Diary / Justbobbi / Sep 26, 2022
Actress Gretchen Mol Talks Spike Lee, Motherhood & Acting
Written by: Bobbi
Actress Gretchen Mol has worked with everyone from Woody Allen to Spike Lee over the course of her career. Today, she is starring in a new series, Nightflyers, which is set aboard a ship looking for alien life in the year 2093. I interviewed her for this week’s podcast episode and we talked about everything from her breakout moment to being a mother in Hollywood and the #MeToo movement.
Check out an excerpt from our conversation below and listen to more on the podcast here!
On getting the acting bug...
I did, I acted in high school. I think I was pretty young when I had the instinct to be in the center. I wanted the part, I was competitive in that way. It wasn’t like I had a push from anyone outside. When I think back, it was all driven by me.
Her breakout moment...
It was 1998, I did movies called Rounders and Celebrity around the same time. Then I got a cover of Vanity Fair. It wasn’t so much the roles or the movies that garnered that kind of attention, but that was the moment.
Working with Spike Lee...
He did a movie called Girl 6, and he needed a lot of, sort of what I would call ‘glorified extras’ to be phone sex operators [in the film]. There were about 14 girls that were hired to be there and each person would have their opportunity to do a call. He ended up using my call throughout the opening credits. I was barely in the movie, but it was a start. He was really cool. I remember he said to me, “So, this is your first real film?” I said yes. And he said, “Just take it and run.”
Being a mother in Hollywood…
Gretchen: Its project by project, year by year. I remember going back to work really early with my son and remember feeling grateful to be going back to work, and grateful to be able to have support in the childrearing aspect and still have my toe in the thing I cared about. I probably didn’t need to do that at that time, but there was something really right for me about it. The lovely thing about this job is there is a lot of support on productions in and around babies and children.