Michelle Pfeiffer has revealed why she turned down the chance to reunite with Jonathan Demme in The Silence Of The Lambs.
A spoiler for The Silence Of The Lambs lies ahead.
Michelle Pfeiffer has been chatting to The New Yorker (via Movieweb) about never getting the chance to reunite with director Jonathan Demme. The pair first collaborated on 1988’s Married To The Mob, and Pfeiffer was keen to continue their working relationship. However, when Demme offered her the role of Clarice Starling in The Silence Of The Lambs, Pfeiffer rejected it out of concern that the story, replete as it is with acts of horrific cannibalism, was simply too dark.
As she says, “with The Silence Of The Lambs, I was trepidatious. There was such evil in that film. The thing I most regret is missing the opportunity to do another film with Jonathan [Demme]. It was that evil won in the end, that at the end of that film evil ruled out. I was uncomfortable with that ending. I didn’t want to put that out into the world.”
We won’t discuss exactly what she means by that ending, just that the film certainly boasts a final act that stays with you for a long time. Nonetheless, Pfeiffer found the project too disturbing to consider. The role went to Jodie Foster who would snag an Oscar for the film, which would go on to win a hatful of awards and wow audiences.
Sadly, Demme, who also won a Best Director Oscar for the movie, would pass away in 2017 and thus Pfeiffer and Demme would never work together again. That said, Pfeiffer remains full of compliments for him, stating that “it’s so sad to me that he’s no longer with us, first of all, he is the nicest person, he is funny, and not only is he really funny but he’s the easiest person to make laugh, so we just laugh all the time”.
Pfeiffer can next be seen in the greatly-anticipated surreal drama French Exit, due here in the UK on February 26th, whilst she’s signalled too that she’d like to return to the role of Catwoman, a character she immortalised in 1992’s Batman Returns. Despite her 1992 co-star Michel Keaton reportedly donning the cape and cowl again to play the Caped Crusader for 2022’s FlashPoint, Pfeiffer says that as yet, she has not been approached, but that she’d be interested. If any news breaks in that regard though, you can be sure we’ll let you know.
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