Heather Graham | The Film That Lit My Fuse - video Dailymotion

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00:00What film or series lit your fuse as a young person and made you have to tell stories on screen?

00:18I loved watching The Wizard of Oz as a kid. I definitely wanted to be in that world. I wanted

00:25to be Judy Garland. I remember watching Sound of Music. When I got slightly older as a teenager,

00:32I remember watching The Godfather. Even though I was so young, I recognized Al Pacino in The

00:36Godfather as like, this performance is amazing. And Sophie's Choice and French Lieutenant's Woman.

00:43Such a dark movie, but I just thought, oh, I want to do that. Also John Hughes movies like

00:49The Breakfast Club and Sixteen Candles. I definitely loved. But what first gave you

00:54the confidence that is, in fact, you should be doing this and you could belong? They did a play,

01:00The Wizard of Oz, in my elementary school and I was cast as Dorothy. So that was a really exciting

01:06moment in my life. So that gave me confidence. And then when I was in high school, I would audition

01:11for the school plays. And I love musical theater and I would, you know, practice singing all these

01:17different musical theater numbers in the living room of my parents' house. And I don't know,

01:22I love just going into a fantasy world and pretending to be other people. You know, as a

01:27kid, I was insecure. I was struggling with some different things. So escaping into a fantasy world

01:32seemed like a good idea. And, you know, my mom did encourage me to be an artist. And just the

01:39fact that whenever I auditioned for the school plays, I would get cast in roles. And I think

01:46I really wanted to be independent. And I had this fantasy of becoming a movie star and being able to

01:51pay for my own life and be this independent person. And so I started to audition for roles

01:58and things when I was 16. I lived outside of Los Angeles as a teenager. I lived in Agora.

02:03So I was able to audition and it just felt like such an exciting way to be independent and to be

02:10creative. And, you know, of course, I had a dream of being a great actress and being a movie star.

02:17The influence that you've mentioned, a lot of them have been musicals and they've been,

02:21they were these old classic studio extravaganzas. But you've really found a niche in independent

02:29films. How did that happen? The late 80s, 90s, that was a very exciting time for independent movies.

02:36I just got cast in Drugstore Cowboy. That was really exciting to be on the cusp of that

02:41independent movie movement at that time. And I love watching independent movies. I mean, I grew

02:47up really in the suburbs and it wasn't really a culture where a lot of people were watching

02:51independent films. But as I got older and got more and more into film, I learned that I love

03:00independent movies. I can still remember the first time that I saw Boogie Nights and it was

03:07just such a sprawling, crazy tale. You just couldn't take your eyes off of it. And I remember

03:15the late Burt Reynolds, you know, he didn't really embrace the movie until he was nominated for an

03:21Oscar. When you were shooting that movie, did it seem, did it kind of seem like a hot mess? Did you

03:28see where it was going? What do you remember about making that film? When you read that

03:36script, did you think, wow, this is going to be a classic? Can you tell? Well, at that time I was

03:44not famous and I was just auditioning for roles. I was trying to get jobs. I was going on a lot of

03:50auditions. So, and I think that they had offered the role to a more famous actress than me. And

03:57and I auditioned and I guess she turned it down. So what I did think the script was great and,

04:02and, you know, it had big actors in it and I did think it could be amazing. But, you know,

04:07you never really know for sure. But it did feel exciting. Something about it felt, felt really

04:11good. What would you say was the biggest obstacle that you had to overcome to allow you to turn

04:18all these influences into your own language as an actress? I think that I had a drive to want,

04:26I really wanted to be independent. So I wanted to support myself financially. And also I really,

04:33you know, wanted to be an actress. I had a fantasy about, you know, being a movie star,

04:38certain things in my life that were challenging. It felt so good to pretend to be a different

04:43person, to be in another world, to like let out all these feelings that I had no outlet for. It

04:49felt kind of cathartic to just express emotions as a different person. So all the feelings I had,

04:57you know, it was an outlet for me to let that stuff out that I didn't know how to deal with.

05:03Well, and I mean, I don't mean to prod, but maybe is there any sort of specifics of things that,

05:12that this was an escape from? Well, I think that my family was dysfunctional and I feel like,

05:25you know, my father was abusive. And I think that, that, you know, being in movies felt like

05:34an empowering way that my voice would matter, that I could be a separate independent person.

05:40Well, now what burned in you on a place of bones to, to tell that story? Tell me about a little

05:48bit about that movie and, and, and why it's important to you. Well, I really liked the

05:53script and I really love female filmmakers telling stories from a female perspective.

06:00I love the idea of taking the Western genre and having a female protagonist in that kind of film.

06:06It was really exciting to me. Besides the fact the script was very well written and the character

06:11was really complicated and interesting and tough and she's a badass and gets to fight and, and

06:18challenge the men and she's really smart. It was just a really exciting character to get to play.

Heather Graham | The Film That Lit My Fuse

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