Weaver weaves a tale
From sci-fi and comedy to heavyweight dramas, Sigourney Weaver has done them all.
SIGOURNEY Weaver had to wait till she was 29 years old to achieve “overnight stardom”, when she played the iconic heroine of Ridley Scott’s sci-fi thriller Alien. The sole survivor of that movie, she returned to play Ripley for three more Alien sequels, setting the standard for butt-kicking big screen heroines for generations to come.
At her press conference for her latest movie Chappie, she confirms she will be in the reboot to be directed by her Chappie director Neill Blomkamp.
Not confirmed yet if she’ll be the heroine.
The thinking man’s sex symbol, Weaver lit up the screen throughout the 1980s and 1990s in a series of hit films which ran the gamut from comedy – Ghostbusters and Galaxy Quest – to critically lauded dramas – The Year Of Living Dangerously, Gorillas In The Mist and The Ice Storm.
She could well be the most nominated actress that never won an Oscar.
Which wouldn’t bother her in the least if I told her so.
I remember telling her, when she was the only female star able to command a salary of US$5mil, that Whoopi Goldberg didn’t think she was worth it. Blithely she replied: “That’s only for the Alien pictures. Otherwise, I’m way down on the list.”
At 65, she still looks quite ravishing. She may be tall, but she’s unmistakably feminine. Elegant, poised, and charming, she’s also articulate, down-to-earth, and totally unpretentious.
You’d never know that she comes from an aristocratic background. Her father was the legendary Pat Weaver, who presided over NBC, and her mother was actress Elizabeth Inglis, who appeared in early Hitchcock movies.
Do you remember the first time you thought of being an actress?
I wasn’t one of those people who at seven said I’m going to be an actor some day. I was always sort of a show-off but I was also very shy; so I thought I’d be a journalist, actually. It wasn’t until I’d had a number of years of success that I thought it was going to work out, I was really a late bloomer.
Did your parents give you any sound advice?
My father always encouraged me to do commercial films. A lot of actors would say, “I go for the part, I want to do something very artistic” but I like to do things that are commercial. I like to be in things that people see. And I get that from my father.
And from your mother?
My mother was English and very private about her career. Once when something discouraging happened to me, she said, “Now you see why I gave it up” and that was about it. It wasn’t until years later after she died I found all her playbills. She was a big star on the London stage. I would have loved to have those conversations with her, but she was very private.
Maybe it was because she’d given it up when she had children. In those days you couldn’t do both. My father had a big career and the wife was supposed to be with the husband with the big career. Maybe that’s why she was utterly amazed that I had a career and she didn’t.
There must have been advantages to being brought up by parents who were rich and famous?
I suppose, because I had the best education, I am capable of speaking in complete sentences. But seriously, I was brought up to speak with confidence and to speak my own mind. I was taught that I had value.
How did you meet your husband? (Weaver has been married to Jim Simpson, an off-Broadway director, for 30 years. They have a 26-year-old daughter, Charlotte.)
“We were at the Williamstown Theatre Festival. I was doing a play by Harold Pinter, and he was in charge of non-Equity actors. I went over to him and asked him to dance. It was at a party, and he said no. Luckily we got another chance.”
Does it bother him that you make more money than he does?
Well, he makes no money at all. He’s a theatre director and he works off-off Broadway. So, he’s glad somebody’s making money.
Didn’t it create conflict?
Why should it? We both feel his work is more important than mine. Everything that’s new comes from the theatre.
The avant garde experimental theatre is the source of much of (what evolves in) conventional theatre. What my husband does is much more on the cutting edge than the film work I do, much though I adore it. Do your schedules conflict?
We’ve worked hard at balancing them. He’s been extremely supportive and travelled with me. I think we see each other more than a lot of married couples because we’re both unemployed for periods of time which allows us to go away together. I see him more than wives see their husbands who work from 9 to 5.
Is marriage everything you hoped it would be?
For me, marriage has been particularly wonderful because I married someone who thinks I can do anything. And it’s very nice to live with someone who believes that, because then you start believing it yourself. So I’ve been very lucky. I married the right person.
In Chappie you play a woman who manages a lot of people. How good a manager are you?
I did have a company for a long time. I used to have a sign of myself as Katharine Parker from Working
chappie.
alien Girl on my door, which said “Boss from Hell.”
But, in fact, I think I’m the opposite. I’m probably overly friendly. I always try to hire young actors to work for me so they can learn what life is like, how it’s always challenging and hard to find good scripts.
Is it easier for you to give orders or take orders?
Gosh. I don’t think of myself as taking orders. Taking direction, but taking orders, I don’t think I take orders, but I don’t give orders either. I always say please.
How would you like to be remembered?
I’d like to be remembered as someone who did some good. I want to be remembered as someone who did something useful, and I don’t care if it’s very local, like the Flea Theatre which we started.
I’m very proud of that. It’s changed a lot of young people’s lives and helped them on their careers and made our artistic world richer.