October 18, 2022 • 32 mins
Geena Davis (Thelma and Louise, A League of Their Own, Commander in Chief) joins Brooke to talk about the perils of having polite parents, how playing empowered female characters onscreen helped her cope with childhood trauma and her latest thoughts on Bill Murray. Plus, she shares a #MeToo moment involving a Hollywood director that changed how she forever saw the industry.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
What do you do in life doesn't go according to
plan that moment you lose a job, or a loved one,
or even a piece of yourself. I'm Brookshields and this
is now What, a podcast about pivotal moments as told
by people who lived them. Each week, I sit down
with a guest to talk about the times they were
knocked off course and what they did to move forward.
(00:26):
Some stories are funny, others are cut wrenching, but all
are unapologetically human and remind us that every success and
every setback is accompanied by a choice, and that choice
answers one question, now what. I'm fascinated by your archery.
(00:52):
I'm just talking to me about how that happens. Just
we I love this so well. When I got cast
in the league of their own, I had to learn
how to play baseball and I started really picking it
up and and they started saying, you know, you have
a lot of untapped athletic ability, and I was like,
it took me to thirty six to find this out.
(01:14):
And I thought, you know, I want I wonder if
I would be good in real life in a sport,
because in a movie that you know, if you can't
do it they'll make it happen anyway. And uh, I
was watching the Olympics in nineties and on TV, and
there was a lot of coverage of archery, and I thought, wow,
(01:35):
archery is very beautiful and it's very dramatic. I wonder
if I could be good at that. My guest today
is the incredible Gina Davis. We met years ago through
a dear friend. I remember being struck by our humor
and her intelligence, her amazing intelligence, and her kindness. Those
(01:56):
are qualities that she maintains to this day. Like many
of you, I'm also a huge fan of her work.
I can't count the number of times I've watched Fellman Louise.
When I closed my eyes, I can still see Gina
in that blue convertible, hand in hand with Susan Sarandon,
flying free into the air like a true rebel. And
(02:19):
this many years later, Gina is still a certified badass.
She is an Oscar Award winning actor, an activist for
equal representation on screen, a fellow tall girl, and now
the author of the hilarious and very poignant new book
Dying of Politeness. We sat down to talk about her
(02:41):
incredible journey and everything she's learned along the way. So
Gina Davis Um trying to think of when we first
really kind of got to hang out, and I'm like,
my memories are more sort of like first line of
a book. All those parties we would we would have
with Gavin and Garrison Is Harry Sheer and all those guys.
(03:04):
I was a fan then and maintain a huge amount
of respect for you. Thank you. So I have to
say that I always ask people when when we come on,
because I know everybody sort of in from some period
of time in my life. But I always am curious
as to, like, if you were to try to describe yourself,
(03:28):
like what words would you use to sort of encapsulate
who you are? Brother? Well, happy, I could definitely say
I'm happy in a great place in my life. I'm
still you know, a passionate you know about about things
about about acting and uh, and I found a new
(03:51):
passion writing this book. Did you feel like that you
wrote you I can't wait to write another one. I
really enjoy it. I really can't. I enjoyed it tremendously. Yeah,
and actually penning it yourself, you know, without a ghostwriter.
I think it's just a very different part of your brain,
you know. But there's something unbelievable about it. What did
(04:13):
you like the most about it? Well, that I could
actually make myself do it, you know, because you know
I'm a terrible procrastinator and chef. But like you, I
found it really enjoyable to do what made you? And
you said you wanted to be an actor ever since
you were really three. That's when my mom snuck into
(04:38):
her first moving picture was when she was three years old.
She told a lady at the ticket thing, this isn't
like the late thirties, She said, my mommy's in there.
She stayed there all day long and the police had
to come and get her because she was escaping into
the movies. No way. That is incredible. Oh my god.
(04:58):
But did you ever consider pursuing anything else or were
you just focused? That was it? That was it. I
just was fixated on that and very comfortable, not stressed
about it at all. This is what I'm going to be.
That's what I'm gonna do. Did you have favorite icons
or actresses when you were growing up? I mean not really. No.
We we never almost never went to the movies unless
(05:19):
it was a Disney movie. I mean we watched old
movies on TV, but there wasn't anybody who made me say, oh,
that's the exact person I want to be, Like. It
was just the world of film, and it's just the
world of it, you know. I think I was so
self conscious and afraid to you know, I don't know
(05:39):
you were terribly bothered by being tall when you were
a kid with people treat you differently, or did you
feel like you had to be smaller or well, you know,
it was interesting. My dad was six seven and he
always slouched and my mom would put tape between my
shoulders so that if I slouched, the tape with like
stick and so I would have to Like, I didn't
(06:02):
want to slouch because I didn't want it to stick.
And she was like, shoulders back, headheld high. Nobody likes
to see a stooping, you know, female. And because I
modeled from quite a young age, it was an acceptable height.
What I was struggled with was that with that height
came I was the athletic one, you know. I was
(06:23):
never model skinny or that. So that was my sort
of issue. But you say you were insecure, so it
was in school you were always tall. Yeah, I was
the tallest from kindergarten on, like way tall and it
made you insecure. Yeah, it did. But it's funny you
said that about your mother, because my mother always made
sure I didn't slout. She didn't come up with a
(06:43):
very interesting technique. A brutal child abused, but she always
said you have to stand up straight. And interestingly, she
never said, like your mother, you have to be proud.
Probably it was because it was rude to slouch your shoulder,
but she just started, I shouldn't do that. So then
I found ways to twist my hips, you know, to
(07:08):
be shorter, or you know, pitching on furniture and stuff
like that seem shorter. I just did that last week.
I was taking a picture with this guy and it
was a bunch of us and he said, did you
just louch? And I went yeah. He said, oh no,
that fells girls do not. What is wrong with you?
And I was like, it's just my body went right
(07:30):
into it again, you know, the shoulder down, the hip
out right, you know. And I was like, well, because I,
as a female, I kind of always wanted to be
under a guy's shoulder rather than over it, you know.
And my first husband hated when I wore heels, and
I was like, but my legs looked better with heels,
(07:50):
and I realized it was all about him. He just didn't,
you know, it emasculated him evidently that that I, you know,
that I was tall and I don't know. So it's
such a crazy thing, but I call this podcast now
what you know? There are now moments in our lives,
and I'm curious as to what are some of the
(08:12):
first real now what moments that you experienced at any age?
You know. I think one of my earlier ones was
my church had a youth group and I enjoyed it.
I liked going and uh and all that. I was
probably in tenth grade, but I had never had a
boyfriend or anything like that. And uh. I was talking
(08:34):
to the pastor who led the youth group privately one day.
I said, why do you think that nobody asked, asked me.
I don't nobody interested being, you know, my boyfriend or anything.
And we were outside it was very quiet, and I
was very contemplative, and he said, why don't you try
being more like you are now? More? Just kind of quiet? God,
(08:59):
And this is he saying this to an incredibly shy
person once in a while, bursts out of her shill.
But how did you internalize that? Like, what's that message
in your brain that made me hopeless? That just made
me feel like am I going to accomplish that? And
what a a sad goal? I mean, I didn't realize
(09:20):
at that time what a sad goal that was. Were
there any people or experiences that counteracted that negativity? Well,
my dad and my mom really, but they both thought
I could do anything. And my mom's most famous phrase
that I remember was but you can't, Oh, never mind,
(09:42):
You're gonna do it anyway, whatever it was, whatever it is,
I'd come up with that I wanted to do or
make or build or whatever. And my dad was always
from when I was very little, you know, if he
was painting the house, I was painting the house and
fixing the car. So I wasn't shy about can I
(10:02):
do things? For some reason, it was very confident that
I could do things. It was more in interpersonal relationships
that I was shy. This next question is a difficult
one for me to ask. I think that it just
might be tough for some of our listeners to hear
(10:24):
as well. But there is a moment in your book, um,
that you talk about and it just really struck a
chord with me, probably because I have two daughters. Um,
but there's a moment in your book when you discussed
the idea that you realized in hindsight that you were
sexually abused by a neighbor when you were young. Right,
(10:46):
I told my mother this behavior he was doing that
I didn't understand because I didn't know there were parts
of my body were not to be touched. And how
old were you? Ten? Ten? And you had a paper route? Yeah? Yeah,
my mom, you know, talk to him and and and
said I could never go inside his house again, just
(11:09):
leave the paper down at the bottom and and all that.
But shouldn't be explain this is what happened. This is
why it's bad. I just knew there's something horrible had happened.
Then I was sure whether I was responsible for or not.
But did you have a shame around it? Like yeah, yeah,
like it's something I should have done to prevent whatever
(11:32):
this was. So, yeah, I was probably an adult by
the time I realized what had happened, and nobody called
Did anybody call the police? I mean, I guess And
you didn't do it then, right, that wasn't what you did.
Do you think that going forward, any of the roles
you played helped helped you process that that experience by
(11:56):
most of the roles you play and the characters are
there's a sense of real powerment in them. Yes, I
you know, here's my theory about all this is that
I was faking being I was acting being powerful and
strong and decisive and and all that stuff, and the
(12:17):
process of acting it kind of gives you an opportunity
to practice in a way. And so so I think
I was able to embody, you know, some of the
things my characters didn't standing up for myself or whatever,
because I played a character that had those qualities. I
think a lot had to do with the essence of
(12:39):
your I mean, your early days as an actor. Are
there moments that stick out that you're the most proud
of or those you just cringe at? Well, TUTSI was
my first movie, my first audition, even the first and
you get it and come on and when we're daring
(13:00):
to by Sydney Pology opposite starring dustn't happen. Uh. I
didn't want to ask any questions. I was very worried
that they would think she doesn't know where to stand
or what to do. And I was sure that there
was something called movie acting that I hadn't learned and
I'd be found out as a fake. But I didn't
(13:21):
know that you only come on the days when you shoot.
I read that. I died laughing. So cute, I know,
and nobody told me. I guess they didn't realize, you know,
how really naive I was or anything. I just assumed
everybody comes every day. You show up out every day
every day at six am. There I was some days
(13:44):
and you weren't getting into hair and makeup? Did that? No? No, no,
flew you in at all? No? No, I thought. I
didn't think I was had to be there to act.
I thought just as a member of this you know,
collective thing that I But but why didn't noticed that
Jessica Land wasn't hanging around on the issues. And you know,
(14:05):
it's kind of a theater mentality. I mean, you know,
you are a company. The company shows up. It's very
different in film and TV and and all of that. Um,
but that's such a sweet, sweet thing. When I read that,
I was like, oh God, she's just showing up to
work every single day for four months or three months
(14:27):
or whatever. But you know what, and hindsight, I'm sure
that was the best. It was like a masterclass, was
it really was. I mean, Sydney Pollock was an extraordinary director,
and uh and Dustin Hoppin. And the really really fortunate
thing for me was that they both from the beginning
(14:49):
treated me like a peer because I was a model
doing a change in my underweard, you know, and it
took me very very seriously, and uh, that really made
such an impression on me. It really. Did they give
you any advice? Oh god, Yeah, Dustin was giving me
advice constantly. We're just thrilling because he clearly thought that
(15:12):
I was going to have a career, because you know,
because he give me very sophisticated advice, um, you know
about optioning books and things like that, and he doesn't
wanted to also make sure that I didn't get preyed
upon by people. And he a bit of his advice
was to never never sleep with your co stars because
(15:36):
it's just it's just a bad idea, makes everything messy.
It's just a bad idea. So here's what you say
when that comes up. You say, oh, I would love
to You're very attractive, but I'm afraid that it would
ruin the sexual tension between us. As a way to
get out of it, and then I had to use
it somebody later, did you for the most part in
(16:00):
your career, he'd his advice or yeah, yeah, yeah, she
slipped every now and then. No, no, that's good on
Blue Lago. And they were desperate for us to fall
in love, really fall in love, and I was by
the end of it. I was like, stay away from me,
stay far away from me. We were like brother and sister.
You've always been such an advocate for women, but I'm
(16:23):
curious about as a woman your experiences in Hollywood. Was
there any point, like way before the me too stuff
that you kind of said, wait a minute, this isn't behavior.
I want to tolerate this is this is wrong? Yeah,
oh yeah, yeah, definitely definitely. But I you know, I thought,
(16:47):
you can't complain about this stuff, or you can't even
tell anybody about it, that we'll reflect on you, you know,
or something or something like that happened. I had a
very very uncomfortable audition for a role with the director.
But uh, but I as so well. You never would
(17:09):
have heard of him. He was the director of Transylvania
six five thousand. I think he hadn't anything since then.
But there was a scene in the movie. It's a
very very silly movie, and I'm playing a vampire, and uh,
there's a scene where I'm trying to seduce Ed Bigley Jr.
Because I'm a nymphamaniacal vampire. You understand that. I climb
(17:35):
up into his lap and I'm rubbing all over him,
and you know, I say something to take me, take me,
and I pressed his face into my breasts. Uh. And
he's supposed to say something that comes out mumbled, so
suffocating it. So this is the scene the director wants
to be to audition with and there's nobody else there.
(18:00):
And I said, how are we how are we going
to do this? How we're gonna act it? You're gonna
act it with me? Okay? Uh? And then and then
he said, but actually act the scene with me, like
sit on my lap, and uh, oh my god, God,
well no, no, that's okay, no, no, no, come on, yes,
(18:21):
I want to see how you how you acted. And
he stuffed his face in my breasts and uh, yeah,
it was God that the whole thing is unfathomable to
me that how do you I mean, do you walk
how do you walk away from that? What do you feel?
(18:41):
In that moment? I hit it all and repressed it all.
I didn't tell my agent, who would have I'm sure
like to know that, but it was just shameful to me.
I think it's probably the same thing like with my paperword.
I didn't quite know what happened. Again, it's a now
what moment, but you're not aware of it. And there's
(19:02):
another incident that you talked about, a very troubling encounter
with Bill Murray. Did that How did that change your view?
That was very, very pivotal in my life? And I
realized later I should have I could have. You know,
you you can always recriminate yourself, but I should have
(19:25):
walked out of the initial meeting rather than actually get
the part and go on the set and be treated terribly.
But at the meeting, it was in a hotel suite,
but there was there was a couple other people that
producers or whatever were there, and uh, I went to
go sit down with the people who were there, and
(19:46):
Bill said, Hey, have you ever heard of the thumper?
Have you ever tried the thumper. I'm like, what is that?
It's a massage thing? You've ever tried? No? No, we
like we would like to try. No, no, thank you,
And he kept at it and add it and add it. No,
come on, come on try just come here, just come
here to the bedroom and try it. And I realized
(20:10):
he's not ever going to give up. He was so
intent on it, and the other two men were not saying, Bill,
come on, you know, drop it. So what I realized, Brooke,
is that unless I yelled at him, I wasn't going
to get out of doing this. But the other option
would have been to leave, you know, but I couldn't
(20:34):
manage to do either one. So I I went in
the bedroom and I kind of perched on the edge
of the bed and he thumped it on my back
like literally two seconds, and then didn't ask how was it?
Did you like it? Because it wasn't about I want
you to try this cool thing. It was about can
(20:55):
I make you do what I want to make you do?
She's going to be a difficult actress or she going
to be malleable? Yes, exactly, And and and I learned
later it was because I had just won an oscar.
You know, for the supporting actress, and he was concerned
that I might think I was all that. Now, that
(21:16):
to me is so despicable because there's jealousy, right. I
don't think he had won an oscar by then, probably not.
And you're a woman, was very talented, beautiful, probably taller
than he is, So every single thing is an emasculating
element to that. And god, it's so it's so crazy,
(21:39):
and you talk about him going on. He even brates
you in front of everybody about what, what was it?
Why it was again? I'm sure in hindsight it was again.
Two put me in my place because I saw him
do it with other people. As the movie went on,
he quite frequently would explode at somebody and become very
(22:04):
vicious and then turn away like almost like you know,
well I did that. I got that out of you know,
like that. It was a deliberate tactic. How did you
come off of that experience? It was miserable, it was
I felt so shamed, and at lunch, just an hour
(22:26):
or two later, my manager and my agent came to
take me to lunch, and I didn't tell them because
I was so ashamed. I mean, in hindsight, oh my God,
you know, I'll be in my trailer calling my lawyer
or something, you know. But I guess I must have
(22:46):
internalized something about it that, oh I really wasn't doing
the right thing, or he made it so embarrassing and
so public, you know, in front of a couple of
hundred people. God, it was just awful. That fear instilling
fear is a sense of power and comidation. You do. Right.
There's a line that I wrote down where you say
(23:08):
you didn't know how to avoid being treated that way.
That's a really interesting statement because not I didn't know
how to stop this behavior from happening, but I didn't
know how to just avoid it. Oh, it's going to happen.
It's going to keep happening, and evidently it's okay, right,
that's fascinating to me. Yes, it is it because it's
(23:31):
going to happen all the time. That's the problem. That's
the problem. There's so many movies that you have been
in that have just O God, I've just made such
a difference, have sort of changed the narrative for women.
(23:54):
And I did not know that you had not originally
been cast in Thelman Louise Right, Yeah, Okay, teach, me
every time. I've gotten all of that movie that they
just cast so inside and I'm like, but I read
the book and it's uncorrected proof. How do you know
what to do in that case? Well, I just was
making it up as I went along, because I read
(24:15):
the script someone had slipped it to me, and I said,
oh my god, I have to be in this movie.
My agent said, oh no, it's already been cast. And
then I kept asking about it, and so he started
calling Ridley's office. Ridley Scott was going to be just
the producer of that movie at that time, and he
(24:36):
would call Ridley Scott's office once a week every week
and say, you know, if anything happens, Gene is still
interested if it happens. And then it turned out that
a couple of months later, whoever that director was and
whatever that situation was, that all fell apart. And I
was so obsessed with this movie that I was actually
(24:56):
meeting with my acting coach to work on it when
it was cast with somebody else, which is just ludicrous.
It's just ridiculous. But I just got in my head
that I had to be in this movie. And I
don't know why I even thought it would ever fall apart.
I mean, most things profoundly do not fall apart. But anyway,
(25:19):
so that happened like three times, and then Ridley decided
he was going to directed himself, and finally I got
to meet with him and try to convince him that
you absolutely did, but you were active in that process.
I don't know what I was thinking, why I thought
there was such a good chance that I would actually
(25:41):
end up in the movie. So you get the part?
Did you have to read with Susan or no? I
got cast first, and I signed a contract that I
would play either part. And because I had told him
that I felt like I could play Louise. And then
I meet Susan and I'm like, oh my god, what
was I thinking? I was going to play Louis? Wow?
(26:02):
And was was she a mentor at all? To you?
Oh my god? Yeah, because it seems crazy, but I
had never really spent significant time with a woman who
doesn't preface everything she says with I don't know what
you'll think. This is probably really stupid, but I mean
the first time we so we sit down, the meeting
(26:25):
is so we can sit down and go through the
script and you know, make comments. Whoever wants to make
a comment or maybe when we've changed this line or whatever.
So so we sit down and crack opened the script
and I swear it was on page one that Susan said,
you know this first line I have, I think we
should cut it. We don't need that. What do you think?
(26:45):
He's like, oh yeah, he said, actually right, And I
was just like, what just happened? What sort of stunned
to watch? Anyway, it was. It was such a lesson
for me, and then the entire shoot was that way.
I got to observe her every day for three months
(27:08):
and her very cat her convictions of what she wanted
and how and has always been extraordinarily clear about that
was acting over the age of forty? What is that like?
And what was that like for you? Um? You know,
I had heard. I was very well aware that people
(27:29):
talked about actresses don't get much work after forty, and
I thought, well, I mean that won't be me probably.
I mean I'm getting all these great parts and and anyway,
Sally Field and Jessica Lang and Gone Close and Meryl Streep,
We're all doing these incredible movies, you know, where the
(27:50):
female lead and everything. And I thought, well, that's not
gonna be true for them either, so they'll fix it
before I get to before and they didn't. And it
happened to me too. It was it was shocking. It
was that it now what moment for you? God? Yeah, yeah,
it really was. I wasn't reading things that I could
(28:12):
advocate for, if you know what you know, like like
with some of the ways, or I think it wasn't.
I wasn't seeing good scripts. I saw was actually some
a lot of really crummy scripts and most of them
didn't even come out. But yeah, it was. It was
really stunning. Did you consider quitting or walking away? No? No, no,
(28:32):
it was still it's what I what I do, what
I'm passionate about, what I care about, you know, I don't.
It was very very hard because like, well, now am
I supposed to redefine myself? I'm an actor. What's fascinating
was when I was fifty, I got cast as the
lead in a TV show called Commander in Chief, where
(28:53):
I got to be the first female president, and then
found like, well at last, you know, okay, now it's
now it's picking back up. Uh. It was tough. I'm
glad you're still doing it because we need more of you. Um,
you recently just were awarded an Emmy for the work
that you've done with the Gina Davis Institute on Gender
(29:13):
in Media. How did that whole endeavor come about? The
whole reason I started all of that was having a daughter,
and uh, when she was two years old, I thought, hey,
we could start watching preschool shows. Now, I'm sure she
would would love that, and put around my lap and
(29:35):
turn on the on a show. And within five minutes,
maybe ten minutes, I was saying, how many female characters
are there in this thing? Obviously we know there's a
big imbalance in general, but I couldn't have imagined it
would be in kids entertainment. And then I saw it
everywhere in the movies that came out in a you know,
(29:56):
G rated video. I didn't attend to know. Now I'm
going to form and it's you're anything, But I just started.
Whenever I had a meeting, I would ask if they
whoever it was, had had ever noticed that there were
far fewer female characters in movies made for kids. And
every single person said, no, no, that's not true anymore.
(30:16):
That's been fixed, And they would name a movie with
one female character as proof the gender inequality was over.
Like people very often said, well, there's been Belle from
Beauty and the Beast, you know, but huh and she's
a prisoner and you know, get Stockholm syndrome. So I
was like, wow, this is so unconscious. I wonder if
(30:41):
I got the data and went directly to them, because
I probably can get meetings with whoever if that would
have an impact. If it's completely unconscious and they find
out what they're doing, will they want to make the change?
And uh? And it turned out they did. You know,
it was very ports of it in the people who
make empty minutes for kids do it because they love kids.
(31:05):
And so when they learned that they were not going
right by half of the kids, uh, they everybody really
wanted to make a change. Well, if those of you
go back way, it's like the mother always dies within
the within the first six minutes of a of a
Disney movie. You know, Dumbo's mom and Bambi's mom and
you know everybody. Um, but I just I'm I'm a
(31:28):
huge fan of yours and I want to thank you
for being so open and I've gained a lot of
hope and confidence from talking to you. So thank you.
Oh that's incredible. Thank you. So it's really been fun
to talk to you, Brooke. That was the one and
only Gina Davis. If you want to hear more from her,
(31:50):
pick up a copy of her new memoir. It's called
Dying of Politeness. Trust me, you'll be glad you did.
And that's all for today. Talk to you next week.
Ye now. What is produced by the wonderful Julia Weaver
with help from Darby Masters. Our executive producer is Christina Everett.
(32:10):
The show is mixed by Bahed Fraser and Christian Bowman.
A special thanks to nicky Etre and Will Pearson. If
you liked this episode, please subscribe to the show on
the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
get your shows
What do you do in life doesn't go according to
plan that moment you lose a job, or a loved one,
or even a piece of yourself. I'm Brookshields and this
is now What, a podcast about pivotal moments as told
by people who lived them. Each week, I sit down
with a guest to talk about the times they were
knocked off course and what they did to move forward.
(00:26):
Some stories are funny, others are cut wrenching, but all
are unapologetically human and remind us that every success and
every setback is accompanied by a choice, and that choice
answers one question, now what. I'm fascinated by your archery.
(00:52):
I'm just talking to me about how that happens. Just
we I love this so well. When I got cast
in the league of their own, I had to learn
how to play baseball and I started really picking it
up and and they started saying, you know, you have
a lot of untapped athletic ability, and I was like,
it took me to thirty six to find this out.
(01:14):
And I thought, you know, I want I wonder if
I would be good in real life in a sport,
because in a movie that you know, if you can't
do it they'll make it happen anyway. And uh, I
was watching the Olympics in nineties and on TV, and
there was a lot of coverage of archery, and I thought, wow,
(01:35):
archery is very beautiful and it's very dramatic. I wonder
if I could be good at that. My guest today
is the incredible Gina Davis. We met years ago through
a dear friend. I remember being struck by our humor
and her intelligence, her amazing intelligence, and her kindness. Those
(01:56):
are qualities that she maintains to this day. Like many
of you, I'm also a huge fan of her work.
I can't count the number of times I've watched Fellman Louise.
When I closed my eyes, I can still see Gina
in that blue convertible, hand in hand with Susan Sarandon,
flying free into the air like a true rebel. And
(02:19):
this many years later, Gina is still a certified badass.
She is an Oscar Award winning actor, an activist for
equal representation on screen, a fellow tall girl, and now
the author of the hilarious and very poignant new book
Dying of Politeness. We sat down to talk about her
(02:41):
incredible journey and everything she's learned along the way. So
Gina Davis Um trying to think of when we first
really kind of got to hang out, and I'm like,
my memories are more sort of like first line of
a book. All those parties we would we would have
with Gavin and Garrison Is Harry Sheer and all those guys.
(03:04):
I was a fan then and maintain a huge amount
of respect for you. Thank you. So I have to
say that I always ask people when when we come on,
because I know everybody sort of in from some period
of time in my life. But I always am curious
as to, like, if you were to try to describe yourself,
(03:28):
like what words would you use to sort of encapsulate
who you are? Brother? Well, happy, I could definitely say
I'm happy in a great place in my life. I'm
still you know, a passionate you know about about things
about about acting and uh, and I found a new
(03:51):
passion writing this book. Did you feel like that you
wrote you I can't wait to write another one. I
really enjoy it. I really can't. I enjoyed it tremendously. Yeah,
and actually penning it yourself, you know, without a ghostwriter.
I think it's just a very different part of your brain,
you know. But there's something unbelievable about it. What did
(04:13):
you like the most about it? Well, that I could
actually make myself do it, you know, because you know
I'm a terrible procrastinator and chef. But like you, I
found it really enjoyable to do what made you? And
you said you wanted to be an actor ever since
you were really three. That's when my mom snuck into
(04:38):
her first moving picture was when she was three years old.
She told a lady at the ticket thing, this isn't
like the late thirties, She said, my mommy's in there.
She stayed there all day long and the police had
to come and get her because she was escaping into
the movies. No way. That is incredible. Oh my god.
(04:58):
But did you ever consider pursuing anything else or were
you just focused? That was it? That was it. I
just was fixated on that and very comfortable, not stressed
about it at all. This is what I'm going to be.
That's what I'm gonna do. Did you have favorite icons
or actresses when you were growing up? I mean not really. No.
We we never almost never went to the movies unless
(05:19):
it was a Disney movie. I mean we watched old
movies on TV, but there wasn't anybody who made me say, oh,
that's the exact person I want to be, Like. It
was just the world of film, and it's just the
world of it, you know. I think I was so
self conscious and afraid to you know, I don't know
(05:39):
you were terribly bothered by being tall when you were
a kid with people treat you differently, or did you
feel like you had to be smaller or well, you know,
it was interesting. My dad was six seven and he
always slouched and my mom would put tape between my
shoulders so that if I slouched, the tape with like
stick and so I would have to Like, I didn't
(06:02):
want to slouch because I didn't want it to stick.
And she was like, shoulders back, headheld high. Nobody likes
to see a stooping, you know, female. And because I
modeled from quite a young age, it was an acceptable height.
What I was struggled with was that with that height
came I was the athletic one, you know. I was
(06:23):
never model skinny or that. So that was my sort
of issue. But you say you were insecure, so it
was in school you were always tall. Yeah, I was
the tallest from kindergarten on, like way tall and it
made you insecure. Yeah, it did. But it's funny you
said that about your mother, because my mother always made
sure I didn't slout. She didn't come up with a
(06:43):
very interesting technique. A brutal child abused, but she always
said you have to stand up straight. And interestingly, she
never said, like your mother, you have to be proud.
Probably it was because it was rude to slouch your shoulder,
but she just started, I shouldn't do that. So then
I found ways to twist my hips, you know, to
(07:08):
be shorter, or you know, pitching on furniture and stuff
like that seem shorter. I just did that last week.
I was taking a picture with this guy and it
was a bunch of us and he said, did you
just louch? And I went yeah. He said, oh no,
that fells girls do not. What is wrong with you?
And I was like, it's just my body went right
(07:30):
into it again, you know, the shoulder down, the hip
out right, you know. And I was like, well, because I,
as a female, I kind of always wanted to be
under a guy's shoulder rather than over it, you know.
And my first husband hated when I wore heels, and
I was like, but my legs looked better with heels,
(07:50):
and I realized it was all about him. He just didn't,
you know, it emasculated him evidently that that I, you know,
that I was tall and I don't know. So it's
such a crazy thing, but I call this podcast now
what you know? There are now moments in our lives,
and I'm curious as to what are some of the
(08:12):
first real now what moments that you experienced at any age?
You know. I think one of my earlier ones was
my church had a youth group and I enjoyed it.
I liked going and uh and all that. I was
probably in tenth grade, but I had never had a
boyfriend or anything like that. And uh. I was talking
(08:34):
to the pastor who led the youth group privately one day.
I said, why do you think that nobody asked, asked me.
I don't nobody interested being, you know, my boyfriend or anything.
And we were outside it was very quiet, and I
was very contemplative, and he said, why don't you try
being more like you are now? More? Just kind of quiet? God,
(08:59):
And this is he saying this to an incredibly shy
person once in a while, bursts out of her shill.
But how did you internalize that? Like, what's that message
in your brain that made me hopeless? That just made
me feel like am I going to accomplish that? And
what a a sad goal? I mean, I didn't realize
(09:20):
at that time what a sad goal that was. Were
there any people or experiences that counteracted that negativity? Well,
my dad and my mom really, but they both thought
I could do anything. And my mom's most famous phrase
that I remember was but you can't, Oh, never mind,
(09:42):
You're gonna do it anyway, whatever it was, whatever it is,
I'd come up with that I wanted to do or
make or build or whatever. And my dad was always
from when I was very little, you know, if he
was painting the house, I was painting the house and
fixing the car. So I wasn't shy about can I
(10:02):
do things? For some reason, it was very confident that
I could do things. It was more in interpersonal relationships
that I was shy. This next question is a difficult
one for me to ask. I think that it just
might be tough for some of our listeners to hear
(10:24):
as well. But there is a moment in your book, um,
that you talk about and it just really struck a
chord with me, probably because I have two daughters. Um,
but there's a moment in your book when you discussed
the idea that you realized in hindsight that you were
sexually abused by a neighbor when you were young. Right,
(10:46):
I told my mother this behavior he was doing that
I didn't understand because I didn't know there were parts
of my body were not to be touched. And how
old were you? Ten? Ten? And you had a paper route? Yeah? Yeah,
my mom, you know, talk to him and and and
said I could never go inside his house again, just
(11:09):
leave the paper down at the bottom and and all that.
But shouldn't be explain this is what happened. This is
why it's bad. I just knew there's something horrible had happened.
Then I was sure whether I was responsible for or not.
But did you have a shame around it? Like yeah, yeah,
like it's something I should have done to prevent whatever
(11:32):
this was. So, yeah, I was probably an adult by
the time I realized what had happened, and nobody called
Did anybody call the police? I mean, I guess And
you didn't do it then, right, that wasn't what you did.
Do you think that going forward, any of the roles
you played helped helped you process that that experience by
(11:56):
most of the roles you play and the characters are
there's a sense of real powerment in them. Yes, I
you know, here's my theory about all this is that
I was faking being I was acting being powerful and
strong and decisive and and all that stuff, and the
(12:17):
process of acting it kind of gives you an opportunity
to practice in a way. And so so I think
I was able to embody, you know, some of the
things my characters didn't standing up for myself or whatever,
because I played a character that had those qualities. I
think a lot had to do with the essence of
(12:39):
your I mean, your early days as an actor. Are
there moments that stick out that you're the most proud
of or those you just cringe at? Well, TUTSI was
my first movie, my first audition, even the first and
you get it and come on and when we're daring
(13:00):
to by Sydney Pology opposite starring dustn't happen. Uh. I
didn't want to ask any questions. I was very worried
that they would think she doesn't know where to stand
or what to do. And I was sure that there
was something called movie acting that I hadn't learned and
I'd be found out as a fake. But I didn't
(13:21):
know that you only come on the days when you shoot.
I read that. I died laughing. So cute, I know,
and nobody told me. I guess they didn't realize, you know,
how really naive I was or anything. I just assumed
everybody comes every day. You show up out every day
every day at six am. There I was some days
(13:44):
and you weren't getting into hair and makeup? Did that? No? No, no,
flew you in at all? No? No, I thought. I
didn't think I was had to be there to act.
I thought just as a member of this you know,
collective thing that I But but why didn't noticed that
Jessica Land wasn't hanging around on the issues. And you know,
(14:05):
it's kind of a theater mentality. I mean, you know,
you are a company. The company shows up. It's very
different in film and TV and and all of that. Um,
but that's such a sweet, sweet thing. When I read that,
I was like, oh God, she's just showing up to
work every single day for four months or three months
(14:27):
or whatever. But you know what, and hindsight, I'm sure
that was the best. It was like a masterclass, was
it really was. I mean, Sydney Pollock was an extraordinary director,
and uh and Dustin Hoppin. And the really really fortunate
thing for me was that they both from the beginning
(14:49):
treated me like a peer because I was a model
doing a change in my underweard, you know, and it
took me very very seriously, and uh, that really made
such an impression on me. It really. Did they give
you any advice? Oh god, Yeah, Dustin was giving me
advice constantly. We're just thrilling because he clearly thought that
(15:12):
I was going to have a career, because you know,
because he give me very sophisticated advice, um, you know
about optioning books and things like that, and he doesn't
wanted to also make sure that I didn't get preyed
upon by people. And he a bit of his advice
was to never never sleep with your co stars because
(15:36):
it's just it's just a bad idea, makes everything messy.
It's just a bad idea. So here's what you say
when that comes up. You say, oh, I would love
to You're very attractive, but I'm afraid that it would
ruin the sexual tension between us. As a way to
get out of it, and then I had to use
it somebody later, did you for the most part in
(16:00):
your career, he'd his advice or yeah, yeah, yeah, she
slipped every now and then. No, no, that's good on
Blue Lago. And they were desperate for us to fall
in love, really fall in love, and I was by
the end of it. I was like, stay away from me,
stay far away from me. We were like brother and sister.
You've always been such an advocate for women, but I'm
(16:23):
curious about as a woman your experiences in Hollywood. Was
there any point, like way before the me too stuff
that you kind of said, wait a minute, this isn't behavior.
I want to tolerate this is this is wrong? Yeah,
oh yeah, yeah, definitely definitely. But I you know, I thought,
(16:47):
you can't complain about this stuff, or you can't even
tell anybody about it, that we'll reflect on you, you know,
or something or something like that happened. I had a
very very uncomfortable audition for a role with the director.
But uh, but I as so well. You never would
(17:09):
have heard of him. He was the director of Transylvania
six five thousand. I think he hadn't anything since then.
But there was a scene in the movie. It's a
very very silly movie, and I'm playing a vampire, and uh,
there's a scene where I'm trying to seduce Ed Bigley Jr.
Because I'm a nymphamaniacal vampire. You understand that. I climb
(17:35):
up into his lap and I'm rubbing all over him,
and you know, I say something to take me, take me,
and I pressed his face into my breasts. Uh. And
he's supposed to say something that comes out mumbled, so
suffocating it. So this is the scene the director wants
to be to audition with and there's nobody else there.
(18:00):
And I said, how are we how are we going
to do this? How we're gonna act it? You're gonna
act it with me? Okay? Uh? And then and then
he said, but actually act the scene with me, like
sit on my lap, and uh, oh my god, God,
well no, no, that's okay, no, no, no, come on, yes,
(18:21):
I want to see how you how you acted. And
he stuffed his face in my breasts and uh, yeah,
it was God that the whole thing is unfathomable to
me that how do you I mean, do you walk
how do you walk away from that? What do you feel?
(18:41):
In that moment? I hit it all and repressed it all.
I didn't tell my agent, who would have I'm sure
like to know that, but it was just shameful to me.
I think it's probably the same thing like with my paperword.
I didn't quite know what happened. Again, it's a now
what moment, but you're not aware of it. And there's
(19:02):
another incident that you talked about, a very troubling encounter
with Bill Murray. Did that How did that change your view?
That was very, very pivotal in my life? And I
realized later I should have I could have. You know,
you you can always recriminate yourself, but I should have
(19:25):
walked out of the initial meeting rather than actually get
the part and go on the set and be treated terribly.
But at the meeting, it was in a hotel suite,
but there was there was a couple other people that
producers or whatever were there, and uh, I went to
go sit down with the people who were there, and
(19:46):
Bill said, Hey, have you ever heard of the thumper?
Have you ever tried the thumper. I'm like, what is that?
It's a massage thing? You've ever tried? No? No, we
like we would like to try. No, no, thank you,
And he kept at it and add it and add it. No,
come on, come on try just come here, just come
here to the bedroom and try it. And I realized
(20:10):
he's not ever going to give up. He was so
intent on it, and the other two men were not saying, Bill,
come on, you know, drop it. So what I realized, Brooke,
is that unless I yelled at him, I wasn't going
to get out of doing this. But the other option
would have been to leave, you know, but I couldn't
(20:34):
manage to do either one. So I I went in
the bedroom and I kind of perched on the edge
of the bed and he thumped it on my back
like literally two seconds, and then didn't ask how was it?
Did you like it? Because it wasn't about I want
you to try this cool thing. It was about can
(20:55):
I make you do what I want to make you do?
She's going to be a difficult actress or she going
to be malleable? Yes, exactly, And and and I learned
later it was because I had just won an oscar.
You know, for the supporting actress, and he was concerned
that I might think I was all that. Now, that
(21:16):
to me is so despicable because there's jealousy, right. I
don't think he had won an oscar by then, probably not.
And you're a woman, was very talented, beautiful, probably taller
than he is, So every single thing is an emasculating
element to that. And god, it's so it's so crazy,
(21:39):
and you talk about him going on. He even brates
you in front of everybody about what, what was it?
Why it was again? I'm sure in hindsight it was again.
Two put me in my place because I saw him
do it with other people. As the movie went on,
he quite frequently would explode at somebody and become very
(22:04):
vicious and then turn away like almost like you know,
well I did that. I got that out of you know,
like that. It was a deliberate tactic. How did you
come off of that experience? It was miserable, it was
I felt so shamed, and at lunch, just an hour
(22:26):
or two later, my manager and my agent came to
take me to lunch, and I didn't tell them because
I was so ashamed. I mean, in hindsight, oh my God,
you know, I'll be in my trailer calling my lawyer
or something, you know. But I guess I must have
(22:46):
internalized something about it that, oh I really wasn't doing
the right thing, or he made it so embarrassing and
so public, you know, in front of a couple of
hundred people. God, it was just awful. That fear instilling
fear is a sense of power and comidation. You do. Right.
There's a line that I wrote down where you say
(23:08):
you didn't know how to avoid being treated that way.
That's a really interesting statement because not I didn't know
how to stop this behavior from happening, but I didn't
know how to just avoid it. Oh, it's going to happen.
It's going to keep happening, and evidently it's okay, right,
that's fascinating to me. Yes, it is it because it's
(23:31):
going to happen all the time. That's the problem. That's
the problem. There's so many movies that you have been
in that have just O God, I've just made such
a difference, have sort of changed the narrative for women.
(23:54):
And I did not know that you had not originally
been cast in Thelman Louise Right, Yeah, Okay, teach, me
every time. I've gotten all of that movie that they
just cast so inside and I'm like, but I read
the book and it's uncorrected proof. How do you know
what to do in that case? Well, I just was
making it up as I went along, because I read
(24:15):
the script someone had slipped it to me, and I said,
oh my god, I have to be in this movie.
My agent said, oh no, it's already been cast. And
then I kept asking about it, and so he started
calling Ridley's office. Ridley Scott was going to be just
the producer of that movie at that time, and he
(24:36):
would call Ridley Scott's office once a week every week
and say, you know, if anything happens, Gene is still
interested if it happens. And then it turned out that
a couple of months later, whoever that director was and
whatever that situation was, that all fell apart. And I
was so obsessed with this movie that I was actually
(24:56):
meeting with my acting coach to work on it when
it was cast with somebody else, which is just ludicrous.
It's just ridiculous. But I just got in my head
that I had to be in this movie. And I
don't know why I even thought it would ever fall apart.
I mean, most things profoundly do not fall apart. But anyway,
(25:19):
so that happened like three times, and then Ridley decided
he was going to directed himself, and finally I got
to meet with him and try to convince him that
you absolutely did, but you were active in that process.
I don't know what I was thinking, why I thought
there was such a good chance that I would actually
(25:41):
end up in the movie. So you get the part?
Did you have to read with Susan or no? I
got cast first, and I signed a contract that I
would play either part. And because I had told him
that I felt like I could play Louise. And then
I meet Susan and I'm like, oh my god, what
was I thinking? I was going to play Louis? Wow?
(26:02):
And was was she a mentor at all? To you?
Oh my god? Yeah, because it seems crazy, but I
had never really spent significant time with a woman who
doesn't preface everything she says with I don't know what
you'll think. This is probably really stupid, but I mean
the first time we so we sit down, the meeting
(26:25):
is so we can sit down and go through the
script and you know, make comments. Whoever wants to make
a comment or maybe when we've changed this line or whatever.
So so we sit down and crack opened the script
and I swear it was on page one that Susan said,
you know this first line I have, I think we
should cut it. We don't need that. What do you think?
(26:45):
He's like, oh yeah, he said, actually right, And I
was just like, what just happened? What sort of stunned
to watch? Anyway, it was. It was such a lesson
for me, and then the entire shoot was that way.
I got to observe her every day for three months
(27:08):
and her very cat her convictions of what she wanted
and how and has always been extraordinarily clear about that
was acting over the age of forty? What is that like?
And what was that like for you? Um? You know,
I had heard. I was very well aware that people
(27:29):
talked about actresses don't get much work after forty, and
I thought, well, I mean that won't be me probably.
I mean I'm getting all these great parts and and anyway,
Sally Field and Jessica Lang and Gone Close and Meryl Streep,
We're all doing these incredible movies, you know, where the
(27:50):
female lead and everything. And I thought, well, that's not
gonna be true for them either, so they'll fix it
before I get to before and they didn't. And it
happened to me too. It was it was shocking. It
was that it now what moment for you? God? Yeah, yeah,
it really was. I wasn't reading things that I could
(28:12):
advocate for, if you know what you know, like like
with some of the ways, or I think it wasn't.
I wasn't seeing good scripts. I saw was actually some
a lot of really crummy scripts and most of them
didn't even come out. But yeah, it was. It was
really stunning. Did you consider quitting or walking away? No? No, no,
(28:32):
it was still it's what I what I do, what
I'm passionate about, what I care about, you know, I don't.
It was very very hard because like, well, now am
I supposed to redefine myself? I'm an actor. What's fascinating
was when I was fifty, I got cast as the
lead in a TV show called Commander in Chief, where
(28:53):
I got to be the first female president, and then
found like, well at last, you know, okay, now it's
now it's picking back up. Uh. It was tough. I'm
glad you're still doing it because we need more of you. Um,
you recently just were awarded an Emmy for the work
that you've done with the Gina Davis Institute on Gender
(29:13):
in Media. How did that whole endeavor come about? The
whole reason I started all of that was having a daughter,
and uh, when she was two years old, I thought, hey,
we could start watching preschool shows. Now, I'm sure she
would would love that, and put around my lap and
(29:35):
turn on the on a show. And within five minutes,
maybe ten minutes, I was saying, how many female characters
are there in this thing? Obviously we know there's a
big imbalance in general, but I couldn't have imagined it
would be in kids entertainment. And then I saw it
everywhere in the movies that came out in a you know,
(29:56):
G rated video. I didn't attend to know. Now I'm
going to form and it's you're anything, But I just started.
Whenever I had a meeting, I would ask if they
whoever it was, had had ever noticed that there were
far fewer female characters in movies made for kids. And
every single person said, no, no, that's not true anymore.
(30:16):
That's been fixed, And they would name a movie with
one female character as proof the gender inequality was over.
Like people very often said, well, there's been Belle from
Beauty and the Beast, you know, but huh and she's
a prisoner and you know, get Stockholm syndrome. So I
was like, wow, this is so unconscious. I wonder if
(30:41):
I got the data and went directly to them, because
I probably can get meetings with whoever if that would
have an impact. If it's completely unconscious and they find
out what they're doing, will they want to make the change?
And uh? And it turned out they did. You know,
it was very ports of it in the people who
make empty minutes for kids do it because they love kids.
(31:05):
And so when they learned that they were not going
right by half of the kids, uh, they everybody really
wanted to make a change. Well, if those of you
go back way, it's like the mother always dies within
the within the first six minutes of a of a
Disney movie. You know, Dumbo's mom and Bambi's mom and
you know everybody. Um, but I just I'm I'm a
(31:28):
huge fan of yours and I want to thank you
for being so open and I've gained a lot of
hope and confidence from talking to you. So thank you.
Oh that's incredible. Thank you. So it's really been fun
to talk to you, Brooke. That was the one and
only Gina Davis. If you want to hear more from her,
(31:50):
pick up a copy of her new memoir. It's called
Dying of Politeness. Trust me, you'll be glad you did.
And that's all for today. Talk to you next week.
Ye now. What is produced by the wonderful Julia Weaver
with help from Darby Masters. Our executive producer is Christina Everett.
(32:10):
The show is mixed by Bahed Fraser and Christian Bowman.
A special thanks to nicky Etre and Will Pearson. If
you liked this episode, please subscribe to the show on
the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
get your shows
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com