Emily Hamilton, Edgar Allan Poe’s love interest in ‘The Raven’, is an unusual woman for her time: educated, privileged, independent and stunningly beautiful. The daughter of one of Baltimore’s wealthiest businessmen, Emily has made up her mind that she is going to marry Poe, with or without her father’s approval. Alice Eve, who like Luke Evans, who play  Detective Fields, is a veteran of the English theater, plays Emily.

“We all knew it was going be Alice,” says producer Aaron Ryder. “Somebody in my office kept saying to me, why don’t you just cast her? She’s both strong and vulnerable, which was perfect for the character.”

Eve perfectly embodies the character’s extraordinary attributes, according to director James McTeigue. “I’m sure there are a lot of men out there who think Alice is worth dying for,” he notes. “She is a really great mixture. She’s very bright and very beautiful as well.”

The actress found the idea of exploring the life of a great writer intriguing, but the script was the deciding factor. “I loved it,” says Eve. “It’s a proper thriller with a great backstory that is based in fact. There’s the emotional story, which is my story. And then there’s the epic film that Luke and John [Cusack] star in. And then there are the horrific stories of murder. Hopefully, it will appeal to a large cross-section of movie lovers.”

Eve’s character, Emily, is secretly engaged to Poe and wants to reveal their plans to her father, knowing that he violently disapproves of her betrothed. “She’s a real woman,” the actress says. “The character is strong and forthright. But she has a complicated relationship with her father. Her mother died when she was very young, and she’s stepped into that role in a lot of ways. Now she’s fallen in love with a wild genius and it puts her in the way of danger. They are a bit like Romeo and Juliet, in that they have come together at perhaps the wrong time and in the wrong place.”

Cusack brought a lot of lyricism to his character, says Eve. “He gives the language a melody and flare. He inhabited the neurotic, alcoholic man very well. We did a lot of talking and investigating and working out what kind of man Poe is. There are lots of things written about him, but as they say, never trust the poet, trust the poem. John had to find the man for himself.”

Eve’s character is an amalgamation of several women in Poe’s life. “Emily didn’t really exist so my task was different from John’s in discovering who she is,” says the actress. “I had a bit more freedom. I imagined that Emily is the next and last best hope for him. Poe redeems himself when he understands true love and sacrifices himself for it.”

Eve studied piano and the Viennese waltz to prepare to play a 19th-century aristocrat, but the most difficult aspect required her to learn to do nothing. When Emily is kidnapped by the murderer, he stashes her in a way that would do Poe proud: He keeps her in a coffin. The actress found that sequence particularly difficult to shoot. “I’m claustrophobic, so when buried alive in a stinking, wet, box, I tend to feel panicked,” she admits. “This very powerful character reverts to utter helplessness and weakness. That was an interesting journey within the film for me.”

Image Courtesy of   The Raven

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