Human Instincts Talented on Many Plains, Aleksa Palladino Is What We Like to Call a True Artist

098 COMBUSTION Written by ASHLEY CAPUTO TELEVISION 099 HUMAN INSTINCTS TALENTED ON MANY PLAINS, ALEKSA PALLADINO IS WHAT WE LIKE TO CALL A TRUE ARTIST appiness and sadness are emotions we, as humans, have no other choice but to feel. For some people Growing up in Manhattan, Aleksa claims, “There wasn’t much to do besides run around the hallways those emotions are not only felt, but embedded and stamped so close to the surface that you can and get in trouble. Which is how I got into music. I didn’t have a backyard to play in so everything became Halmost touch it and see it surrounding their aura. It is haunting and dark, but not always scary. These more about ‘What can I do in my room?’ people are a part of a rare selection of humans who are both gifted and cursed with the ability to carry the Aleksa is a self-taught musician, getting her first instrument when she was nine years old — a small pain and sorrow that others dismiss or refuse to feel. They are, rather, the emotional pickers who nestle the toy guitar with plastic strings. By the time she was 12, she was playing large acoustic guitars an image dif- brute most cannot bear, and have done so for generations. This group is widely known as artists. ficult to imagine looking at her small frame and tiny fingers. Referring to Aleksa Palladino as an actress or musician just does not seem deserving in an age when we as- On her decision to avoid going to school for either singing or acting, Aleksa explains she doesn’t like be- sociate such vocations in the realm of an almost-factious Hollywood. Instead, Aleksa is an artist, untainted by ing told there’s a way to do things. “If you’re stubborn — which I am — you don’t want someone to tell you objectives to be famous and guided by the innate capability to transform human experience into an expressive you’re doing something wrong. If I had, I would end up saying, fuck this,” she says as she begins to laugh art form. – this high-pitched quirky laugh you wouldn’t expect to come from such a serious, gentle creature. “It may “It’s not easy to be a person. I think that’s why people have people be expressive. Different feelings and take me twice as long, but at least I know it’s mine.” different experiences have to be used and become something. They have to get used,” says Aleksa. “I don’t She has been recording her own music for 15 years now. Aleksa and Devon Church, her husband, know how to have all this stuff happen to me and just be okay with it. Even the best things can still break your formed a band called ExitMusic. When the couple moved in together, they started to write music. It took heart.” Each sentence is spoken slowly in a serious tone, as if each word is a part of a deeper thought some- them five years to complete their first album, which they ended up releasing just a few years ago. where else in her mind. Her flawless, porcelain-like face is expressionless. Although from the words spoken, I “Nobody really heard it. It was more like this labor of love didn’t get a proper birth,” says Aleksa. For the past know that she is quite the opposite. three years they have been working on their second album. In the beginning of this past summer, ExitMusic got signed to the label Secretly Canadian. They have already started touring the United States and United Kingdom. Aleksa finds her lyrics to be revelations from her subconscious. “While I’m writing a song and I’m half way through, I’ll realize what I’m writing about and maybe I didn’t necessarily know in my real life that it was bothering me so much,” says Aleksa. “Through your art, you see yourself so much clearer than you do in your day-to-day life.” Aleksa has been acting since the age of 14. She has had roles in many successful independent films, gaining most of her recognition after being cast as Jimmy Darmody’s wife Angela in the Martin Scorsese HBO hit series, Boardwalk Empire. This is the first time a wider audience has seen Aleksa. Her character, An- gela, is a 1920’s bohemian woman trapped by the iron, jail-like bars of the era inhibiting her to be expressive and free. Aleksa’s incomparable portrayal of Angela derives from her natural ability to feel the same pain. As Aleksa talks about Angela, and her confusion and loneliness, there is such a sheer realness to her tone as if they are her own — as if Angela is an extension of her own self. “I remember getting scripts this year and I would find something related [to Jimmy and my history together] and I would just ball,” says Aleksa. “As this character, as Angela, I have so many unanswered questions always. There are not a lot of resolutions in her storyline; we never find peace. So every piece of closure or information you get really affects you.” Photographed by JESSE DITTMAR Creative Direction by TILAL IMANI Styled by NIMA FORD !"#$%&'(%$)*+,--./0.--.*122333/45 --6/76--33389873(:.

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