QUESTION: IS THAT THE NEW
BLACKBERRY?
PARKER:
I do have a new one. I do have a new one. You know why? HBO started a
partnership with Cingular. I stay with them because they’re creative geniuses.
QUESTION:
Is that swag?[Something about Swag?]
PARKER: No, it’s not swag. It’s because
we’re doing these downloads for Cingular. So this is my compensation. No, it
really was. Yeah, Blackberryies for life.
QUESTION: The suit was settled for
now
PARKER:
Yeah? When did it
happen?
QUESTION:
THERE WAS SOMETHING IN THE PAPER YESTERDAY ABOUT
IT.
PARKER:
Is that right? Do you think that’s because the government is primarily
run by Blackberries? Did they step in some covert way
and?
QUESTION: THEY ARE GOING TO MAKE AN
EXCEPTION FOR GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES.
PARKER:
Really, Really. I suppose our business isn’t important? Shady dealings.
OK.
QUESTION: WHEN A ROMANTIC COMEDY COMES YOUR
WAY—
PARKER: You don’t want to talk about
Blackberries anymore? [laughter]
QUESTION: YOU CAN IF YOU
WANT—
PARKER: I would much prefer it because, you
know, it’s interesting.
QUESTION:
AS OPPOSED TO SEX AND THE CITY.
PARKER: Well, you
know.
QUESTION:
WHEN A ROMANTIC COMEDY COMES YOUR WAY YOU IMMEDIATELY LOOK AT IT TO SEE
WHETHER OR NOT THERE IS NO HINT OF MISS BRADSHAW IN THERE, IN THE
CHARACTER?
PARKER: It’s not as kind of sweeping and
arbitrary, like, ‘Is it…?’ I pursue my career in the same fashion I always have
which is, ‘What is interesting to me? What is different? How does this fit into
what I’m doing now and what I’m to do in the future? And what are they
ingredients? Who are I working with, who’s directing it, who’s producing it? Why
do they want to make this? What’s interesting, what’s potentially interesting
about this story?’ Look, when it’s glaringly obvious that it is some redux of a
show that I was a part of it’s not interesting at all at all. It takes no energy
to decide to not do what is comfortable and often more lucrative than other
things. What’s interesting to me is trying to make good choices and trying to
work with really good people. Does it always work out? No. But you just kind of
do the best with the options you have. I mean, that’s the best that I can do.
QUESTION: DO YOU RELATE TO THIS GIRL?
PARKER: No. I don’t relate to her at all. I
mean, she seems to like food a lot. I mean, I like that about her. Honestly,
like that was pretty much it. But I don’t have to — that’s much more
interesting to me, to not to relate to somebody. Meredith Morton (in The Family
Stone), I didn’t relate to at all. The movie (Spinning into Butter) I did right
after this is someone whose life is strikingly unfamiliar to me.
QUESTION: WHAT WAS IT ABOUT THIS FILM THAT
BROUGHT YOU INTO IT?
PARKER:
Well, the first time that I had heard about it was when I went to meet with
Allie Shermright (?????). She’s one of the big chiefs at
and at that point there was no first draft even of the script. It was an idea
based on this article and oddly enough I had seen the ’60 Minutes’ piece a few
years before about this phenomenon in
that really wasn’t new, but it’d just been spotlighted in some way. And it
seemed funny to me. I mean, at the time, I don’t know, it just seemed like well
that’s an interesting idea – a man living at home past what’s considered an
appropriate age. I’ve known Scott Rudin forever and I’ve made a couple of movies
with him, and there were just things about it, you know – this kind of surface,
easy-breezy quality she possessed, this strange idea for a business model, for a
vocation, her clever attempts at deflecting from her own lack of romance in
her life. And just frankly, this idea of
a big, lush, decadent schedule of a romantic comedy. A big studio picture. They
don’t make these very much anymore. They really don’t and certainly not with
people our age in them. I don’t know. It seemed perfect to me. ‘Family Stone’
and ‘Failure to Launch’ and ‘Spinning Into Butter.’ What more can an actor ask
for? I get to dabble in a little of each.
QUESTION: YOU SAID YOUR AGE. WHAT AGE ARE
YOU PLAYING IN THE FILM?
PARKER: You know, that’s a good question.
Mid-thirties [Laughs]. Mid-thirties. What’s so funny now is that any time I
describe something to my friends they’re always like ‘What is it about?’ I go,
‘Well, it’s about this girl,’ and I’m like ‘woman,’ because I still say girl and
I know it’s not right cause someone my age. But I still say
girl.
QUESTION: What’s the age of the voice in
your head?
PARKER: I would say that it’s about 34. I
mean, my voice is terrible. When I hear it back it’s much higher than I think it
is when I hear it. I think that my voice has more resonance to it. I just wish
it did. I think I wish I had Patty Clarkson’s voice. You know how hers is like
whiskey and like southern, but it’s not. She’s got the voice of like a
seven-year-old all the time.
QUESTION: WHAT’S THE EMOTIONAL VOICE THAT
YOU HEAR, THE AGE OF THE PERSON IN OUR HEAD?
PARKER: You mean on a daily
basis?
QUESTION:
YEAH.
PARKER; I think it’s exactly who I
am.
QUESTION:
REALLY?
PARKER: And it’s a great comfort to actually
know who you are. Like I have no delusions. I feel very lucky that I recognize
the years and what you get from it. So I feel like I’m the voice of a
40-year-old. Whatever 40 means to me – whatever. I don’t know.
QUESTION: YOU’RE NOT
FORTY?
PARKER:
Yeah, I am. I’m about to be 41.
QUESTION: I THOUGHT THAT YOU WERE EARLY
THIRTIES.
PARKER: Ah, come on dude. We’ll have a one
on one later [Laughs].
QUESTION: WHEN DID YOU LEAVE
HOME?
PARKER: Seventeen. All my siblings were.
QUESTION: YOUR MOTHER PUSHED YOU
OUT?
PARKER: She didn’t. She was really
conflicted. I think she did what every kind of thinking person does, which is as
hard as it was to let us go, she knew it was good for us. You know, that’s the
age most kids go off to college and those of us who didn’t go to college went
off to pursue our work. I think my mother did a lot of things right. I’m sure
she made a lot of crazy decisions, too, but I really like the way she encouraged
our independence and I think that it’s probably the best thing for a child. We
could always come home. We always brought our laundry home. She still made food
for us and brought it into the city. She was there, but she wanted us to be
independent thinking people and I think it served us well.
QUESTION: DO YOU THINK THAT LEAVING ‘SEX AND
THE CITY’ WAS LIKE LEAVING THE NEST FOR YOU? WHAT WAS IT SEVEN
YEARS?
PARKER:
Seven years. [Laughs] Oh, that was much harder than leaving the nest.
Yeah. It was harder.
QUESTION: THERE WAS SECURITY THERE FOR YOU.
HOW LONG DID YOU DO THAT AND HOW WAS IT TO GO INTO THE LESS SECURE WORLD OF
MOVIES?
PARKER:
It’s terrifying, but I thought that was why it was necessary. I mean,
it’s such a strange thing to be so happy, so content and to know therefore you
should leave. And I guess that it is like leaving home because there’s every
opportunity for failure. Especially in relation to that particular show and the
kind of success even while we were only on cable, the kind of success that show
had. But I don’t know. I’m not afraid of failure, really. I don’t want it and I
certainly don’t court it, but I just think it’s what has to happen sometimes. I
mean, it’s the truth. Triumphs are very sweet when you’ve experienced
disappointment. I don’t think I have a constitution for disappointment or
failure, but I just feel like you have to understand that it’s going to happen,
especially in a profession like this where you’re just simply, constantly
scrutinized, and especially if you care all about critics, and never mind public
sentiment. So you just have to expect it and just ride the wave. People’s
careers – I’m sure in your own there’s times you feel really engaged and really
excited by your work and there are times you feel disappointed by what your
editors ask of you or how you did something. I mean, it’s for everybody, and I
think that’s the nature of being an adult and really caring about your work.
QUESTION: Gutsiest thing you’ve ever done
was the play Sylvia.
PARKER: I played a dog. Well, that was one
of the most perfectly written plays, I think, in the history of the American
stage. That’s just my opinion. But that role was very easy for me. I do not know
why. Then there have been other things that have been far more difficult. ‘Once
Upon a Mattress’ was a far more challenging experience. Sylvia, playing a dog, I
don’t know why – it really was. It came really, really easy to me.
QUESTION: DID YOU KNOW ANY
DOGS?
PARKER: Well, we had a dog at the time that
I mimicked a lot, but I also was mimicking Matthew mimicking our dog because she
was a Border Collie – she just passed away – and a Dingo mix and she was really
crazy. She was really egotistical, like she was a real narcissist. She was kind
of like a supermodel. I mean, she was really beautiful and she knew it. I don’t
know; I guess I just used her and Matthew quite a bit. Pete Gurney (known by his
pen name, A.R. Gurney) loved his dog and that whole play was about his crazy
relationship with his dog.
QUESTION: WOULD YOU WANT TO DO A PLAY WITH
MATTHEW?
PARKER: No. We don’t really look for stuff
together, but I think that there is a play that I might do in the spring. We’ll
see how it all kind of fits in.
QUESTION: I THOUGHT THAT YOU TWO WERE
LOOKING AT DOING ‘MUSIC MAN’ TOGETHER?
PARKER:
Oh, that’s true. That’s true. But I couldn’t sing it. I know ‘Music Man’
because of Barbara Cooke (????). It’s a soprano. And then (producers) Craig
(Zadan) and Neil (Meron) said, ‘We’ll take the keys down,’ and I said, ‘You
shouldn’t do that.’ Marian should be a soprano. Also, I just think I really like
being Matthew’s audience. I don’t want to be in a situation with Matthew where
we both need attention, we’re both worried and nervous and both away from our
son at the same time. We don’t really feel the need to work together. I mean, if
something came along that was really right and seemed so obvious,
but—
QUESTION: DO YOU THINK THAT IT KEEPS YOUR
RELATIONSHIP STRONG TO NOT WORK TOGETHER?
PARKER: Maybe. I mean, I don’t know. I don’t
know if our relationship is strong or if we have nowhere else to go [Laughs].
But we just really like each other. I mean, I really still like him so much and
I’m sure that I annoy him and I know that he annoys me, but I like that we
really do have separate lives. I don’t mean in a bad way, but I just mean in a
healthy way. My friend Amy, Amy Sedaris, she says it’s ‘married singles,’ but I
think that’s a good thing. Like, he has his friends that he really connects to,
and his work in the theater, whatever, and then I have my thing and then we see
each other and it’s so nice. And we have our son.
HOW OFTEN DO YOU SIT DOWN AT HOME AND COME
ACROSS YOURSELF ON THE TV, IN SOMETHING YOU DID WHEN YOU WERE YOUNGER, LIKE
SQAURE PEGS?
I wish I did. I never do. I think some of my
earlier work is some of my best work, and I wish I saw it more, but I don’t see
it. The only thing about that to me that’s amazing is that I started working
when I was eight. That’s a really long time ago. That was 1973 and most people
that I meet today weren’t even born yet, then. It’s so strange to be the elder
statesman on a set. I was always the youngest person on the set. I was always
the one hanging around, watching, learning. I’m still learning, but it’s so
weird for me to reference something and then say, ‘You actually weren’t born
then?’ And they say, ‘No, I wasn’t. Well, six months later I was born.’ That’s
the only thing about that. I don’t see myself ever on
television.
HAS YOUR SON SEEN YOU ON
TELEVISION?
He’s just seen contemporary things. I don’t
know if it’s weird for him because I don’t know if he thinks every other parent
is always on television. I don’t know that he has distinguished our lives from
his peer group’s. So I don’t know. He’s three and three
months.
MORE
KIDS?
I don’t know. We’ll see. We’ll see. We’ll
see.
WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON WITH
YOU?
Nothing. Nothing! I’m not going to lie to
you. I’m on a self-appointed sabbatical until
September.
AND THE HBO DEAL INVOLVES
WHAT?
That is going on. That’s pretty busy. We’re
producing long and short-form television and movies for HBO specifically. Only
producing.
ANY WAY IN THE WORLD YOU’D DO MORE SEX AND
THE CITY?
We all wanted to do (the movie). Kim didn’t
want to at the time. I think that that moment seems (to have passed). She might
(now), but for us it’s passed. There was a script, there were sets, there were
costumes, there was a crew, and that’s all gone now. The sets are all broken
down or sold or in a dumpster or, I don’t know, on eBay. It’d be hard to buy it
back. All the shoes, we have. We all have our shoes and they can have them back.
But that particular momentum, which is really critical for a movie… I mean, who
knows, way down the line, but it was a very hard pill to swallow, to have it not
happen. I think it would be hard to revisit it
later.
YOU WERE ON THE SHOW SO LONG AND ARE SO
IDENTIFIED WITH THAT ONE ROLE. ARE YOU TAKING MOVIE ROLES AND PURPOSEFULLY
AVOIDING GETTING BACK INTO THAT AREA?
It’s not hard for me at all. It just
wouldn’t even occur to me to get back in that same general area. If I was going
to do it anywhere I’d stay right where I was with Michael Patrick King writing
it. And it’s no longer appropriate for me. I don’t have any interest in
exploring (it). In fact, I think for all of us, we should put away that
particular conversation for a while. I think another show about women and
dating, flawed women in the City that love fashion and have great jobs and have
bad relationships has really been just dissected to the degree that, to me, it’s
not interesting right now. I think what’s interesting right now is a different
story. So I don’t feel any particular vulnerability to being sucked back in
because it’s not even on the radar for me.
CYNTHIA NIXON SURELY HAS MOVED AWAY FROM
THAT IMAGE WITH HER STAGE WORK.
Yeah, absolutely. But that’s Cynthia. That’s
classic Cynthia. Cynthia will always do what’s interesting to her. She’ll play
Eleanor Roosevelt. She’ll do Rabbit Hole. She’ll do House for a couple of weeks.
That’s classic. She just always does interesting
things.
AND KRISTIN DAVIS HAS THE SHAGGY
DOG.
Oh, that’s March 10th! We’re
coming out the same day! It’s all-out war.
YOU WANT TO CRUSH THE BITCH, RIGHT? YOU
WANNA RUN THAT DOG OVER, RIGHT?
I feel very conflicted. I feel very
conflicted. I think we’re going for different audiences. Don’t
you?
HOW
IMPORTANT IS IT TO YOU TO LIVE IN
YORK
I
wouldn’t go anywhere else. I don’t have another choice. That’s it. I don’t know
how to describe it. Our families are here. My husband was born and raised here.
I’ve lived here for 30-some years. My son was born here. It’s not about a
conscious decision every day. It’s just simply who we are. It’s like you get up,
you brush your teeth, and you live in
York
It’s like anybody from their town that they love and live in. People in
feel equally as devoted to their city. There are cities that I love, but I just
don’t want to live there.
WHEN
YOU GO TO
HOW LIKE AN ALIEN CULTURE IS IT?
I like going there because I never go for
very long and, because someone else is paying, I always stay at a really nice
hotel. They have great Mexican food there and great sushi. So it does feel alien
to me because it’s so monopolized by this particular industry. It can make you
anxious, but I kind of like visiting. I’m fine visiting. I just don’t want to be
away from home, in any other city for that
long.
AS YOU AGE, IS THERE MORE OF A CHALLENGE TO
FIND THE RIGHT TYPES OF WOMEN TO PLAY?
There was at 20, too. It doesn’t
change.
BUT AREN’T THE OPPORTUNITIES DIFFERENT IN
YOUR 40’S?
You know what? I’m reading a variety of
scripts, literally everything from a nun to a con artist to a woman who’s
suicidal. There doesn’t seem to be this great deficit of roles. They’re not all
$40 million movies, but there are amazing period pieces. There are two period
pieces with great women’s roles. And if they’re talking to me I’m certain there
are a lot of other women that are my age that are being considered as well. I
can’t explain why, but it hardly seems a fallow period for women’s
roles.