Hilary Swank Finds Her Next Thrill in Highflying 'Amelia'

By Donna Freydkin, 'USA Today'

As part of her preparation for playing the role of Amelia Earhart in an upcoming biopic, actress Hilary Swank is, naturally, learning to fly. "You can’t play Amelia Earhart and not learn how to fly," she says. "That’s just wrong in every way." She says she finds flying to be "exhilarating," and plans to keep learning after the film is complete and get a pilot’s license. "I love daredevil things," she says, referring both to flying and to her acting career, which has included playing a female boxer and a transgendered teen in addition to the groundbreaking Earhart. "I don’t know if it’s my sign or my makeup, [but] I like to take roles that are challenging in a way that scare me." And she likes to scare her boyfriend as well—on a recent trip to Las Vegas, she cancelled his commercial flight and showed up in a small plane to fly him there herself. "He was sitting in the back seat white-knuckled," she says, grinning widely. "I feel like I’m the luckiest girl on earth," she says. "I like my job."

November 12, 2009