Real-life characters

"Edie starred in a series of artist Andy Warhol's films (Vinyl, Kitchen, Beauty Part II). Chloe [Sevigny] starred in the film KIDS, directed by Larry Clark and written by former "One to Watch" boy Harmony Korine".
Source: www.blairmag.com

"Factory Girl", about tragic style icon Edie Sedgwick and her relationship with Andy Warhol.

The small-budget independent picture could become an important boost to Sienna's acting career. Those who have seen early rough-cut versions tell me the performances of Sienna and leading man Guy Pearce, as Warhol, are brilliant.

Certainly, playing Edie Sedgwick took its toll. "The more I delved into her, the more I realised she'd had this traumatic life," Sienna, left as Sedgwick, told me, explaining how her childhood was an emotional nightmare.
She was popping Valium at eight, had electric shock treatment at 14, and was sexually abused by her father. "You can see why she went so wild," Sienna noted, alluding to Sedgwick's s society antics in Sixties New York.

The actress, 24, was fascinated by Sedgwick, spending the best part of a year researching her life, and admits she became "totally obsessed" with the model-turned-muse.
"I found it really hard to take my black tights off," she joked, referring to Sedgwick's trademark nylons. But then, more seriously, she added: "Actually, I didn't want to let her go."
Finally, though, Sienna's mother told her to pull herself together. "She said: 'You've got to stop this now.' I took myself off to Mexico on my own for a week and just chilled out, but it was several more weeks before Edie escaped my system. I think there's still a bit of her in me." Source: www.dailymail.co.uk

"In 2007, Emile Hirsch garnered attention for his captivating performance in “Into the Wild”, directed by Sean Penn. Based on the best-selling book by Jon Krakauer and adapted for the screen by Penn, “Into the Wild” starred Hirsch as real-life adventurer Christopher McCandless. The portrayal earned him the National Board of Review award for Breakthrough Performance by an Actor; the Rising Star Award from the Palm Springs International Film Festival; Gotham and Critics’ Choice Award nominations for Best Actor; and two Screen Actors Guild Award nominations, in the lead actor category as well as the ensemble category. Hirsch’s additional film credits include two more true-life stories, Nick Cassavetes’ “Alpha Dog” and Catherine Hardwicke’s “Lords of Dogtown". Source: www.moviesonline.ca
“I enjoy playing real-life people. I’ve always had a knack for taking on characteristics or mannerisms. And I was the most spoiled actor on the movie because I was able to spend every day with the real Cleve,” who was on set as a historical consultant. “Cleve would watch me and be like, ‘I don’t do that.’ And I’d say, ‘Yeah, you do, baby.’ People don’t always know how they act.”
Source: nymag.com

"Peter Sarsgaard on Researching His Role: Each of the characters in “Jarhead” is based on a real person, but Sarsgaard said he never did any research on the guy he plays in the film prior to playing the part.Sarsgaard said, “You know, it's the greatest thing that ever happened to us, I've got to say. I mean, going in - I always tell this story - my aunt had my uncle once landscape her property and they didn't speak for a year after that. And I told Jake that before we started. I said, 'You know, if we're not careful, this could be very bad.' Source: movies.about.com
"Jake Gyllenhaal Explains His Decision Not to Meet with the Real Tony Swofford Before Shooting “Jarhead:” “I think I felt like…Sam said to me two weeks into rehearsal, he said, ‘Now it’s time to put down your books and now it’s going to become your own experience. I don’t want you coming up and referencing, you know, the book and what happened here and there. It’s going to be our own process and our own experience.’
I think Bill Broyles wrote the script, and also Tony who wrote [the book], recognizes a sort of artifice in the character. Recognizes that I had to also personally say, ‘This is going to be half me and half him. I’m going to go through his experiences and see how I respond and try and be as honest and as present as I can.’ …If I kept asking Tony, if I called Tony up in the middle of the night and said, ‘How did you feel here? What happened here and what was really going on?,’ I think that one) it would have taken the helm away from Sam as a director. And I think for me it would have taken my personal response of the experience away.”
Source: movies.about.com