The Truth About Hilary Then and Hillary Now

Let’s say we told you our two thumbs shot up for a movie called “Jackie.” Whose pillbox hat comes to mind?

Exactly. Which is why the October film is called “Hilary and Jackie” instead.

“ ‘Jackie’ was always only a working title. Everyone in America would have assumed it was about Jackie Onassis. It would have been a real marketing problem, so we changed it.”

We are chatting with the Oscar-nominated actress Emily Watson about her portrayal of the late Jacqueline du Pre, the virtuoso British cellist whose tragic life is seen through the eyes of her sister, Hilary (Rachel Griffiths). The busy stars couldn’t make it to L.A. in time for the film’s late-December opening, so Watson is actress of honor at an unusual celebration a shade into the new year. The post-opening, post-screening bash at Morton’s isn’t a premiere, exactly. A deuxieme, perhaps?

Known for playing tortured women, Watson can out-De Niro De Niro. When the eccentric Hilary learned that Watson had been cast as her sister, she blurted out, “ ‘Her breasts aren’t big enough. Jackie was an awfully big girl.’

“So I wore a Wonderbra throughout the film, which was my tribute to Hilary du Pre.”

Which is more than De Niro ever did for any of his characters. So there.

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After the audience’s reaction to his opening-night performance in the musical “Titanic” at the Ahmanson Theatre in L.A. on Sunday, Adam Heller was absolutely beaming.

“They tell me if I’m doing my job right,” Heller says, “I get a lot of boos.”

Oh, did we leave that part out?

We tore ourselves away from a buffet of Titanic-oid savories at the Biltmore Hotel to find out how Heller can live with himself. In the touring company of the Tony-winning musical, Heller plays the dastardly shipping company exec Bruce Ismay, who urges the Titanic’s captain to go full steam ahead toward destruction, then dares to take one of the rare seats in a lifeboat.

“There were Senate hearings. He was on the record as saying it was important that someone from the line be there to report what had happened. It was said that he was helpful and loaded people onto the boat.

“I feel sorry for the poor bastard. He lived the rest of his life in exile on a farm in Scotland. Had circumstances been a little different, he would have been a hero. He would have been the Donald Trump of his age.”

Stop that booing, you guys. Are those the words of someone who did a lot of research to find something to like about himself? OK, his faux self.

“When you play the classic villain, you think of yourself as a man doing the job, but I didn’t want to play a sneering villain.”

Not that Heller really heard the boos from his perch onstage anyway. “I thought they were shouting ‘Mookie’ the way they do at Mets games.”

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If you’re one of the three people on the planet who isn’t curious about the Clintons’ believe-it-or-not marriage, you won’t want to read Gail Sheehy’s deconstruction in February’s Vanity Fair. If you’re someone else, take this quiz:

Quick. How could Hillary defend her husband on television after reports of his trysts with Monica Lewinsky first deluged the press?

Easy. She didn’t read them.

“One reason Hillary Clinton is able to maintain her momentum is that she imposes a PG rating on the news digests her staff prepares for her--no sex, no late-night-talk-show gibes, no facts about the scandal that might distress or distract her. Hillary is not a news junkie like her husband,” Sheehy writes.

Now don’t try that at home. Needless to say, bad boy Bill isn’t going to be the first to disturb Hillary’s blissful ignorance. Dick Morris told Sheehy the Clintons don’t like to bug each other with the icky questions. “She doesn’t ask him about the sex stuff. And he doesn’t ask about her commodities investments or her Madison Guaranty transactions.”

Unfortunately for their cone of silence, it’s the public’s right to know. Which means scandal-o-rama. Sheehy explains Hillary’s incentive for sticking around with her chastened husband:

“When Hillary the wife lost, Hillary as political partner usually made gains. She took charge. And he let her. She also gained something in their personal relationship. When his misbehavior was flagrant enough to incur her wrath, this normally narcissistic man compensated by giving his wife some attention, some warmth, some physical intimacy.”

As Morris’ wife, Eileen McGann, tells Sheehy, “When Hillary rescues Bill, he invests her with a lot of power. Those are the few times he’s able to be warm and emotional and just give something.”

Yikes.