Sounds like Scarlett Johansson has had babies on the brain for a while. In a just-released interview conducted before news of her pregnancy went public, the Her actress, 29, opens up for the first time about wanting to have it all (skeptics be damned!) with fiance Romain Dauriac — love, career, and, yes, kids.
"It seems so stressful to not be able to spend time with your family because you're constantly chasing the tail of your own success," Johansson says in the April issue of WSJ magazine. "There must exist a world in which I can balance those things, be able to raise a family and still make a film a year, or work on my own, develop things, do theater. I want to be able to have it all. Selfishly."
Which is not to say she won't compromise. "I know that with that there will be some sacrifices," the Avengers superstar tells WSJ of balancing kids and her job. "I know that's the struggle with working mothers and successful careers. It happens."
She notes, however, that there's a double standard. "With [male actors] it just doesn't happen that way," she laments. "You can be every woman's fantasy, and nobody thinks twice about the fact that you have eight kids or whatever."
For now, it seems, Johansson and her fiance, a former magazine editor turned creative director of a French ad agency, are focused just on the one kid, due later this year. "Our life is quiet," she tells WSJ, joking that their couple nickname should be something like "Scar-Ro" or "Scar-Main." As for their wedding? "Our plan is to get married at some point," she says vaguely.
At this point, though, the once-divorced actress — whose ex-husband, Ryan Reynolds, got remarried last fall to his Green Lantern costar Blake Lively — is more preoccupied with improving her French than picking out a wedding dress. "When you're in a relationship with somebody and you're communicating with them, you want to be as clear and concise as possible," she says. "We try to speak French a little, but it's mostly like, 'I like this sandwich.' 'That's a nice color.'"
She may want to practice "I'm sorry," too. She recently joked on David Letterman's late-night show about the rudeness of people in Paris, where she spends most of her time with Dauriac — but not everyone thought it was very funny. "His father called him and said, 'What is she smoking? What is she thinking?'" Johansson recalls, laughing. "Hopefully they will accept me back there."
