This being our Beautiful People issue, we thought it would be a good time to catch up with Tony award-winning actress and former Beautiful Person Nina Arianda about her starring role in Rob the Mob, out now. Based on a true story, the film follows Tommy (Michael Pitt) and Rosie Uva (Arianda), a young, madly in love married couple from Queens, as they hold up mob social clubs in 1991. Playing the getaway driver, Arianda, a native New Yorker, found herself behind the wheel for the first time in three years and fascinated by the power of folie à deux. Are you a good driver? Do you think you could handle driving a getaway car IRL?
Hell no. It's not a good idea for me to be driving. That was one of the challenges of making this film. They had me practicing in a minivan around the boroughs -- like, really? But I did it, and I actually had a moment where I was proud of myself, which doesn't happen often. So if I had to in real life, I would find a way. It wouldn't be very graceful, but I would do it.
What fascinated you most about Rosie and Tommy's story?
It was the whole concept of folie à deux. When people are that in love with each other, they share a language inexplicable to anyone else. They were a team and when you're in that frame of mind, everything is a good idea.
Do you consider Rosie and Tommy to be beautiful people?
I do. It is so rare these days to be committed to someone else and to what you're doing in such a full-bodied way, and I think that makes them very beautiful.