Balance June 2019 - 61

" I DON' T WANT TO BE
ST U CK IN BOXES"

CULTURE
INTERVIEW

Patricia Arquette's varied career has taken her from silver screen to
small screen, and she's finally getting the plaudits she deserves

T

he Act is the chilling true
story of Gypsy Blanchard
(Joey King) and mother Dee
Dee (Patricia Arquette).
The latter would be diagnosed with
Munchausen Syndrome By Proxy (where
a parent harms their child in order to
care for them). To say much more will
spoil a very special TV series, so we
grilled Patricia Arquette on some more
pressing issues...

The Act is all the more remarkable
when you realise it's a true story...
I'd known about Munchhausen By Proxy,
but didn't know about this specific case.
I told my kids and they were, like, "No,
pease don't play that lady" because they
knew the story. They were actually
terrified. The simple idea I'd play this part
scared them.
Was Dee Dee Blanchard a character
you brought home?
No way. I actually did the opposite: go for
a bike ride, or a nice dinner with friends.
Maybe go out with Joey to an arcade.
I'd do different things and be more
spontaneous. My character in Escape at
Dannemora (Tilly), with her low-grade
depression, shooting in prisons, being up
north where it was cold... that kind of
depression stuck with me longer.
We had sympathy for Tilly...
It was an amazing project to work on, and
I also had feelings for Tilly. So did Ben
Stiller [the director]. She has different
mechanisms to get her needs met than
Dee Dee.
How wonderful is it as an artist, we
can talk about such a one-two in your
recent repertoire?
At 51 to be getting these parts, it's pretty
crazy. Character work and being able
to play these very complicated people,
I'm lucky I'm at this age at a time where
plenty of people are trying to make a lot
of content for a lot of channels. There
used to be 1,000 channels and no content
and I'd be like, "Guys, people are going
to turn off their cable if you don't start

making something." It's a good time to be
in Hollywood and our industry. The film
business was drying up for a long time.
It's a golden age of television, isn't it?
It is. As a viewer and a person who loves
art, watching a lot of the demise of the
film business - all those mega films,
small films drying up, people not going
to the movie theatres, people staying at
home, pirating - I was worried about the
industry. The quality in TV has brought
things up a notch.
Your upbringing sounds wonderful: a
Jewish mother and a dad who was a
convert to Judaism...
Yeah, dad was supposed to convert
to Judaism, but he got lost, ended up
at a mosque and converted to Islam
instead. He went home to tell my mum
and she was like, "Only you." He was
Muslim for many, many years, went to
Mecca and did Ramadan every year.
We always talked about religion in our
household, comparative religion, different
beliefs and traditions. We had many fights
about many things, but religion was never
a source of them.

What has played the key role in
you now being at a point in your
profession where you're banging out
career best stuff?
To start as an ingénue, then have the love
affair stories, and from being "the girl" to
mums, and Medium, Boyhood and now
this moment. There were strategic things
I did along the way: I started working
in TV before people were working in
TV. I saw things were happening in
film that were not good. Film was going
away. There was a snotty quality towards
television, which I didn't agree with.
Why can't we do good acting on TV? So
I migrated and saw TV had an important
future. When I got Escape at Dannemora,
a lot of business people said, "You can't
gain weight and look like her." I said, "I'm
going to do this and have the conversation
about who's allowed to be sexual and
what body type." Hey, here's this lady
who is unapologetically sexual. Shouldn't
she have space to feel love and feel alive?
Let's have that conversation. I want to be
an actor and don't want to be stuck in all
these boxes. I feel so limited by them. So
there were strategic things I did along the
way that were pushing back on industry
standards and ways of doing business and
thinking about your career that I wasn't
willing to agree to.
Finally, we can't let you go without
talking about your appearance in Toy
Story 4...
And I also have a mother comedy coming
out called Motherhood. It's a tiny part
in Toy Story 4. I was very excited to be
involved in an animated franchise; my
grandfather worked with [legendary voice
artist] Mel Blanc, and my dad had been
a voice on Johnny Quest, so I'd always
wanted to break into that. I'm also writing
a book and directing a film, so I've got a
lot of little fires burning all over the place.
You have the world by the tail!
That's right. That tiger. I have a little bowl
of milk out for it...

Catch Patricia Arquete in The Act,
available from 14 June on StarzPlay

61
Balance June 2019

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