Julianne Moore: «I built a house on the foundation of my loneliness»

A damp haze rises over the Venetian Lagoon, blurring the clarity of a landscape that has changed little over the past five centuries. Tables in the restaurant are covered with white wool-colored tablecloths, and a smoky awning carefully hangs over the heads of visitors.

The sad nebula favorably sets off the brightness of her red hair and the golden scattering of freckles. Against this phlegmatic background, she is the focus of joyful colors. Moore looks like a wealthy tourist, a visitor to Venice, a regular on the Lido beach. But of course it is not. Julianne Moore on the island of Lido, where the Venice Film Festival takes place, presents two films — «In Short» by Alexander Payne and «Suburbicon» by George Clooney.

She’s here on business. And today I seem to be her fourth interviewer. Moore says that she had breakfast with the first, drank tea with the second, sat by the sea with the third, and here I am. And a garden-restaurant, an awning and an evening mist. But if she had not told me about her predecessors, it would never have occurred to me that my interview was not the first. She listens attentively to questions and answers them seriously, she does not save words and shares her memories.

I assume that she must be tired of the festival fuss… But in response, Julianna looks, slightly squinting, at the lagoon and barely noticeably smiles. My sympathetic remark seems ridiculous to her. And she explains why. She always explains.

Julianne Moore: No, absolutely not. I usually live a pretty quiet life. Our New York home is in the West Village. Breakfasts, dinners, containers for school snacks. Husband (Bart Freundlich — playwright and director. — Approx. ed.). His work, his shooting. Family affairs and conversations. My sister and brother. Bart’s cousins. Yoga. Some meetings. Books, scripts. Hiking in the Film Forum (one of the oldest art-house cinemas in New York. — Approx. ed.). My life is extremely measured.

I don’t seem to have given a single non-festival interview after three o’clock in the afternoon, that is, after school hours. And I didn’t agree to any big shooting during the holidays — after all, we always spend them with my husband and children in Montauk, which is three hours from New York. You would say «dacha». I almost never agree to shoot far from New York. I can go to Hollywood for a week, but no more. Whatever role I am offered, if I need to work, say, in Hungary, I will answer: “Of course, I agree. Just reschedule, please, filming in Connecticut.

So festivals and everything that accompanies them is more like a kind of vacation for me. A way to switch, finally live a social, and not just a personal and filming life. And then, now I see that I have to leave the house for a while — I have a full-fledged teenager there. My daughter Liv is 16, she needs a break from me. Caleb, the son, is already 19, he is in college, which was a separate drama for my maternal self, but I seem to have survived it.

You are a generous mother.

Well no. I may have figured it all out too late. But there are times when life speaks directly to you.

For example?

Well, for example, shortly before leaving here, I cooked Liv’s breakfast. I always do it — it’s iron. She baked waffles, and Liv dropped one on herself. Well, the stain, of course. I tell her: «Let me quickly wash it.» Her: «No need.» I say: «Yes, I’m fast.» The daughter is more insistent: «No need.» Me: “But the stain will annoy you all day.” And Liv: “No, mom, it will annoy you all day.” I lagged behind. She’s right. At some point you have to stop being a mother to your children. And become a mother of adults. Recognize their right to live a life in which there is less and less of me.

Did your parents do the same?

They were not masters of themselves. Even now it seems to me that a significant part of me and my life is a consequence of this. My father was in the military, we moved all the time, I didn’t go to the same school for more than a year and a half. And each new environment had to adapt. Hence my increased adaptability — I get along with any environment. Nobody and nothing annoys me, I don’t get tired of people. As a child, I learned to draw conclusions about what I saw, it was vitally important to understand how they dress here, how they usually behave. But the main conclusion: the way you behave does not mean at all that you are real.

And I’m also quick-witted and able to imitate — which is important in our business. I realized that no matter how different people are in new places, inside we are all the same. This knowledge greatly simplifies existence!

The life of my mother also affected me. We were very close. In a way, I am a product of her life. You know, she and dad had the happiest marriage in the world. They met when they were 11 years old, fell in love with each other and did not part until my mother’s death … But our happy family deprived her of her own life. It wasn’t until my sister and brother and I grew up that she was finally able to graduate from college, and later get her degree as a psychologist and social worker.

Mom always insisted that my sister and I must get an education, become independent, and then think about the family. I went to college at 18, and my parents were far, too far away — in Germany, where my father served … This also distorted something in me, directed me on a path that, under other circumstances, I might not have chosen. I just constantly felt lonely, neither new friends nor a new life could replace our family for me. And so I got married at the age of 23.

My marriage was unsuccessful, because I was not looking for a man, not a partner for life — I wanted to find a new home, breathe in that familiar family air. The house is built on the foundation of relationships, and I tried my best to create it, because I felt lonely, I created the foundation from my loneliness … I was in a hurry, I was worried that I would not have time.

For the second time, did you manage to build the kind of family you dreamed of?

It seems to me that this is at least a full-fledged house. We have sports sections and French classes, discussions of books and films. My kids go to premieres with me, Bart and I don’t miss a single Liv and Caleb game — we both play basketball, which their father is passionate about.

Yes, our dad is about joy, sports and fun … And mom is about languages, cleaning, accuracy, commitment and other tediousness. I am not kidding. I’m obsessed with cleanliness, I can’t breathe in chaos. No, I know that there is a special type of personality — «chaotic». What to me is a nightmare of disorder is their version of order… I’m glad they can live too. But not next to me. I need order — in order to think, to do business.

And you do not tyrannize at home by any chance?

So I do everything myself, I don’t force them. And home, you know, do not protest. Here is the focus. When I was still going to kindergarten, my father went to war, to Vietnam, my mother and I went to live with my grandparents. I remember very well how I felt fear and anxiety in adults, it scared me so much. Their lives were blown up by that war… I was always afraid that my children would have to experience this feeling that the life of adults is disordered. Maybe that’s why I always fight for order in the house — so that the children have the confidence that their life is in order?

But how can one live with this thirst for order in our elemental world?

Do you think this is a rhetorical question? For me, no. I know the answer. It is necessary to bring order into the world, to balance the cacophony with harmony. Wash floors. Restore connections. Only we ourselves can bring meaning to the chaos of the world. You know, I got British citizenship for these reasons. My mother was Scottish, she came to the States as a child. And all her life she spoke with a Scottish accent. I actually wrote a book about her — My mother is a foreigner, but not for me. For all the kids whose moms are not like other moms…

So — my whole life I considered myself a Scot. I went to my Greenock — her cousins ​​were there, she adored them … Mom died 8 years ago, she was only 68 … It’s so unfair! Septic shock, a massive bacterial infection… In fact, overnight… When Britain passed a law that the descendants of British-born females could receive citizenship (previously only those who had fathers and grandfathers from there were eligible), I immediately filled out the questionnaire. I’m British now, like my mother. For me, this is … the restoration of the interrupted connection with her, with her homeland, which is also mine. In general, I am sure that you can bring harmony into your little life.

And yet, few succeed!

Well, I didn’t always succeed, I say the same: from 20 to 30 years old, I lived in vanity and unrest. In an attempt to work as much as possible, to do everything, to be wherever possible. What does «nowhere» really mean? I wanted to have a family, but pursued a career — it didn’t work out very well, just because in fact I dreamed of something else …

And when I realized that I was “nowhere”, I went to a psychotherapist. She helped me understand one interesting thing. The fact is that we live our youth in the conviction that we must achieve the maximum professionally, but our personal life will develop by itself, we don’t have to work on it. But the trick is that personal success is as much a consequence of work as career achievement. Personal life must be dealt with, it should also invest effort, mental abilities. It is necessary to leave space in the head and in life for feelings, novels, desires. Once I realized this…

… everything started to improve? And you met Bart?

Well, yes — and lived happily ever after! No, I met Bart later. I just became calmer. I stopped striving, tearing, regretting. And in some ways she became bolder, abandoned the habit of adapting to any circumstances. I started building my own circumstances.

But it’s curious: both your main roles and your family — all this happened when you were already over 30. At this time, it was customary for actresses of your generation to think about the inevitability of leaving the profession. Moreover, the most memorable of your roles — in «Short Cut» by Robert Altman — was very peculiar …

Well, yes. My heroine argues with her husband, walking around the living room half-dressed — literally, in a blouse and naked from the waist. And, I must say, in this form, neither before nor after, no one appeared in a dramatic movie. Now there is a legend about it. According to her, after one of my performances, Altman told me that he had a role, but I only had to play it naked from the waist down. Allegedly, I answered him: “And you are lucky — I really am a redhead.” But there was no such conversation.

Is this role the courage of despair?

What’s especially bold about that? Actors play roles. Directors have different artistic goals. Actors must match them. And in general, I am against the fact that our profession was given some kind of romantic meaning. I prefer a different approach.

For the role in the film “Still Alice” (in 2015, Moore received an Oscar for her. – Approx. ed.), I took a test for the likelihood of developing Alzheimer’s disease, my heroine suffers from this disease. There are many tasks, very tricky — for memory, for reactions. So the conclusion was: «You are normal.» I was waiting for praise, because I demonstrated acting heights of memorization … And medicine — it knows two parameters: the norm and pathology. Here is my approach. And a minimum of pathos. I am generally a supporter of a direct view of the world. And in that sense, I’m «Still Julie.» Julie Smith.

What do you mean?

This is my real name. It was impossible with him in the cinema, on TV, on stage. There were too many of us, Julie Smith. And I took a pseudonym — Julie plus Anna — that was my mother’s name, and Moore — my father’s second name. I deliberately did not change the name, but only added new details. And didn’t offend anyone. Yes, I’m still Julie. Everyone calls me that. And for myself, I am exclusively Julie Smith.