Barrymore takes directors seat in 'Whip It'

Girls just wanna get rough.

Believe it or not, they are led by that adorable little girl Gertie who befriended E.T. 27 years ago.

Drew Barrymore, now 34 but age 7 back in her "E.T." days, is in charge of the bruising, fishnet-wearing women who are the fastest things on eight wheels in "Whip It." The comedy-sports-drama about roller derby women on the prowl opens today at local theaters.

There's Babe Ruthless, played by Ellen Page, the Oscar nominee from "Juno." There's Iron Maven, played by Juliette Lewis, returning to films after a five-year absence rocking with her band. There's Rosa Sparks, played by hip-hop artist Eve. Barrymore plays Smashley Simpson, a freewheeling stoner who encourages party time, on and off the track.

Barrymore is making her directorial debut with "Whip It," and if you were on the scene at the film's world premiere at the Toronto Film Festival, you would have noted that she was thoroughly in charge of her territory. America's kewpie doll for almost four decades, she's now a director with ideas and discipline.

"I like the idea that girls can do what boys do and still be attractive and humorous," she said.

Barrymore was inspired by Shauna Cross' book "Derby Girls." "I knew nothing about roller derby, but Shauna had been a skater herself, and I soon got the idea that this was camaraderie and it didn't matter about your size or your age. Roller derby is adaptable. Suddenly, I knew this was the one. This was the movie I had to direct. It would be my first."

The tips of her blond hair were dyed inky black, giving her a mod-rebel touch. "I did it in my bathroom in New York over the weekend," she said.

The fledgling director was sitting in the Park Hyatt Hotel in Toronto, backed by her cast and writers.

"I've been in some 50 movies and I've been working since I was 7," she said, "and I feel like all of it was practicing to get ready for this. I took every little detail that I have soaked up and brought it to the set. It was my emotional and cultural piggy bank, and I took my piggy bank and broke it all over the floor for this movie. I've been like a sponge in watching directors, actors and life, and I tried to use all of it in filming this movie. There was a place for everything."

She's the adorable princess, if not the queen, of the romantic-comedy genre, with hits co-starring Hugh Grant ("Music and Lyrics"), Jimmy Fallon (the baseball romance "Fever Pitch") and Adam Sandler ("50 First Dates"). Behind the scenes, she has formed one of the most successful production companies in Hollywood. Of Flower Films' 10 films, eight have been major hits, including the "Charlie's Angels" movies and "Donnie Darko."

She felt it was time to direct, "which, after all, is what I always wanted to do from the beginning. When Steven (Spielberg) directed me in 'E.T.,' I wanted to be like him, not like the other actors."

"Besides," she said, "as an actress, people keep saying I talk out of the side of my mouth. I'm working on it."

She says she asked Page to take on the all-important role of Babe Ruthless long before she became a star with "Juno."

Page, who has to carry the movie more than any other performer, said, "The saving thing is that Babe is a newcomer to the sport."

That didn't save her, though, from training harder than anyone else in the cast, according to her director.

"She's just an adorable girl - a tomboy and yet glamorous and capable of doing anything you ask for in a scene. Her 'Juno' fans are going to be surprised. Here, she can be vulnerable but strong at the same time. She's a girl who wants to escape from her small Texas town, but she isn't the beauty pageant kind of girl."

Scandalous headlines surfaced when the director and Page locked lips for the October cover of Marie Claire magazine, making it one of the most talked-about girlie kisses since Madonna smooched Britney Spears at that 2003 MTV Video Music Awards show.

"There's nothing there but fun, girlie friendship and affection," Barrymore said. "I can't believe that Ellen was the little angel that was there for me for the first movie I got to direct. I look at her little face and just get tears of affection for her."

Barrymore gave herself a supporting role in "Whip It" "because I didn't want to be a dictator giving orders from the sidelines. I wanted to go through the training with the girls and, if I was going to do it, I wanted to show it in the movie. We grew proud of our bruises. There were some injuries, but nothing major. When the insurance people came on the set, I told them that I was sorry but that these women had worked like hell in training and they were going to get a chance to show it in the film. We wanted to make it clear that we weren't using stunt people."

Barrymore has had a reputation as a wild child. Spielberg, her godfather, gave her a quilt for her birthday with a note urging her to "cover yourself up" after she posed nude for Playboy magazine. The pictures were altered by his staff to make her fully clothed.

She mooned David Letterman on his late-night show.

Her first of two impulsive marriages was to a Los Angeles bartender, with the wedding ceremony performed at a bar at 5 a.m. by a clairvoyant from a psychic hot line.

She was married twice to comedian Tom Green, once after eloping to the South Pacific and again in Malibu. When their multimillion-dollar home burned to the ground, they escaped only because her dog warned them.

Although she never finished high school, she was a best-selling author by age 14 with "Little Girl Lost," about her childhood with drugs and show business.

"I know certain actors who are totally screwed up on drugs," she said, "and it gets covered up. Why wasn't I excused for the flu or exhaustion or something like that? It worked for them."

She has been critical of Robert Downey Jr. "for having all those chances any actor would kill for, and yet he threw them away again and again." She praised the actor, though, for his comeback.

Barrymore has no current boyfriend and, according to her, isn't looking.

"I haven't been in a relationship in years because I've been so focused on my work. That's been my lover."

She added: "As a director and an actor, I am a very focused and disciplined person, but that doesn't mean that I don't like to go get plastered with my friends on Saturday night."

Mal Vincent, (757) 446-2347, mal.vincent@pilotonline.com