Back when Olive Kitteridge premiered on HBO, Frances McDormand, who acted in and produced the miniseries that spans 25 years of an abrasive New England math teacher’s life, reigned in her ranting and gave an eloquent interview about aging with Katie Couric.
The 57-year-old actor-producer explained to the 57-year-old anchor why she feels rage and sadness when women doggedly pursue eternal youth. It was a little awkward, given that with the thick schmear of TV make-up, Couric looks kind of ageless. Then Couric admitted to hair-dying and McDormand tried hard not to tell her to stop: “We have a lot of responsibility because we present ourselves in a medium that reaches a lot of people.”
After a decade of avoiding press, and preserving her privacy, McDormand is lately purposefully presenting herself as a successful and powerful woman with a “map” on her face of all the challenges and triumphs of her life. To take 15 years off with a knife, to McDormand, is to amputate your own history (part of her history includes a BUST cover back in 2003!).
Glad to have this face and this voice back in popular culture in 2014, and looking forward to more next year (supposedly she bought the rights to The Omnivore’s Dilemma) because one of the good things about having four decades of Hollywood bullshit youth worship under your belt, is not having to take it anymore.
In the full interview, Frances talks about the production of Olive Kitteridge and the legacy of Fargo. Watch it below:
Images and video via Burn After Reading, BUST
