Kathleen Turner (Actor)

Kathleen Turner at the after party for the opening night of The Odd Couple. (Photo: Paul Hawthorne / Getty Images)

About Kathleen Turner

Possessing poise reminiscent of the Hollywood divas of old, Kathleen Turner parlayed her blonde, sultry looks and sexy, smoky voice to overnight stardom with her feature debut as William Hurt's seductive temptress in "Body Heat" (1981), Lawrence Kasdan's contemporary film noir. Her unforgettable temperature-raising performance established her femme fatale persona and prompted Barbara Stanwyck to write and say that the only actress who could have played Matty Walker better was Barbara Stanwyck. Turner, who speaks five languages and acquired her presence honestly enough as the globe-trotting daughter of a foreign diplomat, experienced a rather meteoric rise through the ranks, although like most, she had trouble remaining at the heights she reached. Though her father's death deposited her broken-hearted in her mother's home state of Missouri, she threw herself into life as a student actress and landed an agent within a month of her 1977 arrival in NYC. Work Off-Broadway led to her role as social-climbing Nola Dancy Aldrich on the NBC daytime drama "The Doctors", and she debuted on Broadway in "Gemini" in 1978.

While shooting "Body Heat", Turner felt self-conscious, sure that she looked ridiculous and that all her supposedly smoldering glances would leave the audience laughing, but seeing the film made her realize for the first time that indeed she was sexy. She went on to specialize in sensuous, aggressive roles like Steve Martin's gold-digging wife in Carl Reiner's "The Man with Two Brains" (1982), a business woman-turned-prostitute in Ken Russell's "Crimes of Passion" (1984), and the cold-hearted hit-woman in John Huston's Mafia comedy, "Prizzi's Honor" (1985), at one point notoriously saying, "When I'm really hot I can walk into a room and if a man doesn't look at me, he's probably gay." Yet she also proved a likable comedienne in films ranging from the old-fashioned adventure yarn "Romancing the Stone" (1984) to Danny De Vito's blackly humorous study in marital breakdown, "The War of the Roses" (1989), both opposite Michael Douglas. The success of "Romancing the Stone", in which Turner was cast as romance novelist Joan Wilder and Douglas a professional adventurer, triggered the 1985 sequel, "Jewel of the Nile" (in which their characters wed), but it took a $25 million lawsuit on the part of the studio to make Turner honor her contract for what she perceived was a vastly inferior script compared with the original.

Turner replaced Debra Winger in Francis Ford Coppola's "Peggy Sue Got Married" (1986) and earned a Best Actress Oscar nomination for her tour de force performance as a mature woman inhabiting the body of her teenage self. Absolutely believable as a 42-year-old in a 17-year-old body (the actress was 32 at the time), she captured youthful insouciance through her altered speech and body movements and was the best thing about the sentimental picture. After the psychological thriller "Julia and Julia" (1987) cast her as a woman caught between a happily married existence with Gabriel Byrne and a dangerous affair with Sting, she lent her distinctive vocal talents to the sexy cartoon character Jessica Rabbit ("I'm not bad, I'm just drawn that way") in "Who Framed Roger Rabbit". She then reteamed with Hurt and Kasdan for "The Accidental Tourist" (both 1988), playing the former's emotionally distant spouse. Though Geena Davis stole the show (and took home a supporting actress Oscar) as the flamboyant dog-walker and new love interest for Hurt, Turner was compelling and sympathetic as a woman deeply scarred by the death of her 12-year-old son. She also starred that year with Burt Reynolds and Christopher Reeves in "Switching Channels", a slapdash TV newsroom-updating of "The Front Page".

Turner gave a much-applauded, Tony-nominated portrayal as Maggie in a Broadway revival of Tennessee Williams' "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" in 1990, but the new decade would not bode well for the maturing actress' box office clout. The detective film "V.I. Warshawski" (1991), the small-scale medical drama "House of Cards", and the "Thin Man" wannabe "Undercover Blues" (both 1993) all failed with critics and the public, so Turner opted for lighter material with John Waters' "Serial Mom" (1994). Playing a modern-day homemaker with the looks of June Cleaver and the heart of Charles Manson, she at once frightened and delighted audiences but could not re-ignite her feature career. (This also was complicated in part by health problems which led to rumors of substance abuse which also had a detrimental effect on her ability to find work.) During the 80s, Turner had kept her TV appearances to a minimum, hosting NBC's "Saturday Night Live" in 1985 and 1989. Now she turned to the small screen with a vengeance. Her experience at the helm of "Leslie's Folly" (1994), part of Showtime's "Directed By" series, did not earn her subsequent directorial work, and she produced and starred in her network TV-movie debut, "Friends at Last" (CBS, 1995), showing that she was more than willing to be unglamorous in her new life as a character actress. She also became a frequent narrator and host of TV documentaries.

Relegated to either supporting roles (e.g., the stepmother in "Moonlight and Valentino" 1995) or comic villains (e.g., the wicked fairy in 1997's "A Simple Wish"; a nefarious scientist obsessing over "Baby Geniuses" 1999) in films, Turner enjoyed more success onstage, portraying an incestuous mother in a Broadway production of Jean Cocteau's "Indiscretions" (1995) and later venturing to London to act in "Our Betters" and perform a one-woman show about Tallulah Bankhead. She filmed a pilot, "Style and Substance", about a Martha Stewart-like figure, for CBS in 1997, but left the project over creative differences and was replaced by Jean Smart. After appearing as a TV anchorwoman in TNT's satirical "Legalese" (1998), Turner was excellent in her understated turn as the rigid, dowdy mother of five in Sophia Coppola's feature directing debut, "The Virgin Suicides" (2000). She then returned to the British stage as Mrs. Robinson in a theatrical adaptation of "The Graduate" (2000).

Notes

"'Crimes of Passion,' which is one of the best films I've done, will live strongly in my resume, even though it didn't do well. If my ego was out of whack and I believed that I could carry anything off, that would be a stupid risk. But so far there's been no reason not to try anything." - Turner in Interview magazine, August 1995

"I average about seven stitches a film now. I do almost all my own stunts, and I love it, the thrill and the physicality. But I got scared doing the chandalier stunt in 'The War of the Roses,' I really did. I was surprised, and Michael [Douglas] said to me, 'Is this the first stunt since [the birth of daughter] Rachel?' And I said yeah. I was never scared before. I think before you have kids you really have this feeling that you'll never die, and then after you're so afraid that something might happen to the kid, I think in a way you realize you could die, too." - Kathleen Turner to Premiere, August 1991

"I made sure, in my early twenties, even before I was successful with 'Body Heat', that I would not date actors because I know how selfish we all are. During a shoot I always found a member of the crew was a better bet. I found lighting technicians were usually accessible. No, seriously, sometimes when I've finished acting for the day I'm so hyped up by it, I feel like I'm living through every part of my body, and then, when I was single, I would have a brief liason. That's how I dealt with it."

She did find a husband [realtor Jay Weiss] who could be 'Mr. Turner' and deal with it and the Hollywood stuff: "He [Weiss] puts on his Mr Turner hat and smiles, and stays by my side, and says to me, 'Keep moving, keep moving,' and that's what I need because when I'm out being Kathleen Turner Hollywood Star I get mobbed." - Turner to the Daily Telegraph, March 15, 2000

"I never wanted to be that accessible. I always felt, if they want me for a part they can either fly me over there of they can come here. At least that meant you actually stood a chance of getting the role rather than just being seen for the hell of it." - Turner on living in New York instead of California, quoted in Daily Telegraph, March 15, 2000

"I'm not a naturalistic actor. I believe acting is a planned process of communication. I don't see anything naturalistic about it." - Turner in USAToday, May 3, 1995

"I've been fighting rheumatod arthritis, and I'm winning. I was seriously crippled and taking all these medications and steroids for years. The FDA finally approved these new drugs that are targeted specifically for inflammation of the joints, and they're heaven because they don't have any side effects. Before, I had a lot of bloating, anger, depression. Steroids are really heavy-duty stuff, so it was pretty rough there for a few years. Now I'm almost pain-free." - Turner to People magazine, Feb. 14, 2000

"She is formidable, she's scary. I wouldn't cross her. But she only explodes when needs be. She is an absolute craftsman. She works it to the bone. A week before we were to go on, she was still working through scenes again and again. I loved that about her. At that age, she still gives a f**k and really wants to nail it." - "The Graduate" co-star Matthew Rhys on Turner from The Sunday Independent, April 1, 2001

"The body of work that one has built, and I think mine is impressive, is not considered as important a factor as appearance. So I don't know if you lose the edge at 40, but you certainly don't gain weight for a character the way a man does." - Turner quoted in The New York Times, April 10, 1994

In 1992, Turner was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis.

On the relationship between frequent co-star and friend Michael Douglas and Catherine Zeta-Jones: "They seem very happy, which is great because, frankly, I never saw him talk with his ex-wife, let alone laugh." - Turner to London's Evening Standard, March 8, 2000