Actors usually have their lines memorized, but backstage at the 13th Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards Hollywood.com caught the winners working without a script:
[IMG:L]Helen Mirren on not feeling limited to playing monarchs:
“In terms of my particular connection to royalty, the last time I was nominated for a SAG Award was actually for playing the housekeeper in Gosford Park. So I do downstairs as well as upstairs.”
[IMG:R]Forest Whitaker on the ups and downs of being a working actor:
“There are many lean times in my career…I was fortunate because when I was young I didn’t really care about it. I was in survival [mode] but I had a little threshold, so I could live on somebody’s couch and not have much. Live on ramen and the little Thai restaurant–steal the sauce from inside and I’m cool. I was good about that. My parents and my family was more concerned than I was. Then when I got older and I started working, the lean times were more about trying to find the right job. Then when you have a family, it is about how you take care of your family.”
[IMG:L]America Ferrera on the Ugly-fication of television:
“I think that there is definitely some significance at how this show and how this character has been embraced. I think the show says a lot about what our society is ready for and willing to accept and really the demand for seeing normal people represented in our pop culture. Not only on our show, but you’re seeing it on shows like The Office where they are just everyday people who are being role models. There are shows like Heroes where they don’t look like superstars or superheroes, but they are. So I think that the television landscape is changing across the board.”
[IMG:R]Steve Carell on how Little Miss Sunshine’s ensemble became the Hoover family:
“We never auditioned together but did spend a couple of weeks rehearsing. We took a field trip in a van and went bowling and went to lunch in character. It was one of the funniest things that I think I’ve ever seen or witnessed, Alan [Arkin] was in the back of the van saying, ‘I’ve got to pee. I’ve got to pee.’ He was silent for probably the first 25 minutes of the trip and everyone was doing all of their improv and trying to get into their characters, and Alan was completely silent and from time to time you’d see him go, ‘Oh, God. God.’ That pretty much summed up his character. I think that those things, those couple of things rehearsing really helped us as a cast to gel.”
[IMG:L]Julie Andrews on seeing her acting life flash before her eyes:
“I was stunned to see some of the footage that they found because it was stuff that I hadn’t seen in a long time and stuff that I didn’t even know existed especially with the running on the stage there, and I think that I’ve just been so incredibly lucky to be in the right place at the right time, to be fortunate to have been asked to play in The Sound of Music. And Victor/Victoria. Of course I had a little sway there because I happened to be living with the director, but really just to be asked to do all of those wonderful movies is such a thrill.”
[IMG:R]The Office’s Jenna Fischer on being presented an award by the cast of the Mary Tyler Moore Show:
“When I was watching them up onstage reading the nominees I was sort of daydreaming and I was wondering if maybe one day in many years we would all be getting back together to present an award, because we all really like each other and we truly get along, and they seem to as well.”
[IMG:L]Jeremy Irons on the relationship between American and British acting techniques:
“I think that American actors are wonderful at film work and I think that we have a tremendous theatrical tradition at home. What I try to do is to find the sort of middle area where one can use some of the technique you’ve learned for theater, but find the truth and the immediacy and the oddness and the strength of American film performances. So I think that we look to each other actually.”
[IMG:R]Eddie Murphy on discovering his gift for comedy:
‘I come from a really funny family of people. I knew around the house I was funny. Once I got sent into school – junior high school, high school – in the lunch room and kids would kind of come around the table to hear what you are going to say. It’s like, “Hey, there is a whole audience at school. That’s when I realized ‘Hey, they are listening.”’
[IMG:L]The Office’s Rainn Wilson on the Actor Award upon closer inspection:
“There’s a nub where the genitals should be.”
Helen Mirren on the prospect of inspiring some professional jealousy after so many recent awards victories:[IMG:R]
“I am sure there are some actresses out there who are saying ‘Get that woman out of my face, I wish she would go away!‘ This year anyway, but you know contrary to media belief, actresses actually get on really, really well together. Judi [Dench] and Meryl [Streep] and I did an interview together just a couple of weeks ago. It was such fun to be able to speak with those two, these absolutely great extraordinary and legendary actresses. I have been with Penelope [Cruz] a couple of evenings and she is just this wonderful girl. She is one of my goddesses, anyway. There is a great sense of camaraderie and support. We are very lucky this year because we have really great actresses in really great movies, four or five of them, and that is rare. It is great to be a part of that.”
Click here for a complete list of winners and nominations.
