Michelle Pfeiffer can’t watch Thelma & Louise because she had to pass on the role of a lifetime.
The actress tells Variety she was forced to turn down the 1991 film, because she had already signed up to play a Dallas, Texas housewife in Love Field – a role that earned her an Oscar nomination alongside Thelma & Louise stars Susan Sarandon and Geena Davis.
And she has never quite recovered from having to say no to director Ridley Scott’s cult classic.
“I still can’t watch Thelma & Louise,” she said. “It was a direct conflict, so it was one film or the other. It still kills me. You can’t always do everything. You’ve got to give something up.”
The 59-year-old star also reveals she turned down Nicole Kidman’s role in To Die For and and passed on The Silence of the Lambs, for which Jodie Foster took home an Academy Award.
Meanwhile, there’s one character she’d like to have another crack at – Catwoman.
The actress slipped into Selina Kyle’s costume for Batman Returns in 1992 and even put a live bird in her mouth for one killer scene – something she wouldn’t do again if the role came back to her.
“I can’t believe I did that,” she tells Variety with a smile. “I could have gotten a disease”.
But she enjoyed working with director Tim Burton, telling the outlet he was able to bring “heart and darkness and humor” to the film, and testing her acting chops opposite Batman Michael Keaton and Danny DeVito, who portrayed villain The Penguin.
Michelle has returned to the comic book world for Marvel’s Ant-Man sequel.
