Emmy Rossum was apprehensive about taking a role in the U.S. adaptation of British TV show Shameless because she felt uncomfortable about the graphic sex scenes and gritty content. The Phantom of the Opera star appears opposite William H. MACy and Joan Cusack in the new series, which focuses on a dysfunctional family living in Chicago, Illinois. Rossum didn’t want to audition for the role of Fiona Gallagher initially, because she was put off by the nudity, swearing and shocking storylines, but her agent persuaded her to give it a go. She tells the New York Post, “I was loathe to do that (the sex scenes), but she’s a really interesting character and it’s rare for actresses to get good opportunities. My agent said, ‘People would never see you in that role… it’s a great part… you have to fight for it.’ “So, although I felt a little guilt, I got the script and auditioned four times. It’s not necessarily pretty writing. No time for sweet sayings. Mostly grip and grope – making love on the floor, the father’s drunk, cops come… He hits the kids.” Rossum also struggled to come to terms with her appearance on the show, adding, “I wear no make-up. None. My hair’s frizzed out. (But) I’m OK with not looking my best…”

Source: Contactmusic

Emmy Rossum has revealed how cast members on the US remake of Shameless pass the time between takes: making up rude songs. The 24-year-old, lauded for her angelic singing in The Phantom Of The Opera, said she and co-star William H Macy enjoyed composing naughty ditties during their downtime. “Bill Macy brings his ukulele to set and we make up funny songs – dirty songs,” Emmy laughed. The actress – who plays Fiona, the oldest daughter in the raucous Gallagher brood – said there was an opportunity to flex her vocal chords on the show. “There’s one scene later in the season where we discover that Bill’s character can play the piano, and we’re all singing ‘I Will Survive.’ But I was instructed to sing poorly,” she added. Emmy won high praise from William, who plays drunken dad Frank in the Showtime series, adapted from Paul Abbott’s original Channel 4 show. “Really, the heart and soul of the thing is Emmy Rossum,” he said. “She does the heavy lifting on our show.”

Source: The Press Association

Some actors pick up postcards as souvenirs from their location shoots. Emmy Rossum scooped up an alley cat. “Gosh, she was so gross,” Rossum says of Fiona Kitty. The cat made herself at home last fall on the Chicago set of Shameless, Showtime’s gritty new drama about the Gallaghers, a highly unconventional family of grifters getting by. Fiona Kitty had to be rid of worms and fleas before Rossum flew her back to Los Angeles. Still, she hasn’t completely shed the streets of her native West Side. She’s known to whack Rossum’s Yorkie, Cinnamon, in the head — “they’re sequestered right now” — and has clawed her new owner’s face “a little bit.” “She is definitely channeling my character,” Rossum says, and her namesake, Fiona Gallagher, the de facto matriarch in a household of five younger siblings and a drunken single father (William H. Macy) who works thankless jobs (at a concession stand, as a motel maid) and dates a charismatic car thief. Rossum, 24, knows that playing a mostly makeup-free, often braless anti-heroine is a stretch from the “corset-y, period drama” roles she’s used to. “I’m not obviously imagined as a kind of feral girl from Chicago,” she says. Fiona is “very aggressive. She has to have her defenses up, but at the same time, she has this innate sensitivity. You don’t know if she’s going to claw your eyes out or kiss you.” Read the rest of this entry…