All About Evil

16. Lysette Anthony (actress, Husbands and Wives, The Advocate)

"How could anyone not pick Cruella? She's so camp!"

17. Juliette Lewis (actress, What's Eating Gilbert Grape, Natural Born Killers)

"I like Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction because she was so cool."

18. Lili Fini Zanuck (director, Rush. producer, Wild Bill)

"My choice would have to be Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct. She's a totally empowered villainess, in complete control, and clearly enjoy-ing herself. We're given no justification what-ever for her behavior--we don't know that she had an unhappy childhood; we don't know her dysfunction or whether she's even got one. I think that's great. Also, her villainy is not resolved for us--there's no price to pay for what she's done."

19. Kathy Najimy (actress, Sister Act, Hocus Pocus)

"The villainesses I'm drawn to are the ones who have a reason. There was a movie called Ms. 45, about a gorgeous mute woman who'd been raped and abused so much that she'd just had it. So when a guy breaks into her apartment, she kills him and then cuts him up and puts pieces of him in garbage bags. She was very cool, plus, she was ecologically minded because she used plastic garbage bags. I always like a good murderess who has a con-science about recycling. The only thing we're missing is a place to turn it in for five cents."

20. Winona Ryder (actress, Little Women, Boys)

"I was overwhelmed by Barbara Stanwyck in Double Indemnity. I guess the reason I remember her so vividly is because I liked her and hated her at the same time."

21. Anna Hamilton Phelan (screenwriter, Gorillas in the Mist, Mask)

"Hollywood puts out lots of images of bitches, whether it's Sylvia Fowler in The Women or Alexis Carrington on 'Dynasty,' but a villainess is more than just that. For me, the Muhammad Ali of villainy is Bette Davis as Regina in The Little Foxes. Think of that scene where she stands by as her husband is dying; he tells her to get his medicine but she doesn't make a move. She just stands there, watching, until he collapses and then dies. That's a truly supreme villainess."

22. Lauren Holly (actress, "Picket Fences," Dumb and Dumber)

"Although she wasn't exactly a villainess, I liked Kathleen Turner in The War of the Roses. She spewed such delicious venom!"

23. Guinevere Turner (actress, co-screen-writer, co-producer, Go Fish)

"Hedy, the character Jennifer Jason Leigh played in Single White Female, is my favorite because she's so damn psycho under the guise of being so damn pathetic."

24. Trini Alvarado (actress, Stella, Little Women)

"Bette Davis played great villainesses on the screen. I especially liked Davis in Of Human Bondage, and not just because she was so mean. The character sort of drifted over into Davis's own life--the strong decisions she made against her own studio and so forth. It felt its if Davis, like the character in Of Human Bandage, just didn't care what anybody thought."

25. Valeria Golino (actress, Rain Man, Immortal Beloved)

"I'd have to name Body Heat, because Kathleen Turner was terrific in that--so cool, so calculating, so evil."

26. Lauren Lloyd (VP of Production, Hollywood Pictures; producer, Mermaids, Drop Zone)

"I just loved that little girl in The Bad Seed, because you never expected to see someone her age killing people. And she had no remorse, none, so you can't forget her."

27. Cameron Diaz (actress, The Mask, The Last Supper)

"I loved Faye Dunaway as Joan Crawford in Mommie Dearest--especially when she says, 'No more wire hangers!"'

28. Sandra Bullock (actress, Demolition Man, Speed)

"I thought Bette Davis in What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? was great. I saw it just the other night, and she was frightening. Those amazing eyes! She could just walk into a room and command attention."

29. Gillian Armstrong (director, Mrs. Soffel, Link Women)

"Barbara Stanwyck in Double Indemnity comes to mind. She was a brilliant schemer, unrelenting in her evil."

30. Tyra Banks (actress, Higher Learning)

"I loved Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction. I think what made her so effective was that they always dressed her in white, her apartment was white: her hair was blonde, her skin was very fair. So that made you think that she was very nice, but she was really very evil."

31. Shannen Doherty (actress, "Beverly Hills, 90210," Burning Passion: The Margaret Mitchell Story)

"I loved Faye Dunaway in Mommie Dearest--and in anything else, really. She just sort of had that evil quality to her."

Pages: 1 2 3