Natalie Portman said she loves her native Israel, despite her difficulties in being a Hollywood celebrity there. The Jerusalem-born film star said in a newspaper interview published last Friday that she visits Israel from her home in the United States at least three or four times a year.
“I see myself as a citizen of the world, and I want to feel at home anywhere I go, but obviously I have an emotional connection to Israel that connects me to it more than to other places,” she told Yediot Achronot.
But Portman complained that Israelis in general deny her privacy when she visits. “They treat you like an object, like a Mickey Mouse doll,” she said. “They point at you, stare at you, photograph you, shout.”
Thus, the 25-year-old beauty said, romantic overtures are rare for her in Israel. “I can’t explain it. The guys just don’t approach me,” she said.
Portman may spend more time than ever in Israel if she follows through on tentative plans to direct and act in a film adaptation of Amos Oz’s memoir, “A Tale of Love and Darkness.”
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