JoBeth Williams: EPISODE LINK

Transcripts:

Colleen: Welcome back, everybody. We are thrilled to have Jo Beth Williams back on the show today. Welcome.

JoBeth: Thanks. Great to be back.

Colleen: Well, it’s, you know, I was telling Bridgett, one of the clips that we did when you were on the first time about the skeletons in the pool from Poltergeist was one of the most watched clips on our channel.

Bridgett: Like it was insane how many people are still commenting.

Colleen: They definitely found that interesting. But you are in a new movie now and it’s called Not Without Hope. And I remember the story, being from Florida in the 2009 story about the football players going out to to fish. And we’ll talk about that. Bridgett just saw the film recently. What made you want to go back and do this film?

JoBeth: You know, when I read the script, I was just so emotionally involved in the story. It’s such a powerful story. And knowing it was a true story made it even more engrossing. And I loved my character. I’ve played a mom before

who has rescued her child. And that’s something that’s very dear to me, the idea of what’s happened to my child. And that’s what this woman is going through. And it had a very…

appealing director Joe Carnahan who has done a lot of movies, The Gray with Liam Neeson and The A Team and just many, mostly guy movies, I guess you’d say, but uh this story, I think the family is kind of, even though we’re not kind of the at the forefront of a lot of the story,

we are the glue that holds the story together because we are the ones that you see waiting to find out what has happened to our sons. And I just found that very emotionally powerful. And I wanted to work with Joe Carnahan, who I think is a wonderful director.

We were shooting in Malta, which was very appealing because I’d never been there. So there were a lot of things that really drew me into the story. And having seen the movie, I think it’s very powerful. It’s heartbreaking in some ways, but it’s hopeful in other ways.

Bridgett: Yes. You know, what I did like about that part was it was showing the waiting.

Your character and the fiancé of the character of who plays your son, and then the family of the football player that had a child and a wife, that part, it showed the waiting. What do you do when you’re waiting in a horrible situation like that? Did you get to meet the mother of Nick, his actual mother?

JoBeth: I did not get to meet her. Marsha Skyler, I think, is her name. No, I, you know, I found this story, the character, so compelling. And I would love to have met her, but I don’t know that she wanted to kind of put herself in that situation. I don’t know.

But it was a very, very powerful shooting process, too, because we were kind of on this island, rather isolated. The cast was wonderful. Josh Duhamel, I had a great scene with him. He was just fantastic to work with. And the…

The meaning of being that woman, me, my character, being in that situation was so strong that it just, it seemed to be there. Not every character really kind of comes easily, but that one certainly was something that I really felt close to.

Bridgett: And you’ve had, like you said, you’ve played a mother a lot. I mean, I remember your role in Adam, the story of Adam Walsh.

You’ve really had to dig deep. You know, these are traumatizing to dig deep there.

JoBeth: They are in a funny way. They certainly are. And especially if you’re playing a real person, which I was in the, in Adam’s story, I was playing Reve’ Walsh. She and John Walsh had lost their six-year-old son, Adam, was missing for a long time. And then they found him,

having been murdered. And I met Reve’ and she was around, she and John both when we were shooting it. So I felt really a sense of need to be true to her character, not to do an imitation of her, of course, but to bring what I could of what I sensed about her,

her personally into the character. You never want to do a caricature of someone real that you’re playing. And I felt that way about Marsha Schuyler because even though I didn’t know her, her presence was very strong in the story and really came through. And so I wanted to be true to that. I wanted her not to feel that somehow…

I had undercut the difficulty of what they went through.

Colleen: That sounds like a big responsibility for anybody to take on a role that is a living person. And I wonder, when you are reading these scripts, because you’ve done so much incredible work, what jumps out at you on the page that says, I need to do this? This is something that I feel drawn to do.

JoBeth: Well, I think first, it’s the emotional life of the character.

that draws me? You know, is this something I can relate to? Do I feel this script is truthful in telling this story and in creating this character? Does that feel truthful to me? Of course, I look at the overall script and I say, you know, is this compelling? Is it well written? But for me, there has to be an emotional

connection in some way, even in comedies, you know, even in the comedies that I’ve done, you have to find as an actor the sort of through truth of the character to make it real and to make it believable.

Bridgett: You know, and we’re all three mothers. In the movie, when you make that phone call.

It’s like that sense at the beginning, that first phone call when you say,  “Hey, there’s a bad storm coming.”

I know all three of us have done something like that in that situation. I think it really came through. And also in the movie, they talk about the orange jacket that Nick is wearing. And I just remember watching that and I thought, something’s going to happen with that orange jacket.

Making fun of him for wearing the orange jacket. And he’s like, “my mother bought me this orange jacket.”

JoBeth: You know, you do that as a mom. You think, OK, I want him to be people to see him so they don’t run over him or whatever.

Bridgett: I’m just curious, too, as your character, how did you reach in to find that hope, the hope for your child in that character?

JoBeth: Yes. I mean, I think that’s what kept me going. That’s what kept his mother going. You know, you don’t give up hope until you know. But the not knowing is so painful and so horrible.

I had that scene with Josh Duhamel where I said to him, “is my son alive? Tell me or is he not alive?” And you want to know, you know, you want to know. And yet you don’t want to know. And so there’s this ongoing sort of push pull. I loved working with Floriana Lima, who played the girlfriend of Zach (Nick), and that we both were trying to shore each other up to maintain some kind of faith that Nick was still alive. It was really wonderful to have another woman with me going through that.

And she was great, great to work with. And the whole cast was just, I thought, wonderful. Colleen: With roles that really are intense like that, you’ve done many of them. How do you release that? How do you not take that home with you at the end of the day? Or do you? JoBeth: Well, it’s hard. It’s hard to let go of that. You go home and you say, okay,

First of all, I’ve got to be up at 5 a.m. in the morning to shoot again. So I’ve got to get myself to bed and get myself together. But it’s really hard to let go of that. Even though you know that this is not reality, it is real in many ways because you are using your own fears and passions and sometimes even images from your own life.

to bring this character to life. So it’s not, it’s not something I personally can just drop at the front door, you know, and go in and say, “hi, let’s have dinner.” It kind of lingers with you. Bridgett: Yeah. It’s just those scenes too.  I kept thinking while I was watching it, I wonder if those guys got sick and all that water and all that rain.

Were they OK? I mean, really, that was very scary to watch the filming of it, the filming and the storm and everything.

JoBeth: I want to tell you, they’ve spent two months in that tank, which is, you know, the reason we were in Malta was because it has one of the largest tanks, you know, filming tanks in the world. The tank opens out onto the ocean so that it looks like it’s a continuous.

ocean and two months they spent in there underwater, getting out, you know being put in a place to sit for a few minutes and given water and stuff and then going back in I don’t know how they did it!  I had enough of that in in poltergeist!  I was like, I’m having flashbacks from what we originally talked about!

Yeah, I was so grateful that I was not shooting in that tank.

Colleen: That must have been really hard on the guys.

Bridgett:  especially they go underwater to get things out of the boat and get it back out. And I thought, oh, my goodness, that was incredible footage. And you were talking about, the different roles that you’ve done. I mean, you were a mom in Poltergeist and you’ve had a lot of roles, though, where.

something super emotional is going on, just like within Poltergeist, getting Carol Ann back through the whole thing, and Adam, you also played Mary Beth Whitehead,

JoBeth: Baby M yeah

Bridgett: which is a whole different arc.

Colleen: Are you saying she likes intense films, Bridgett? Like you could really get into that intensity. Do you look for a comedy after that? Do you say I need a good comedy?

JoBeth: I try. I have done some comedies and I and I love doing comedies, you know, but I mean, for some reason, I guess I’m drawn to these kind of

really emotionally involving characters. But I love doing comedy and I’ve, you know, Stir Crazy, was like my second movie with Gene Wilder and Richard Pryor and Sidney Poitier directing and that was really fun. And I did one, a Blake Edwards movie with Ellen Barkin where I played a

kind of a bad woman and that was a really fun character. You know, it’s, it’s nice to kind of shake it up if you can.

Bridgett: Was one of your first ones, was that Kramer versus Kramer?

JoBeth:  That was my very first.

Colleen: Another intense film.

JoBeth: It was intense for me because I’d never done a nude scene before.

Colleen:  Oh, my. How do you prep for that?

JoBeth: And I’d never made a movie before. So this was my first introduction to, you know, movie making. And I was going to do a nude scene with a five-year-old child, which, of course, I then considered, would I be paying his shrink bills for the rest of his life? So that was interesting. And I was really nervous.

Fortunately, I was working with Robert Benton, the director, who made things as comfortable as possible.

Colleen: How do you prep for knowing you’re walking into a nude scene and they’re filmed out of order, so it could be any day that you have to do that?

JoBeth: Well, first you go on a diet.

Colleen: Good point. Okay.

JoBeth: And you spend a lot of time looking at how you’re doing. Oh, God. And you try and do a little bit of workout, you know. Fortunately, I was still, you know, in my late 20s, so I was okay. But, yeah, it is intense. And I have to say Dustin was very kind. He really was.

He knew I was really nervous. He knew it was my first movie. And so the scene started out with he and I in bed, asleep, naked under the covers. And then I get up naked and put on my glasses and then go out into the hall and run into the little boy. And so Dustin said, now I’m going to make this more comfortable for you. I’m going to be naked too.

I don’t know if that would make me more comfortable. I don’t really think that might be the best.

Colleen:  How thoughtful of him.

JoBeth: What he did was he put on, I didn’t know this, but he put on a

feathered G-string. When we were under the covers and when they started rolling, he threw off the covers and he jumped out and he danced around in this orange feathered G-string. And it was so hilarious! You know, the whole crew, we were all laughing so hard that it really kind of broke the ice for me. So, you know, when I had to actually go cold turkey and drop my robe you know do the scene, it actually was a little easier because it was funny. It was a funny scene and once I got into playing it, it was fine.

Bridgett: And Justin Henry was little at the time right. He didn’t react. I mean was he actually looking at you? I guess you said you were with a five-year-old.

JoBeth:  he was totally right there, you know this tall,  uh looking up at me and he was so not interested, not worried. His mother said she talked to him the night before she said “now Justin, you’re gonna be in this scene with JoBeth, and she’s not gonna have any clothes on” and she said “now how do you feel about that” and he said “I don’t know mom she’s awful skinny”.

And I thought, wait a minute, a critic at five. Come on. I don’t need this.

Colleen: That’s too funny. What a sweet story of the whole experience. If you have to do your first nude scene, it sounds like everybody’s trying to make you feel good.

JoBeth: They really did. I mean, they cleared this out. You know, they do as much as they can to get rid of everybody who doesn’t actually have to really be there. But yeah, it was interesting. It was a learning process.

Colleen: You’ve been on so many different sets. What do you find has changed in sets from the time you were filming something like Kramer vs. Kramer to now when you’re filming on these sets that have so much more like AI and all the other stuff that’s involved? How is it different on sets?

JoBeth: Well, I have to admit, I haven’t done a lot of things that have a lot of AI in them. I mean, certainly I know that, they’re editing and they’re going to do a lot of, add a lot of effects and all of that. But I haven’t, I mean, really, Poltergeist, was the one where I really, we did a lot of blue screen and were screaming at nothing and didn’t know what the what the monster was going to be. And Craig Nelson turned to me and said, “what if it’s like Bambi, you know, and we look like idiots.” And so you have to kind of have a lot of faith in the people you’re working with that it’s going to be good. And since Spielberg had written it and was producing it, I figured he’s not going to, you know, mess around with this.

I mean, I guess now that television, you know, has certainly changed quite a bit. I think streaming has changed things. But I haven’t personally done stuff where there was a lot of AI involved yet. But it is concerning as an actor to look ahead and think, hmm, how long are they going to need us? You know? And I said to my husband, John Pasquin, who was a director of both films and television, we are really lucky that we came into the business at the time that we did. Because, you know, it was sort of the heyday, if you will, of real actors, real directors. And, you know, now TikTok is doing, you know, three-minute vertical films, which I don’t think I’m going to be called to do a lot of. And I’m grateful. You know, it’s just it’s a whole different world now, and attention spans are much shorter, and I’m just really glad that I’ve been able to do what I’ve done.

Bridgett: And you’ve done work before with SAG in the past, and how is that going? I know that SAG-AFTRA now, they’re really trying to work to make sure that the people in acting and the people are just taken care of in that aspect. What’s going on with that?

JoBeth: Well, our union is really trying to create parameters for AI so that the actors aren’t left out in the cold, unable to make a living, being used in an improper way, without permission. So, you know, this is a new can of worms that has opened.

I have to say the union is very intensely into it, trying to, you know, make reasonable rules to protect us. It’s a whole new world in a way. And so it’s hard to know how it’s going to end up or, you know, it’s an ongoing process, obviously. But I keep saying, you know,

Haven’t these people watched the horror movies? Haven’t they watched the sci-fi movies? Didn’t they see where, wasn’t it Johnny Depp where he, even though he was dead, he was still controlling the computers of the world. Didn’t they see those? Why do they continue to pursue this?

Colleen: It’s a very good question because we wonder, do they not know that it’s eventually going to get smart enough to know why are we listening to humans when we’re smarter than humans at a certain point? But people see dollar signs and I think that’s all that they see. And I think what you were saying about actors, it really applies to everyone. We all have children, adult children.

We worry about their job security and what’s going to happen with this next year. From what I understand, you’re a new grandmother. So am I. Congratulations.

JoBeth:Congratulations. Back to you.

Colleen: You had a little girl, right, Lily?

JoBeth: Yes. Yes. Very good.

Colleen: And my daughter had a little boy named Miles. But you worry now about the next generation. Where are they going to find? What is the world going to be like for them?

And that’s a new, you worry about your kids, but your grandkids, it’s almost like, am I going to be here to protect them? Am I going to be here to see what’s going on? Does that give you pause to think like, what is going to happen even in the next generation?

JoBeth: Absolutely. I mean, I…

I look at my sons and I think, boy, the world is really changing for them. Now, granted, they grew up with technology in a way that I didn’t. So they have much more understanding of all of this. They use it in different ways than I do. But I do. I look at someone like my seven-month-old granddaughter and I think…

What will the world be for her when she’s in her 20s and 30s? What will jobs be? It’s hard to imagine. I feel like my grandmother going, “well, I’m not getting in one of those plane things. If God had wanted us to fly, you’d have given us a wings.” In my day. Yeah, yeah.

Colleen:  So true. AI is affecting every aspect of the world. And it is, you know, it’s another concerning thing to think about. What was it like becoming a grandmother for the first time? JoBeth: Oh, it was absolutely thrilling. It was so thrilling. It was she is just.

I’m not prejudiced at all, but she’s a beautiful baby, a happy baby. The pictures are all of her smiling and sort of reaching out for the world. And it’s so invigorating to see this life, this little life that she’s just in love with the world, fascinated by it.

And it just brings you joy. You know, it brings you joy to see the newness of everything and her pleasure in it. Not all babies, I think, find pleasure in all the new stuff. They’re a little, some are overwhelmed, but she is just fascinated with absolutely everything.

Bridgett: Oh, that’s so exciting. I’m a little jealous of both of you because I don’t have grandchildren, but I have a lot of great nieces and nephews.

Colleen: Yes, and you will absolutely get it. It’s just, it’s so, first off, you don’t have to discipline, which is lovely, okay? And you can do it, you give them back.

at the end of the day so you can have your downtime.

JoBeth: that’s ideal, “here she’s wet here she is”

Colleen:  yes exactly but it’s just there’s so many it’s like you it’s

You earn it. You raise the kids and this is your prize. You’ve earned a grandchild. And it’s just. Exactly. It’s such a joy. So I hope you enjoyed her first Christmas and everything that goes with that.

JoBeth: What I just love to see is my son holding her. And this guy, you know, this guy in his 30s that I’ve known all his life.

And to see him, how tender he is with her and how gentle, and it just makes my heart sing because I think it will change him in really good ways too. You know, just having a child does that to you, I think, hopefully.

Colleen: Yeah. I agree. And I think it’s such a gift that we get to watch it because not everybody…

lives long enough to see their grandchildren. So it’s a privilege and I’m glad you’re enjoying it because I think it’s the best thing ever. I tell Bridgett all the time, this is the best because I’m not, like if I’m putting him to bed, I’m not thinking of the 20 things I have to do. I have to go do the dishes and then the laundry. Like I’m just sitting there with him. I’m present in that moment and I don’t think we got to do that very often with the kids when they were little.

JoBeth: No, you can’t when they’re your own because you’re, A, you’re exhausted because you didn’t get much sleep and, you know, B, you have to feed them and, you know, change them and every moment watch them and pay attention. And it’s pretty exhausting, especially the early years and especially if you’re working, if you’re a working mom.

It’s a lot, but yeah, being a grandma.

Bridgett: My husband and I, we live in the same subdivision as Colleen. The day after the baby was born, we were pulling around and we saw Colleen and her husband walking and  they might as well have been floating.

They were so funny. We pulled over and they were like  “The nurses said that this baby is really pretty. Most of them look like they’ve been through a war, but this baby’s pretty.”

JoBeth:  Our child is gorgeous. Exactly. Some of those others are wrinkled and kind of ugly, but not mine. It’s just such a beautiful time of life.

Colleen: I’m glad you’re enjoying it. What’s next? Are you looking at working some more or taking some time off?

JoBeth: Well, I just shot a movie with Pedro Pascal.

Bridgett:  Ohhhhhh!

JoBeth:  It’s a very small part.

Colleen:  I’m glad you mentioned that. Bridgett’s heart just fluttered there.

JoBeth: Yeah, he is pretty great.

It’s a small part, you know, it’s like two scenes, but I love him and he evidently asked for me to do this role. So that was really amazing.

Bridgett: Oh, wow, that’s awesome. Yeah, so that’s cool.

JoBeth: And at the moment, I am just getting ready for the Actor Awards because I’m one of the producers of the show and we are no longer the SAG Awards. We are the Actor Awards presented by…

SAG-AFTRA. Okay. Oh, and that’s this year? The first time it’s been called the Actor Award? Yes, we changed it in August.

Bridgett: Oh, that sounds so fun. It sounds like a lot of work, too, but a lot of fun, too.

JoBeth: It is, but I’m glad to be involved in it.

Colleen: With the Actors Awards, how has it changed with streaming? Because there’s so many different avenues now.

JoBeth: We’re on Netflix. Okay, so we are presented by Netflix. This is our third year with them. And part of the reason, one of the reasons for the name change, I mean, part of it had to do with the fact that

we were no longer just the SAG union, we’re the SAG-Aftra union, and we had kept SAG awards because the SAG-Aftra awards was such a long sort of awkward name, and we were so well-known in the other way. But also because being on Netflix now, we’re streaming worldwide, and we have a much larger worldwide audience.

Most of whom don’t know what SAG-AFTRA is, but when you say the Actor Awards, which is actors voting on actors and only actors, people get it. And they’re always interested in actors seeing performances. So that’s one of the draws to us changing our name. But we still stay presented by SAG-AFTRA, so our union is still involved.

Colleen:  Do you have involvement in who sits where? Is it like a wedding plan? Like there’s some people that can’t sit near each other. Is that an odd question? It’s just, I always think that has to be so difficult to figure out who sits where. I mean, I know shows sit together, but still people who don’t get along. And are you involved in that?

JoBeth:  I not personally, we have one of the hired

tech people who is a whiz and has been doing it for many years, Jennifer, plans the room. And I mean, it’s a lot of people and a lot of tables. But the main thing is you have to kind of figure out who is likely to win, how to shoot, you know, where to put ensembles of a lot of people, where to put individuals. You want them to be near to each other, fairly close to the stage. So there are a lot of parameters that she and those who work with her have to figure out come the day of rehearsal when it’s already, you know, been planned. And yeah, people have no idea what goes into.

Bridgett: Oh my goodness. I can’t even imagine.

Colleen: Yeah. Make it look seamless.

JoBeth: I mean, we start working on the next show literally like the week after the show is on and airs. We’re already looking to the next year.

Bridgett: Wow. Do you typically use the same venue or do you switch it around? We have switched around a bit. Like in the pandemic, we shot in a smaller place where it was easier to, you know, sort of check people and make sure they had their…

masks and their vaccines and all that um and we tried another venue I think two years ago in a hotel for various reasons but mostly we’ve done it at The Shrine Auditorium because we know the space it’s um you know it’s big. It’s

kind of cumbersome, but there are ways to decorate it to make it feel more intimate. And so we’re back there this year, too.

And it’s short. Remember, it’s not three and a half hours. A little over two hours, but it’s, it’s fun.

Colleen: when the Oscars are like Best Foreign this script and you’re like can we just fast forward to Supporting actor.

JoBeth:  and they and they’ve added awards to the Oscars and it’s sort of like you know I mean enough the Golden Globes

Too many awards.

Colleen:  Well, we appreciate so much you coming on and talking about the film and the Actor Awards.  Thank you so much for coming on. It’s always fun to talk to you.

JoBeth: It’s great to talk to you too. You’re so easy to talk to and fun.