As her latest movie, Holy Water, arrives to rent on DVD, iconic actress Linda Hamilton chats with blockbuster.co.uk's Marshall Julius about the pitfalls, dangers and temptations of Hollywood living.
She faced a pair of Terminators, won the heart of a Beast, survived Kong and
James Cameron, and lived to tell the tales. She's
Linda Hamilton, as easy going and hospitable in real life, as Sarah Connor, the greatest kick ass heroine in all of action cinema, is hostile and intense. But that was then, almost thirty years now since she ran for dear life from a cyberised
Schwarzenegger, and this is now. And right now she's happily promoting an altogether different kind of movie,
Holy Water, a gentle, rural comedy set in a sleepy Irish village that's both enlivened and invigorated by a stolen stash of Viagra that's hastily dumped in a well and subsequently dissolves in the local water supply. Rent it now on
DVD, in store and online from blockbuster.co.uk.
"I liked the script a lot," she says with conviction. "I championed the screenplay for a couple of years before they made it. It was just so small, funny and perfectly formed, I had to be involved. It reminded me of all those little BBC shows, things like Last of the Summer Wine, which my parents watch every day of their life. It just felt right to do it."
When it comes to choosing roles, says the actress, instinct is key. If it feels right, do it. If not, no matter the financial rewards, avoid, avoid, avoid. "Unfortunately for my bank account," she explains, "I cannot bring myself to do work that might pay a huge amount but doesn't have any real value for me as an actor or a person, or goes against what I believe in. I don't have to be in synch with every character that I play, but if it seriously clashes with my nature, I can't do it."
Back in the day, Hamilton went to acting school with Saw star
Tobin Bell, but while she's happy he's done so well for himself, torture porn tops her list of Don'ts. "Oh my God, I turned down so much money this year, which I really could have used," she says, adding, "because I'm not as rich as everyone thinks. There was a film I was offered that I really wanted to sell my soul for, because it was going to be a serious pay day. Actually it was going to be a franchise, so it was going to be a series of serious pay days. But I couldn't do it. It was just too nasty. I could play a killer, if the movie I played her in had something to say, or some value other than slasher horror. But I couldn't be involved with a movie that represented everything that's wrong with the world. Senseless violence that adds up to nothing. I just couldn't be a part of it."
Terminator's Sarah Connor, on the other hand, was a part the actress embraced with unbound enthusiasm. "She was strong but damaged. A real person in an unreal situation." Regardless, Hamilton turned down the chance to reprise the role in
Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines. "The thing is," she says, "there was no payday on the first or second movie. The company that made those movies went bankrupt so there were no residuals. What happens is they give you a small salary when you make the movie, because they know you're going to make three times that amount from residuals. It's a big package. But there was no such return for those films, so I just wasn't motivated to make a third. Not that it's all about the money, but the first two took so much out of me, it's only right that you should be rewarded for your work. These days I have friends who send me a dollar every time they see a Terminator film. So if you see one, don't forget: send me a dollar!"
Back in 1984, when Hamilton first worked with Schwarzenegger, she made no secret of her disdain for the Austrian muscle mountain. "I can't believe he turned out to be the Governor of California," she says, smiling and shaking her head. "When we made the first Terminator, I was first naysayer. I was like, 'Arnold Schwarzenegger? I don't think so...' I was a complete snob. I was a serious New York actress, and when I considered moving to LA, casting people warned me, 'Don't do it. You'll lose your soul.' But move I did and now here I was, working with Arnold, going, 'I'm not sure about this...' Eventually, though, I came around. He was a good guy. And though it didn't make me rich, Terminator definitely opened some doors for me."
Outside the Terminator franchise Hamilton remains best known for playing opposite
Hellboy's
Ron Perlman in late Eighties cult TV sensation Beauty and the Beast, and it's while discussing her role on the show that the actress reveals a particular talent for telling tales of behind-the-scenes horror. "It was only when I worked a scene with tarantulas that I realised how arachnophobic I was," she reveals. "I could handle one, I found, but when they sent a whole bunch of them my way, I started crying hysterically. It was good for the scene, but not for me. I was just so scared!"
Pressed for more on-set tales of woe, Hamilton delivers. "Once I was bitten by a snake, another time I almost drowned, then of course there were the killer bees." Ah yes. The killer bees. "We were in the desert shooting a film, but they hadn't scouted the location very well. Turns out we were standing on a hive of killer bees and they attacked us. They chased the entire movie company down a mountain, stinging us all the way. Months later, I had to have a stinger surgically removed from under my eye."
As juicy as these stories are, they pale in comparison with Hamilton's memories of shooting
Terminator 2: Judgment Day, the 1991 sequel she made with future ex-husband Cameron, who she married in 1997, had a daughter with, and then split from in 1999. "One day I went deaf, and the next I got shell shock...
"To this day I have serious hearing loss in one ear. We were shooting a scene in an elevator and I'd forgotten to put my earplugs in. The doors closed, we had shotguns and started blasting, and suddenly I was in agony. I fell to my knees in pain. I thought I'd been shot. That was how bad it was. I knew we weren't using real ammunition, that they were squibs, little explosives that double for bullets, but I was sure that something has misfired and I'd been hit by shrapnel or something. The noise was so intense, so extreme, I'll never forget it. So I fell to the ground, but thought 'shit, nobody's noticing, nobody's stopping,' so I got back up again, picked up my gun and kept on going. That was the professional thing to do. But it hurt like Hell.
"Another day I spent being shot at the whole time, running around on broken glass, throwing myself every which way. By late afternoon I was totally out of it, but had no clue what was wrong with me. James was saying, 'I want you to look over there, duck under here, and crawl over here,' but I just staggered and blurted out, 'I can't do all of those things at once.' I was like, totally confused. Then someone told me that I probably had shell shock. Like soldiers in a war under heavy fire. It's what happens when you're surrounded by violence and noise."
Fortunately, says Hamilton, she survived the experience without any lasting mental damage. "From my marriage, definitely," she quips, "but not the movie. Definitely got some post-traumatic stress from the marriage though."
Today, at 53, Hamilton appears happy and healthy and it's been a good long time, she says, since she had any sort of near-death experience. There is one thing, however, that continues to haunt her from those early days, and it's something she'll never escape. Something big, terrifying and awful, from her first encounter with the Terminator in 1984: her hairstyle. "I can't even say it was a wig," she says, eyes wide in disbelief. "It was my real hair – so bad! So now, whenever a young actress says to me, 'What advice would you give an actress trying to break into the business,' I always say the same thing: 'Never be put on film in the Eighties - you'll always regret it!'"
