Oscar winner Emma Stone explains why she had to audition for her new movie, but 'didn't find it insulting'

• Emma Stone had to audition to get the role of one of the main characters in "The Favourite."
• Director Yorgos Lanthimos said he did it so he was confident Stone, the only American actor on set, could pull off a convincing English accent.
• "I just didn't want her to feel uncomfortable while we were doing it or make a fool of herself," he told Business Insider.
• Stone said she did not feel insulted having to read for the part, as she also was able to find out "if you like the director."

 

After winning an Oscar for her performance in 2016's "La La Land," Emma Stone is on track to getting her third nomination in four years when her new movie "The Favourite" opens on Friday.

But in a surprising revelation, despite being one of the biggest stars working today, Stone said she had to audition for "The Favourite" director Yorgos Lanthimos to get the role of the scheming cousin, Abigail.

While sitting in a New York City hotel room across from her director, when the topic was brought up Stone said the main reason was so Lanthimos could hear her English accent, but then she playfully directed the question to her director to explain why she did have to come in.

Read more: Emma Stone told us "The Favourite" was her first movie in 4 years she wasn't constantly "fixing"

"It was making sure that we would be able to work creatively free without the accent being a hindrance in the way that we wanted to work," Lanthimos told Business Insider.

Lanthimos said he and Stone had a few sessions with a dialect coach and noted that he worked with her the same way he worked with all the actors during rehearsals. The director even played down that it was really an audition, but Stone spoke up to say that it definitely felt like one.

"It was taped and at a casting office," Stone said.

But the actress also added that this was very different than in the early days of her career where she had to drive around to casting calls to get a job.

"If I do need to read something now it's more of a chemistry thing," she said. "I didn't find it insulting. You learn too as an actor if the role fits and if you like the director."

Lanthimos said that Stone's English accent (she was the only American actor in a movie set in 18th century England) passed with flying colors from the dialect coach and his English friends.

"I just didn't want her to feel uncomfortable while we were doing it or make a fool of herself," Lanthimos said of Stone taking on the role.

Fans of Stone's work have nothing to worry about. The Oscar winner gives a fantastic performance playing one of two wicked cousins (the other is played by Rachel Weisz) who fight over the attention of Queen Anne (Olivia Colman) during her reign in the early 1700s.