solar panels for first-response stations. Johansson says with a twinge of wistfulness that her mom, dad and siblings long ago moved out of the downtown apartment that once held so many memories, dreams and hopes. “It’s somebody else’s childhood home now,” she says. But she makes sure to point it out every time she and Rose pass it. “One of the great privileges of raising your kids where you grew up is that you get to do stuff and see things you did when you were a kid.” When there’s not a quarantine, the two do everything together from visiting the Bronx Zoo to hitting the playgrounds in Central Park and seeing the Rockettes at Radio City Music Hall. (Rose’s dad is Johansson’s ex-husband, French ad exec RomainDauriac.)
Yankee Fever
The passion ignited at a tender age and never subsided. Was it a problem that her family didn’t follow suit? Not at all. Young Scarlett Johansson was determined to live out the dream of…being a New York Yankees fan. “They were killing it when I was in high school,” the actress says of the 1998–2000 World Series champs. “They had this incredible all-star team.” So, while her grandparents, parents and siblings were all crazy about the cross-town rival New York Mets, Johansson and her then-boyfriend regularly attended Yankees games in the Bronx, where she rooted for her favorite player, shortstop Derek Jeter. “I loved him,” she recalls. “I used to keep his rookie card in my wallet!” Sadly, Johansson’s fiancé has a hard-core obsession with, sigh, the New York Mets. “It’s a sore subject,” she says, shaking her head. “He just told me that he’d rather see the [Boston] Red Sox win than the Yankees win. Like, what?! I said I was just going to ignore that.”
The Acting Bug
As a child, Johansson loved watching vintage-Hollywood movies, including Judy Garland classics, Rodgers and Hammerstein musicals and Disney fare such as the 1961 romp The Parent Trap (which she just showed to her daughter for the first time). “I disappeared into those movies and took on those characters,” she says. Her mother shuttled her to auditions for commercials that never panned out. Oh, sure, she was cast in 1997’s Home Alone 3 and in 1998’s The Horse Whisperer with Robert Redford, but neither greatly enhanced her acting profile. “Since a very young age, I’ve been rejected constantly,” she says. “When people starting out ask me for advice, I always say to stay open-minded, because you never know.” The determined teen nabbed roles in three 2001 films (including the well-regarded Ghost World), all while attending the Professional Children’s School and diligently doing all her homework. Even then, she insists she wasn’t fixated on her fame. “I was too never caught up in being an actress or being a teenager,” she says. “I had a social life and friends and made movies, and those two things never competed with each other.” It helped that her mom, who accompanied her to sets, kept her grounded: “She was my mom first, and that makes a difference.” (Johansson adds that daughter Rose hasn’t yet expressed a desire for acting, but she’d get the green light if she did.) She worked so hard for so long that she never experienced a moment of “I’ve made it!” That includes the Scarlett-fever breakout of 2003, when her performances in the ethereal Lost in Translation and the period drama Girl With a Pearl Earring led to dual Golden Globe nominations when Johansson was all of 19. “I’ve never felt that I had both feet out, you know?” she says. “I never imagined having another career, but there were definitely times when I felt like I should try something else in the industry.” The actress freely admits that she wasn’t even the first choice to play Black Widow. As she tells it, there was a “wonderful” meeting with Iron Man 2 director Jon Favreau, “and I was really excited to work with him, so I said, ‘If this doesn’t work out, I’m an actor for hire, so call me anytime.’” After the original actress (Emily Blunt) had to bow out for scheduling reasons, Johansson snagged the part. “The best call you can receive is after you are rejected for something and then you get it,” she says. “You appreciate it more. I’ve basically made a career out of being second choice.”
Becoming a Hero
Her Black Widow role turned out to be—in her words—life-changing. “When we did Iron Man, I didn’t know if the audience would like my interpretation of the character,” she says. But she knew she was part of something special during production of The Avengers (2012) as the original six Avengers—Black Widow, Iron Man, Thor, Captain America, Hawkeye and the Hulk—stand in a circle in NYC, ready for battle. “It’s the iconic hero shot,” she says. “We were all thinking, This is crazy! because these worlds were coming together. We’re still processing how much of an impact these movies have had.” Set after the events of 2016’s Captain America: Civil War, the new movie finds Black Widow (nee Natasha Romanoff) in Budapest revisiting her complicated past. The role serves as a curtain call for Johansson, who was introduced as the character back in Iron Man 2 (2010) and yet had to wait a full decade for a stand-alone film of her own. But from her perspective as its headlining star and co-executive producer, the timing is ideal. “It’s a film very much about self-forgiveness and accepting decisions that were made for you. It’s much deeper than anything we could have done earlier.” The cast includes Marvel newbies Rachel Weisz, Stranger Things’ David Harbour and Little Women Oscar nominee Florence Pugh as fellow spies. “They’re not family, because [Natasha] has no family, but they’re assigned familial roles,” Johansson says, noting that Pugh’s character is like a sister. When asked about the rumors that Robert Downey Jr.’s Tony Stark/Iron Man returns in the film, which takes place before the character’s death in Endgame, she only smiles. (Inquire nicely, and she might show you the “A” tattoo on her right bicep that she and her five co-stars received after Endgame last year.)
Next Comes…Marriage?
After Rose goes to sleep on Saturday nights, Johansson tries to stay up to catch Saturday Night Live. She first met her future fiancé—Jost is himself a Staten Island native—on the SNL set in 2010 during one of her six hosting stints. “What you see is what you get with him,” she says. “He’s very optimistic, easygoing, funny, nice, and those are the qualities that really drew me to him.” They started off as friends and started dating in 2017. “It’s so funny to have a long-term shared experience with someone and then the relationships changes,” she adds. Jost popped the question in 2019, and the stunning 11-carat light brown diamond ring is proudly displayed on her left hand. Is there a wedding date in the future? Ever the veteran actress, she replies “No comment” with a hearty laugh. But she does mention her SNL host monologue from December, when she threw her arms around her fiancé onstage and called him the love of her life. “His grandma asked him if he wrote that line for me!” she says. “He was like, ‘No, grandma.’” Once they’re done with their current work commitments, the pair will take some time off. Johansson is reportedly in talks to portray floozy Audrey in a new movie-musical adaptation of Little Shop of Horrors. Or, perhaps, she’ll direct a project. Or take on another executive producing job. Or maybe she’ll just enjoy her life. “I’m so used to going, going, going all the time,” she says. “I don’t take the time to take it in because I’m constantly moving on to what’s next. As I’ve gotten older, I’ve tried to become much better at stopping and appreciating. I’m the one who tells my friends that a lot of wonderful things are going on. I should really do that more for myself.”
Scarlett 411
Movie I’m Watching “I finally just saw [Adam Sandler’s] Uncut Gems. But I watched it before bed and had extreme anxiety. I loved The Peanut Butter Falcon too.” Book I’m Reading “Three Women by Lisa Taddeo. [Black Widow director] Cate Shortland recommended it and it is fantastic.” TV Series I’m Bingeing 90 Day Fiancé Favorite Childhood TV Show “I love all those shows on Nick at Nite like I Love Lucy, The Mary Tyler Moore Show and Taxi.” Teen Crush “Patrick Swayze was my everything. The other day we were watching TV and some commercial came on for Point Break and I was like, ‘Ahhh, so good!’” Secret Talent “I’m a pretty good cook. I can go in the fridge and make a meal out of what’s in the fridge.” Parade Memory “We used to get it in the paper at home. It was one of the few magazines we had around. Like, it was that and my dad’s Car and Driver.” Superhero power “I have a weird electrical problem. Something like a light switch or a remote control will crap out if I get my hands on it. It’s some kind of glitch with me.” Next, 15 Inspiring, Uplifting Movies to Binge Watch on Netflix Right Now
