Michelle Williams for Elle Magazine (April 2008) at The Insider

Michelle Williams Pictures: Michelle Williams for Elle Magazine (April 2008)

Michelle Williams was born with a gift for acting, a love of books, and an acute sense of self. While filming in Sweden in the weeks before Heath Ledger’s death, the Oscar-nominated actress and young mother opened up about life and love, with amazing grace.

She stole the keys. She stole the car. She stole into the night that is already morning on the dashboard clock: 3:26 a.m., 01.09.08. It is too late and too early and too soon to tell if Michelle Williams has pushed her luck. “I’ll take my chances,” the actress says, turning the engine over, breathing warmth into her cupped hands. The snow is falling, the digital seconds flashing, the wipers swiping as a man on the radio sings a twangy country tune, “Goodbye ole paint, I’m a leavin’ Cheyenne…,” cutting the cold, sleeping silence of this Swedish industrial town. In the windows of the dark houses, electric candelabra glow, still burning from Christmas nearly three weeks past.
The black iced road glistens, curving this way and that way, down, down, down the mountain, away from the old Albert Hotel, which has opened especially for her. A mansion dating from 1857, it perches on a cliff above Trollhättan, home to a Saab factory, wondrous waterfalls, and the Gõta Ãlv River, where, local legend has it, large trolls live. Literally translated, Trollhättan is Trolls’ Hood, and the residents are not to be taken lightly. In the midst of their watery stomping ground is Mímir’s Well, owned and operated by Mímir, a Norse deity renowned for his wisdom (and a striking resemblance to Kris Kristofferson). It is said that anyone who drinks from his well has the power to see the future. Odin gave an eye for the privilege, and in peering through Time’s keyhole, he never smiled again.
“I’m obsessed with water,” Williams says. “The scene in Brokeback Mountain when I open the door and see Heath and Jake kiss? Everyone was outside and I was in this hallway by myself, and I just kept thinking, I want to be like water. I want to slip through fingers, but hold up a ship.”

Read Complete Interview @ Elle