Tara Reid: 'Alone' In Perceptions of Dignity

At first glance, Tara Reid doesn’t look like a table dancer.

She stands a petite 5’4”, sporting a flashy blonde mane that belies her hard looks and tight face. The figure doesn’t seem to fit her new role as America’s top party girl, a tabloid target whose slips of the tongue and recent wardrobe malfunction have made her a sitting duck for the gossip hounds of Page Six. But if torrid Tara isn’t in the bod, where’s she hiding?

“I think my whole party girl image is definitely taken way out of control. I don’t think I do anything different from what any of us do,” Reid says plainly, with a touch of exasperation. The words may be genuine, but they reveal more than she’d like. Put simply, the Tara Reid she’d love to shake isn’t going anywhere. She’s in her voice.

It’s a husky mix of smoker’s rasp and the phone sex operator next door. Reid is ten months shy of her thirtieth birthday, but her voice evokes the world-weariness of a woman beyond her years. Speaking to reporters over the phone from New York, Reid didn’t volunteer her exact location, but one couldn’t help but imagine her perched on a barstool, throwing back shots of whiskey and lamenting life’s betrayals. It’s sexy, in an intimidating way—perhaps the very feature that has attracted a worldwide fan base for the American Pie star. Some say her acting chops aren’t up to snuff, but critics can’t argue with a voice like that.

Of course, the critics haven’t been silent either. They weren’t too enamored of Reid’s performance in her new film Alone in the Dark, where she plays a brilliant anthropologist forced to contend with evil demons intent on world domination. The role represents a break from the starlet’s standard parts in sex comedies like Van Wilder—and Reid suggests her sexpot days may be numbered.

“Now that I’m getting older I’m getting different opportunities to play different roles,” Reid says. “An anthropologist, a mother, a doctor.”

Of course, Alone in the Dark isn’t exactly Sophie’s Choice. A B-grade horror film based on an Atari video game, the film resembles a clumsy remake of Tomb Raider, minus the budget. Still, the movie – with its strong (and, supposedly, smart) female protagonist – could have been ripe territory for an actress who says she wants to be known more for her dramatic chops than her off-screen antics.

“I go out and have a good time, but I work really hard too. I've done twenty-four movies so I’m working a lot,” Reid says. “People need to stop writing so much about that. It shouldn’t be the focus of my life. I’m proud of some of the work I’ve done too. I think it takes away from me getting those really great roles.”

Unfortunately, Alone in the Dark isn’t going to net any Oscars for the ambitious starlet. Reid’s presence onscreen leaves something to be desired—but at least she had fun filming.

“Comedies are actually a lot harder to shoot than a horror movie or a drama,” Reid explains. “It's harder to tell a joke, it’s harder to be funny than it is to be mad or scared.” Which means the grueling process of filming My Boss’s Daughter took more of a toll on the starlet than the shoot-’em-up antics of Alone in the Dark.

The former Saved by the Bell: The New Class regular says she now plans on returning to television: she’s developing a sitcom about an actress who “gets in trouble with the tabloids.” Very meta.

“It’s about me having the last laugh,” Reid says, sounding quite satisfied with the idea. “People from the Page Sixes who have messed with me, this is going to spin it back around at them. People might think a little bit more about things they want to write about me.”

—Staff writer Michael M. Grynbaum can be reached at grynbaum@fas.harvard.edu.