Shirley MacLaine talks to Advocate regarding sexual identity, contemplation, and more

She's still such a goddamn weirdo. Reincarnation. UFO sightings. Spending time with Dennis Kucinich.

She was more entertaining back when she wrote an entire book about George McGovern, the lunatic who ended up losing 49 states in a national election. Then she won an Oscar, stood at the podium, and basically said "You're goddamned right I won! What took you so long?"

I'm glad I farted in her general direction.

[Quote]George McGovern, the lunatic

I know you're being facetious but the result of that election reflects more on the American people than George McGovern.

Back to Shirley, with the the Pentagon officially studying UFO reports, she doesn't seem so crazy anymore.

After all, it’s how she met her husband r2. 🤭🤭🤭🤭

I applaud Shirley on her open mindedness, but it would have been nice if she paid me some attention as a kid (or ever really).

R4 Pure fiction, every word of it

[quote]Debra Winger, the former Mrs. Hutton

Fitting title, since that was the last time you had any relevance.

I have always liked her, even with the narcissism and kookiness. More personality and talent than every actress working today combined!

Agreed. I’d argue that Shirley has become under appreciated.

She’s sporting the corpse look

One of our great actresses. Her beliefs are wacky, but at least she's not hurting anyone with them like several other religions. I feel for her daughter, but I think that it just goes to show you that some people were never meant to be parents and Shirley was one of them. She's self-absorbed, but not in a truly narcissistic way. If she was, she wouldn't be as great of an actress. The truly narcissistic actors are always the ones who care more about how they look than giving a good performance and Shirley's never been that way. In fact, she seems to be a very giving and vanity-free actress. She has such empathy for her characters.

She isn't that far away from being a corpse, R9.

You mean being reborn

She seems less wacky now that the whole world is even wackier. She seems like she's in good nick for 88.

I think Jane Fonda has become wackier than our Shirl in recent years

I believe she is the greatest actress of her generation. She stole scene after scene in Terms of Endearment and deserved the Oscar. As for her unconventional views on life I applaud her. She’s never wavered from these views through the years. A woman of conviction I would say.

Has anyone else ever woke up early and pulled a Shirley MacLaine?

I adore her Out on a Limb TV miniseries that aired in the late 80s. It was directed by Colin Firth, who also directed 9 to 5 and later died of AIDS.

Not THAT Colin Firth right?

Colin Higgins, Rose.

She's (not quite) eternally her own chick what for her past life views. I truly believe her in regard to her opinion of our community and the manner in which she views us.

Warren and Shirley come from good stock. They're both naturally artistic, have good politics, and are quite elderly at this point but far from feeble. I wonder what their upbringing was like.

Recent BeKindRewind video on Shirley.

Shirley and Warren are from a good Virginia family. Both parents were very educated - father was a PhD of psychology and both worked in education.

R1, McGovern was a better man than your boy, Nixon. The second biggest crook to be in the White House after Trump

[quote] "Colin Higgins, Rose."

Thank you, R19. You beat me to it.

There's nothing wrong with Dennis Kucinich, for God's sake. He was the mayor of Cleveland, he was a member of the Ohio Senate, and he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives, 8 times in a row. He said many of the same things Bernie Sanders says now.

Most actresses today would kill to have a filmography this good:

The Trouble with Harry

Some Came Running

The Apartment

Irma La Douche

The Children's Hour

The Turning Point

Being There

Terms of Endearment

Steel Magnolias

Madame Soutsaka

Postcards from the Edge

R26 True, but where was Mama at bedtime?

R27 waving directors up the stairs.

Shirley also argued that the Jews who perished in the Holocaust were victims of their own bad karma in previous lives, and they deserved it. She also believes Stephen Hawking willed himself to develop ALS so he could focus all his daily energies on his physics rather than being able to walk and chew his own food.

Read it in her metaphysical claptrap. It's all in there! "What If...: A lifetime of questions, speculations, reasonable guesses, and a few things I know for sure." (2013).

She charmed a banquet of losers - Dennis Kucinich, George McGovern, Nicolas Cage - but her Oscar-winning costars hated her guts. Anthony Hopkins called her a diva, and Jack Lemmon and Jack Nicholson couldn't stand her. Even Billy Wilder wanted to slap that tramp!

Proof of Billy Wilder and Jack Nicholson wanting to slap her?

"Irma La Douche."

aka, Irma the Shower.

Carrot top has really let himself go in that picture, OP

R22 Shirley's mother was born in Nova Scotia, Canada, in North Sydney, to be precise. She was a drama teacher.

R33 Oh, so she's your fault!

r26, "Irma La Douche" was the remake starring Helen Lawson.

Shirley MacLaine's original version was titled "Irma La Douce".

Irma La Douce was okay but maybe they should have kept it a musical

The Kennedy Center Honors program couldn't get top flight stars or her contemporaries to honor her, so they had to settle for this. It was kind of like going to a funeral and hear a preacher talk about he didn't know.

^someone he didn't know.

We're just calling me KO now, cunts!

R37 that’s a musical tribute to Shirley starring current Broadway stars like Sutton Foster.

Other stars/friends were there like Kathy Bates

And apparently Shirley is so disliked/not respected by her peers that they got Meryl Streep to hand an AFI Lifetime Achievement award to her.

She was always kinda passable, but she really took things to a new level as Aurora Greenway in Terms of Endearment. An iconic gay performance. It made me LIKE her so much. Which carried over to Postcards, Madame Sousatzka, ect.

It actually bummed me out to hear what her daughter had to say. And what he daughter said was pretty credible. I really wanted her to be like Aurora. But that was a creation of Larry McMurtry and James L. Brooks. It's never fun when you mature and realize most actors are nothing at all like they are on screen.

I remember being excited to see Shirley mix it up with Dame Maggie on Downton, but it turned out to be a bust. I got the sense that the actresses were cold toward each other. And, the writers failed her there.

Now get me my crème brûlée, faggot.

What about that stinker she made with Liz and Debbie Reynolds? It was called "These Old Broads," and was an exercise in menopausal vanity.

Yes, These Old Broads, also starring Joan Collins and written by Carrie Fisher

Shirley is one of the rare actresses that got more interesting work after 40. She'd even tell you it's because she lacked vanity and glamour, although she could be very glam if called upon to do so like in scenes from Postcards From the Edge. Many actresses could play the "movie star" portion of that movie, but few would have been willing to do that scene with her in the hospital at the end looking like hell.

At the start, she was kind of an early prototype of the manic pixie dream girl. In the '70s she just became kind of... serviceable. It makes sense that the mother in The Exorcist is based on her. Someone you call when you need a familiar face, who will never be BAD, but will never be all that great either. Think of her in Being There. A workman-like performance that just gets the job done.

Whatever it was in Terms- the writing, her director- she more than rose to the challenge. Given all her previous work, I never would've cast her in that part. I assume she must have given a hell of an audition. World weary, neurotic, overbearing, and just funny as hell. I adore her for that.

Her work in the 60's was excellent, but she kept getting type cast as the down on her luck hooker. She was an excellent Charity in Sweet Charity. It's a really sweet, funny, and warm performance. She really makes you feel for this sad sack of a woman who never seems to learn her lesson when it comes to the men in her life.

As R47 said, her 70's work wasn't much to be excited about. Even The Turning Point wasn't that great of a showcase for her, but it seemed like she was more preoccupied with political stuff in that decade. Her 80's and 90's work is really what cemented her as an acting legend. So many memorable performances from Terms to Postcards to Steel Magnolias. Any actor would be lucky to be given just one of those roles in their lifetime.

What Shirley really said at the Oscars:

“I’m gonna cry because this show has been as long as my career! For 26 years I’ve been wondering what this would feel like. Thank you for terminating the suspense.”

Her book My Lucky Stars is a great read. Not just for the dirt on the movies, but her political side adventures as well.

She said she would have retired from showbiz and looked to work in George McGovern's administration had he been elected President. She did a ton of ground work for him, traveling all over the country, giving stump speeches, going into people's homes and organizing a Women for McGovern benefit at Madison Square Garden.

Most entertainers spout politics, but Shirley was one of the rare few who put her money where her mouth was.

The greatest tearjerker of all time, Terms of Endearment, and nothing else matters. Shirley will always be remembered for that great work.

R51 I think part of the reason I was so disheartened by Sachi Parker's book was that Shirley was so very good as the at times difficult but fiercely loyal and decent mother in Terms of Endearment. She could be overly critical and judgmental of Emma, but God help you if you were one second late with Emma's shot when she was in pain. And I always loved her smacking some sense into that little brat for shit talking Emma.

Again, I'm an adult, I've know for a very long time that actors aren't like their characters, and are really no better than any other random person you might meet. Buuuut still. And I know there are two sides to every story, but some of the things Parker writes about, that are pretty much verified as having happened, are unforgivable.

It's a shame that Shirley turned down the part of the mother in The Exorcist. She would have been much better than Burstyn.

[quote]She stole scene after scene in Terms of Endearment and deserved the Oscar.

Can the star of the movie steal scenes though?

What are some of the verified unforgivable things did Shirley do?

R47 workman like? She was nominated for 5 Oscars and by the time Terms came out was considered well overdue.

That is some revisionist history.

I've known her as an actress, not as a personal friend, so I couldn't care less about her mothering style as long as she isn't in jail or charged with felony child abuse.

What a terrible interview. The Advocate is circling the toilet.

She had a great bit in Defending Your Life and she still delivers the sizzle in Only Murders in the Building. I completely understand why she gave such a a dull performance in Downton Abbey.

I loved her in The Turning Point. Watching Anne Bancroft and her play off each other in their scenes was fucking sublime.

R60 I'll have to check it out.

Fun little interview with Colbert and Shirley

I had a friend who was Rebecca De Morney's personal assistant. Rebecca was doing a movie in Canada with Shirley MacLaine. They all had to take a train somewhere for a few days of filming.

They were all in a train compartment. Shirley said "Ugh. I can't STAND Canadians. They're so passive aggressive." A train porter opened the door to the compartment and said "Just wanted to check on you folks to make sure everything was ok." As soon as he left, Shirley looked up at everyone and said "You see?"

R63 And now for the real tea: Tell us more about Rebecca De Mornay!

R64 there actually is some stuff. One thing was, my friend was shown pictures of Tom Cruise, naked in a bathtub from when they were dating.

There was a bunch of stuff about her husband, who was Ryan O'Neill's kid. But he was light years a better person than his father.

One thing I remember. My friend was very attractive. She'd go running every morning. She'd run by David Lynch's house, and he'd ALWAYS be outside to wave and say hello to her.

Is the movie version of Can-Can worth watching?

I hate op’s corpsey pic

R66, Shirley is sexy in Can-Can but she’s also shrill at certain points. You might just want to watch some clips.

She is shrill in Can Can. That's probably the only movie I don't like her in and it's a shame because the movie itself is not bad, and the Cole Porter songs are gorgeous.

At her best she was superb. So what if she used tricks like every other actor or actress? At least her interest usually was to convey some kind of realistic personality emanating from the flakes, imps, sly-smart gals, hookers, hurt women and "women of age who are half-cracked."

And she's always been better at acting than her brother was.

When is she NOT shrill? Even in her great performances.

She was completely miscast in Can-Can. I understand they combined two characters from the show into hers to get her to star in it. She's the epitome of the 50's American blonde in it trying to play, incompetently, a French woman. But she was fabulous in everything else.

I think I’ll watch What A Way To Go (1964) for the first time tonight

r73...it will be well worth it for the costumes alone

I love this performance from her 1976 one woman show. This French song was written by Serge Lama, who also wrote one of Dalida’s signature songs Je Suis Malade (1973).

English lyrics written by Fred Ebb.

Love Shirley. Great thread.

Shirley does disco in Paris

Shirley dances jive.

Shirley is a better actor that her low IQ brother.

But social skills? They’re both a big fail.

Everywhere she shoots a movie, she shits on the local community. A total cunt that knows nothing of paying it forward, or keeping her mouth shut from complaining. The hotel’s not right, the commute sucks, why doesn’t everyone kiss my crusty ass?

She was a great actress. The actors and actresses today are terrible.

Holy crap this whole Lido in Paris TV special is everything. Granted I am a Shirley stan and a little drunk but I am Mary’ing all over the place watching this.

MacLaine has never been "shrill" in her performances unless a director (poorly) required it. That's a sexist concept, especially when other actors come to mind as constant

Her sense of humor, vulnerability, resolve and superb physical expressiveness all were keys to her success. Some of the 1950s films were awful set-pieces that didn't fill their transitions well, and "Can-Can" and "Irma La Douce" come to mind. She could do broad comedy (scenes in "Being There" and "The Trouble with Harry"), too. No, I haven't liked her late career, but I don't fault her for that.

Her way of expressing her beliefs was sometimes wearing - high-handed assertions are as unconvincing with new-age things as orthodox Xtianity.

BUT

R65 "There was a bunch of stuff about her husband, who was Ryan O'Neill's kid."

Patrick O'Neal was raised by his mother Leigh Taylor-Young, which explains why he isn't a lost case as his half-siblings. Patrick is the father of Rebecca's daughters but they never married.

SALEM WITCH TRIALS from 2002. Did anyone see that? Never heard of... but what a cast: Kirstie Alley, Alan Bates, Henry Czerny, Rebecca De Mornay, Gloria Reuben, Shirley MacLaine and Peter Ustinov!

It was a tv movie on CBS r83

Heres a link r83...its on youtube...with commercials

Liza looks….relaxed in this photo: