European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - February 6, 1986, Darmstadt, Hesse Profile Sally Field flies High by Sean Mitchell King features Sally Field he California southerner is making apologies for her office which is really a Large and pleasant office by the standards of Normal people but which May not be a layout to match Lane s or Coldie s or who knows whose. Hollywood is nothing if not about appearances. It s my first one the actress says in its defense. It is a fir is door suite in producers building 4, right Clown the Hall from Stacy Koach at the Burbank studios and it comes equipped with modern furniture secretaries typewriters and sunlight compliments of Columbia pictures which has just released Murphy s Romance the first movie to Omer go from Field s 3-year-old Dogwood films company. After playing i duct and the flying nun and jiggling her Way through All those Burt Reynolds pictures Field is an executive now in the current fashion of movie stars who Are Given their own Corner of a studio to read scripts hold meetings and put projects in development for themselves and their landlords Hope for the studio. She has won the Oscar or Best actress twice in the last six years including last year for places of the heart but she s also a reminder of How things have changed since the Day in 1942 when Warner Bros suspended Bette Davis without pay because she refused to appear in cod s country and the woman. I can have More feedback from More people readers and studio executives and All the various agents than i could if i were just alone me a Little person looking for work which essentially is what i m still doing she says while seated on a Long White Couch across the room from a desk big enough to look Good inside a Bank. Her Brown eyes Are open wide her Chestnut hair Fluffy enough for a shampoo commercial. It s so curious because this is not what actors Are trained to do but if they have the Power to get in and get a picture developed and made then you feel that you have to do it because there Are so few films made. You have to get in there and do it Field has a tendency to look As though she might be on the verge of tears. This hint of a girl who needs to be hugged combined As it is with the alternate possibility that she has just been peeled off a pinup Calendar for a machine tool company has made her a movie object of diverse affections. Murphy s Romance began in this office on the softly carpeted floor where she and her former partner Laura Ziskin sat one Day and discussed a Short novel by Max Scott that Ziskin had read. Field passed the novel on to the writing team of Irving Ravetch and Harriet Frank jr., the husband and wife who wrote Norma Kae and have been regularly supplied with ideas by Field Ever since. I take everything to the rav etches she says Between delicate bites of an Apple. About once a week every wednesday i Call up and say hey Guys i be got something else for you " nothing proved workable until the rav etches came Back with a screenplay about a recently divorced woman who buys a rundown ranch in a Small Arizona town and backs into a Romance with an eccentric older Man played by James Garner. For Field it is a variation on the role of the scrappy Independent woman she has come to represent both on and off screen since Norma Rae. In her own mind it was More than a variation. The fact that Emma her latest character was a Little less scrappy and that the picture directed by Martin Ritt was relatively easy to make actually scared her. I feel much More comfortable when i m in a great Deal of pain the entire time we shoot. Sally Field s new film Murphy s Romance was made under the auspices of her own production company. If i can think agony i feel instead she thought holy smoke what do you do just have a Good time that s Tough. I Don t think i know How to have a Good time in real life but i did have a Good steering her through the strangeness of the experience was her , Martin Ritt the decorated Veteran of the actors studio who blessed her with the part of Norma Rae in 1979 and has continued to influence her work so much that she often hears his instructional voice in her head. Sometimes i know even when he s not there and is not directing me i m aware of what he would say to me. Cod knows he changed my life because he hired me for Norma but he changed my. she also says that Ritt gave her reason to believe in herself As an actress. She had some doubts after All those years of cuteness on television and the slam bang features including Smokey and the Bandit with Reynolds that followed. She had even run into strangers in the supermarket who said hey you everyone s entitled to their opinion says Field but i really Don t want to hear it Over the tomatoes. It she remembers that when she went to read for Norma Rae she did t know what to Wear because she figured i would have to come in and pretend to be this character. I had realized the Only Way i could be hired was if people thought i was the character. Because they were real she earned a Large degree of respect for her performance in Sybil the television drama in which she played a mentally disturbed woman who had developed 16 distinct personalities but she half jokes that she Only got that part because i think i finally convinced them i was wacko. They figured this poor girl has about a week to go on the outside before they put her in a Home so we might As Well film about Halfway through the filming of Norma Rae tilt made an unscheduled but very important visit to her trailer one Day. He walked in and said to her simply Sally i want you to know you re first it was like someone had said i was the world s most wonderful human Field recalls relaxing the furrows that Are often Busy in her brow. Coming from him and the Way he said it. I won t Ever forget the Story Rolls out of her As clean As a Stone pulled from a White water Stream. The Story May have a corollary that beyond calculation or artifice or professional competence what Sally Field is often Selling up on the big screen is an ongoing search for acceptance that others in Large numbers can reach out and touch feel and applaud. She even carried the search to the night of the Academy awards last Spring when she exclaimed in tearful gratitude to the members of the Academy you like met you like me it was a True enough observation that managed to curdle in the moment it took to express a bottle of old yearning Sud i open to the air i always have a tendency to get 12 when i m nervous she says not sounding the least bit nervous at the moment and adding that it was riot nervousness she Felt at the oscars. The time i won for Norma Rae i just Felt numb i was afraid to be foolish that i would do something wrong. You re thinking they la judge your clothes and talk about your walk. You re by critiqued for your speech As Well As your performance. It was much More important to me this time to say what was in my heart. We re up there Selling ourselves one More time she says her voice rising. One More time we re trying to like a Good rating get a Good score and i thought Don t want to do that i had something to say really Felt that i wanted to say to the people who had taken that time to put their x next to my k name again i wanted them to know How much it meant to me at Baseline. Just Baseline this is w it was i Field who turned 39 in november says this is the happiest time of her life. I feel the Best about my work that i Ever she recently married producer Alan Treisman she has her office at Columbia she has two teen age sons and five or projects in development. And she still has her " Mother who has always been someone she ask advice about scripts. Murphy s Romance is her payoff to Columbi Athree years investment in her and she is relieved to just be getting the movie out there. If it is not movie of Large ambitions it is a film she takes pm in for its evidence of Craft. It is Likely that Many her fans Wilt find it funny and warm and satisfy 20 stripes Magazine february 6,13ss
