Elle Fanning studied Lea Michele on Glee to prepare for The Girl from Plainville, but she didn't reach out to Michelle Carter

Variety

"I didn’t feel that it was appropriate for me to reach out to Michelle," Fanning tells Variety. But to prepare to play Carter, Fanning says: "I watched a lot of Glee. She was a huge Glee fan. I had seen the show, but I watched a lot of it on set. Reading the pilot, in the last scene she’s singing 'Make You Feel My Love,' mimicking Lea Michele’s grief. Lea’s grief was real in the show; she’s also mourning her real-life boyfriend (Cory Monteith, who died in 2013). I’ve never met her, but I know every mannerism that she does in that scene. I have a legal pad of notes. I wrote down every time she blinked, every time she moved her hand with each word, to mimic the emotion. It was a real exercise. I felt really connected to her, because I feel like I’ve seen her grieve. It was very meta." ALSO: Lea Michele says she hasn't watched The Girl from Plainville: "I’m a huge fan of Elle and everything that she does, but I haven’t seen it yet."