January marks the tenth anniversary of Thirteen, the Nikki Reed and Evan Rachel Wood film based loosely on Reed’s life. IMDb has the film’s synopsis as “A thirteen-year-old girl’s relationship with her mother is put to the test as she discovers drugs, sex, and petty crime in the company of her cool but troubled best friend.” My little gay fourteen-year old brain had the film’s synopsis as “two girls make out.” At the time, Thirteen was being buzzed about because of the self-harm, drug use, and sexualization of underage girls present in the film. Since I was just a gay babe that didn’t realize I was such, I was CERTAIN that if I ever tried to rent this movie at Blockbuster, everyone would think I was gay. Because straight people are super paranoid about that kind of thing, right? So I didn’t.
This is all to say that Nikki Reed and Evan Rachel Wood Bisexual live streamed a Q&A session in honor of the movie’s 10th anniversary. Even if you’ve never seen it, this is worth checking out solely because of Wood’s backwards hat and suspenders situation. When someone asked the question that’s apparently been tumbling around their head since Evan Rachel Wood Bisexual came out as bisexual, if she had a crush on Reed during the movie, the feed cut out. And just when they started wrapping up the session and you thought all hope was lost, someone off camera reminds them that the viewers never actually heard the full answer to that question. Blessed be that person. There are three parts to the session but the part we’ll be discussing happens around the 11 minute mark of this one.
Now I’m no stranger to filling in someone years after the fact that I had a crush on them back in the day, even if I couldn’t identify it as such at the time. I know how awkward that moment can be and so I feel for Wood because she had to do it TWICE. Wood, the champ that she is, gets back into the topic with a joke. “When it cut out we were making out the whole time. I’m so sorry that you missed it.”
Apparently they’d never discussed whether Wood had a crush on Reed during filming before. They’ve only rekindled their friendship over the past year (thanks to Twitter) so I’m not too surprised that two married women haven’t discussed a childhood crush. Once Wood gets going, Reed temporarily curls into a little ball which made me have a crush on her for a hot second. She seems bashful and flattered even though they’re speaking about events that transpired over ten years ago. It’s pretty cute. Wood fesses up to her crush:
I did have a crush on Nikki. I don’t think I realized at the time that it was like a full blown crush but I definitely remember having feelings and thinking she was so beautiful. I thought you were so gorgeous and fun and there was something about you. The relationships you have with girls when you’re a teenager–there’s a part of you that wants to be them, there’s a part of you that kind of hates them, and there’s a part of you that’s kind of in love with them.
Reed chimes in and notes that she doesn’t meant to devalue Evan Rachel Wood Bisexual’s very bisexual feelings but that she thinks feelings of curiosity and confusion are very common with teenage girls.
Your first girl friend kind of represents your first time exploring love and what it means to love someone like that outside of your family and it’s not necessarily sexual although your body’s going through all these crazy things. The most making out I’d done up to that point in my life was with Evan in this movie and that was my first time experiencing what that was like and so you have all these crazy feelings and things that are happening–it is all mixed into one.
Wood goes on to state that she thinks a lot of girls get crushes on their best friends. They then talk about how they practiced for the kissing scene and are only now realizing that in some ways, their real lives began mirroring the movie. Both of them agree that this revelation changes how they interpret that experience and makes them reflect back on their own motivations. The video ends with Reed jokingly, but poignantly asserting that while making Thirteen they were “just two girls in love.” If a time machine is ever invented, do not go back in time and tell little Brittani this information. Her brain WILL explode.
oh god oh god oh god oh god
I know right! Not in the better of this at all!
i’m gonna die.
evan rachel wood bisexual’s hipbones and i have a lot of feelings about this
Your classmate’s sister-in-law is Evan Rachel Wood Bisexual?!?!?!
Scam alert!!
UGH STOP TALKING ABOUT YOUR SISTER IN LAW
oh my god riese you can’t just ask someone to stop talking about their sister-in-law who makes $79 every hour on the internet.
he needs to stop making his “sister-in-law who makes $79 every hour on the internet” happen, it’s not going to happen!!!!!!
Oh shit, teenage me’s brain just exploded! I love that ERWB was crushing the hell out of this experience. I remember , at the time, reading an article about this film in one of the Sunday papers and having to wait forever for it to get released over here. I feel like I saved the article, “because it was interesting” and possibly because of an unidentified feelings fest for Nikki Reed.
Somehow I forgot that they kissed in this movie!
I was obsessed with Evan Rachel Wood after this movie, and watched it secretly whenever I got a chance. I was 16 at the time, and somehow I didn’t realize that I had a total crush on her.
I must go watch it again!
No bra, no panties.
the backwards hat and suspenders situation, oh my god
I felt like I could see Evan playing a movie in her head about what her life would be like now if she and Nikki had actually dated, and in this situation, with Nikki talking about it so casually…Evan’s face and body language speaks serious feels. If it had been me, I would’ve acted the same way then cried by myself after this was over. Evan should ditch her marriage and they should just get together and have brunch with Ellen and Portia every Sunday for eternity.
oh god evan rachel wood bisexual, i just fell in love all over again.
I need to watch “Thirteen” again. I loved it as a teenager.
Oh wow, that hat and suspender situation plus Evan’s charmingly cocky hat-tilts = swoonfest.
That was a really poignant dialogue, and it’s so great that Evan was able to tell her story with Nikki’s support. I haven’t watched the movie since it came out, and I kind of remembered the movie the way Nikki sums it up as “two girls in love” but in a damaged way. Sounds like this is my cue to revisit that movie.
I actually found this movie to be really annoying when I first saw it. Ohh i know it was supposed to be this serious movie about how fucked up this girl’s live is. I felt so much better about my life when I saw it
This movie captures how, as a teenager, not feeling out-of-control is a good sign that you are totally out-of-control.
I rented it secretly and watched when my mom was out of the house. That’s how out of control I was.
I don’t remember if I downloaded ilegally or if I rented at as sleepover with friends. I know a friends wanted to watch it too. now, I wonder who she was crushing on.
this movie was super significant to young-teen me realizing i was bisexual. since it was also super significant to young-teen evan rachel wood bisexual realizing she was bisexual, i’m gonna go ahead and assume we’re soul-twins.
OMG, I can’t believe I missed their Q&A! I follow them both on twitter and I remember reading about it and being excited for it and then it completely slipped my mind, what a shame!
Ten years ago, I was so eager to watch this movie. I’ve loved Evan Rachel Wood Bisexual since Once&Again and the movie’s thematic seemed interesting to confuse,angsty teen me.
and yeah, what they say is so true. I didn’t realise then, but looking back I definitely had crushes on a couple of my friends.
at the moment I honestly didn’t like girls. or boys,really, though I did my best to pretend.
I didn’t know what it was, I just knew I felt very strongly about certain people.
oh an may I say? Evan looks AMAZING
so this means I’ve had a crush on her for more than ten years now?
I watched this with my (straight, but likes to make out with girls “to bond”) best friend the night before we went out to the park in the middle of the night, smoked some weed, and made out on the playground equipment (my first kiss). How fitting.
LIFE IMITATES ART
Yup. Definitely watched this when I was fourteen. Definitely went and got my tongue pierced the next week. Definitely suppressed all the lady loving feelings for much longer.
I’m so looking forward to ‘twenty-three’ coming out, because that’s totally how all these movies work, right?
Well, I’m just going to keep on pretending they wound up together IRL…
suspenders.
!!!
I remember pretending not to be excited by the kissing scene all those years ago! I also remember wondering/wishing if someone was going on between the two of them after listening to the commentary/watching the making of.