20 Questions: Theresa Russell

Theresa Russell gives off strong sexual heat and magnificently intelligent performances in interesting films. She is married to film director Nicolas Roeg and lives with him and their two young sons in London. Claudia Dreifus caught up with Russell while the actress was passing through New York City on a recent afternoon. She reports: "All the men I know are crazy for Theresa Russell—and when you meet her, it's easy to understand why. The woman is bright, sensuous, funny—and wonderfully candid. Incidentally, she wears black-leather minidresses better than anyone alive except Tina Turner."

1.

Playboy: You seem to have a quality in your movies that says, I'm sensuous, I like being that way and I'm totally in control of my own sexuality. Is that something you're looking to project?

Russell: [Laughs] No. I mean, it's nothing that I work for. If I give off a kind of self-determined sensuousness, that's just something I happen to have, something I was born with, a lucky gift. You know, there have been critics who've accused me of overplaying my sensuous side. Well, that's just not true. If the role calls for something else, I'll work against that part of me. Now, a couple of years ago, when I played a Marilyn Monroe–like character in Insignificance, of course I tuned up my own qualities—exaggerated them. And if in some of my other films a sexiness was projected, well, that just happens to be part of who I am. In real life, I am very aware of my own sensuousness. And, yeah, it is a bit on my own terms.

2.

Playboy: When you played that character in Insignificance, did you do much thinking about what guys find sexy?

Russell: Yeah, before the movie, I thought that most guys were turned on by natural-looking women. One afternoon, I decided to go out into the street in my Marilyn drag and see what kind of effect it had on men. My platinum-blonde hair was teased a mile high and my make-up was about an inch thick. I was very plastic-looking. Underneath my dress were a pair of artificial breasts the costumer had planted there to make me look enormous. Wherever I went, guys did double takes. They started following me around; they went crazy. The fact that men looked at me when I was dressed up like that was a shock: I looked like some tart! But then, men still do look at tarts, don't they?

3.

Playboy: In Insignificance, your Marilyn made a list of the ten men in the world she most wanted to sleep with—Albert Einstein was her first choice. Who would be on such a list if Theresa Russell were drafting one for herself?

Russell: Please—I'm a happily married 31-year-old mother of two. I don't have thoughts like that! [Laughs] Well, OK, we'll do this as an exercise. Obviously, Nick Roeg is number one—and that's because he's clearly the guy in the world I'm attracted to most. Now, about the others, I don't mean this all that seriously, but number two, I'd say, is Norman Mailer. He's such a tough guy and he's kind of cute. A man's man. I like his work, also. I think he's probably a good fuck, too. Next on my list is Sam Shepard. He's just the cutest leading man around. Also, I'd be interested in the young Brando. Oh, yeah, like my character in Insignificance, I'd like to go to bed with Einstein, because, obviously, it would be fun to fuck a genius. Or Mozart—my favorite composer. And Joseph Conrad, my favorite author. After that, John Kennedy. Robert Kennedy. Any Kennedy male, dead or living. Their aura intrigues me.

4.

Playboy: Rumor has it that John Kennedy was no prize in the sack—a one-poke man. Are you sure you want to leave him on your list?

Russell: No! We'll scratch him off. Besides, we need to put some more living people on this. Let's add Paul Theroux. I know him. He's really cute and neat and a really good writer. Let's see, also Ian Botham—he's a cricket player in England. He's really good and plays great cricket. I'm madly in love with him. Also Walt Disney—because he was one of the first men I ever loved—a big daddy. Also, finally, any Marlboro man. Now, I don't want you to think from this that I appreciate just macho in guys—there are quite a few brains on my list. That's more than ten, isn't it?

5.

Playboy: How did you meet Roeg?

Russell: Through work, what else? He had come to Hollywood to read actresses for Bad Timing a Sensual Obsession, and I had a million questions and notes for him. Instantly, there was some kind of magic connection. God, I wanted that part like nothing I'd ever wanted in my life—and I got it. Actually, nothing happened between us until later—when we were in Vienna, shooting the picture. In Vienna, we'd go out for drinks or dinner—a lot. Step by step, things got a little more intense. After about two or three months, I absolutely knew this was the man for me. It wasn't all that easy being together. He was married. There's a big age difference between us. None of it was all that feasible. But here we are, in 1988: We're real happy, we have two little boys and we've made five real interesting pictures together.

6.

Playboy: What did you do to make this relationship become "feasible"?

Russell: We went through a long period of indecision about what our future would be. I remember sometime around 1980, after we'd finished shooting Bad Timing, things between Nick and me were very on-again and off-again. I was living in New York—and Nick was in England, cutting the picture. We were flying back and forth. One day, I couldn't stand not seeing him—so, on an impulse, without telling him, I just got on a plane, took a taxi to Pinewood Studios and headed straight to the lavatory there. Then, without even thinking about it, I took all my clothes off and put on my overcoat. After that, I went to his office, told his secretary that I had to see him. When he got to his private office, I ripped open my coat and we fucked madly for the rest of the day. [Laughs] Right there in the office! I mean, I didn't plan it. But it was great.

7.

Playboy: Before Roeg, you lived with a shrink, right?

Russell: No, I was alone when I met him. I'd been alone for a year at that point. But before that, I lived with a psychologist—again, he was a man much older than me. He was an associate of Arthur Janov, the primal-scream therapist. That was a relationship I had begun when I was 16, and there were some problems between us. When I made Bad Timing, it was interesting to have that relationship in my past. The movie was about a love affair between my character, Milena, and a shrink played by Art Garfunkel. Given my own experiences, I was able to use a lot of my own life for the characterization. Now, my real-life lover wasn't like the Art Garfunkel character, but there were certain superficial parallels that I was able to bring to my part. Shrinks do try to get into your brain a little too much and mess about with it. They try to manipulate you all the time. In the real-life relationship, I was constantly battling against that, and after a while, it was tiring to me. So by the time I got to Bad Timing, there were enough experiences in my own background to give me plenty of openings to really identify with Milena. In its own way, acting in Bad Timing was an exorcism for me. I needed to get that part of my life dealt with and get on with what was coming next.

8.

Playboy: Donald Sutherland says that Roeg demands total obedience from his actors, that an actor has to become his complete creature. As Roeg's wife and leading lady, do you give him that?

Russell: Yes, but only when our ideas are the same. We do have moments when our ideas clash and we get into our little difficulties. And, yes, it does pose a problem being married to the director. If I'm working in one of Nick's films and I disagree with something he says, I can't exactly just fly off the handle and abuse him in front of the crew. On the other hand, when Donald says that Nick requires surrender, I agree. Nick has very definite ideas of what he wants, and an actor must capitulate to them. Actually, I want to please my director—Nick or whomever.

9.

Playboy: Do you take your characters home with you?

Russell: I try not to—though people complain that I do. When I did The Razor's Edge, I had a four-month-old baby at home and I had to do a scene where my character loses her husband and her baby. The horrible feeling that I had to conjure up for my performance was something I couldn't shake for days. I put myself into that place, and it was unbearable. The same thing with the rape scene in Bad Timing. My character has taken an overdose and has tried to kill herself and she's called the Art Garfunkel character for help. He waits until she's almost dead to go to her, and then, just before she's dead, he rapes her. Rape is really horrible, and if you start thinking about how you might feel being raped, well, you can't push it away so easily. After I did that scene, I felt kind of dirty for a long while.

10.

Playboy: You seem more comfortable than a lot of actors with doing nude scenes.

Russell: I've never been that modest a person. So I don't have that to overcome.

11.

Playboy: Is it hard to achieve a sense of intimacy on a set?

Russell: It's not easy. But it's very controlled. It's one of the least horny things you can imagine doing. In fact, it's not horny at all—or at least I don't find it horny. They usually clear the set—but there's still the cinematographer and the director and others standing around. The lovemaking is almost choreographed. When you first get onto the set, it's tremendously embarrassing. The crew is thinking, What does she really look like nude? But then they start shooting you from every angle and everyone loses both curiosity and modesty. After you've been doing it for a few hours and the crew has seen you from every angle, you can't be bothered with modesty. Basically, you get into a room and you work out ideas about what you're going to do. You go from A to B. You roll over and maybe you go down and do this and do that. And a lot of the time, there is this really noisy camera going bbbzzzzzzzrrr and there's the director yelling, "Now, roll over this way. Oh, that's great. Now lift her up." And, meanwhile, you're trying to make it look natural—as if you've thought of each motion right then and there.

12.

Playboy: What's the most interesting thing that's happened to you while doing a nude scene?

Russell: When I was making Straight Time, with Dustin Hoffman, we had a love scene. We got to the rehearsal and I'm there in my robe and he's there in his underwear and we're going through what was to happen: whether we'd go up and down or sideways—the usual choreography that one works out for those scenes. All of a sudden, I look down and there's this big dildo there! It must have been 100 feet, or at least 12 inches, long—and it's sticking out of his underwear. Boy, that broke the tension. You know, it's usually so boring when you do love scenes.

13.

Playboy: Does it help to be attracted to your co-star?

Russell: That's totally unnecessary! You're an actress, for Chrissake, you act. A lot of times, when you see a love scene between two people who are really having an affair, it's, like, stinko. They're mooning over each other and there's all that crap in the scene that doesn't work and that isn't necessary. Real sexual chemistry doesn't matter in a movie. Sometimes it's even destructive to the film.

14.

Playboy: Does Nick get jealous when you do nude scenes?

Russell: Not if they're in his films. Interestingly, he doesn't like it if I do them in other people's films. My position is that I will do a nude scene if I feel it's nonexploitative, and that's that. If Nick's reaction is just personal jealousy, I'll say, "I feel I have to do this and you'll just have to live with it." I mean, he's just finished making a film called Castaway, and his two leading characters were nude for most of it. I wasn't thrilled with his being away and the leading lady's having her tits out all the time.

15.

Playboy: Can it be that Theresa Russell is a jealous woman?

Russell: I'm very jealous and possessive. And I don't apologize for it. It's a part of passion, and life. Jealousy is one of the main emotions. Now, when Nick went off to do Castaway, I had to accept that—even though I was jealous. But you develop a kind of emotional intimacy with the director and the other actors. Nick knows that I have my priorities straight about our relationship. Sometimes—on a set—things can get a bit fuzzy. I don't do that, though. I can't fool myself into falling in love with the leading man or the director.

16.

Playboy: What's the strangest thing you've ever had to do for a part?

Russell: That scene in Bad Timing where I had to get dressed up in a very weird outfit and basically cut the nuts off Art Garfunkel's character. My character is screaming, "Is this what you want?" Also, in Eureka, I got dressed up in a solid-gold bikini. That was pretty strange.

17.

Playboy: The character played by Rutger Hauer in that movie looks at you in that outfit and says, "You look fantastic." Did you feel fantastic?

Russell: Sure. Once I was over the embarrassment of it. I mean, sure, I like dressing up. I prefer it in the privacy of my own bedroom, of course. I see nothing wrong with men's and women's dressing up for each other and having fun. As long as nobody gets hurt and everyone agrees with whatever is happening and there's no element of humiliation—why not? It's probably healthy. And it has nothing to do with being an actor. Every woman should be able to do that.

18.

Playboy: Any personal preferences in outfits?

Russell: I'm keen on suspender belts and stockings and nice push-up bras. A little G string, maybe. That always is fun.

19.

Playboy: What's the funniest thing that has happened to you while making a movie?

Russell: This didn't happen on camera, but in The Last Tycoon, I have to laugh hysterically when my father's secretary falls out of the closet. I was drying up and I couldn't do it. So I said to Robert Mitchum, who played my father, "When you come out of the bathroom, do something funny to make me laugh. Tell a joke or make a face or do something." So, on cue, he opened the door, came out of the bathroom and mooned me!

20.

Playboy: How did his butt look? Droopy?

Russell: He looks great! I mean, he'll probably look great until he drops dead.

the thinking man's sex symbol on jealousy, recreational underwear and the impact of being mooned by robert mitchum