It’s been five years since Emma Watson last attended an Oscars party, but the former Harry Potter actress went out tonight for Elton John’s charity event. Watson was photographed in a sheer black off-the-shoulder dress at the Elton John AIDS Foundation’s 31st Annual Academy Awards Viewing Party. She wore her light brown hair down with a side part and loose waves.
Watson has kept a very low profile in recent months with the exception of releasing her Prada commercial last summer, which she directed. As she explained to Harper’s Bazaar Australia at the time, her being able to direct the film for the fragrance Prada Paradoxe was a condition for her involvement.
“I was very specific that, if I’m going to do this, I want to tell a story and I want to be a real character who is going to do something,” she said. “To tell my own story and frame myself, to get to be in charge of my own image felt genuinely exciting.”
Watson said she had long had an interest in directing. “I wanted to be a director since I was seven years old,” she said. “I don’t think I thought it was a possibility. No one offered me the directing job. I had to give myself permission. I had to ask. I love telling stories. I think I’m good at it. I think I have a vision. I’m not waiting for anyone’s permission any more.”
“I think it was serendipitous that Prada came to me with this project,” she continued. “It was around the time when I had decided in my heart, and my head, that I wanted to direct something. I found the concept of being a woman who is a paradox so interesting.”
“As a director, I wanted to find a piece of material that I wasn’t going to get bored of, that I felt good about living inside of and exploring every single day, intensively.” She added that “having been in so many photoshoots and fashion campaigns, and really having spent my life been captured by other people; to tell my own story and frame myself, to get to be in charge of my own image felt genuinely exciting.”
Senior News and Strategy Editor
Alyssa Bailey is the senior news and strategy editor at ELLE.com, where she oversees coverage of celebrities and royals (particularly Meghan Markle and Kate Middleton). She previously held positions at InStyle and Cosmopolitan. When she’s not working, she loves running around Central Park, making people take #ootd pics of her, and exploring New York City.
