Heather Graham: The Heat on Heather

Q: You followed Drugstore Cowboy with Lawrence Kasdan's I Love You to Death...

A: Wow, you're really going back. Most people just want to talk about my boyfriends.

Q: We'll get to them. Did you regret taking that role?

A: I probably should have been really choosy after Drugstore Cowboy because that film gave me momentum. But when you're in your late teens, that's a pretty confusing time. I wasn't very together then.

Q: Were you disappointed when films like Shout and Guilty as Charged failed?

A: I started thinking that maybe it was never going to happen for me. I considered going back to school, maybe becoming a doctor.

Q: Who was your support then?

A: Other struggling actors, directors, writers and friends. I have a circle of friends and started seeing the therapist I see now. I took acting classes. It all helped. Especially a group of friends who were going through the same thing. It was kind of fun, being in L.A., in this community struggling to be artists.

Q: In '92 you got a break in Diggstown, and you developed a romance with its star, James Woods.

A: Oh, I did? I don't remember. [Laughs nervously]

Q: Did he show you the ropes?

A: Did we go out? I don't remember. Well, I have to say that I did have people around me who helped center me.

Q: You've had several relationships with actors or directors on movies you've made.

A: When I was younger, I felt like I was on a set, and I was supposed to be pretending that I was in love with someone. It's very conducive. Everyone wants you to have chemistry, everyone wants you to be together. It's a false environment, a movie set is fake. I don't believe anything I feel about anyone on that set. I think you have to wait till it's over and get into real life, and then see. I have a policy that I've adhered to for the past eight years. I don't want to go out with people while I'm working with them.

Q: You had a relationship with director Stephen Hopkins during the filming of Lost in Space.

A: Oh, OK, that was the last time I did it. It wasn't eight years ago, probably more like six. Busted.

Q: When the movie doesn't become a hit, does that put a burden on the relationship?

A: I don't think so, I don't think that had a bearing on our relationship. These relationships end for other reasons.

Q: You were also romantically involved with Edward Burns, who directed you in Sidewalks of New York. Are you still friends?

A: Oh, yeah.

Q: You've talked in recent interviews about your latest boyfriend, Heath Ledger, who's a star in the making...

A: We broke up. A few weeks ago.

Q: I won't torture you then with breakup questions.

A: Thank you.

Q: Edward Burns and Heath Ledger have both said you have a great sense of humor.

A: Eddie has a really great sense of humor and Heath is also really funny--I think your sense of humor develops from other people. When you get to know someone really well, the little things are funny--the quirky, idiosyncratic things.

Q: The press never hesitates to report on the status of your love life. Does it ever get to you?

A: I don't seek out gossip columns, but sometimes I read them. You have to know that what you experience with that person is real, and what is in the gossip column is a filtered version for someone else's entertainment. I've had stuff written about me and my relationships that is so incredibly wrong.

Q: Who do you think handles fame well?

A: Six years ago I met Drew Barrymore, who was so incredibly warm, genuine and supportive as opposed to being like, "Oh my God, everyone's putting all this stuff on me and I can't stand it." She handles the downside gracefully. She's also been supportive of me. There were a few times she was offered a role and instead of just turning it down, said, "Well, what about Heather Graham?" I thought that was just so nice.

Q: You've spoken in other interviews about your estrangement from your parents. Do you see a reconciliation in the future?

A: It's nothing that I'm planning.

Q: Did you simply grow apart?

A: I find that whenever I talk about it in the press and I read it later, I never feel that it's accurate to what I experienced. I think I'm not good at describing it and so I've decided I'd better not. I'm better off shutting up.

Q: Getting back to your career, in 1993 you went back to making some interesting indie movies. First Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, then Six Degrees of Separation. What did you think of your performance in those films?

A: That was during a phase when I didn't watch the movies I made.

Q: Was it frustrating that you didn't have much to do in Mrs. Parker and the Vicious Circle?

A: Yes. I was starting to think, Will it ever be my turn?

Q: Two years later you made Swingers. How did you get cast?

A: It was one of those things you do for your friends in the community of actors, where you just want to help someone out. I wasn't thinking, This is going to help me. I was trying to be helpful and it was something to do.

Q: Around that time, you did a movie called Entertaining Angels: The Dorothy Day Story, which starred Moira Kelly as Day, who devoted herself to feeding the homeless during the Depression. You were raised a strict Catholic and probably look at a person like this as an ideal of what the faith should be, as opposed to a restrictive way to lead your life to avoid going to hell. Was doing that movie a religious gesture?

A: It was that ideal. But I'm not religious at all. I respect people who get a lot from it, but my sense is, I don't enjoy being Catholic. Are you Catholic?

Q: Yes.

A: It's a very male-dominated religion. But I think it was the way I was exposed to it. I didn't get anything out of it. I tried to find other things. I feel like I'm a spiritual person, but I dislike the regimented way that it was taught to me. It didn't seem to fit in with my feeling of what was real about spirituality. Like if I go out, and I'm in a forest or by the water, I feel connected to some kind of higher power. I've been doing transcendental meditation for the past 10 years. Twenty minutes a day, twice a day--it really works for me. I feel connected to controlling the negatives. It's powerful and compassionate, more than organized religion.

Q: If we were having this interview five years from now, do you think I'd be talking to a working mom or an Oscar winner?

A: I do find myself thinking more about having kids, but I don't find myself feeling, Oh, my God, I have to do this today or I'll die. But I don't like to plan things that much. If it happens, I'd like it.

Q: What's your priority now?

A: I want to be more selective with the films I choose.

Q: How selective do you think you can afford to be?

A: I don't need to do the girlfriend roles anymore. I don't need the money. It's getting exciting, though. The other day I did this reading of a script. There were all these really good actors there. I was sitting at a table with Christopher Plummer, Alec Baldwin, John Turturro, Willem Dafoe and Leonardo DiCaprio. I was thinking, What am I doing here? It's a cool feeling.

Q: Do you think people still don't know what you're capable of yet?

A: I do think that, yeah.

Q: Is it important for you to be considered a big star?

A: It's not that it's important, but it is fun. Some actors say they hate it. I'm thinking, You don't hate it that much or you wouldn't be doing it. Go work in theater in Oregon if you hate it that much.

Q: What's your big Hollywood goal?

A: My main goal is not to be a bankable star, on the level of Julia Roberts or Sandra Bullock. My main goal is to just do a few movies that are classics. And to have pivotal roles in films that, years and years from now, people still watch.

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Michael Fleming interviewed director John McTiernan for the August issue of Movieline.

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