September 15, 2025 • 45 mins
Episode Summary
Most of the world knows Alexandra Paul as one of the stars of Baywatch, where she became a household name on one of the most-watched TV shows in history. But Alexandra’s story runs far deeper than the beaches of Malibu.
In this inspiring conversation with host Damien Swaby, Alexandra opens up about how she fell into acting at just 18, the role of storytelling in her life, and what it really took to thrive in the competitive world of Hollywood. She shares candid reflections on the ups and downs of fame, her journey into activism, and why she continues to reinvent herself through podcasting and personal growth.Whether you’re chasing a creative dream, building resilience in your career, or seeking to align your work with your values, Alexandra’s wisdom will resonate.Why Listen?
Most of the world knows Alexandra Paul as one of the stars of Baywatch, where she became a household name on one of the most-watched TV shows in history. But Alexandra’s story runs far deeper than the beaches of Malibu.
In this inspiring conversation with host Damien Swaby, Alexandra opens up about how she fell into acting at just 18, the role of storytelling in her life, and what it really took to thrive in the competitive world of Hollywood. She shares candid reflections on the ups and downs of fame, her journey into activism, and why she continues to reinvent herself through podcasting and personal growth.Whether you’re chasing a creative dream, building resilience in your career, or seeking to align your work with your values, Alexandra’s wisdom will resonate.Why Listen?
- Hear the untold story of how Alexandra went from shy high-school drama student to international Baywatch star.
- Learn how storytelling can become a tool for both self-expression and connection.
- Discover the challenges and lessons of sustaining a career in Hollywood while staying true to your values.
- Be inspired by Alexandra’s activism and her commitment to living authentically.
- 00:02:00 – Early years: Growing up in a non-artistic family, finding her own creative spark.
- 00:06:30 – First steps into acting: From modeling at 16 to falling in love with performance at 18.
- 00:15:00 – Hollywood lessons: What it takes to survive and thrive in the industry.
- 00:22:00 – Baywatch fame: The highs and challenges of starring on a global hit series.
- 00:35:00 – Reinvention: How Alexandra transitioned into podcasting and other creative pursuits.
- 00:45:00 – Activism: Aligning her public platform with her passion for making a difference.
- 00:55:00 – Final reflections: Advice on authenticity, resilience, and purpose.
- 🎬 You don’t need a creative upbringing to follow a creative path.
- 💡 Storytelling is about truth, connection, and self-expression.
- 💪 Resilience and consistency are the true engines of longevity in any career.
- 🌍 Living in alignment with your values is more rewarding than fame or success alone.
- 🎤 Reinvention keeps creativity alive — never stop evolving.
- Alexandra Paul’s Official Site https://alexandrapaul.com
- Follow Alexandra on Instagram
- Learn more at FlowVeda.com
- A Handbook of the Stanislavski Method
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:04):
You are listening to the IFH podcast Network.
Speaker 2 (00:07):
For more amazing filmmaking and screenwriting podcasts, just go to
ifhpodcastnetwork dot com.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Welcome back to Filmmaking Conversations with Me, your host, Damien Swaby.
Today's guest is someone many of you instantly recognize. She's
an actress, activist, and storyteller whose career began at just
eighteen years old. You may know her from feature films,
her powerful activism, or, of course, her iconic role on
(00:35):
the global hit series Baywatch, where she starred for five seasons.
But Alexander Paul's story goes beyond Hollywood. In this conversation,
we explore her journey from modeling to acting, the greatest
spark that led her to storytelling, the resilience it takes
to thrive in an industry as demanding as film and television,
(00:59):
and the deeper calling that led her into activism, and
the deeper calling that led her into activism. Get ready
for an honest, thoughtful, and inspiring conversation with the incredible
Alexander Paul. Alexandra, how are you today?
Speaker 2 (01:16):
I'm very well. Thank you, Damien, Thank you for having
me on your show.
Speaker 1 (01:20):
Thank you for coming on the show. I really appreciate
it someone of as many talents as you, as consistent
as you, as hard working as you are, and someone
who's also done an incredible job with a podcast. So
it's absolutely brilliant to have.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
You here my pleasure.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
You began active professionally at eighteen, launching me with paper
dolls and quickly moving into feature films. What was it
about storytelling that got you interested in acting?
Speaker 2 (01:45):
Oh gosh, you know what really got me interested in
acting was the creative part of it, in terms of
my character and what I could express. So they came
from a family. My mother is British actually, and my
father there's a conservative Midwest Midwest raised banker. So we
(02:07):
did not we did not We did not do art.
We went and looked at art yep. So we were
not a creative family. I would say there wasn't a
ton of music in our life. Or we went to plays,
but not a lot of movies. We didn't have a
TV for most childhood, so it was about reading and sports.
(02:34):
So education and I guess being healthy and having an
active life. So when I when I was young, I
started modeling when I was sixteen and I fell into
acting because my modeling agency asked me to take acting
classes and it was like a whole new world opened
(02:55):
up for me, and I was just enchanted. But the
fact that I could express myself and be different people
and not be this good girl that I thought I
should be this sort of narrow box.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
So when you were in school where the drama lessons
or acting classes you could have taken on what your
parents probably advised you against that.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
When I was in high school, I was part of
the drama club, but only because I was a very
well rounded person. I was part of most clubs, so
I was part of the model u n and I
was part of drama, and I remember just being terrified
every time I was up on stage. And I didn't
have very large parts, and I wasn't I wasn't part
of the artsy crowd. So yeah, and my my mother
(03:42):
was not supportive of my acting career, and my father was,
but my mother wasn't she she thought. I think I'm
not sure exactly what her thinking has been, But yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:54):
And your mother you said she was British. Is she
from London? I mean, there's so many theaters here in London.
She must have enjoyed some of them at that time.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
Oh my gosh, she loves culture, she loves I mean,
we saw a lot of museums and went to plays,
but being actually creative wasn't sort of a focus in
my childhood. It was more about doing well in school,
more sort of intellectual rather than emotional. And as you
(04:22):
know that the acting process in America is the emotions
are very important. They sort of lead, and that the
technical come second. Is how I was taught in terms
of acting. So it's how it's viewed a lot here.
And certainly Hollywood was not something that my mother was
particularly impressed with, you know, it was more you know,
(04:44):
Broadway in the West End. So she grew up in Liverpool.
She was born in Liverpool and then moved somewhere else,
and I'm not sure where.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
But with your agency, they moved you well, persuading you
to try acting for a period of time, which i'll
worked out well for you. But one of the things
I've come to understand is that a lot of agents
they don't want their talent to be an actor and
model or actor and a dancer. They want you to
go down one path. Why is it exacting that your
agent decided that it would be a good idea for you
(05:15):
to get into modeling.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
Right to acting. Well, actually, what they wanted me to
do was send me on commercials, which is what models
would do back then. So that's why they wanted me
to take acting classes, was so that I could audition
for commercials. They didn't have They didn't have a acting
department at my agency. Wilhelmina was the name of the
(05:38):
agency in New York City, but they did send actors
out on commercials and.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
As a model. What did you enjoy about that career path?
Speaker 2 (05:47):
I guess the affirmation of you know that I was attractive.
Frankly at sixteen, I got to travel, went to you know,
Italy to work and traveled for jobs. But yeah, otherwise,
all it did was also, at the same time reinforce
(06:09):
that I wasn't good enough, pretty enough. So it has
a double edged sword modeling.
Speaker 1 (06:16):
And in your active work, you've managed to work with
people such as Kevin Costner, Tom Hanks, Jeff Bridges, and
even Leslie Nilsen. Can you share a favorite memory or
lesson working with such iconic actors?
Speaker 2 (06:27):
Oh gosh, well, I have to say that I really
appreciated working with Jeff Bridges. It was a film called
eight Million Ways to Die that also starred Andy Garcia
and Roseanna Arquette, and he was so relaxed in his
acting that that was really helpful because I, coming from
(06:49):
a family that really valued studying and learning, was very
technical with my acting and it was hard for me
to let go. And he has a much more easy
going style, more natural, and that that was helpful to me.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
And that technical style, where did you trying to learn that?
Speaker 2 (07:09):
You know, it's funny because I've worked with British actors
and you all go to acting college essentially, whereas actors
tend to well, certainly in the eighties, I'll speak for
the nineteen eighties when I started, and in Hollywood, so
movie and TV actors, what we do is we move
(07:31):
there and then we take acting classes with various acting teachers.
So we don't go to one school. We go to
a teacher for six months or a year, and then
we go to another teacher. We might take another like
an improv class also and another place. So it's more
more of taking classes rather than going to a college.
Speaker 1 (07:53):
I say, how did you find your time in England?
Speaker 2 (07:55):
In England? Well, I was in England. I shot a
movie Charles Dance in England actually, and in Europe. I guess.
We moved around and I thought it was great, But
I never lived in England. Yeah, just visiting family and
then working on that movie in nineteen eighty eight maybe.
Speaker 1 (08:21):
And what would you say have been your favorite role?
Speaker 2 (08:23):
Well, I know that my favorite acting experience was shooting Baywatch,
which people find odd because it was such a fluffy
show and I'm kind of an earnest person. But the
truth was is that I when I first was offered
the role, I didn't want to do it because I
didn't want to do a television series. Back in the
(08:44):
early nineteen nineties, an actor did not move easily between
television and film, and I was worried that if I
did a television series, I'd be stuck in television forever.
I also didn't want to commit to a series. I
was afraid of any kind of commitment back then when
I was twenty eight. But I was so glad I
said yes because I actually really caught into the pace
(09:05):
of shooting television, which is much faster, much much faster
than shooting feature films, and I appreciated that. I found
it more creative actually, and I enjoyed doing fleshing out
the same character. Fleshing out the same character every week
and having relationships with the same actors just makes you
(09:27):
more comfortable on the set, the crew, and so that
kind of continuity and routine I really really enjoyed. And
now I would say my favorite medium is shooting television
series and in.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
Terms of frame with situations and characters and things of
that nature. You've played a gay woman in four films
and you said that makes you proud due to your
sister being gay. How would your advocacy for LGBTQ plus
representation shune up in your acting decisions.
Speaker 2 (09:55):
Wow, Well, I'm happy to do to play lesbians, proud
of it. And I do believe that because my identical
twin is gay, that I must have some gay dna uh,
because I believe that we are born gay and it's
it's not a choice. Although if it was a choice,
that's fine too, and I think that I have.
Speaker 1 (10:21):
I have.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
Definitely turned down roles that I felt we didn't jive
with my morals. Usually it's not the role, it's the
whole message of the film because people, Yeah, I've you know,
I played bad people and good people and things like that.
It's more about the message of the film that's important
to me.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
What would be your ideal message in a film?
Speaker 2 (10:45):
Well, you know, I don't feel like it's funny because
I'm an activist in real life. But my films and
projects have been very you know, Guilty Pleasures and Melrose
Place and of course Beywash's a lot of movies on
What we have here is Lifetime, which is a cable
network that caters to sort of who Done it? And
(11:09):
women centered plots that involve either like romance or a crime,
the woman comes out on top. So none of my
films really most very few of my films have a
really serious message. And I don't mind at all because
I don't think everything has to have a message. Yeah,
(11:30):
but so I would say that actually, because I work
very hard in my personal life to make the world
a better place, I don't feel like my film content
has to change the world. I just don't feel I
don't want it to send a message that I personally
don't believe in.
Speaker 1 (11:49):
And you've done fifteen Lifetime movies. What is it about
those stories? Even though you say, you know, not every
film has to have a message, which I agree with
and understand. But what is it about a lifetime film
that makes you keep coming back?
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Oh, my gosh, because the woman is the lead, The
woman is strong, the woman that is still annoying when
I see films and like the girlfriend or the wife
and is the husband is or the boyfriend is fighting
and the girlfriend's cowering in the corner not helping. It
just annoys the heck out of me. And in lifetime films,
that's not how it goes. Is the woman is this center.
(12:24):
Although I do remember when I was shooting a film
and I had a husband and an ex husband, and
whenever we had all three of us had a scene together,
I noticed that the two men had all the lines
and I had very few, And I was like, what
is this about? This is a natural bias against the
(12:46):
men taking control of the situation, and it was It
annoyed me.
Speaker 1 (12:52):
How can I understand that? Yeah, a natural bias that
we see far too often, that's for sure. And the
women in these films, as you said, they're the leads
by they written by women, that they produced by women.
Speaker 2 (13:04):
Women as well written. Yeah, a lot of them are
written by women. A lot of the ones I did
were written by women. I can't remember if that one
was written by a woman. I think it was, and
I remember being surprised. But you know, just because a
woman has written it doesn't mean that a lot of
the male producers or the male director haven't gotten their
hands in it and changed their in net so, but
(13:28):
it also could be that our society is just so
biased towards men taking over a situation that she wrote
it that way just naturally, but it was not. I
was surprised. It's hard being an actor in a scene
and not and it's actually maybe even harder and not
having any dialogue not not. I'm not talking about ego.
(13:51):
I'm talking about as an actor, like what do you do? Naturally,
I wouldn't be shutting up like that as a as
a in that situation, normally I wouldn't. I would have
my input. And then it's written as if like you're
completely mute and the two men are Oh, it's not
easy to shoot that kind of scene.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
And in those situations if there is a male director
that you may not particularly see the world in the
same way. What type of challenges have you been through
and how did you overcome them on set?
Speaker 2 (14:22):
Most of the directors I've worked with have been male.
I would say I've only worked with maybe six female
directors out of one hundred. Maybe on Baywatch I did,
over I did. I can't remember how many episodes I did,
but certainly over one hundred episodes. There were maybe a
couple more female directors that I'm forgetting about, but most
(14:46):
of them are male, So.
Speaker 3 (14:50):
I I think, well, I remember I was I did
a film where I was the female lead, and I
was sort of a lifetime film, so.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
Yeah, I was the lead. And then there was the
male detective. He probably would have considered himself bely. We
were co leades, let's say, and then we became like
lovers in the film. But he was not as tall
as I, and I remember that the actor didn't want
me to wear heels because that made me taller than him. Otherwise,
(15:25):
I guess we were about the same height. And I
was wearing a very short skirt and it makes your
legs look better if you wear heels, and I wanted
to wear heels, and he just completely you know, basically,
and I ended up capitulating, and not that I don't
(15:45):
really I'm not of an aggressive person, So what really
happened was that I ended up weeping in the corner
with the wardrobe person because I had to wear flats
and I just didn't feel good in them. And it
wasn't like I was wearing high high heels, but I
just wanted a little heel.
Speaker 4 (16:02):
And it's it's a silly thing that it was interesting
to me a how I reacted, which was to cry,
not because I can't be I'm not.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
I think now I would be. I'm sixty two now
and I was probably thirty then. But I didn't stick
up for myself at all. And the male the director
was male to and you know, the actor was older.
Of course that also happens the dynamic between the actors
is usually the male lead is older than the female lead.
(16:38):
And yeah, so I've I think I learned that I
need to be able to state what I need without
you know, getting so emotional about it. It's just a
pair of shoes, for God's sake. But yeah, it was
interesting how he just didn't want me to be taller
than him, which is an old like that's a cultural
(17:01):
trope that we've learned that the men should be taller
and that means are more powerful, which is bullshit basically, right, Yeah,
And uh, I guess he felt more masculine, and then
I guess I felt more would feel more feminine if
I was wearing a little bit of heel because it
made my legs look better. So I mean we were
both we were all falling into cultural bologney.
Speaker 1 (17:22):
But why if he were the official lead, or even
if he want the official lead, why did he win?
Like how did he get away of saying I'm going
to win this situation?
Speaker 2 (17:32):
You know? I think he well, he was a bigger
name he had. I think he'd been nominated from it.
I can't remember his full name now he's passed, but uh,
he was it was a lifetime like movie. But he
was a bigger name then, I know, and he was
(17:53):
older and had more credits and more status. I think
if it was you know, I think if it was
a man who hadn't who was didn't have his large
a role, he might not have pushed as much. He
might not There's there was a hierarchy on the set
and number one. He was probably number one on the
(18:14):
call sheet and I was number two frankly so, But
it was just the fact the decision was being made,
like Okay, you're not wearing that because the man doesn't
want it, And there was never any discussion really about it.
And you know, I remember there's a there is a
definite hierarchy between men and women in Hollywood. I remember
(18:35):
I was in a in an audition where we were
It was for a dot what's his name. He's a
big blonde guy who played the bad guy in one
of the Rocky movies. And he's from delf Thunder Yes
delph Lungdren, Yes del a delf Lungren series that they
were going to make. And they were screen testing women
(18:55):
and second second male leads, so lead women and male leads,
and they was taking forever, so they put us in
separate rooms so that we could study our lines, I guess.
And one of my friends was also at the audition too,
and I didn't recognize any of the men in that
(19:17):
audition who were auditioning for the second male lead. But
my friend who was put in the producer's office to
study her.
Speaker 5 (19:24):
Lines, she saw on the wall the payment schedule, like
what they were offering the men versus the women, and
the second male leads off were being offered.
Speaker 2 (19:38):
More money than the lead females and I, as I said, I,
you know, I had much more experience than those men.
There were like four or five of men and four
or five women. And it irked me that before we
even got the job, they had decided what the pay
(19:58):
range was going to be for, you know, the second
male lead versus the first female lead, and the first
female lead was there's no chance of her getting as
much as the second male lead because they had budgeted.
This is what they say, Oh we budgeted, and so yeah,
it was irksome. I did not get the job. I
do not think the series ever went but I found
(20:19):
that to be such an interesting lesson on how Hollywood
is already stacked against well women because they decide the
budget before you even go in to audition.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
Shocking. I had no idea about deciding budget before you
even go in. That's it.
Speaker 2 (20:36):
If well, it probably doesn't affect ever happen all the time,
and there might be some leeway they really want a
certain actor. But just the fact that they had deemed
the second male lead more valuable financially than the first
female lead, I thought that was odd.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
But moving away from scripted content, who Killed the Electric
Car highlighted your work in environmental activism. What was it
like to being part of that documentary and what kind
of impact do you think it had.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
It was a documentary about electric cars, and it was
filmed in the early two thousands when electric cars were
just coming on the scene and the car companies wanted
to squash the technology and we were I got my
first electric car in nineteen ninety as an environmentalist, had
(21:30):
been an environmentalist all my life, and I felt that
was important to start while walking my talk and how
I drove a car around LA and so beating that
documentary meant a lot to me. I didn't realize actually
that it was. I was just going about my activism
and there happened to be a little camera there. I
didn't pay much attention to it. And then as our
(21:53):
activism went on and on and on, the camera cows
got bigger and bigger, and I guess they got more
funded and things like that. But yeah, it was an
important time in electric cars and it was an important documentary.
Actually went to Sundance, and that helped people understand more
(22:14):
about what was going on with the technology and how
the companies were trying to squash the technology because they
didn't want to move forward. They want to stay on
fossil fuels.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
What type of impact do you think it had, because
you know, in nineteen ninety I didn't even realize electric
cars were available. Maybe they weren't in the UK, maybe
that's why. But what type of impact do you think
that documentary had.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
Well, No, people didn't realize us Speaking to your comment
about the in nineteen ninety it was a conversion. It
was a conversion that it wasn't made by an auto,
big auto maker. My car, my first couple cars were
made by you know, people who were enthusiasts and had
converted a gas car to an electric car.
Speaker 1 (23:01):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
My first electric car just went twenty five miles and
it had lead acid batteries. It had about I don't
know how many thirty lead acid batteries in it, and
I had to fill it up with water, them up
with water every week. And it only plugged into a
one to ten outlet, you know, regular house outlet, so
it took quite a bit long time to charge. So
(23:23):
and then my second car got fifty miles and that
was a conversion also, and then I was able to
lease the EV one, which was an amazing car. And
one of the first cars that was electric cars that
was mass produced by an automaker in the twentieth century.
Because in the nineteenth century and at the turn, like
in eighteen ninety nine in New York City, there were
(23:47):
more electric taxis than gas taxis. So yes, so there
were a lot of electric cars were something that in
the early nineteen hundreds women preferred to drive because they
were easier to start. Used to have to start a
gas car like you did a lawnmower by pulling this leg. Yeah,
(24:10):
and women didn't like that. It was dirty and noisy,
and so they were electric cars back then, and they
liked that technology better actually, But the fossil fuel industry
won out, and that's why left cars disappeared for many
decades and started coming back slowly the end of the
(24:32):
twentieth century.
Speaker 1 (24:33):
And you even went to jail to protect them. Can
you tell us a bit about that?
Speaker 2 (24:37):
Yes, I did, I and then had to do. I
was arrested doing a peaceful civil disobedience protecting the electric
cars from General Motors called ev ones that General Motors
was crushing perfectly good electric cars. They decided they would
(24:57):
crush their electric car fleet because California changed its rules
and wasn't mandating the electric car company, sorry, the car
companies to make electric cars. There was a time. The
reason the electric cars exist really at all is because
of the state of California, which mandated in the late
(25:19):
nineties that the top eight automakers needed to make a
certain percentage of cars that were emission free, and that
meant electric at that time, and the car makers were basically,
because California is such a big market, they basically had
to start making electric cars. And most of the companies
(25:40):
just converted a gas car that they had into electric,
and you know, Toyota sold like two hundred and thirty.
There were very few that were available, but the ev
one there were oh I think there were over one
thousand that were leased. And then the governmant of California changed,
(26:01):
under pressure from the oil companies and car companies, you know,
said Okay, you don't have to do this anymore. And
so the car companies wanted to crush their cars because
they didn't want to have any remnants of these amazing,
amazing vehicles by the way, which were faster, smoother, quieter,
and much less expensive to run. Because you I didn't
(26:22):
have to Gosh, you don't have to take your.
Speaker 1 (26:25):
Electric car courn.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
Oil change or there's no transmission stuff, so there's so
many fewer moving parts. So the the car companies did
not want to have electric cars.
Speaker 1 (26:35):
So you've also done open rescues with groups like Direct
Action Everywhere. The listeners, I'm familiar with that. Can you
explain what the open rescue is and why do you
do it?
Speaker 2 (26:47):
I'm an AMML rights activist also, and open rescue is
when we investigate a factory farm, which is a factory
farm facility that basically enclose is large number of animals
in a small space to raise them for food. So
it's usually dairy farms, beef farms, chicken farms, duck farms,
(27:11):
so livestock and Direct Action Everywhere is a nonprofit that
we go in and document what's going on in those
places because otherwise nobody would know what was going on
in factory farm facilities because the government and the companies
really try and keep it from the consumer what exactly
(27:35):
went into raising the meat and dairy that they put
on the shelves. So we go in and document what
goes on and we rescue if we can as many
animals as we can, but usually it's very few because
it's hard to place in the sanctuary animals. So we
(27:57):
usually rescue several animals from the fact farm facility. And
while we do this, we do not cover our faces.
We will put it on the internet the rescue with
the rescuers faces uncovered. We name ourselves because we believe
what we're doing is right and so that we don't
(28:17):
need to hide what we're doing. And usually the companies,
the food companies and these factory facilities don't come after
us because they know that in court that too much
unsavory information about their practices and how they treat the
animals would come out. So they know that, I mean
(28:40):
most people, most everybody knows that factory farm facilities are
cruel to animals. But we need to keep showing people
the images so that the large companies can't continue to
sort of whitewash what what they're doing.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
When you've also spoken at universities, created award winning documentaries,
and given a TEDx talk on human overpopulation, what's the
core message you hope to take away from your work
on these issues.
Speaker 2 (29:13):
I'm very concerned about the number of people on the
planet and how fast we're growing. Just to give you
some context, as I said, I'm sixty two, and when
I was born, there were three billion people on the planet,
and now there are eight billion and there are yeah,
so it's more than doubled in my lifetime. And in
my mother's lifetime it's quadrupled. It was two billion when
(29:36):
she was born. She's eighty nine. So I feel just logically,
because remember I'm a logical person, that this kind of
math doesn't work, and that any other creature on Earth,
we understand that they can overpopulate, it can be unsustainable.
But for some reason, for humans, we don't see that,
(29:56):
and we think more is better, and a special rich
company owners want to have more people. So you'll see
people like Elon Musk and JD. Vance, the Vice President
of the United States, talking about how people should have
more babies, and the president of Hungary, victor Or Bond,
saying that Hungarians women should have more babies. And the
(30:19):
reason for this is because more people is better for
a GDP of a country because they have more output
and more consumers. Is better for people like Elon Musk
who wants to sell things to you, but it's not
good for the individual person. And in fact, if our
(30:40):
population is going to grow to ten billion, the United
Nations has predicted we will go up to ten billion,
then we'll probably ten point three in about forty years,
and then we will start going slowly down. And that
is to me a good thing, because I don't believe
that our planet can sustain ten billion people where everyone
(31:03):
can get what they need. Now, rich white Westerners in
the United North America will do just fine, but the
people who will suffer are people in the southern hemisphere
and people of lower incomes. They will suffer a lot
when there are well now they're suffering, but even more.
(31:25):
And I'm very saddened about how the media is putting
out all this information about how we have a birth
dearth and the fertility is going down. Oh my god,
it's terrible. We're gonna human race is going to go extinct,
and that's not true. All We're still growing. The population
is still growing, even though family size is smaller. The
(31:49):
average family size across the world is two point five
kids per couple. But when you have eight billion people
and so many of them are having babies, you are
going to grow. And we are continuing to grow, and
it really concerns me because it's really just a very
capitalist notion that we have to have more and more
people so they can have more and more things to make.
(32:14):
We can have more and more workers to make things
and more and more consumers. And there is also just
one more point is that people say, well, we need
more workers because we have a very old population and
we need to take care of the elders. And I
understand that economic dilemma, but it is an economic dilemma.
It's not a do we have enough water and food
(32:37):
and clean air and space and nature dilemma, which is
to me much harder to solve. If we have a
we're worried about not having enough workers to take care
of older people, that is maybe a one or two
generation problem. And then it will even out and there
will be this, you know, fewer old people. I guess
(33:00):
the ratio of old to young will even out as
we slowly, you know, get used to having let's say,
two kids per couple instead of two and a half
kids per couple. But running out of food and water
and space, and it's a national it's a security problem
because when people don't have enough, they migrate, and that
(33:23):
makes people mad. And then there's wars. I mean, it's
it's huge, it's huge, hugely irresponsible for these mostly men
to tell people and mostly women that they should have
more babies without looking at the real consequences of how
(33:43):
everyone will suffer except for the richest. And it concerns
me very much that the poor will become poor, and
especially with climate change, when you know we're struggling already
to deal with floods and droughts, how do we expect
to feed so many people? If you ask me a
question like population, I could go on for an hour talking.
Speaker 1 (34:07):
I could care the passion and the sun. It's amazing that.
Speaker 2 (34:11):
You and I just want to say one thing is
that I am somebody who cares about population, but I
don't believe in in forcing people to have fewer kids.
I believe in giving them the choice and talking about
the benefits of having smaller families. Because right now, every
species is programmed to procreate, So our culture is very
(34:32):
pro pro having as many babies as you can, or
at least having more babies and making sure that we
continue to quote unquote grow because that's in our DNA.
But we are such a successful species at pro creating
that now to survive, we have to stop procreating as
fast as quickly, and we need to have fewer babies
(34:55):
per couple. And that is done by just explaining the
benefits of having smaller families, which are many so much
less stress, less financial burden, better for the kids, better
for the municipality, the area to not grow so fast
so you can educate everybody, have enough parks, have enough space,
have enough nature. I mean, there's so many benefits to
(35:17):
having fewer kids. Yet this pressure for people to have
more children, it's incredibly concerning. It's like an old way
of thinking, especially with AI coming in and they're being
going to be fewer jobs for people, climate change. It's
just really like we haven't changed our mindset about procreation
(35:40):
and we need to so, but we need to without coercion.
I'm not for forcing people to have fewer babies. I
am for educating people, educating women, and then they will
choose to have fewer babies. If women are educated around
the world, they will always choose to have fewer kids.
And it's it's usually the men who want to have
(36:02):
more babies because guess what, they're not raising them like
the women are.
Speaker 1 (36:08):
No I mean, I mean, it's clear your passion, your care,
your concern for activism and humanitarian work. But how does
it inform you when you make decisions in terms of
building a character. And do you ever participate in method
acting when you got into any of your roles?
Speaker 2 (36:26):
Oh? Yes, all my roles are. I'm involved with method
acting and a mixture of method acting, just all sorts
of things, Like for your audience. Method acting is when
you bring up emotions from your past and use them
to flesh out your character. And I do that a lot,
(36:48):
but I also work technically. So how does she look?
What is her what is her relationship to every person
whom she interacts with in that story? What is her backstory?
Where did she just come from? What does she want?
All those things are questions that are you know, I
(37:09):
sit down and study and decide and brainstorm. Yeah, it's
uh and it's fun a lot of it, you know,
just deciding you know, what's you know? Nobody sees this,
but I know it. Like how many siblings does she have?
Always her relationship with her parents? What was her socioeconomic background?
(37:31):
All those things just helped me feel more comfortable in
the character. And how does she walk. What does she wear?
That is that's a collaboration with me and the wardrobe person.
But I'll decide, like what her hair looks like? Does
she wear nail polish? Does she do? I do I
need to put nails on? Do I? You know the
whole What color is my nail polish makes a difference,
(37:55):
tel says something about the character. So there is method
acting emotions and trying to find ways to relate to
a character that are true to me. But there's also
technical things.
Speaker 1 (38:11):
You are incredibly athletic. He happened since a young age,
that's for sure, since your early acting era. And how
do you find some smilarities between training for endurance events
and preparing for a long term role or a difficult shoot.
Speaker 2 (38:28):
I have a lot of discipline I have learned. I
worked with a I'm shooting something in Australia and the
writer had in college sold a script that then became
a sequel that then became like a ride at Disney World,
and then he sold another script that also had a sequel,
(38:52):
and he was just very successful. And I asked him,
so what has helped you be a success And he said,
you know, alexand I do what I'm asked. So when
someone says write a script in three weeks, it might
not be the best script, but I get it done
in three weeks. I give them what they need. And
a lot of people, but actors too, don't just do
(39:15):
the basics like showing up on time and knowing your
lines and being clear on the character, being respectful on
the set, being a professional. That is such a basic
thing for me, and I think that and discipline. So
when I was working on Baywatch, I got up at
three thirty in the morning so I could work out
before I got to the set at six because we
(39:37):
had to get to the set as soon as the
light was up because we shot outside, so everything needed
to be we use sunlight. So yeah, I got up
burly to work out because I knew that after a
long day of shooting twelve hour days, I wouldn't really
want to go to the gym and work out. So
I knew that I wasn't going to use, oh, I
have a long day at work as an excuse not
(39:59):
to be healthy feel my best, especially when you're going
to be in a bathing suit. But I do that
for every every film. I continue my workout program. I
bring my own food to the set because it's just healthier.
I try and stay away from craft service because it's
just everything that your mother would not want you to eat.
(40:21):
So yeah, I just I think that that discipline has
helped me with my athletic endeavors. When you train for
a endurance race like I've done the Hawaii iron Man,
which is a very long race, and I've swam been
done a fourteen mile ocean swim in Mexico, and you
(40:43):
have to have a lot of discipline to train for those.
It's the training that's the discipline, and you just have
to show up. Like that writer Greg told me, you
just show up and you do what you're supposed to do.
And guess what, I don't win my races. I'm not
the best to buy any man. I am average, but
I'm average of the people who are showed up. But
(41:05):
I you know, I'm in the game. And the reason
I'm in the game is because I I showed up.
I did what was asked of me to get there.
Speaker 1 (41:14):
And what time do you go to bed to wake
up to trying it half free?
Speaker 2 (41:19):
Oh? Back then? Because now I don't. Now. Now we
go to bed, my husband and I go to bed
before ten and we get up between five thirty and six.
But so, what is that That's almost eight hours week
at so I guess, you know, I guess I think
I would go to bed probably nine or ten. I
probably wasn't getting enough sleep, but I was. I loved
(41:39):
shooting that series so much that it was it was okay,
just but you know, I didn't party, it didn't drink.
I you know, so that I always was able to
get up in the morning.
Speaker 1 (41:52):
And it makes sense now. Yeah, and after such a
wide ranging career from big budget films to gloss root actively,
I'm excited to know, especially being on your website Letty
and everything, what's next for you.
Speaker 2 (42:06):
I have no idea. I'm at this moment just taking
care of my mom, who has Parkinson's. Thank you. She's
doing pretty well. We've been here three years and I've
been taking care and I'm I'm starting to look for
work again because I realize that I need to work
(42:27):
just for my own sense of self, and so I'm
hoping to I want to continue working till no one
will ever hire me again. So I plan on working
hopefully through to ninety and thank you, yeah, ah, thank you,
thank you, and yeah, and I continue my activism right now,
(42:48):
it's much more. I have been involved with open rescues
and investigations of factory farms, but I also volunteer at
my local animal shelter as a dog walker, which means
a lot to be I don't have a dog. I
never I haven't had dogs as an adult, but I
do love animals, So yeah, that's I do that two
(43:08):
or three times a week.
Speaker 1 (43:10):
I hope that the cats or two cats don't get
jealous when you out orpen the dogs. And finally, what
advice would you give to actors and filmmakers who want
to use their platform for more than just entertainment just
like you do?
Speaker 2 (43:24):
Yeah, I would. I would recommend that they do their work,
they do their acting work, and they become as successful
as they can be. And then when one of the
things about for me at least be an actor was
that I was unemployed for a certain times, so I
had the bandwidth to be an activist and really get
involved in lots of issues that were important to me. Because,
(43:47):
as I said, acting makes me happy, but activism feeds
my soul suck. And so I recommend that people work
and do what they love and you know, and flourish
in that area, and then they have an issue that
they care about. They nowadays you have social media, so
(44:10):
if you're a really successful actor, you have a lot
of followers and you can just talk about your the
issues that you care about on your platform. That's very,
very very helpful to get the word out. So but
I just recommend that people follow their their creative heart
and their their moral heart and they'll have a fulfilled,
(44:33):
fulfilled life.
Speaker 1 (44:36):
Excellent, Alexandra, thanks so much for coming on the podcast.
It's been a pleasure speaking to you, learning about yourself,
your career, your activism, and I really hope to speak
to you soon.
Speaker 2 (44:46):
Thank you, Damian, I appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (44:47):
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(45:09):
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Speaker 2 (00:07):
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ifhpodcastnetwork dot com.
Speaker 1 (00:13):
Welcome back to Filmmaking Conversations with Me, your host, Damien Swaby.
Today's guest is someone many of you instantly recognize. She's
an actress, activist, and storyteller whose career began at just
eighteen years old. You may know her from feature films,
her powerful activism, or, of course, her iconic role on
(00:35):
the global hit series Baywatch, where she starred for five seasons.
But Alexander Paul's story goes beyond Hollywood. In this conversation,
we explore her journey from modeling to acting, the greatest
spark that led her to storytelling, the resilience it takes
to thrive in an industry as demanding as film and television,
(00:59):
and the deeper calling that led her into activism, and
the deeper calling that led her into activism. Get ready
for an honest, thoughtful, and inspiring conversation with the incredible
Alexander Paul. Alexandra, how are you today?
Speaker 2 (01:16):
I'm very well. Thank you, Damien, Thank you for having
me on your show.
Speaker 1 (01:20):
Thank you for coming on the show. I really appreciate
it someone of as many talents as you, as consistent
as you, as hard working as you are, and someone
who's also done an incredible job with a podcast. So
it's absolutely brilliant to have.
Speaker 2 (01:33):
You here my pleasure.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
You began active professionally at eighteen, launching me with paper
dolls and quickly moving into feature films. What was it
about storytelling that got you interested in acting?
Speaker 2 (01:45):
Oh gosh, you know what really got me interested in
acting was the creative part of it, in terms of
my character and what I could express. So they came
from a family. My mother is British actually, and my
father there's a conservative Midwest Midwest raised banker. So we
(02:07):
did not we did not We did not do art.
We went and looked at art yep. So we were
not a creative family. I would say there wasn't a
ton of music in our life. Or we went to plays,
but not a lot of movies. We didn't have a
TV for most childhood, so it was about reading and sports.
(02:34):
So education and I guess being healthy and having an
active life. So when I when I was young, I
started modeling when I was sixteen and I fell into
acting because my modeling agency asked me to take acting
classes and it was like a whole new world opened
(02:55):
up for me, and I was just enchanted. But the
fact that I could express myself and be different people
and not be this good girl that I thought I
should be this sort of narrow box.
Speaker 1 (03:09):
So when you were in school where the drama lessons
or acting classes you could have taken on what your
parents probably advised you against that.
Speaker 2 (03:17):
When I was in high school, I was part of
the drama club, but only because I was a very
well rounded person. I was part of most clubs, so
I was part of the model u n and I
was part of drama, and I remember just being terrified
every time I was up on stage. And I didn't
have very large parts, and I wasn't I wasn't part
of the artsy crowd. So yeah, and my my mother
(03:42):
was not supportive of my acting career, and my father was,
but my mother wasn't she she thought. I think I'm
not sure exactly what her thinking has been, But yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:54):
And your mother you said she was British. Is she
from London? I mean, there's so many theaters here in London.
She must have enjoyed some of them at that time.
Speaker 2 (04:02):
Oh my gosh, she loves culture, she loves I mean,
we saw a lot of museums and went to plays,
but being actually creative wasn't sort of a focus in
my childhood. It was more about doing well in school,
more sort of intellectual rather than emotional. And as you
(04:22):
know that the acting process in America is the emotions
are very important. They sort of lead, and that the
technical come second. Is how I was taught in terms
of acting. So it's how it's viewed a lot here.
And certainly Hollywood was not something that my mother was
particularly impressed with, you know, it was more you know,
(04:44):
Broadway in the West End. So she grew up in Liverpool.
She was born in Liverpool and then moved somewhere else,
and I'm not sure where.
Speaker 1 (04:53):
But with your agency, they moved you well, persuading you
to try acting for a period of time, which i'll
worked out well for you. But one of the things
I've come to understand is that a lot of agents
they don't want their talent to be an actor and
model or actor and a dancer. They want you to
go down one path. Why is it exacting that your
agent decided that it would be a good idea for you
(05:15):
to get into modeling.
Speaker 2 (05:17):
Right to acting. Well, actually, what they wanted me to
do was send me on commercials, which is what models
would do back then. So that's why they wanted me
to take acting classes, was so that I could audition
for commercials. They didn't have They didn't have a acting
department at my agency. Wilhelmina was the name of the
(05:38):
agency in New York City, but they did send actors
out on commercials and.
Speaker 1 (05:44):
As a model. What did you enjoy about that career path?
Speaker 2 (05:47):
I guess the affirmation of you know that I was attractive.
Frankly at sixteen, I got to travel, went to you know,
Italy to work and traveled for jobs. But yeah, otherwise,
all it did was also, at the same time reinforce
(06:09):
that I wasn't good enough, pretty enough. So it has
a double edged sword modeling.
Speaker 1 (06:16):
And in your active work, you've managed to work with
people such as Kevin Costner, Tom Hanks, Jeff Bridges, and
even Leslie Nilsen. Can you share a favorite memory or
lesson working with such iconic actors?
Speaker 2 (06:27):
Oh gosh, well, I have to say that I really
appreciated working with Jeff Bridges. It was a film called
eight Million Ways to Die that also starred Andy Garcia
and Roseanna Arquette, and he was so relaxed in his
acting that that was really helpful because I, coming from
(06:49):
a family that really valued studying and learning, was very
technical with my acting and it was hard for me
to let go. And he has a much more easy
going style, more natural, and that that was helpful to me.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
And that technical style, where did you trying to learn that?
Speaker 2 (07:09):
You know, it's funny because I've worked with British actors
and you all go to acting college essentially, whereas actors
tend to well, certainly in the eighties, I'll speak for
the nineteen eighties when I started, and in Hollywood, so
movie and TV actors, what we do is we move
(07:31):
there and then we take acting classes with various acting teachers.
So we don't go to one school. We go to
a teacher for six months or a year, and then
we go to another teacher. We might take another like
an improv class also and another place. So it's more
more of taking classes rather than going to a college.
Speaker 1 (07:53):
I say, how did you find your time in England?
Speaker 2 (07:55):
In England? Well, I was in England. I shot a
movie Charles Dance in England actually, and in Europe. I guess.
We moved around and I thought it was great, But
I never lived in England. Yeah, just visiting family and
then working on that movie in nineteen eighty eight maybe.
Speaker 1 (08:21):
And what would you say have been your favorite role?
Speaker 2 (08:23):
Well, I know that my favorite acting experience was shooting Baywatch,
which people find odd because it was such a fluffy
show and I'm kind of an earnest person. But the
truth was is that I when I first was offered
the role, I didn't want to do it because I
didn't want to do a television series. Back in the
(08:44):
early nineteen nineties, an actor did not move easily between
television and film, and I was worried that if I
did a television series, I'd be stuck in television forever.
I also didn't want to commit to a series. I
was afraid of any kind of commitment back then when
I was twenty eight. But I was so glad I
said yes because I actually really caught into the pace
(09:05):
of shooting television, which is much faster, much much faster
than shooting feature films, and I appreciated that. I found
it more creative actually, and I enjoyed doing fleshing out
the same character. Fleshing out the same character every week
and having relationships with the same actors just makes you
(09:27):
more comfortable on the set, the crew, and so that
kind of continuity and routine I really really enjoyed. And
now I would say my favorite medium is shooting television
series and in.
Speaker 1 (09:38):
Terms of frame with situations and characters and things of
that nature. You've played a gay woman in four films
and you said that makes you proud due to your
sister being gay. How would your advocacy for LGBTQ plus
representation shune up in your acting decisions.
Speaker 2 (09:55):
Wow, Well, I'm happy to do to play lesbians, proud
of it. And I do believe that because my identical
twin is gay, that I must have some gay dna uh,
because I believe that we are born gay and it's
it's not a choice. Although if it was a choice,
that's fine too, and I think that I have.
Speaker 1 (10:21):
I have.
Speaker 2 (10:23):
Definitely turned down roles that I felt we didn't jive
with my morals. Usually it's not the role, it's the
whole message of the film because people, Yeah, I've you know,
I played bad people and good people and things like that.
It's more about the message of the film that's important
to me.
Speaker 1 (10:42):
What would be your ideal message in a film?
Speaker 2 (10:45):
Well, you know, I don't feel like it's funny because
I'm an activist in real life. But my films and
projects have been very you know, Guilty Pleasures and Melrose
Place and of course Beywash's a lot of movies on
What we have here is Lifetime, which is a cable
network that caters to sort of who Done it? And
(11:09):
women centered plots that involve either like romance or a crime,
the woman comes out on top. So none of my
films really most very few of my films have a
really serious message. And I don't mind at all because
I don't think everything has to have a message. Yeah,
(11:30):
but so I would say that actually, because I work
very hard in my personal life to make the world
a better place, I don't feel like my film content
has to change the world. I just don't feel I
don't want it to send a message that I personally
don't believe in.
Speaker 1 (11:49):
And you've done fifteen Lifetime movies. What is it about
those stories? Even though you say, you know, not every
film has to have a message, which I agree with
and understand. But what is it about a lifetime film
that makes you keep coming back?
Speaker 2 (12:01):
Oh, my gosh, because the woman is the lead, The
woman is strong, the woman that is still annoying when
I see films and like the girlfriend or the wife
and is the husband is or the boyfriend is fighting
and the girlfriend's cowering in the corner not helping. It
just annoys the heck out of me. And in lifetime films,
that's not how it goes. Is the woman is this center.
(12:24):
Although I do remember when I was shooting a film
and I had a husband and an ex husband, and
whenever we had all three of us had a scene together,
I noticed that the two men had all the lines
and I had very few, And I was like, what
is this about? This is a natural bias against the
(12:46):
men taking control of the situation, and it was It
annoyed me.
Speaker 1 (12:52):
How can I understand that? Yeah, a natural bias that
we see far too often, that's for sure. And the
women in these films, as you said, they're the leads
by they written by women, that they produced by women.
Speaker 2 (13:04):
Women as well written. Yeah, a lot of them are
written by women. A lot of the ones I did
were written by women. I can't remember if that one
was written by a woman. I think it was, and
I remember being surprised. But you know, just because a
woman has written it doesn't mean that a lot of
the male producers or the male director haven't gotten their
hands in it and changed their in net so, but
(13:28):
it also could be that our society is just so
biased towards men taking over a situation that she wrote
it that way just naturally, but it was not. I
was surprised. It's hard being an actor in a scene
and not and it's actually maybe even harder and not
having any dialogue not not. I'm not talking about ego.
(13:51):
I'm talking about as an actor, like what do you do? Naturally,
I wouldn't be shutting up like that as a as
a in that situation, normally I wouldn't. I would have
my input. And then it's written as if like you're
completely mute and the two men are Oh, it's not
easy to shoot that kind of scene.
Speaker 1 (14:12):
And in those situations if there is a male director
that you may not particularly see the world in the
same way. What type of challenges have you been through
and how did you overcome them on set?
Speaker 2 (14:22):
Most of the directors I've worked with have been male.
I would say I've only worked with maybe six female
directors out of one hundred. Maybe on Baywatch I did,
over I did. I can't remember how many episodes I did,
but certainly over one hundred episodes. There were maybe a
couple more female directors that I'm forgetting about, but most
(14:46):
of them are male, So.
Speaker 3 (14:50):
I I think, well, I remember I was I did
a film where I was the female lead, and I
was sort of a lifetime film, so.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
Yeah, I was the lead. And then there was the
male detective. He probably would have considered himself bely. We
were co leades, let's say, and then we became like
lovers in the film. But he was not as tall
as I, and I remember that the actor didn't want
me to wear heels because that made me taller than him. Otherwise,
(15:25):
I guess we were about the same height. And I
was wearing a very short skirt and it makes your
legs look better if you wear heels, and I wanted
to wear heels, and he just completely you know, basically,
and I ended up capitulating, and not that I don't
(15:45):
really I'm not of an aggressive person, So what really
happened was that I ended up weeping in the corner
with the wardrobe person because I had to wear flats
and I just didn't feel good in them. And it
wasn't like I was wearing high high heels, but I
just wanted a little heel.
Speaker 4 (16:02):
And it's it's a silly thing that it was interesting
to me a how I reacted, which was to cry,
not because I can't be I'm not.
Speaker 2 (16:15):
I think now I would be. I'm sixty two now
and I was probably thirty then. But I didn't stick
up for myself at all. And the male the director
was male to and you know, the actor was older.
Of course that also happens the dynamic between the actors
is usually the male lead is older than the female lead.
(16:38):
And yeah, so I've I think I learned that I
need to be able to state what I need without
you know, getting so emotional about it. It's just a
pair of shoes, for God's sake. But yeah, it was
interesting how he just didn't want me to be taller
than him, which is an old like that's a cultural
(17:01):
trope that we've learned that the men should be taller
and that means are more powerful, which is bullshit basically, right, Yeah,
And uh, I guess he felt more masculine, and then
I guess I felt more would feel more feminine if
I was wearing a little bit of heel because it
made my legs look better. So I mean we were
both we were all falling into cultural bologney.
Speaker 1 (17:22):
But why if he were the official lead, or even
if he want the official lead, why did he win?
Like how did he get away of saying I'm going
to win this situation?
Speaker 2 (17:32):
You know? I think he well, he was a bigger
name he had. I think he'd been nominated from it.
I can't remember his full name now he's passed, but uh,
he was it was a lifetime like movie. But he
was a bigger name then, I know, and he was
(17:53):
older and had more credits and more status. I think
if it was you know, I think if it was
a man who hadn't who was didn't have his large
a role, he might not have pushed as much. He
might not There's there was a hierarchy on the set
and number one. He was probably number one on the
(18:14):
call sheet and I was number two frankly so, But
it was just the fact the decision was being made,
like Okay, you're not wearing that because the man doesn't
want it, And there was never any discussion really about it.
And you know, I remember there's a there is a
definite hierarchy between men and women in Hollywood. I remember
(18:35):
I was in a in an audition where we were
It was for a dot what's his name. He's a
big blonde guy who played the bad guy in one
of the Rocky movies. And he's from delf Thunder Yes
delph Lungdren, Yes del a delf Lungren series that they
were going to make. And they were screen testing women
(18:55):
and second second male leads, so lead women and male leads,
and they was taking forever, so they put us in
separate rooms so that we could study our lines, I guess.
And one of my friends was also at the audition too,
and I didn't recognize any of the men in that
(19:17):
audition who were auditioning for the second male lead. But
my friend who was put in the producer's office to
study her.
Speaker 5 (19:24):
Lines, she saw on the wall the payment schedule, like
what they were offering the men versus the women, and
the second male leads off were being offered.
Speaker 2 (19:38):
More money than the lead females and I, as I said, I,
you know, I had much more experience than those men.
There were like four or five of men and four
or five women. And it irked me that before we
even got the job, they had decided what the pay
(19:58):
range was going to be for, you know, the second
male lead versus the first female lead, and the first
female lead was there's no chance of her getting as
much as the second male lead because they had budgeted.
This is what they say, Oh we budgeted, and so yeah,
it was irksome. I did not get the job. I
do not think the series ever went but I found
(20:19):
that to be such an interesting lesson on how Hollywood
is already stacked against well women because they decide the
budget before you even go in to audition.
Speaker 1 (20:32):
Shocking. I had no idea about deciding budget before you
even go in. That's it.
Speaker 2 (20:36):
If well, it probably doesn't affect ever happen all the time,
and there might be some leeway they really want a
certain actor. But just the fact that they had deemed
the second male lead more valuable financially than the first
female lead, I thought that was odd.
Speaker 1 (20:57):
But moving away from scripted content, who Killed the Electric
Car highlighted your work in environmental activism. What was it
like to being part of that documentary and what kind
of impact do you think it had.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
It was a documentary about electric cars, and it was
filmed in the early two thousands when electric cars were
just coming on the scene and the car companies wanted
to squash the technology and we were I got my
first electric car in nineteen ninety as an environmentalist, had
(21:30):
been an environmentalist all my life, and I felt that
was important to start while walking my talk and how
I drove a car around LA and so beating that
documentary meant a lot to me. I didn't realize actually
that it was. I was just going about my activism
and there happened to be a little camera there. I
didn't pay much attention to it. And then as our
(21:53):
activism went on and on and on, the camera cows
got bigger and bigger, and I guess they got more
funded and things like that. But yeah, it was an
important time in electric cars and it was an important documentary.
Actually went to Sundance, and that helped people understand more
(22:14):
about what was going on with the technology and how
the companies were trying to squash the technology because they
didn't want to move forward. They want to stay on
fossil fuels.
Speaker 1 (22:26):
What type of impact do you think it had, because
you know, in nineteen ninety I didn't even realize electric
cars were available. Maybe they weren't in the UK, maybe
that's why. But what type of impact do you think
that documentary had.
Speaker 2 (22:38):
Well, No, people didn't realize us Speaking to your comment
about the in nineteen ninety it was a conversion. It
was a conversion that it wasn't made by an auto,
big auto maker. My car, my first couple cars were
made by you know, people who were enthusiasts and had
converted a gas car to an electric car.
Speaker 1 (23:01):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (23:03):
My first electric car just went twenty five miles and
it had lead acid batteries. It had about I don't
know how many thirty lead acid batteries in it, and
I had to fill it up with water, them up
with water every week. And it only plugged into a
one to ten outlet, you know, regular house outlet, so
it took quite a bit long time to charge. So
(23:23):
and then my second car got fifty miles and that
was a conversion also, and then I was able to
lease the EV one, which was an amazing car. And
one of the first cars that was electric cars that
was mass produced by an automaker in the twentieth century.
Because in the nineteenth century and at the turn, like
in eighteen ninety nine in New York City, there were
(23:47):
more electric taxis than gas taxis. So yes, so there
were a lot of electric cars were something that in
the early nineteen hundreds women preferred to drive because they
were easier to start. Used to have to start a
gas car like you did a lawnmower by pulling this leg. Yeah,
(24:10):
and women didn't like that. It was dirty and noisy,
and so they were electric cars back then, and they
liked that technology better actually, But the fossil fuel industry
won out, and that's why left cars disappeared for many
decades and started coming back slowly the end of the
(24:32):
twentieth century.
Speaker 1 (24:33):
And you even went to jail to protect them. Can
you tell us a bit about that?
Speaker 2 (24:37):
Yes, I did, I and then had to do. I
was arrested doing a peaceful civil disobedience protecting the electric
cars from General Motors called ev ones that General Motors
was crushing perfectly good electric cars. They decided they would
(24:57):
crush their electric car fleet because California changed its rules
and wasn't mandating the electric car company, sorry, the car
companies to make electric cars. There was a time. The
reason the electric cars exist really at all is because
of the state of California, which mandated in the late
(25:19):
nineties that the top eight automakers needed to make a
certain percentage of cars that were emission free, and that
meant electric at that time, and the car makers were basically,
because California is such a big market, they basically had
to start making electric cars. And most of the companies
(25:40):
just converted a gas car that they had into electric,
and you know, Toyota sold like two hundred and thirty.
There were very few that were available, but the ev
one there were oh I think there were over one
thousand that were leased. And then the governmant of California changed,
(26:01):
under pressure from the oil companies and car companies, you know,
said Okay, you don't have to do this anymore. And
so the car companies wanted to crush their cars because
they didn't want to have any remnants of these amazing,
amazing vehicles by the way, which were faster, smoother, quieter,
and much less expensive to run. Because you I didn't
(26:22):
have to Gosh, you don't have to take your.
Speaker 1 (26:25):
Electric car courn.
Speaker 2 (26:26):
Oil change or there's no transmission stuff, so there's so
many fewer moving parts. So the the car companies did
not want to have electric cars.
Speaker 1 (26:35):
So you've also done open rescues with groups like Direct
Action Everywhere. The listeners, I'm familiar with that. Can you
explain what the open rescue is and why do you
do it?
Speaker 2 (26:47):
I'm an AMML rights activist also, and open rescue is
when we investigate a factory farm, which is a factory
farm facility that basically enclose is large number of animals
in a small space to raise them for food. So
it's usually dairy farms, beef farms, chicken farms, duck farms,
(27:11):
so livestock and Direct Action Everywhere is a nonprofit that
we go in and document what's going on in those
places because otherwise nobody would know what was going on
in factory farm facilities because the government and the companies
really try and keep it from the consumer what exactly
(27:35):
went into raising the meat and dairy that they put
on the shelves. So we go in and document what
goes on and we rescue if we can as many
animals as we can, but usually it's very few because
it's hard to place in the sanctuary animals. So we
(27:57):
usually rescue several animals from the fact farm facility. And
while we do this, we do not cover our faces.
We will put it on the internet the rescue with
the rescuers faces uncovered. We name ourselves because we believe
what we're doing is right and so that we don't
(28:17):
need to hide what we're doing. And usually the companies,
the food companies and these factory facilities don't come after
us because they know that in court that too much
unsavory information about their practices and how they treat the
animals would come out. So they know that, I mean
(28:40):
most people, most everybody knows that factory farm facilities are
cruel to animals. But we need to keep showing people
the images so that the large companies can't continue to
sort of whitewash what what they're doing.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
When you've also spoken at universities, created award winning documentaries,
and given a TEDx talk on human overpopulation, what's the
core message you hope to take away from your work
on these issues.
Speaker 2 (29:13):
I'm very concerned about the number of people on the
planet and how fast we're growing. Just to give you
some context, as I said, I'm sixty two, and when
I was born, there were three billion people on the planet,
and now there are eight billion and there are yeah,
so it's more than doubled in my lifetime. And in
my mother's lifetime it's quadrupled. It was two billion when
(29:36):
she was born. She's eighty nine. So I feel just logically,
because remember I'm a logical person, that this kind of
math doesn't work, and that any other creature on Earth,
we understand that they can overpopulate, it can be unsustainable.
But for some reason, for humans, we don't see that,
(29:56):
and we think more is better, and a special rich
company owners want to have more people. So you'll see
people like Elon Musk and JD. Vance, the Vice President
of the United States, talking about how people should have
more babies, and the president of Hungary, victor Or Bond,
saying that Hungarians women should have more babies. And the
(30:19):
reason for this is because more people is better for
a GDP of a country because they have more output
and more consumers. Is better for people like Elon Musk
who wants to sell things to you, but it's not
good for the individual person. And in fact, if our
(30:40):
population is going to grow to ten billion, the United
Nations has predicted we will go up to ten billion,
then we'll probably ten point three in about forty years,
and then we will start going slowly down. And that
is to me a good thing, because I don't believe
that our planet can sustain ten billion people where everyone
(31:03):
can get what they need. Now, rich white Westerners in
the United North America will do just fine, but the
people who will suffer are people in the southern hemisphere
and people of lower incomes. They will suffer a lot
when there are well now they're suffering, but even more.
(31:25):
And I'm very saddened about how the media is putting
out all this information about how we have a birth
dearth and the fertility is going down. Oh my god,
it's terrible. We're gonna human race is going to go extinct,
and that's not true. All We're still growing. The population
is still growing, even though family size is smaller. The
(31:49):
average family size across the world is two point five
kids per couple. But when you have eight billion people
and so many of them are having babies, you are
going to grow. And we are continuing to grow, and
it really concerns me because it's really just a very
capitalist notion that we have to have more and more
people so they can have more and more things to make.
(32:14):
We can have more and more workers to make things
and more and more consumers. And there is also just
one more point is that people say, well, we need
more workers because we have a very old population and
we need to take care of the elders. And I
understand that economic dilemma, but it is an economic dilemma.
It's not a do we have enough water and food
(32:37):
and clean air and space and nature dilemma, which is
to me much harder to solve. If we have a
we're worried about not having enough workers to take care
of older people, that is maybe a one or two
generation problem. And then it will even out and there
will be this, you know, fewer old people. I guess
(33:00):
the ratio of old to young will even out as
we slowly, you know, get used to having let's say,
two kids per couple instead of two and a half
kids per couple. But running out of food and water
and space, and it's a national it's a security problem
because when people don't have enough, they migrate, and that
(33:23):
makes people mad. And then there's wars. I mean, it's
it's huge, it's huge, hugely irresponsible for these mostly men
to tell people and mostly women that they should have
more babies without looking at the real consequences of how
(33:43):
everyone will suffer except for the richest. And it concerns
me very much that the poor will become poor, and
especially with climate change, when you know we're struggling already
to deal with floods and droughts, how do we expect
to feed so many people? If you ask me a
question like population, I could go on for an hour talking.
Speaker 1 (34:07):
I could care the passion and the sun. It's amazing that.
Speaker 2 (34:11):
You and I just want to say one thing is
that I am somebody who cares about population, but I
don't believe in in forcing people to have fewer kids.
I believe in giving them the choice and talking about
the benefits of having smaller families. Because right now, every
species is programmed to procreate, So our culture is very
(34:32):
pro pro having as many babies as you can, or
at least having more babies and making sure that we
continue to quote unquote grow because that's in our DNA.
But we are such a successful species at pro creating
that now to survive, we have to stop procreating as
fast as quickly, and we need to have fewer babies
(34:55):
per couple. And that is done by just explaining the
benefits of having smaller families, which are many so much
less stress, less financial burden, better for the kids, better
for the municipality, the area to not grow so fast
so you can educate everybody, have enough parks, have enough space,
have enough nature. I mean, there's so many benefits to
(35:17):
having fewer kids. Yet this pressure for people to have
more children, it's incredibly concerning. It's like an old way
of thinking, especially with AI coming in and they're being
going to be fewer jobs for people, climate change. It's
just really like we haven't changed our mindset about procreation
(35:40):
and we need to so, but we need to without coercion.
I'm not for forcing people to have fewer babies. I
am for educating people, educating women, and then they will
choose to have fewer babies. If women are educated around
the world, they will always choose to have fewer kids.
And it's it's usually the men who want to have
(36:02):
more babies because guess what, they're not raising them like
the women are.
Speaker 1 (36:08):
No I mean, I mean, it's clear your passion, your care,
your concern for activism and humanitarian work. But how does
it inform you when you make decisions in terms of
building a character. And do you ever participate in method
acting when you got into any of your roles?
Speaker 2 (36:26):
Oh? Yes, all my roles are. I'm involved with method
acting and a mixture of method acting, just all sorts
of things, Like for your audience. Method acting is when
you bring up emotions from your past and use them
to flesh out your character. And I do that a lot,
(36:48):
but I also work technically. So how does she look?
What is her what is her relationship to every person
whom she interacts with in that story? What is her backstory?
Where did she just come from? What does she want?
All those things are questions that are you know, I
(37:09):
sit down and study and decide and brainstorm. Yeah, it's
uh and it's fun a lot of it, you know,
just deciding you know, what's you know? Nobody sees this,
but I know it. Like how many siblings does she have?
Always her relationship with her parents? What was her socioeconomic background?
(37:31):
All those things just helped me feel more comfortable in
the character. And how does she walk. What does she wear?
That is that's a collaboration with me and the wardrobe person.
But I'll decide, like what her hair looks like? Does
she wear nail polish? Does she do? I do I
need to put nails on? Do I? You know the
whole What color is my nail polish makes a difference,
(37:55):
tel says something about the character. So there is method
acting emotions and trying to find ways to relate to
a character that are true to me. But there's also
technical things.
Speaker 1 (38:11):
You are incredibly athletic. He happened since a young age,
that's for sure, since your early acting era. And how
do you find some smilarities between training for endurance events
and preparing for a long term role or a difficult shoot.
Speaker 2 (38:28):
I have a lot of discipline I have learned. I
worked with a I'm shooting something in Australia and the
writer had in college sold a script that then became
a sequel that then became like a ride at Disney World,
and then he sold another script that also had a sequel,
(38:52):
and he was just very successful. And I asked him,
so what has helped you be a success And he said,
you know, alexand I do what I'm asked. So when
someone says write a script in three weeks, it might
not be the best script, but I get it done
in three weeks. I give them what they need. And
a lot of people, but actors too, don't just do
(39:15):
the basics like showing up on time and knowing your
lines and being clear on the character, being respectful on
the set, being a professional. That is such a basic
thing for me, and I think that and discipline. So
when I was working on Baywatch, I got up at
three thirty in the morning so I could work out
before I got to the set at six because we
(39:37):
had to get to the set as soon as the
light was up because we shot outside, so everything needed
to be we use sunlight. So yeah, I got up
burly to work out because I knew that after a
long day of shooting twelve hour days, I wouldn't really
want to go to the gym and work out. So
I knew that I wasn't going to use, oh, I
have a long day at work as an excuse not
(39:59):
to be healthy feel my best, especially when you're going
to be in a bathing suit. But I do that
for every every film. I continue my workout program. I
bring my own food to the set because it's just healthier.
I try and stay away from craft service because it's
just everything that your mother would not want you to eat.
(40:21):
So yeah, I just I think that that discipline has
helped me with my athletic endeavors. When you train for
a endurance race like I've done the Hawaii iron Man,
which is a very long race, and I've swam been
done a fourteen mile ocean swim in Mexico, and you
(40:43):
have to have a lot of discipline to train for those.
It's the training that's the discipline, and you just have
to show up. Like that writer Greg told me, you
just show up and you do what you're supposed to do.
And guess what, I don't win my races. I'm not
the best to buy any man. I am average, but
I'm average of the people who are showed up. But
(41:05):
I you know, I'm in the game. And the reason
I'm in the game is because I I showed up.
I did what was asked of me to get there.
Speaker 1 (41:14):
And what time do you go to bed to wake
up to trying it half free?
Speaker 2 (41:19):
Oh? Back then? Because now I don't. Now. Now we
go to bed, my husband and I go to bed
before ten and we get up between five thirty and six.
But so, what is that That's almost eight hours week
at so I guess, you know, I guess I think
I would go to bed probably nine or ten. I
probably wasn't getting enough sleep, but I was. I loved
(41:39):
shooting that series so much that it was it was okay,
just but you know, I didn't party, it didn't drink.
I you know, so that I always was able to
get up in the morning.
Speaker 1 (41:52):
And it makes sense now. Yeah, and after such a
wide ranging career from big budget films to gloss root actively,
I'm excited to know, especially being on your website Letty
and everything, what's next for you.
Speaker 2 (42:06):
I have no idea. I'm at this moment just taking
care of my mom, who has Parkinson's. Thank you. She's
doing pretty well. We've been here three years and I've
been taking care and I'm I'm starting to look for
work again because I realize that I need to work
(42:27):
just for my own sense of self, and so I'm
hoping to I want to continue working till no one
will ever hire me again. So I plan on working
hopefully through to ninety and thank you, yeah, ah, thank you,
thank you, and yeah, and I continue my activism right now,
(42:48):
it's much more. I have been involved with open rescues
and investigations of factory farms, but I also volunteer at
my local animal shelter as a dog walker, which means
a lot to be I don't have a dog. I
never I haven't had dogs as an adult, but I
do love animals, So yeah, that's I do that two
(43:08):
or three times a week.
Speaker 1 (43:10):
I hope that the cats or two cats don't get
jealous when you out orpen the dogs. And finally, what
advice would you give to actors and filmmakers who want
to use their platform for more than just entertainment just
like you do?
Speaker 2 (43:24):
Yeah, I would. I would recommend that they do their work,
they do their acting work, and they become as successful
as they can be. And then when one of the
things about for me at least be an actor was
that I was unemployed for a certain times, so I
had the bandwidth to be an activist and really get
involved in lots of issues that were important to me. Because,
(43:47):
as I said, acting makes me happy, but activism feeds
my soul suck. And so I recommend that people work
and do what they love and you know, and flourish
in that area, and then they have an issue that
they care about. They nowadays you have social media, so
(44:10):
if you're a really successful actor, you have a lot
of followers and you can just talk about your the
issues that you care about on your platform. That's very,
very very helpful to get the word out. So but
I just recommend that people follow their their creative heart
and their their moral heart and they'll have a fulfilled,
(44:33):
fulfilled life.
Speaker 1 (44:36):
Excellent, Alexandra, thanks so much for coming on the podcast.
It's been a pleasure speaking to you, learning about yourself,
your career, your activism, and I really hope to speak
to you soon.
Speaker 2 (44:46):
Thank you, Damian, I appreciate it.
Speaker 1 (44:47):
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