NY Daily News – April 13, 2008

Last Update:

Thurman & her men on screen

By n/a
Source: NY Daily News

Uma Thurman has been in films since she was 17 – so she has shared the screen with a lot of leading men. We asked her to talk about a few of them:

John Malkovich: Thurman’s breakout role came in 1988′s “Dangerous Liaisons,” in which she played a romantic pawn in a battle of wills between Malkovich and Glenn Close.

Says Thurman: “Ahh, the brilliant John Malkovich. I remember seeing him in ‘Burn This’ on Broadway. ["Dangerous Liaisons"] was quite an opener for me. At one point, he said to me, ‘You have no idea how good you have it right this second.’ The level of the writing, working with him and Stephen Frears and Glenn Close; it was school for me – and I was paying attention.”

Richard Gere: In “Final Analysis” (1992), Gere played a psychiatrist who is treating Thurman – but then gets involved with her sister (Kim Basinger), plunging them all into a dark murder mystery.

“I was actually the junior leading lady to him in that. That was one of the rare times I worked with someone I’d known before. I knew him since I was a kid. I met him through my father [Buddhist scholar Robert Thurman]. [Gere] is really a lovely guy and a well-intentioned human being.”

John Travolta: Thurman has starred opposite Travolta twice – as the mysterious Mia Wallace to his heroin-shooting Vincent Vega in “Pulp Fiction” (1994), and as a music executive’s widow who gets involved with Travolta as former mobster Chili Palmer in the comedy “Be Cool” (2005).

“I love John Travolta. We work well together. People get all worked up about the Scientology, but I think he’s a really good person.”

George Clooney: In Clooney’s sole time at bat as Batman (in 1997′s “Batman & Robin“), Thurman appeared opposite him as seductive villainess Poison Ivy – but found that Clooney wasn’t around much for her scenes.

“I think he was still on ‘ER‘ at that point, so I worked with a lot of stunt doubles. In that sense, it was like a kabuki opera. I didn’t get to see enough of George, but I respect him as an entity in the arts.”

Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick: As Ulla in “The Producers” (2005), Thurman had both of them panting onscreen – but found that their long-running partnership from the stage production was a hard nut to crack.

“They were so deeply at one with their parts. I definitely felt like a visiting ambassador from the land of Svenska.”

Quentin Tarantino: Thurman jokes that, between having a syringe plunged into her chest in “Pulp Fiction” and having to fight her way across China in the “Kill Bill” films, she should sue Tarantino for abuse.

“But, really, QT is a gentleman. We’ve had quite an impact on each other’s lives, some things you can’t even quantify.”