‘DOING A NUDE SCENE AT 60 WAS A BRAVE CHOICE’

Andie MacDowell stripped for the 2017 film Love After Love

The world of showbiz throws up new experiences and challenges to artists every day. It was no different for Andie MacDowell when she landed a role which required her to go nude onscreen for the first time when she was almost 60. But the Hollywood actor and former supermodel went for it head on, and overcame her own inhibitions.

Talking about stripping for Love After Love (2017), she says, “Where I grew up, society was very reserved and conservative, and [there was] a great deal of pressure to conform to being a good girl. I was always worried as an actor that the roles I played should not be frowned upon by my aunts and my family.”

But when her daughters — Margaret Qualley and Rainey Qualley — decided to take up acting, she didn’t want them to be restricted by the same sense of shame and pressure about meeting expectations.

“I wanted them to be free to make artistic choices according to the characters they played. I found that in giving them that freedom, I set myself free. I felt doing the nude scene was a brave choice for me and I am proud of that, especially since I waited till I was 60 to do it,” adds the actor, who was on her maiden trip to India last month.

Admitting that her perspective towards onscreen nudity has changed, she says, “If nudity is essential to the script or in keeping with the character that I am playing, then there should be no hesitation or shame in doing it.”

Andie is also glad that narratives in cinema are accommodating ageappropriate roles, especially for women. “I was told by someone in Hollywood that people — both men and women — go to the movies to watch men. And that has been how the men in the industry have kept the power. It has been difficult for women over the age of 40 to get mainstream roles. The independent cinema space has certainly been kinder to us [than commercial cinema],” adds the Sex, Lies, and Videotape (1989) actor.

The scenario, she believes, is changing as women are getting more power. “I believe with that change, we will see more women-driven stories. It will result in more interesting roles for women of all ages.”