From the city by the bay that she now calls home, perennial style setter Sharon Stone lets rip on everything from guns, girlfriends and Gwyneth Paltrow to marriage, maternity and her first comedy in over a decade, The Muse.
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When I arrive at San Francisco's Delancey Street Restaurant to meet Sharon Stone, I find her sitting at a table engrossed in conversation with Dr. Mimi Silbert, the bubbly cofounder of the Delancey Street Foundation, a self-help residential education center for former substance abusers and ex-convicts. After I greet them both and sit down, the women continue to chatter like schoolgirls exchanging gossip. "Did you see what was in the Chronicle today?" Stone asks. "They said that my husband and I were necking in a restaurant on the first night of Passover. They took it from the Post, which said we were canoodling. I said to Phil, 'Is that, like, an illegal thing to do if you're Jewish?' He said, 'Not unless you're pork.'"
It's odd and refreshing to see this Hollywood icon giggle over the silly things written about her. Plus, she looks so comfortable and relaxed it's easy to forget she's an icon at all, much less Sharon Stone, one of Hollywood's highest-paid and most ambitious actresses. But then, this is a woman who toughed it out in 17 flicks before becoming a star with 1992's Basic Instinct, has weathered disappointments since (Sliver, Intersection, The Specialist, The Quick and the Dead, Diabolique, Last Dance) and has taken risks to win her accolades (an Oscar nomination and a Golden Globe award for Casino and a Golden Globe nomination for The Mighty).
Stone's life has changed dramatically since she met Phil Bronstein, executive editor of the San Francisco Examiner, while making the sci-fi film Sphere in San Francisco in 1997. Since settling down with her husband in San Francisco, Stone has become heavily involved with that city's social scene and charities. She's made changes in her career, too. Now she's starring in her first comedy in years, Albert Brooks's The Muse, in which she plays the title role, a woman who's convinced neurotic Hollywood screenwriters that she's a genuine daughter of Zeus and can inspire them to overcome writer's block. She's also starring in the indie ensemble Simpatico opposite Nick Nolte and Jeff Bridges in a role that called for her to look her age--which, at 41, she doesn't in real life.
LAWRENCE GROBEL: How did it feel to make a comedy for a change?
SHARON STONE: It was fun to the point where I want to say it was the funnest! Fun to the point of silliness, but absolutely focused and professional. This is my first full-blown comedy and I just wish I understood then when I started it what I know now. I still have a lot to learn. Actually, I'd like to go back and do the movie again.
Q: There are a number of Hollywood-player cameos in The Muse. Doesn't your Casino director, Martin Scorsese, have one?
A: Yes. He plays himself. He talks a thousand miles an hour and never stops speaking for the entire scene, in which he throws a fit and says he needs better parking, and complains that there aren't any magazines around for him to read. I wrote Marty a note that said, "I saw the movie. You're the funniest scene. I, however, am the movie. Kiss my ass."
Q: James Cameron has a role, too. I can't see him being funny.
A: As bold and brilliant an individual as he is, he was the shyest of all the people doing cameos, which was dear.
Q: Brooks doesn't usually do a lot of press. Do you think he will for this film?
A: I tried to tell Albert how he can sell the film, because I have a blue-collar ethic--they give me a lot of money, and when I'm done acting I turn into the Avon lady. That's part of my deal. But it was like I was speaking Swahili to Albert.
Q: You often say after finishing a film that it's the best work you've done. And then the movie quietly disappears and you're left with that quote.
A: I think I ruin everything that I do. On The Muse, I'm not objective. I don't know if I'm good or bad or funny or awful.
Q: I've heard that you're very good in Simpatico, a drama about two friends who double-cross a third friend. What made you want to do it?
A: Because it's the most brilliantly written part I've ever read.
Q: Do you play one of the double-crossers?
A: I play someone whose life is the result of a corrupt and violent choice made 20 years before.
Q: Every time I pick up the paper it seems I'm reading about how you're doing an event here, making a film there. With all you've got on your plate, how often do you see your husband?
A: Constantly. When I met him, he worked seven days a week, like a movie schedule, all year long. He hadn't taken a vacation in five years. Since then things have changed a lot.
Q: Is it true you didn't initially like him?
A: Yes, I didn't like him at first. But then I had lunch with him and a couple of other people. And that night he left to go on a hiking trip. He drove to a pay phone each day to call me. We talked about books, then he sent me some books. Then he sent me some flowers.
Q: How do you know he was at a pay phone and wasn't calling from a cellular phone?
A: Because you could just hear it. People would drive up and be in the parking lot waiting for the phone.
Q: When did you fall in love with him?
A: I would say I've fallen in love with him in a much bigger degree since I've been married to him.
Q. Whose decision was it to marry?
A: His.
Q: Did he have to talk you into it?
A: It was not the kind of thing I could be talked into, but it was certainly he who wanted to get married. I had no interest in getting married anymore. But I had no idea what marriage could be.
Q: Did you draw up cohabitation agreements with him?
A: It's not in good taste to talk about that.
Q: So the answer's yes?
A: The answer is that whatever agreements we came to need to be between us.
Q: What do your parents think of Phil?
A: His parents are more like what you'd think my parents would be like--his mom's an actress, his father was a ballet dancer, they're very artistic, eccentric and wild. And my parents are more what you'd think Phil's would be like--they're more solid. My parents live in Pennsylvania in what used to be my dad's hunting cabin but they expanded it into a big house in the woods. We just visited them. I think Phil died and went to heaven when we got up there. I don't know how Phil consumed the amount of food my mother made. He was on his seventh serving of potatoes and I said, "That's probably enough," and my father took me aside and said, "If Phil wants potatoes, you have to let him have potatoes." That's my marital advice.
Q: Joan Crawford said that actresses shouldn't marry.
A: You have to imagine how different things were then. Their lives were run by the studio.
Q: How much luck is involved in a good marriage?
A: Some, but it's about whether or not you've got the commitment and the courage to do it. My parents have been married for 49 years. They have a relationship, not an arrangement. They hang out, joke, laugh and overtly, every day, love each other. Very few people do that.
Q: Do you think married sex improves over the years?
A: Married, loving sex? I don't care how much you might be in love with someone, there is nothing like married, loving sex. There is no way to tell somebody who hasn't had that experience what it does to the way you look at the world.
Q: Is there more temptation out there for someone like yourself than there is for most people?
A: Oh, that's never been my thing. I have a monogamous gene.
Q: Are you pregnant, as many tabloids have reported?
A: No, but I'd be delighted to be at any time.
Q: Have you looked into why you haven't gotten pregnant?
A: Yes, I've looked into it. There is no reason.
Q: What about adopting?
A: Oh God, yes! However many children we make, we will also adopt children. I know a terrific adoption agency.
Q: Six months ago the tabloids said you were splitting with your husband. Why would they print that?
A: Someone we knew was making up those stories.
Q: Has your husband's profession given you new insight into journalism?
A: His impression of the media and their reaction to celebrities has changed more than mine. Because he's never been on the other side of it before. The last time he was in New York he walked down the street and people started screaming, "It's Sharon Stone's husband!" He said it was the most horrifying, hideous experience.
Q: Are you happier in San Francisco than in L.A.?
A: Yes. The intellectual root, the drive of San Francisco, is much more diverse. It's nice to be in an environment where people care about other things besides the movie industry. I've worked all over the world and this is the most loving town I've ever been in. People are kind to each other here, they're generous. There's dignity in being generous and decent.
Q: Have you made girlfriends?
A: I'm able to make girlfriends. I met a girl from my neighborhood in a restaurant and my God, it's so great--I now just stop by her house and she makes me a cup of tea and we shoot the breeze.
Q: Are you hassled at all in San Francisco?
A: I never, never, never have people hound me for autographs or chase me for pictures or be mean to me because I don't want to kiss their baby. Unless it's a tourist.
Q: If you'd stayed in L.A., would it have driven you insane?
A: I certainly think it was not going to be possible for me to successfully date or to find a relationship or get married in that town.
Q: You've become somewhat of a public figure in San Francisco and are involved with a public-awareness program and a church.
A: Yeah, my friend and I both got voted Woman of the Year up here for our breast cancer-awareness stuff. We're writing a poem for our acceptance speech. She's a well-known published poet and I'm a goofball. So her part is deep, and mine is like: boobs, tits, cantaloupes, watermelons, ta-tas.
Q: Who's got the most beautiful breasts you've ever seen?
A: [Pulls out her top, looks down at her own, laughs] I'm very happy with my own.
Q: And the church, what denomination is it?
A: I think it's probably called Methodist, but it's completely nondenominational. I'd been trying to find a church to go to in L.A. but they would always sell me out for the PR. There would end up being these fucking Globe reporters in the parking lot, who would then chase me into the church. It should be illegal.
Q: Have you always been religious?
A: I've always been very interested in religion. My parents were Protestants. When I was 10 I decided I wanted to go to a Baptist church, so I went separate from them. And I went to a Baptist school. I've studied a myriad of religious philosophies, even Scientology. Ultimately I've come to the conclusion that I'm a Taoist Buddhist who believes in God.
Q: You've said that your will is what made you famous. How willful are you?
A: I don't think it's my will that's kept me famous. I think that I learned my craft and love my job and respect that I work for the public. That's probably kept me famous.
Q: How would you describe yourself?
A: I wouldn't, I'm so sick of me.
Q: How ambitious are you?
A: More than ambitious, I would say that I'm unsatisfied. I'm one of those people who always wants to do a little better, achieve a little more. Is that ambition? Maybe.
Q: Is it hard to be a sex symbol?
A: [Pretending to take airs] Well, for me it just came naturally. Everybody has their thing. It's figuring out what's your thing. I certainly never thought that was going to be my thing, but it's funny to me that it is, and that it happened to me later in my life. If I was 22 instead of 32 it wouldn't have been that funny--it would have been a nightmare and I'd probably be dead.
Q: When have you contemplated death the most?
A: When I had a stalker who threatened my life.
Q: Have you ever pulled a gun on anyone?
A: Yeah, in my L.A. house. I had a circumstance where I had a guy outside the gate and I could see him on the security camera. He was cutting a hole in the gate. I called 911 and no one came. I called 911 again 10 minutes later and still no one came. Then he started to climb the gate. I called 911 a third time, and said, "This muthafucker's on the gate." They were not particularly helpful. So I decided that I didn't want him to get on the property, because if he did, then I would have to shoot him and I didn't want to have to shoot him. So I opened the front door and hit the button that opened the gate so it would swing with him on it. As it swung open I pumped my shotgun and said, "I'm gonna blow your ass all over the street." And I heard him land when he jumped and his footsteps running off.
Q: Now that you've given up your guns to the L.A. Police Department in the wake of the Columbine shootings, you can't chase someone hanging on your fence as easily.
A: I'm not sure confronting a psycho going over your fence is the smartest thing to do anyway. Now I'd rather lock myself in the house than have guns in my life. I still carry a short Louisville slugger bat and a taser in my car. The taser is a great thing. You only use it if someone is in contact distance--it knocks them down and provides you space to get away. But I'll tell you something, when I had my guns, I would hear noises in my house and I'd be afraid. Since I gave my guns away, I've been sleeping like a baby.
Q: Do you know of anyone else who's given up their guns recently?
A: No, but someone should organize a day in every town to give up their guns. Make it July 5th. Be-Independent-of-Your-Guns Day!
Q: Let's talk about actors you like.
A: Judy Davis sends me. I've watched Impromptu a thousand times. Judi Dench. Lynn Redgrave. I was genuinely happy when she got the Golden Globe [for Gods and Monsters].
Q: What about Jim Carrey?
A: I had a mini-breakdown watching The Truman Show. I started to panic at a certain point and had a hard time being with the comedic aspect of it. I think Jim Carrey is a fucking genius. His performance at the Oscars this year was outstanding.
Q: Along with $20 million per picture.
A: That's another thing that isn't so good. Not just the fame, but the money changes everyone around you. For me, I wanted everybody to be in it with me, I wanted them to have it too, but then you have people turn into sycophants.
Q: What do you think of your The Quick and the Dead costar Leonardo DiCaprio, whom you once dubbed a genius?
A: I knew the second I saw that kid, he's just the one. Leonardo's like Mozart, there's not a lot of that. People don't know it really yet because of the kind of movies he's done, and because he looks like a kid. But, like the Magic 8 Ball says, "It Will Be Revealed." It will be revealed with Leonardo. If he makes it. It's such a hideous thing, what's happened to him. I can't think of anything worse.
Q: What do you mean?
A: For him to be so famous. It's just awful. Fame is an ugly thing.
Q: Which actresses do you think are worth watching?
A: Ashley Judd has a lot of talent and doesn't need to be doing that whole glamour trip. Angelina Jolie's lovely, really terrific. Charlize Theron has real talent.
Q: You haven't mentioned Gwyneth Paltrow. Is that because of the parody she did of you on Saturday Night Live?
A: I don't know yet what I think of her. She's very young and lives in rarefied air that's a little thin. It's like she's not getting quite enough oxygen. She's being guided, in some situations, by people who have bigger plans than her. I would like to think that she just doesn't know, that she's just young. I would like to think that she will eventually spend her fame valuably. The women in the generation before me cut the path for women like me to walk freely in the world. The women in this next generation don't really know what that cost. So they don't respect it. It's a lot easier for me to be an individual, to be self-employed, to make my own decisions as an actor than it has ever been in any generation before me, and those women before me worked very hard to change the way the game was played. These kids that are coming up don't understand why it's so easy now. When fame comes upon people who are really young they don't know that they're being eaten by it, they think they're being fed by it. But probably since the Oscars, that young lady [Paltrow] has a better understanding of what it is than ever before. I wish her a lot of luck and stability, because she's got a lot of talent.
Q: Is this your warm way of saying you didn't really appreciate her parody?
A: I didn't appreciate it. And I particularly didn't appreciate her being malicious about my husband.
Q: Which was?
A: She said something nasty about him. I don't want to believe she has any malicious intent, I want to imagine that she's just that naive.
Q: Are there any young actresses you think are a bit more self-aware?
A: Angelina Jolie intrigues me, because I think she gets it. She has a tattoo on her stomach that's so intense--it's in Latin and says, "That which nourishes me also destroys me." Can you imagine what you must know at that age to have done that to yourself?
Q: What actors do you feel close with?
A: The ones I like to hang out with are Faye [Dunaway] and Shirley MacLaine.
Q: And do you share MacLaine's concept of an afterlife?
A: Yeah. If you're not trapped in the idea that this is all there is, the concept of death is kind of exciting and terrific. My husband is not very keen on this.
Q: You always refrain from commenting about Steven Seagal, whom you worked with on Above the Law. What did he do to you?
A: I just think he's an individual who isn't worth the ink it would take to write about him.
Q: So you don't believe he's a reincarnation of a Tibetan holy man?
A: I don't believe that the Dalai Lama believes that.
Q: Is Bette Davis your favorite actress?
A: No, although Marty and Bob [De Niro] said that I would be the next Bette Davis if I don't do plastic surgery.
Q: Would you consider doing plastic surgery?
A: Yeah. My husband thinks it's awful. I think when your face doesn't go with your body, that looks really dumb. Like Goldie Hawn said in The First Wives Club, if you want to freshen up a little bit, that's OK. But that thing where you have a mask that stops at your jawline and you have this baggy old body underneath, I wouldn't do that to myself.
Q: What are you in need of now?
A: I have really good genes about aging. I'm lucky. I see women who are 31 that look older than me--and I'm 41. You shouldn't do bad things in excess but it's good to have a drink now and then, good to have a steak or smoke a cigarette.
Q: What about marijuana?
A: Terrific! It should be legalized. It's much better for you than alcohol and is a terrific medicine.
Q: Cocaine?
A: No, cocaine is an evil, horrible, awful thing.
Q: Mescaline or peyote?
A: I'm too fragile to take hallucinogenics. I would lose my mind.
Q: Have you ever?
A: I had someone put LSD in my drink when I was 19 and I had a very long trip.
Q: Let's play "Best & Worst." What's your favorite quote?
A: Katharine Hepburn's: "Aging is like watching a car crash in slow motion." That's hilarious.
Q: Best hotel?
A: The Ritz, in Paris.
Q: Worst hotel?
A: In Victoria Falls in Africa. They had shag carpet and they didn't have a vacuum cleaner. Ticks lived in the carpet.
Q: Best restaurant?
A: Hmmm. Petrossian in New York.
Q: Best beach?
A: In Mauritius, off the southern tip of Africa. You can float 12 feet above the ocean floor and still see every grain of sand.
Q: Best designer?
A: Banana Republic.
Q: Best dessert?
A: An absolutely fresh homemade chocolate eclair.
Q: Do you make them?
A: No, or I'd be Sophie Tucker.
Q: Best smile?
A: Children.
Q: Face?
A: Ava Gardner.
Q: Body?
A: My husband.
Q: Best kiss you've ever had?
A: My husband.
Q: Best movie kisser?
A: Robert De Niro.
Q: Best sex stimulant?
A: Laughter.
Q: Best sex scene?
A: A scene that didn't have sex in it, in Witness where Kelly McGillis is washing and Harrison Ford is just looking at her.
Q: Your best movie?
A: It's yet to come, I hope.
Q: Of the ones you've done?
A: Casino was a special thing, a dream come true.
Q: What's your favorite movie?
A: The animated The Jungle Book. When we started Casino, Marty asked me that question and I told him the answer and he said he had a print, which I couldn't believe, because prints like that are in a vault in Tennessee. If you want to screen it it's a big deal--I've tried. I said, "If I do a really good job can I have it?" Five months later we finish the movie, which was an arduous process, and at the end I walked into my trailer and the film cans were stacked on my chair.
Q: Favorite artist?
A: Between Max Ernst and Egon Schiele. I have a Schiele drawing and an Ernst triptych painting that's very beautiful.
Q: Is that what you mainly collect?
A: Paintings, yes. And photographs. I have a couple of first-edition books like Cocteau's Opium.
Q: So if I do a really good job with this interview, can I have that book?
A: [Laughs]
Q: Favorite TV show?
A: I love Homicide: Life on the Street. Love it. I love The Sopranos. Oz is too much for me. Dharma & Greg. Jenna Elfman's delightful. I liked Ellen. I'm going to play a gay girl in a comedy. You know HBO's If These Walls Could Talk, which was about abortion? They're going to do a similar series this year about pregnancy, and Ellen DeGeneres will be my partner.
Q: Will Ann Heche get jealous?
A: She's gonna direct it.
Q: Do you have any other movies coming up?
A: I'm going to do a little part as Woody Allen's wife in the black comedy Picking Up the Pieces. The director is Alfonso Arau, who made Like Water for Chocolate.
Q: Whatever happened to the sequel to Basic Instinct?
A: They wrote a pretty good script, and I've been harassed to do a sequel. It should have been made four years after the first. I don't think it's timely.
Q: You said about Hollywood that you can only fuck your way to the middle: for those at the bottom, isn't that called progress?
A: [Laughs] I suspect it is.
Q: Do blondes have more fun?
A: I feel better about myself when I'm a little blonder.
Q: Are people jealous or envious of you?
A: Sure, come on. I got to be tall and blonde and a movie star--that's a lot to get in life.
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Lawrence Grobel interviewed Brendan Fraser for the June 99 issue of Movieline.