Sarah Polley: The Men You Meet Making Movies
I loved acting, still do, but I knew, after 14 years of working professionally,
that it wasn’t worth it to me, and the reasons were not unconnected to the tone of that meeting almost 20 years ago.
Several years ago, I approached a couple of successful female actors in Hollywood about an idea I had for a comedy project: We would write, direct
and star in a short film about the craziest, worst experience we’d ever had on a set.
One producer, when I mentioned I didn’t feel a rape scene was being handled sensitively, barked
that Dakota Fanning had done a rape scene when she was 12 — “And she’s fine!” A debatable conjecture, surely.
But for a long time, I felt that it wasn’t worth it to me to open my heart and make myself so vulnerable in an industry
that makes its disdain for women evident everywhere I turn.
While working on “Away From Her,” I had the privilege of working with Julie Christie, who, while maintaining her vision for her character, was deeply committed to collaboration
and could shift her performance on a dime when given direction.
One day, when I was 19 years old, I was in the middle of a photo shoot for a Miramax film when I was suddenly told it was time to leave.
But the stories, when we told them, left us in tears
and bewildered at how casually we had taken these horror stories and tried to make them into comedy.
