I could swallow my pride and ask to borrow from someone in the humanitarian aid group that brought me, but they had already left for the other side of the island. With few cell phones, most everyone is still accustomed to leaving messages at someone’s home and waiting for a return call. My younger sister, who was there with her college, had agreed to cover for me. That is, if anyone could find the person to unlock the dormitory safe, and that could take days. I knew I might not starve, but I would have to beg, borrow or steal to pay for the rest of my stay.

I replayed every expense that had gotten me to this point. If only I had argued with the taxi drivers more. If only I had waited in the very long lines with the locals for a better exchange rate, instead of lazily going to the Hotel Nacional. I was under the impression I had been quite frugal, but I was so accustomed to thoughtlessly using credit cards, I had underestimated how much cash to bring even just for the basics.

There are two currencies in Cuba, one for tourists and one for Cubans, and therefore two prices for everything. The first day I arrived, I wandered into the part of town everyone warned against to hear some live rumba. The music was free, but the overall experience was not. Two women decided to take me under their wing, explaining customs and the symbolism behind their dances. In exchange, they seemed only to want me to buy them drinks, and I was happy to oblige. “From each according to his ability,” I figured. It’s easy to romanticize the socialist ideals graffitied on every concrete wall, because generosity seems to be contagious. Obviously the reality is more complex.

I needed to access my email in order to have a glimmer of hope that my group might learn of my dilemma, which was unlikely, considering virtually no one has internet access in their home. Even the controversial blogger Yoani Sanchez uses a flash drive to upload her blog posts at hotel kiosks. When I met her days before, I noticed paint on her hand and asked if she was a painter as well as a writer. Chuckling, she told me she was doing construction on her house—literally, as in she was doing it herself. She told me that every Cuban has to be resourceful in order to survive.

I knew that the painfully slow connection at a hotel was too expensive for me at this point, but I was told of a student’s residence hall that had a computer room. I snuck in and logged on to their ancient PC. Of course I got caught, but pleaded with the attendant to just give me five minutes. Before I was able to address my cash situation, an email from friends back in the States sidetracked me, congratulating me on a Golden Globe nomination. There I was, thrilled to have received such a professional honor, yet still unable to barter it for cab fare.

In Havana, everything can seem poetic. At movie theaters and baseball games, a few entrepreneurial people strap cardboard boxes to their shoulders and sell “Rositas de Maiz.” Instead of calling it popcorn, though, Cubans refer to the treat as “little roses of corn.” As elated as I was about the recognition from my industry, it would afford me no special treatment on this remote and yet not-so-distant island.

Eventually the Keeper of the Safe was located, and I was able to borrow money to pay for my housing. My host generously offered to drive me to the airport in his 25-year-old stick shift, and I boarded the flight to Miami. With all of its crumbling beauty, Havana taught me the true value of a dollar. It also taught me that the people you know, and the ways in which you rely on one another, are more valuable than any paper currency.

—Ms. Stiles will be appearing on Broadway this spring in the Neil LaBute play “Fat Pig.”

Producer says she’s not dead so she could be back…

Dexter producer Sara Colleton says Julia Stiles may return to the show next season to reprise her role as Lumen.

Colleton said, “She’s alive, so therefore the door is, of course, open [for her return].”

“From the very beginning we knew that Lumen would leave Dexter,” she confirmed. “It’s devastating for Dexter to lose her, and he has never wanted anything before like this. But at the same time there’s something so incredibly direct about Lumen that when she tells him why she has to leave, it makes perfect sense to him.”

Colleton also said that making Lumen likable was “a very hard thing to pull off”.

“Society holds women up to a different standard of behavior, so having a woman who wanted to avenge what was done to her and is single-minded about it was [difficult],” she said. “It’s a thorny, hard character that is not feminine. And yet Julia played it so real that you care about her, and you end up rooting for her and for this odd romance [with Dexter].”

She may play the friend of a serial killer on Dexter, but in real life this actress gets totally freaked out by watching scary movies alone. In this exclusive video, Julia spills the fright flicks that leave her shaking. Watch the clip then pick up the December issue of Cosmo, where Julia talks about the vice she’s not at all apologetic about, her freaky phobia, and what she finds to be most confusing about celebrity life.

Do you find those kinds of scenes draining?
I’m not sure if this makes me a masochist or something but I think, as draining as the emotionally and physically demanding scenes can be, they’re also very rewarding. There was one scene in particular where I was surprised by how difficult it was for me to shake the emotional stuff. Yet when a day or two goes by and I can step away from it, I have no regrets. It’s very exciting to know I can go to those places and be surprised by work.

Is there anything you can tell us about those disturbing scenes without giving the story away?
It’s in episode ten, a few episodes away from the finale. The implications of the scene in terms of what Dexter tells me is pretty shattering.

I love the scene, in an early episode, in which you and Dexter meet in the coffee shop and you’re pulling apart all the sugar packets. Where did that impulse come from?
We needed something to physically show how she’s dealing with all this. I thought about what she had experienced before we meet her, about how she would have gotten through all of that. I did a lot of reading about trauma victims, abduction victims, torture victims, and physically, in order to survive, they have to focus on something that helps them detach from their bodies. I needed something that she would keep to help her get through every day of her life after she escaped. The writers had written she was pouring the sugar in piles, and I just changed it to crumpling the paper.

You mentioned reading about trauma — did you do much research for this character?
I read about torture victims and people who were abducted and rape victims, but that all felt very intellectual to me. I needed something that would make me connect emotionally, so the most helpful thing was details, specific memories, or smells or sounds. I would elaborate on those in my imagination, almost like meditating, I would sit and imagine those horrible experiences and eventually your muscles connect to your brain and it settles in. In a certain way, characters become people and you don’t want to do a disservice to them. I wanted to be as dark as I could about what the reality of that experience would be. I felt like I had to do that to do justice to anybody who had an experience even close to that.

Did you have any misgivings about spending all that time in the head of someone really damaged?
No. The thing that really got me is that she wasn’t going to be a victim the whole time.

Lumen is an exception for Dexter: He has rules about how to handle people who are innocent and rules about how to handle people who are a threat to him, but Lumen is both. What do you think really bonds them?
That is so interesting that you say that. The true nature of their bond is something we deal with throughout the season, even up until the finale. What Dexter sees in her is the kind of rage and darkness that has been unleashed in her because of what she’s experienced. They’re connecting about how to channel that hateful, destructive energy.

Okay, bottom line: Why should we keep watching? What does Lumen have in store for us?
She will surprise you. That feral animal quality we saw when she is first introduced shows that she is not going to take things lying down.

America Ferrera and Julia Stiles are set to star in Neil LaBute’s Tony award-nominated play reasons to be pretty on the London stage!

According to producer Howard Panter, the show is “about people being drawn to the superficial, and how we all get seduced by the surface – and how that can be a thorny path.”

LaBute’s material is generally pretty dark and effed up, so we’re curious to see how Stiles and Ferrera would tackle their roles! It would certainly be a change of pace for both of them.

Well, not Stiles – she’s on Dexter right now – but you get what we mean!

Seniors, take note—an actress, a senator, and the president of Estonia are all possibilities for your Class Day speaker.

A list of 17 possible speakers were sent to seniors in an email Wednesday. The lineup includes current president of Estonia Toomas Hendrik Ilves, actresses Julia Stiles and Anna Paquin, and outgoing Senator Judd Gregg.

The executive producer of Dexter has revealed details of Julia Stiles’s role on the fifth season of the show.

Speaking to E! Online, Sara Colleton explained that Stiles’s character will eventually help Dexter come to terms with the death of his wife Rita (Julie Benz).

“She plays a character who is literally thrust into Dexter’s life and comes with a lot of baggage and damage at a time when he doesn’t want to have any,” Colleton said.

“Dexter has been so burned by thinking he could have human friends and emotions, and right now all his energy is just trying to figure out what these feelings are, with his kids and his sister. It’s an interesting relationship, and she plays her part in how he eventually achieves self-forgiveness. What’s more human than that?”

However, Colleton suggested that Stiles’s character will not become a love interest for Dexter.

“Dexter realises more than ever he had that one shot with Rita that he blew,” she said. “It’s not that at all.”

Dexter returns on September 26 on Showtime.

With a key character making a dramatic exit at the end of Dexter’s fourth season, it’s no surprise that there’s potential for another female lead to join the cast. Just the other day, EW’s Michael Ausiello reported that Julie Benz signed on to reprise her role as Dexter’s late wife, Rita, in the new season. How she’ll reappear we don’t know, but it’s certainly exciting to hear she’ll return in any capacity.

The details are sparse for the new addition as well. All we know is that Julia Stiles “is in advanced talks to play a major, top secret role.” Rita’s sister? Maybe. A new love interest for Dexter? Maybe. The one possibility you can rule out is Stiles going John Lithgow on us and delivering a Trinity Killer-like character. Chip Johanneseen, the new showrunner, explained, “We’re not going to have a single Big Bad this season.” He added, “We don’t want to try and top John Lithgow, so we’re going to change up the forces that Dexter’s going to be dealing with.”

As someone who’s not really into the whole Bourne thing, it feels as thought Stiles has been off the radar for a quite a while. Minus that series, the last thing I can remember seeing her in is The Omen and well, that one I could have done without. With little coming her way on the big screen, joining the cast of a critically acclaimed and beloved show like Dexter could really be a smart move. However, the pressure will really be on. This is clearly going to be a pivotal year for Dexter. Season four rapped up in a big way and fans will expect season five to kick off strong.

The Vacationeers look to be stepping up, not just with the film but also with their two most recent shorts. Both feature Hollywood star Julia Stiles. “She was dating a friend of mine, and she happened to see our stuff online and wanted to do something with us,” said Brennan, who calls her “amazingly cool.”

She can be seen in The Vacationeers’ Excuse Me, which screened at LSIFF before The Scenesters, and also parodying clueless celebrity activism in their short Julia Stiles Helps the Environment More Than You.

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