20 Questions: Julianna Margulies

Born in New York City and raised in England and France, Julianna Margulies never intended to become an actress. Her love was art history and roaming through the world's great museums. However, during her first year at Sarah Lawrence College, she studied theater as a creative outlet and soon found herself cast in productions. After graduation, Margulies forged a successful theater career in New York (including a part in "The Substance of Fire"), which led to appearances on "Homicide" and "Law and Order." While visiting a friend in Los Angeles, Margulies auditioned for a guest role in the pilot episode of "ER." Impressed with her work, executive producers Steven Spielberg and Michael Crichton chose her for the role of nurse Carole Hathaway. "ER" is consistently among the top five programs in the Nielsen ratings and is the highest-rated drama series in more than 20 years. Members of the cast have been nominated for many acting awards, but Margulies is the sole recipient of an Emmy. She has also been nominated for Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild awards. Her career has recently expanded to the big screen with co-starring roles in "Paradise Road" opposite Glenn Close and "Traveller" with Bill Paxton.

Robert Crane cornered the kinetic Margulies at a coffeehouse in Santa Monica. He reports: "Despite her hectic seven-day-a-week filming schedule (four spent on a movie in New York, three on "ER" in Los Angeles), Margulies is a nonstop energy source focused on her work. She loves what she does. She also has the most intense and groomed eyebrows I've ever stared at."

1.

[Q] Playboy: You have been dubbed Crash Cart--an apparent reference to your celebrated clumsiness. Under what circumstances are you more graceful?

[A] Margulies: Probably when I'm in a beautiful dress, going out for the evening, when I try to have some sort of grace and walk with a little elegance. It doesn't seem to be my style for the most part. I'm kind of proud of my bruises.

My extreme clumsiness happens when I'm not thinking very well. We were filming the show once and were running down the hallway with a gurney. We turned a corner, and I got stuck between a door and the gurney. It was one of the most painful things I've ever felt. The set doctor checked to see if I still had a pelvic region, and we did the shot over.

2.

[Q] Playboy: What actual nursing skill would you like to have?

[A] Margulies: I worry that when someone is really choking, I'm not going to know how to do the Heimlich maneuver. And I'd love to be able to save a life. That is the ultimate, isn't it?

I was at the gym when a girl fainted. Everyone turned to me, and I was on the treadmill going, "I play a nurse on TV. What am I going to do?" It's flattering, though, when they turn to me, because I must be doing my job right.

3.

[Q] Playboy: What's easier, putting a catheter in an attractive guy or in an unattractive guy?

[A] Margulies: It would be easier to put a catheter in an attractive guy because at least you could stare at his face and get some relief. It's a disgusting job, but somebody's got to do it. If the guy is unattractive, you get the job done quicker. I have never put a catheter in anyone, so I'm bullshitting this whole thing.

4.

[Q] Playboy: Is it hard to feel attractive in scrubs? Do you keep your nurse's outfit at home for those special moments?

[A] Margulies: It's hard, but I've come to terms with it. I just accept that I'm going to be a pink blob for the day, and I pray that I have a great T-shirt color underneath. I leave my uniform on the floor in my dressing room, hoping never to see it again. They're a thorn in my side, those pink scrubs.

5.

[Q] Playboy: We heard that Steven Spielberg said you remind him of his ex-wife, Amy Irving.

[A] Margulies: He said to me the first year we were shooting, "You remind me of my ex-wife." I don't think that's why I was hired. NBC and Warner pretty much brought me on, and then Michael Crichton had to OK it. I met Amy Irving recently at a restaurant and she said, "So apparently we're twins." It was great. Personally, I think I look like George Clooney. There are more men I look like than women, but I've heard that I look like Nancy Kerrigan, Kirstie Alley, even a dark-haired Michelle Pfeiffer. I've heard Madonna--imagine that. I think I look like an eastern European Jew, quite frankly.

6.

[Q] Playboy: Among medical support people, which group is the hunkiest?

[A] Margulies: No thought there. Firemen, I mean, they can swing you onto their shoulder with one arm and carry you down a ladder. Of course, you're going to want to end up with a doctor, because you'll have security for the rest of your life. But if it's just a matter of, you know, then you've got to go with the firemen.

7.

[Q] Playboy: Which characters on ER have not achieved their erotic potential?

[A] Margulies: Laura Innes--Dr. Weaver. Man, I think she is so sexy, and that hasn't been explored at all. She walks with a crutch, but that's just her character. She is so beautiful and sexy, and I can't wait for her to get a love interest. That's going to be fun. And then, of course, there's Abe Benrubi, who plays Jerry, the really big guy. I want to see him have sex.

8.

[Q] Playboy: Rate your male co-stars' sexual heat.

[A] Margulies: That would be like fucking your brother. These guys are the brothers I never had, and there is something so wrong with the idea of actually sleeping with any of them. Not that all four of them aren't desirable, they are, but it goes beyond that. It would be sick, unless of course we went back to Kentucky and tried it. I'm from New York, and in New York we don't do that.

9.

[Q] Playboy: What discipline best describes courtship and love--dance, opera or hydraulics?

[A] Margulies: One of the most erotic things you can do is spend all night dancing with someone, I mean, like, beautiful dancing, you know, or even sexy dancing. With disco, there's a rhythm and a mood that stays with you forever. I've always wanted to tango, but I don't know how.

10.

[Q] Playboy: You once said that you would go back to waitressing rather than do a role you hate. Give us an example.

[A] Margulies: There was one role I was supposed to do--the producers wanted me to cut my hair, straighten it, dye it red and play a vixen who gets into bed with a lot of stupid, ugly men. In order to live with myself, I decided it'd be better to sling hash for one more round. It was a TV show that aired once or twice. And I would have been stuck with short, red hair. Come on.

11.

[Q] Playboy: You've lived, traveled and studied in Europe. What can a young woman learn there that she can't learn in the United States?

[A] Margulies: She can learn a lot about history, culture and art--just walking down a street in Paris you're surrounded by it. She can learn a lot about great food. She would learn how to enjoy life, because that's what Europeans do. In so doing she would become much more grounded. Bodies aren't an issue. Breasts aren't an issue. I grew up going to topless beaches and it was never an issue. Then I came here and suddenly I was being stared at and was told I was doing the wrong thing. All of a sudden it was bad to have breasts. If Americans relaxed and allowed the body to be what it is, then we wouldn't make such a big deal out of sex. Girls are much more mature in Europe. I was the skinny, scrawny, boy-body with no breasts, and my friends who were the same age--12 years old--had breasts and their periods already. They were so much more advanced. On the other hand, I was street-smart and could handle a conversation at a young age.

12.

[Q] Playboy: Have you received any letters from heartbroken men in Europe?

[A] Margulies: Apparently we're very big in France right now, and I'm getting all these French love letters. French was my first language, but I'm so rusty at it that I sit there for hours trying to translate. I'm sure the letters are really beautiful, French being the most beautiful language in the world. I also get a lot of prison letters. I am going to be a prison wife to four or five different guys in the next few years. But, hey, we all have our destiny.

13.

[Q] Playboy: What theme or homage show is ER ripe for?

[A] Margulies: I would love to do a dream sequence so we could shoot in Hawaii for a week. I was trying to explain it to the producers. We work really hard, and it would be nice to go to Hawaii for ten days. You'd see Dr. Greene in a lei and a grass skirt, you know, doing that thing with his little glasses. Then you'd see this image of Laura without her cane, running in the sand, and Gloria sitting there with all these men around her, and nurse Hathaway playing the conga, feeling the rhythm. It really would be fun.

And then we'd all wake up, like we were having our own little daydreams in different parts of the hospital. This is why I'm not a writer.

14.

[Q] Playboy: Your father is a successful ad executive who has written many famous jingles. Complete the couplet "Plop, plop, fizz, fizz. . . ."

[A] Margulies: My thing was, Dad, can you write for a car company so we can get BMWs or something? We have enough Alka-Seltzer in the house for a lifetime. As a kid, I wasn't allowed to watch television, so I never knew what a big deal that commercial was. When I got older and people asked me what my father did, I'd say, "Oh, he writes commercials. He wrote that Alka-Seltzer commercial." I never realized the impact it had. My father is a heavy-duty intellectual, so it's not his proudest moment. He finds it ironic that he spent four years studying philosophy and then wrote "Plop, plop, fizz, fizz" and got all of these accolades for it.

My father said to me recently, "I watch you on ER and you're my little girl. I see you on Letterman, I can't relate. You come out in these glamorous things and look so different from what I'm used to seeing." When I'm acting it's fine, but he doesn't get all the publicity stuff. It's hard for him to relate to it as a father. I understand that. It's very odd. In Traveler, the movie I did with Bill Paxton, I do a little striptease number. I'm wearing boxers and a bad Sears bra--my choice--that never comes off. I don't want my dad to see it. It's like Hollywood forgets that you're someone's little girl, you know.

15.

[Q] Playboy: With all the Emmy nominations that ER has received, was it weird for you to be singled out the year that you won?

[A] Margulies: Noah Wyle said to me the night that I won, "God, if that isn't poetic justice," because I wasn't really accepted in the beginning. It wasn't the cast--it was the publicity. I was kept out of everything, so I wasn't seen as part of the cast. They had spent the summer together doing publicity, and then I came on. They tried to keep me a secret. I didn't end up in any of the pictures, and no one knew who I was. The cast had already bonded, and I felt like an outsider. So when I won, it brought me into the loop. I was flattered, I was honored. It got me a raise.

16.

[Q] Playboy: Seinfield is the king of cereal. Is it true you're the queen of toast?

[A] Margulies: When you toast something, the smell that permeates the house is so beautiful. There's something so grounded about bread. You know, "Give us this day our daily bread." And toasted bread is best when the butter melts just right, and you put a little jam on it. Light toast doesn't do it for me. It's got to be toasted pretty well. Not burnt, but just right. For Christmas I was given the toaster I've been waiting for my whole life. It looks like a Fifties radio, and it has four big slots so you don't have to cut the bread too thin. It has a timer for when you are out of the room, because you have to bring the toast up manually. It will keep the toast warm for ten minutes. That's heaven. It's from Williams-Sonoma. And I couldn't buy it for myself because I was embarrassed that it was so expensive. It sits on my kitchen counter with pride.

17.

[Q] Playboy: Are you an organ donor?

[A] Margulies: Yeah. All of them. Proud to be one.

18.

[Q] Playboy: What would we find in your medicine cabinet?

[A] Margulies: You'd find Nyquil, which I just recently discovered. It's great. I had a slight cough and it put me out. That's my newest acquisition. You'd find a big bottle of Advil--I don't believe in suffering with cramps. You'd find old nail polish and nail polish remover, which I never use. You'd find old drugs, including Percodan and Percocet, that I never finished because they make me crazy. I've had friends say, "Listen, I'll buy those from you." For some reason I can't let go of them.

19.

[Q] Playboy: Under what circumstances would you not revive a date?

[A] Margulies: I've had one blind date in my life. I was a freshman in college and my sister set me up with a guy from her office. He sounded great on the phone. He picked me up at her house and he had on a dog collar and one of those earrings with a chain that went from his nose to his ear so if he snapped his head too far his earlobe would rip. And he was about 6'8". The worst date I've ever had. If he had passed out in the middle of the street, I'm not sure I would have woken him up. I probably would have just said goodbye.

20.

[Q] Playboy: Will you stay with the show?

[A] Margulies: If I can keep doing my two films a year, and do ER, yes. I love my character, but I have to be able to go off and do another character in order to keep her fresh. The producers are very understanding of that. I try to pick interesting projects. Ninety-eight percent of the Screen Actors Guild is unemployed. What am I going to do, complain? I don't think so.