Parker Posey: It’s ‘Heartbreaking’ to See How ‘Male-Dominated’ Hollywood Is
Parker Posey knows it’s not all daisies and roses when it comes to female-centric stories onscreen.
The “Best in Show” and “Dazed and Confused” star looked back on her decades in Hollywood and the “intensely male-dominated” films that are greenlit.
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“Your 20s are really intense and then the culture changes and you’re, like, ‘Where am I going to fit in? I’m going to be in “Blade: Trinity” playing a vampire? Never thought I’d see the day but yeah, I want to work and that’ll be interesting,'” Parker told The New York Times while in conversation with Hari Nef. “And then it’s the 40s. It’s heartbreaking when you become aware of just how intensely male-dominated our stories are, especially when you mature as a person and as a woman.”
Posey continued, “I’m so lucky as a middle-aged woman to be playing this part. It’s interesting to observe how quick people are to villainize strong women, how fun it is to see the worst. People love to call someone a bitch. I mean, the misogyny is on fire, still.”
Posey and Nef co-star in Thomas Bradshaw’s play “The Seagull/Woodstock, NY.” Nef, who made history as the first transgender actress-model to land an international modeling deal, reflected on the barriers that still need to be broken in Hollywood.
“The shifts in the culture are by and large cosmetic when it comes to power and who gets the green light and who gets the sign-off for studio things. I can’t control the way I’m cast or how people see me,” Nef said. “‘Bitch’ is often a fill-in for intelligent, for articulate, for opinionated, queer, not conventionally feminine or not conventionally beautiful.”
The “And Just Like That” star continued, “I think the ‘Barbie’ stuff happened because I didn’t play bitchy and I didn’t play dumb and I didn’t play plastic in the audition.”
“Barbie” writer-director Greta Gerwig revealed that she “flipped out” over Nef’s audition tape for the upcoming Mattel movie led by Margot Robbie and Ryan Gosling.
“I ran into the producer’s office with a computer and pressed play and said, ‘That is it. That is our movie,'” Gerwig said of Nef’s audition. “She had a joyfulness and playfulness and twinkling intelligent humor, which was exactly the tone: knowing but not snarky, buoyant but not vapid.”
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