We’ve always loved Elizabeth Banks, but we didn’t realize how much until we really pondered her resume. From cult favorites “Wet Hot American Summer” and “The Baxter” to “30 Rock” (and, naturally, her upcoming role in “The Hunger Games”), Banks’ projects occupy a shockingly large percentage of our Top 10 Things Ever To Appear on a Screen.

Yes, that’s a real list.

Banks’ latest role continues her modus operandi of affable informality — you sorta feel like you know the NYPD psychologist talking Sam Worthington down in action thriller “Man on a Ledge.” It’s that same candor that makes Banks so easy to interview; we heard the best and worst of her “Ledge” preparation … and got the answers to a few “Hunger Games” questions we were duty-bound to ask.

What was it about “Man on a Ledge” that appealed to you? The action? The cast? The chance to play someone unambiguously kind before tackling a shady character like Effie Trinket in “The Hunger Games?”
[laughs] Um, no, you know what? I had no idea about “Hunger Games” when I was making this. I was mostly drawn to the fact that I get to run around with a gun and chase bad guys and do stunts. It really appealed to the tomboy in me. I’ve never really been in an action movie in this kind of capacity.

I felt like I could bring something to this character, Lydia Mercer. When I read her, what excited me, was I felt that it was not gender specific. I felt like if it was a dude, you’d be fine too. I love that they added the tension of it being a woman.

She’s not some woman in a man’s world, apologizing or with a chip on her shoulder. There was just none of that in this film. And she’s like the smartest one in the room, which is always fun.

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She’s played first lady Laura Bush, enticed a 40-year-old virgin and flirted with amateur porn stardom, but never has Elizabeth Banks’ career reached the heights of “Man on a Ledge.” It’s a tall story about being 22 stories up, precariously perched on a 14-inch sill outside New York’s swank Roosevelt Hotel, where the accommodations are nothing more than a bitingly cold wind and a flimsy harness designed to keep her pouty lips from kissing the rock-hard pavement of Madison Avenue.

That she survived the shoot remains a marvel to the Massachusetts-born beauty, but her heart-stopping display of derring-do is indicative of an actress who has never been afraid to take chances. It’s a fearlessness that has won her great favor in Hollywood, where she’s rapidly become one of the industry’s hardest working women. Still, she prides herself on having the ability to keep her feet firmly planted on the ground, even if that ground is nearly 200 feet up.

“I always want to stay grounded and real,” Banks said last week during a trip home to promote Friday’s opening of “Man on a Ledge.” “I’m just a regular gal from Western Mass. who puts her family first. That’s really important to me. I also have a long-term relationship with my husband and a stable home life. I have a real stable life, generally.”

She’s equally proud of diverting her eyes from the glitz and glitter that have blinded so many young stars, an attribute she attributes to staying focused on her education, which was capped off by graduating magna cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania in 1996.

“I came into this business relatively late,” said Banks, smartly dressed in black tights and a short plaid skirt with matching top. “I didn’t have a professional acting job until I was almost 26 years old, so I was already a fully formed person by then. I had worked much of my life in the service industry; I worked with real people. And so I’m always trying to honor them.”

Those honorees, she said, include the dedicated policewoman who served as her technical adviser on “Man on a Ledge,” a high-concept thriller in which Banks plays a hostage negotiator summoned to keep an escaped convict (“Avatar’s” Sam Worthington) from taking a 22-story dive off the hotel’s ledge.

“She was just a great resource. So much of what she told me I brought to the movie,” Banks, 37, said of her consultant. “I also liked that she was very feminine and she had long hair and she was a mom. She was not a cliche, she wasn’t trying to be tough, she wasn’t trying to be masculine, she wasn’t apologizing for being a woman on the police force, she was just a woman who just happened to be a cop.”

The advice was solid, but the prospect of dangling in a harness high above street level was not. In fact, it presented a bit of a distraction that Banks said she had to overcome so she could concentrate entirely on her acting. But that doesn’t mean she ever felt comfortable.

“I was attached to a harness at all times,” Banks said. “It was a great big rigmarole to get in and out of everything, so the hardest thing was not being able to go to the bathroom or take a break. Plus, it was so cold. We shot in November and it was very windy. I had to wear long underwear and several layers of clothes just to stay warm.”

Whenever she was tempted to call her agent to get her out of her predicament, Banks said she was buoyed by the knowledge that she was part of a cast featuring the likes of Ed Harris, Jamie Bell, Kyra Sedgwick, Ed Burns and Anthony Mackie.

“It’s a pretty great bunch,” Banks said. “I really love this group. I think Jamie Bell is a real star. I love that kid. Sam Worthington is great; and obviously Ed Harris is incredible; Anthony Mackie, so great. I was really lucky, too, because Ed Burns, who plays my colleague in the movie, is the epitome of the authentic New York City cop. His entire family is New York cops. He had the language, and he had the accent and the demeanor of all those guys. I just thought he was so right on the money. He just knows that world really well.”

As is the case with nearly everyone she works with, be it Seth Rogen in “Zack and Miri Make a Porno,” Josh Brolin in “W.,” or Alec Baldwin on “30 Rock,” Banks generates potent chemistry with “Ledge” co-stars Burns and Worthington, the latter a disgraced ex-cop looking to right wrongs, or die trying. Banks says sometimes the sparks are set off naturally, sometimes not.

“I have a lot of secret methods,” Banks said with a sly smile. “With Alec Baldwin it comes naturally. I really enjoy him. But for sure, there are times when you have to work at it. I’m a good flirt; that’s probably my No. 1 secret weapon.”

Lately, she’s been flirting with something else: producing. She and her husband, Max Handelman, are partners in the company Brownstone Productions, which will release its second movie, “Pitch Perfect,” later this year. The film, which stars Oscar nominee Anna Kendrick, explores the world of college a cappella singing competitions.

“It’s very hard work,” Banks said of producing. “But it’s also extremely gratifying. I love creating opportunities for other people and getting involved with somebody else’s dream, whether they’re a writer or director. I also love telling stories, and as an actor, I’m just a piece of the puzzle; but as a producer, you pick which puzzle you’re going to make. You get to shape so much of the storytelling because you are choosing the writer, director, the tone and the scope of it.”

It also provides Banks the opportunity to get closer to her husband and their infant son, Felix.

“It’s fantastic,” she said of the chance to work together. “I don’t recommend it for all couples, but it works really well for Max and me. It also, frankly, helps us see each other more often because I travel so much for this job as an actress. And so being able to work together is really great.”

Next up for Banks is the hotly anticipated release of “The Hunger Games” on March 20. In it, she plays Effie Trinket, a “District 12 escort” assigned to keep the tale’s main character, played by Oscar nominee Jennifer Lawrence, in good humor, as the teen enters into a sadistic game of kill or be killed.

“Effie is a really intense character, very theatrical,” said Banks, who is almost unrecognizable in a towering curly pink wig and tons of pink pancake makeup. “I based her partially on Rosalind Russell in ‘Auntie Mame.’ That was one of my favorite influences. It’s a really fun project to be a part of.”

PatriotLedger.com

In her upcoming comedy What to Expect When You’re Expecting (due out on May 11), Elizabeth Banks’ character discovers first-hand just how difficult carrying a child can be. (In fact, she comes to the harsh realization that “pregnancy sucks!”) Luckily, it’s what happens afterwards that makes it worth it.

“The most surprising part of motherhood for me is just my capacity for joy,” says the 37-year-old actress, who’s mom to 10-month-old son Felix with husband Max Handelman. “I did not know how much joy a kid could bring into your life. It’s incredible.”

Of course, motherhood does have its challenges — especially when it comes to the precarious juggling act of also managing a career. “It’s difficult to balance,” Banks (who’ll soon hit theaters on March 23 in the eagerly anticipated The Hunger Games) tells iVillage exclusively. “I think any working parent has a hard time being away from their child, whether it be a mom or a dad.”

Watch our exclusive video to find out how Banks is seeing herself in her son and how she and husband keep their romance alive.

iVillage.com

Rest and relaxation? As if!

The type of spa treatments Elizabeth Banks goes for aren’t quiet as and calm and laid-back as some spa-goers might prefer.

“The most ridiculous [spa] experience I’ve had was in Budapest. It’s known for its bathhouses, and I’d never been to one of those. I had some giant Hungarian smack me with palm fronds,” the actress told Time Out New York about her first platza treatment. “It was so painful [Laughs], but I was too embarrassed to say, “Please stop!”

Like Banks describes, platza treatments are when a massage specialist continuously smacks a broom made of oak leaves soaked in warm water over your entire body. The procedure is said to be a natural way of removing toxins and skin-dulling residue from your body.

For a less rough-and-tumble service, Banks prefers to get wrapped up like a caterpillar.

“I recently had an amazing mud wrap [in Park City, Utah]. The aesthetician asked if I was claustrophobic, which made me wonder if I really knew what a wrap entailed,” the Man on a Ledge actress continued to the weekly regional mag. “She said she was going to wrap me with foil and cover my eyes, which makes some people feel like they’re in a coffin. [Laughs] I told her I thought I’d be okay, and I was.”

UsMagazine.com

Elizabeth Banks eked out some rare down time from shooting scenes from her latest movie, Man on a Ledge.

Of course, this came as she and co-star Sam Worthington were sitting on a 14-inch ledge, 250 feet above the ground atop New York’s Roosevelt Hotel, waiting for cameras to roll.

“The ledge was a few inches bigger than the size of a man’s shoe,” says Banks. “And then it was a straight sheer drop to the street, down 22 floors. You don’t want to pull your BlackBerry out there. I focused on Sam and we hung out.”

“It was just us and the pigeons,” Worthington concurs. “When you’re up there you do get to enjoy the view.”

It was a rare moment of inactivity during one of the most jam-packed schedules in the business. Banks has three major films coming out in the next five months, starting with the crime thriller Man on a Ledge (out Friday) and the hugely anticipated adaptation of Suzanne Collins’ novel The Hunger Games (March 23). She’s also part of the all-star cast in the pregnancy comedy What to Expect When You’re Expecting (May 11).

Adding to the intensity, Banks and husband Max Handelman are parents to seven-month-old son Felix and are also co-producing the comedy Pitch Perfect, about a singing competition.

“It’s a really exciting year and it’s essentially planned through August,” says Banks, 37. “I just have to go one foot through the other day by day and get through it.”

The first step is Ledge, in which Banks, in her first leading action role, plays a police negotiator trying to talk down a potential jumper.

The high emotions during the scene that has Banks joining Worthington on the ledge are authentic simply because the ledge itself was real.

“You can feel Elizabeth’s fear when she’s stepping out there,” says producer Lorenzo di Bonaventua. “If you were on a set, you’re not going to have that. There’s a purity to that fear that you cannot escape.”

Real-life daredevil

Such treacherous moments were hardly deterrents for Banks, who swings on trapezes for a hobby and admits to being a roller coaster fanatic.

“My take on it is, life is worth living,” she says. “It’s much more dangerous getting in my car in Los Angeles than doing these stunts. However, there was a 2% chance of death the entire time.”

Banks had a harness even for scenes shot inside the hotel room with an open window looking out to the ledge. And when the action moved outside, the security system was even more elaborate to keep the stars from danger. Still, as Banks says, errors happen.

“I’m not afraid of heights, I’m afraid of human failure,” she says. “That scares me. I was constantly checking that everything was working.”

“But,” she adds, “it was a pretty great rush.”

Banks has had to get used to a fast-paced acting schedule since breaking out in 2008, playing Laura Bush in Oliver Stone’s W as well as alongside Seth Rogen in Zack and Miri Make a Porno. Her widespread appeal has only increased with juicy characters such as 30 Rock’s brash political commentator Avery Jessup — the Emmy-nominated role she has played during four seasons.

But her past workload hasn’t required the current level of power days until now. During an interview at a sparse editing studio, Banks adroitly juggles planning for an upcoming trip to New York and Europe with her family to promote Ledge (“I need to find the right hotel for my son,” she says), an interview, and overseeing the editing of a webisode promoting Pitch Perfect.

“As producer, it’s so important to shape the movie’s message,” she says. “Marketing is so important.”

She’s focused but isn’t immune to laughing at the ad-libbed performances by the actors on screen. The webisodes are due the next week, though, “so there’s a little pressure,” she adds with a tight smile.

The March release of The Hunger Games is more kindling on her career and hectic schedule with Banks playing the pivotal role of Effie Trinket.

A villain to remember

In both the film adaptation and the best-selling book series, fan favorite Trinket is a wildly dressed representative from an authoritarian regime based in a futuristic center called the Capitol. Banks wanted to make sure her outrageous character had some depth.

“She’s a great villain,” says Banks. “But I wanted to make sure people didn’t dismiss her as comic relief. I wanted to make a three-dimensional character.”

Banks reveled in Effie’s outrageous outfits, images of which have been released in advance of the March release. They were so intricate, right down to the flamboyant fake nails, that she couldn’t do anything on her own on set without assistance — something that further helped her transformation into the character.

“People had to do everything from dress me and take me to the bathroom and unzip. I literally couldn’t even go to the bathroom,” she says. “But that’s totally Effie Trinket.”

In her mind, the clothes represent the everyday strain of Capitol life. “She lives in an oppressive society, so everything she wears is tight and constricting,” Banks says. “The shoes are torturous.”

Though her casting has been accepted by the protective fans of the book series, there will always be detractors. (“There are some haters,” admits Banks. “But you can’t please everyone.”) The mania around the movie is poised to propel Banks into another stratum of recognizability.

“We’ll see,” Banks says. “(The hype) is all online right now and all sort of fake. We won’t know until people actually see it. But I’m also totally unrecognizable in this film.”

She is on full display in What to Expect When You’re Expecting, which boasts an A-list cast including Jennifer Lopez, Cameron Diaz, Brooklyn Decker and Chris Rock.

Banks plays a know-it-all pregnancy author who finds out the real thing is far harder than theory as she transforms during the pregnancy. For Banks, the physical manifestation of that was a prosthetic stomach and a comically bulky bra.

“The stomach wasn’t that bad, it was the boobs,” Banks says with a laugh. “It’s Pamela Anderson times 10. They just weighed so much and totally outpaced the stomach.”

Her hormonal scenes, however, set the stage for high comedy.

“It allowed me to be a little show-offy,” says Banks. “I feel I have frankly the funniest role in the movie.”

Open-ended story line

It’s the kind of out-there comedy fans have come to expect of Banks, whose anything-goes attitude gained a weekly mainstream audience thanks to her hilarious run as Jessup on 30 Rock. At the end of last season, Jessup was being held in North Korea as a slave-bride to leader Kim Jong Il’s son. Now that the dictator has died in real life, Jessup is game to close the fictional loop.

“I know the writers want to address all of this, but I don’t know how or when,” she says. “No one has contacted me about specifics.”

Banks has enough on her plate right now and will soon start looking ahead to new projects, including playing Tinker Bell in the live-action romantic-comedy film Tink. There will always be more flamboyant portrayals, as well.

As the Pitch Perfect editing session resumes, Banks looks up at the screen and sees herself in a webisode as an absurdly loud talk show host called Gail Abernathy.

“You might have noticed,” she says with a smile. “I do love my outrageous characters.”

USAToday.com

Elizabeth Banks was a guest on “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart” last night and you can now watch her interview below!

PopSugar sat down to chat with Elizabeth Banks at the Man on a Ledge junket in Beverly Hills over the weekend. She had a lot to say about playing a cop in the intense film and what it was like actually filming on a building ledge high over New York City. Up next is The Hunger Games mania for Elizabeth, who transformed into Effie for the highly anticipated big-screen adaptation. Having been a Hunger Games fan from the beginning, Elizabeth wasn’t even aware it had become such a sensation until she signed on for the part. As for the finished product, Elizabeth revealed she’s seen enough to know it’s great. Check out our interview with Elizabeth and watch for Man on a Ledge in theaters Jan. 27.