Sylvia Miles: The Mr. Skin Interview

You've been an acclaimed stage actress and an acclaimed character actress in films such as Wall Street and Crossing Delancey. But you've also always been willing to make bizarre appearances in weird movies: Heat, The Funhouse, The Sentinel.
I've written this fictional fantasy book proposal that's about to be published in an anthology. Here's what my career is like: "In New York, they think I'm a Hollywood star. In Hollywood, they think I'm an underground New York actress. Which puts me more or less in Kansas City, where they're probably saying, 'I wonder if she's Jewish?'"

Is there something that draws you to those kinds of productions? You followed up the breakthrough of Midnight Cowboy by going off to Chile for the famously chaotic shoot of Dennis Hopper's The Last Movie.
The Last Movie, I think, was around seven and a half hours long before it was cut. I don't know if Dennis was still with Michelle Phillips from The Mamas & The Papas--they got together on the set of The Last Movie--but he was buried in Taos, New Mexico, for three years editing that movie. I don't know if he was taking drugs, but he was being a bad boy. The two bad boys who meant to be good, Dennis Hopper and Rip Torn, they've done very well for themselves.

You're shooting a film with Rip Torn now.
His daughter Angelica Torn's directing it, and her brother's producing it. I'm playing a fortuneteller. Do you remember my fortunetelling days in The Funhouse? I think that scene in the basement with the monster is one of the funniest things I've ever seen. My accent is so amazing.

That's the scene where you give the monster a handjob--which is a typically bold role for you.
Not that I go around quoting critics, but Rex Reed said that when I did The Sentinel--playing the mad dead crazed German lesbian zombie ballet dancer--that the movie proved that Sylvia Miles will play anything and do it well. Some of those films hold up, don't they? They're not campy.

And they're memorable. The Great Scout & Cathouse Thursday is just a bawdy Western comedy--but it's full of amazing performances.
We were in Durango, New Mexico, through Christmas and New Year's with Oliver Reed and--are you ready for this cast?--Lee Marvin, Oliver Reed, Robert Culp, Strother Martin, Kay Lenz, and Elizabeth Ashley (Picture: 1). I recommended her for that part. I paid her back for getting me in 92 in the Shade. Sally Kellerman couldn't do the role, and I said, "Get Elizabeth Ashley."

There was nothing in Durango. This hotel we were in, I had the address memorized for years. The address translated into "nowhere" in Spanish. We'd all have dinner at a long table every night, and they'd all start to throw turkey carcasses at each other. It was the craziest experience.

Was it a matter of Hollywood not knowing what to do with you?
I was in New York, I wasn't in Hollywood. Some people say that was a stupid decision. I did the pilot for what became The Dick Van Dyke Show, playing the character who was eventually played by Rose Marie. I wanted to have this great career in the theater. I'd already done The Iceman Cometh, and I was doing The Balcony at the Circle in the Square Theater. That's heady stuff. I would've ended up making $5,000 a week for The Dick Van Dyke Show--and this was in 1960. I turned it down. I didn't know that in Hollywood, you could kill somebody, but nothing is worse than turning down money.

It was pretty brilliant casting to put you in Farewell My Lovely. You really had that '50s noir look.
I got Farewell My Lovely because I did 92 in the Shade. It was the same producer. Elizabeth Ashley recommended me. She was having an affair with the famous writer--oh, what's his name?--Thomas McGuane. He had already met Peter Fonda's wife, and he and Peter Fonda ended up switching wives. This was just before all that, and Elizabeth recommended me.

That was your second Oscar nomination, and it was for such a classically Hollywood role.
You know, when I first went out to Hollywood, Barbara Stanwyck wanted to meet me. I didn't know anyone when I did Midnight Cowboy. I was still trying to make a buck at my art. Barbara was very friendly. She took me to lunch at this famous restaurant in the Beverly Hills Hotel. I met a lot of those people from the old studio system.

Here's a good example: We honored Esther Williams at the Academy in New York. I'd never met Esther Williams before. But she came up to me there and said, "Oh, Sylvia, I'm so happy to see you," just like an old friend. I didn't know her, but these were the people who nominated me for Midnight Cowboy. They only knew me like I know Gwyneth Paltrow (Picture: 1 - 2), who I nominated for Shakespeare in Love. But I worked with Gwyneth's mother. The first thing she ever did, summer stock up in Massachusetts.

And then you played an aging Hollywood actress in Heat.
Heat was a wonderful experience. I met Andy Warhol and all those people when I shot Midnight Cowboy. They were friendly with [director] John Schlesinger. I became socially part of that group, and I kept standing by Joe Dallesandro, hoping that Andy and [director] Paul Morrissey would see me with Joe and envision me working with him. I knew we'd have great chemistry together. Joe didn't talk much, thank God. After standing next to Joe for about a year, Paul asked me to lunch at MOMA, and he told me he was thinking about making this movie about the seamier side of Hollywood, based on Sunset Boulevard.

Morrissey must have been really happy with you.
Yes and no. He was always suspicious of professional actors. He thought non-professionals would be better, doing it R-E-A-L instead of R-E-E-L. But that's the kind of actor I am: R-E-A-L. I made up every line of my dialogue, and I won the Best Actress award in about thirteen countries. I had a wonderful time. I have no complaints--not like people like Taylor Mead, complaining that Andy never gave them any money.

You have an amazing look in Heat, and it's a reminder that you became a sex symbol fairly late in life.
Everything I did, I did late in life. Look at how late it is now, and I'm still going. I went to a Christmas party a few years ago, and I got a ride back with the famous Broadway director Hal Prince. I don't know what prompted me to say this, but I asked him for a ride back uptown. We left the party, and apropos of nothing, he said, "Well, Sylvia, you've had a career." When someone says it that way, it means they never thought you'd have a career. I said, "Hal, I'm having a career. I'm not out of it yet."