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NYFF 2013: In command performance, Cate Blanchett makes awards case

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NEW YORK — Cate Blanchett has played a queen, a dancer, a Russian villain and Katharine Hepburn. But she took a more direct approach on a stage Wednesday night being herself.

The “Blue Jasmine” star, who in the summer art-house hit plays a disgraced lady-who-lunches, was holding court at a New York Film Festival gala tribute. It’s an event that marks one of the award season’s early campaign stops and offers a key indicator of how a contender will do on the stump in the months that follow.

How did she do? As it turns out, really well. Blanchett had the room eating out of her hand for most of the one-on-one interview session with the festival’s Kent Jones, offering the kind of hybrid everywoman/actor-y turn that voters gobble up.

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She went mystical about her craft during some moments (on her stage and screen work: “It’s a bit like a dancer where you have an innate sense of where other actors are in space”), but also down-to-earth as she told stories about her young sons, who wonder why she doesn’t do more blockbusters (and also were struck why the doll based on her “Lord of the Rings” character Galadriel didn’t have underpants. “I wore underpants making the movie,” she assured them.)

She offered the requisite bits of honesty. “It’s always terrifying when you’ve been asked to bite off more than you can chew ... ’I don’t know how to do this, I don’t think I can do it,’” the Aussie actress said she often tells her agent. “There’s silence on the other end of the phone.” She finished, “Failure is very public and you have to wear it on the chin but that’s the adrenaline rush.”

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Maybe most important, she had a kind of self-deprecating wit surprisingly rare among A-listers. Damon has it; Clooney does too (incidentally, both actors who Blanchett has acted and held her own against). But it’s not a long list.

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After a clip session ran through her key roles over the past 15 years, she laughed and said, “That was excruciating.”

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After a video tribute to her from Woody Allen, she said “Are you sure that wasn’t meant for Kate Winslet?” (On talking to Allen about Tennessee Williams: “It was like asking him if he could speak Arabic fluently.”)

And she admits to being aware that she “disappointed” Katharine Hepburn fans playing the icon in “The Aviator,” but said, basically, what are you gonna do? “She died. She can’t play that role. I’m the ... who got the job.” She also did a brief but on-point Scorsese imitation.

The evening also took on a spontaneous moment. Early in the night Blanchett told a story about her first role, as a teenage extra while on vacation in Egypt, where she was promised a few Egyptian pounds and free falafel. The director barked through the megaphone, throwing her. “And the falafel never came, so I left.”

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Surprisingly, during the Q&A session, a woman at the front of the festival’s Alice Tully Hall stood up and said she was Egyptian and told her the director of that film felt bad about the incident. “You’re lying,” Blanchett said. The woman responded that he was in the room. Then a man rose from the back of the theater, calling out to the actress that he was indeed the director. “I’m sorry,” he said, as the crowd roared. “I turned out OK,” she deadpanned back.

Blanchett will likely have to work voters hard if she hopes to win her first lead actress Oscar. (A nomination is basically a foregone conclusion.) The challenge will be “Blue Jasmine’s” staying power. Summer movies have a hard time holding voters’ attention amid the flurry of fall films that follow. The last time someone won a lead actress Oscar for a movie that came out before September, in fact, was during the 2007-2008 season, when Marion Cotillard took the prize for “La Vie en Rose.”

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Like then, Cotillard really wanted the Oscar, and she worked the circuit charming voters until they gave it to her. The same daunting challenge awaits Blanchett. Wednesday’s performance simply showed that she’s up to it.

ALSO:

Cate Blanchett channels Blanche in ‘Blue Jasmine’

‘Blue Jasmine:’ Woody Allen on regrets — he’s had a few

‘Blue Jasmine’ will get widest release of Woody Allen’s career

Follow me on Twitter at https://twitter.com/ZeitchikLAT

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