Exclusive: Elizabeth Perkins, The Movie Star Among Us

Photography by Mike Ruiz exclusively for The Mountains

There are many moments amid deep, thoughtful, genuinely substantive discourse with one Elizabeth Perkins—almost always about the perilous state of our nation—in which I’m fully aware that I’m speaking with the very same movie star from Big or Avalon or, better yet, The Flintstones. What tips me off may be something as simple as a flicker of her expressive eyes or the sly smile that escapes her lips when she’s being deliciously mischievous in telling a tale or how she mercifully laughs hard and often at so many of my jokes and observations. Here’s the thing: When Elizabeth Perkins and I talk, we talk. It’s a full-contact sport for us. Like football or brunch in TriBeCa. We’re serious. We’re silly. We’re each other’s kind of people. And just like that, a friendship was born.

“I don’t recognize my country right now,” Perkins tells me with sotto voce urgency. “I think what’s happening in these first few months of the administration has been an absolute shock. I feel very overwhelmed. I feel a deep sense of grief. As a mother to three stepsons and my daughter, Hannah, I’m very afraid for them, not just of the financial and societal crisis that we find ourselves in, but what their future is going to look like. Like you said to me earlier, Richard, about the lack of guarantees that we’ll continue to have clean water, clean air, airplanes that don’t fall from the sky, out-of-control pandemics, national parks that aren’t full of litter, children with measles everywhere. It’s not only the fact that they have these incompetent people in charge of every department, but also the real sense that cruelty is the point. As a deeply emotional actress, person, woman and human being, I can’t help but feel a deep, deep sense of grief which began the minute Roe v. Wade was overturned. The minute it became clear that all of my LGBTQIA+ sisters’ and brothers’ lives were at stake, it hit me hard. Oh, not to mention how we’re now going to invade countries that border us, we’re going to steal land in the Middle East and we’re going to alienate ourselves from our allies in Europe. It’s too much to absorb at once.”

This is the first ten minutes of our eventful afternoon.

Perkins and I are in a semi-private booth in the lobby of The Wick, Hudson’s cool, on-trend hotel, less than 24 hours after Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the Ukrainian president and outright war hero, was publicly berated in the Oval Office, causing outrage from the civilized world appalled at what occurred at the White House. Deciding to split the distance from my Poughkeepsie location and Perkins’ new Berkshires home (much more on that in a moment), The Wick’s inherent fabulousness works in our favor, as we’re largely unbothered for what will become the better part of five hours of conversation as I attempt to capture not only her undeniably substantial acting career, but most importantly, reveal the essence of this deeply consequential person sitting next to me. Needless to say, the time goes by in a flash.

There are two things I’ve always believed about Perkins on screen: She’s not scared of any role, large or small; and there isn’t a moment of disingenuousness in any of her performances. The truth is Perkins’ film and television credits are so numerous, so varied, that when read as a list, it’s hard to fathom one actor playing so many wildly different roles. Was that really Perkins as a young Jewish mom in 1940s Baltimore (Avalon)? Or in bed with a fully nude man as the owner of a Playgirl-like magazine (Minx)? Or as a spot-on Wilma Flintstone opposite John Goodman’s Fred (The Flintstones)? Unreal. And like so few of her peers, for the vast majority of her roles, Perkins makes it look, not easy exactly, but effortless. We never see the wheels turning when she’s on screen as we do in so many of our favorite oft-acclaimed thespians. But just because it looks effortless, doesn’t make it so.

The preternaturally youthful Perkins was born in Queens, NY, some six-and-a-half decades ago and was raised in Colrain, MA. She was formerly married to actor Terry Kinney in the 1980s (“Terry’s an amazing actor and an amazing director—a true artist,” she says. “It just comes with all the pitfalls that implies. I’m still very good friends with him.”) She married Julio Macat, an Argentinean-born cinematographer in 2000 (“We’ve known each other for three decades and I’ve worked with him five times,” Perkins says. “We were shooting Miracle On 34th Street filming the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade scene and Julio had five cameras going at once. I was just watching him shoot this thing and I was like, ‘Who is this person?’ I tend to fall in love with people’s talent.”) She says her return to Massachusetts, specifically to the Berkshires, after nearly four decades in Los Angeles (Hancock Park, Sherman Oaks) was a necessary leap she made for her soul.

“I was raised in Massachusetts and it became my home after my parents’ divorce,” she says, smiling. “My mom moved up to my grandfather’s farm in a little town called Shelburne Falls. My father lived in Kent, CT, and was a New Yorker for years, and so I’d drive right through the Berkshires on my way from Shelburne Falls to Kent. This is a return home for sure. And for my career, my new home made more sense because it’s relatively easy to get from the Berkshires to New York City.”

But it isn’t every day we see celebrity LA lifers pack everything up and head to our mountains, though it’s becoming less unheard of as The White Lotus’ breakout actor Walton Goggins, last issue’s cover star, can also attest. These mountains are alive.

“You know, the house I ended up buying is part of a little community, and I have neighbors, which I absolutely love,” Perkins says. “There are a lot of women in my neighborhood and that makes me feel so good. The first day I went down there, there was a blue heron, and I took that as a good sign. But I think the hard part about the move is change. You know, I’m going to be 65 this year and change at this age is really difficult. [Laughs] The other hard part about living in Los Angeles for me was access to the arts, which is very, very limiting. When I was in LA, I found myself not going to plays, not going to concerts and not even going to museums as much. In the Berkshires, we have MASS MoCA; we have the Clark Art Institute; we have so many opportunities for people to see live performances at Jacob’s Pillow and Tanglewood and the Berkshire Theater Festival, Williamstown Theatre Festival—I mean, it’s just nuts how many options there are here and there are festivals all the time. It’s just easy to get that kind of stimulation close to my new home, and the minute I moved in, I also started taking art classes. I’m a collage artist and I just had my first real show. It’s my side gig, me as a legit mixed media collage artist.” [Laughs]

Wait—a collage artist?

“I started taking classes at the Berkshire Art Center and met some really great people through that,” she tells me shyly. “And my teacher said, ‘Hey, do you want to be part of the show?’ And I hung three pieces. I’ve never been so petrified in my entire life. I mean, I was on Broadway for a year-and-a-half when I was in my 20s, and I was never as afraid as I was when that collage show opened because to me that’s being so much more vulnerable; I’m not playing a character. But every time I’ve been on stage, I have absolutely no stage fright whatsoever. But for some reason, when people walked in and were standing there looking at my art, I was like, ‘Oh God,’ and I really thought I was going to go out in the alley and throw up. I just couldn’t handle it. When you’re an actor and you’re on stage, you have this little shield around you because the person you’re portraying isn’t really you. It’s a creation, a character. And my art is all me. Scary.”

Also scary must have been her LADA (latent autoimmune diabetes in adults), a form of type 1 diabetes (T1D), diagnosis two decades ago. “I was almost in a coma while I was shooting the first season of Weeds,” she says. “It was such a shock that I was getting routine blood at my OBGYN, and they came back and said, ‘We’re sending you in an ambulance to the hospital because your blood sugar is so low.’ Now I have an app on my phone I use every day. I’m fully insulin dependent and have been for almost 21 years. I’m also petrified for my community in terms of insulin because I saw what President Biden did to cap the cost so dramatically, and now to have that reversed is unconscionable. For anybody whose life depends on a medication where you’re paying $1,200 a month, it’s beyond alarming—it’s criminal and it’s heartless.”

Her Greek family name of Pisperikos was anglicized to Perkins when her paternal grandparents emigrated to the US. Perkins seemed predestined for acting glory first by attending the reputable Northfield Mount Hermon School, then later at The Theatre School at DePaul University where she received a Certificate Of Acting. A few years later, Perkins made her Broadway debut in Neil Simon’s iconic Brighton Beach Memoirs, before moving on to the New York Shakespeare Festival and the Steppenwolf Theatre in Chicago. But everything changed quickly in the best possible way when Perkins was cast in her first film, About Last Night, directed by Edward Zwick and co-starring Rob Lowe, Demi Moore and Jim Belushi. “I had a really good time making that movie,” Perkins says wistfully. “I still love everyone associated with it.
I have nothing but great memories from that experience.”

But when it comes to Elizabeth Perkins, the career conversation must unquestionably begin with Big, inarguably the most consequential movie in her acting trajectory thus far. When I bring it up, she’s ready for me.

“It’s kind of a funny story about why I was cast in Big,” she says. “I had been up for the movie Broadcast News. I had already been workshopped in that movie with Bill [William] Hurt and Albert Brooks and I thought I was doing that movie for sure. Then I got a call from my agent saying, ‘Holly Hunter walked in, and it was, Boom!’ And it’s so funny because I can’t watch that movie now without thinking, ‘Holly Hunter is so perfect in that role.’ I think that all the time. So, James Brooks, who was the director of Broadcast News and the producer of Big, turned to me after Debra Winger dropped out and said to the casting folks, ‘Please see Elizabeth.’ So because of James Brooks and [director] Penny Marshall, I was cast opposite Robert De Niro(!) in Big. And so I started workshopping Big with him. That was intense, let me tell you. I don’t think—until Tom Hanks came on board—that Penny realized how important the aspect of the character of Josh’s inherent childlike demeanor was the only way this movie was ever going to work. So when Tom came on board, it was ‘Oh, OK, now we all know what this movie is about,’ because Tom just got it right away. DeNiro would have played it so differently. The thing is I read with so many actors up for the role. I was cast well before they landed on Tom and thank goodness they found him.”

Perkins currently stars as Blake Lively’s mother, Margaret McLinden, in Paul Feig’s latest film, Another Simple Favor, which is streaming on Amazon Prime. And as you may have heard, Lively has been making a few headlines of her own.

“I actually adore Paul Feig,” Perkins says beaming. “I don’t think I could love him more. I was with him filming for a month-and-a-half. I was with Blake Lively, who plays my daughter in the film, and I thought she was one of the nicest people I’ve ever been around. Blake would walk over to me on set with a cup of tea and say, ‘So, tell me, where are you from? Where were you born?’ You know, she engaged with me, all the while she’s got four kids in her trailer. I was impressed. The truth is, I adore Blake and I loved working with her. The thing is in Another Simple Favor I’m actually replacing the great Jean Smart in this role. It was so funny because some interviewer asked me the other day, ‘Why couldn’t Jean Smart do the movie?’ And I’m like, ‘Are you not watching Hacks? She’s the queen of the universe—you know that, right?’ So funny.” [Laughs]

Another seminal film in her run of good luck is her turn in Academy Award-winning director Barry Levinson’s Avalon, his deeply personal opus about growing up in the late 1940s and early 1950s Baltimore. Perkins doesn’t mince words here.

“The truth is, I can’t get enough of that movie,” she says. “It’s my mom in that movie. It was such an honor when Barry Levinson asked me to play his mom. And it was right after he had done Rain Man which had grossed billions, and Barry was way up here, and he wanted to make Avalon, and the studio said do whatever you want. And he got whatever he wanted. We worked ten hours a day, we had costumes, he had a budget. I mean, there’s a shot in that movie where they’re just going through the market and the area and the people that lasts for three-and-a-half minutes or something. It was such an honor to work with him on a movie that was so deeply personal. It was unbelievable. I mean, we’re talking Kevin Pollak, Eve Gordon, Armin Mueller-Stahl, Joan Plowright. I adore Barry and I loved working with Aidan Quinn, whom I’d known from Chicago. We’d all be just sitting around the table, and most of it was improvised. I mean, Barry would write stuff, but he knew better than to give these actors detailed scripts—he’d rather we just go for it. There was a scene with me and Aidan where I’m mad about the parents that are always there and we’re sitting in bed and I’m putting on cuticle cream and it was just supposed to be a scene with me sort of sitting there and Barry was telling me to go for it, and we just started doing the scene. And so imagine you were sitting around a table with 12 of these great actors and everybody’s just riffing, and these guys knew what they were doing, and it was just such an honor to be a part of that. God, how I loved that experience.”

Perkins leans in even more as she recounts these fascinating Hollywood tales, and all my slightly superficial self really wants to ask her about is her experience on The Flintstones. Not only is that my favorite childhood cartoon (the instant camera—genius!), but she was on-set with Elizabeth Taylor. I mean, c’mon.

“Oh, yeah, that’s another interesting story about how I got that job, too,” Perkins tells me, smiling at the memory. “The Flintstones was the biggest cattle call in the universe of actresses who all wanted to play Wilma and Betty. John Goodman had already been cast, which was a no-brainer, of course. But I remember putting my hair up in a Pebbles kind of thing. And later when I was cast, the director told me ‘You were the only person who came in to read who did the Wilma voice.’ And he said the same thing to Rosie O’Donnell, who was cast as Betty. It didn’t occur to me to not do the voice. Cut to a few months later, there we all are barefoot in a rock quarry and, oh, by the way, Elizabeth Taylor was right there with us.”

Again I posit my theory that the universal critical acclaim and the inevitable awards that should’ve followed didn’t flock to Perkins at the commencement of her acting journey because of her evident comfortability in her characters’ skin making it seem that Perkins wasn’t acting at all, itself a deft skill not at all common in Hollywood or in life (curiously Tom Hanks, her Big co-star, received an Oscar nomination for his performance, as did Holly Hunter who replaced Perkins in Broadcast News). But the tide seemed to shift a bit with her portrayal of a cancer patient in the searing William Hurt vehicle, The Doctor, as Perkins received the best reviews of her career to that point and earned a nomination for Best Supporting Actress from the Chicago Film Critics Association.

“The Doctor was another very important film in my life—very important,” Perkins says, speaking a little faster now. “You know, Richard, I had a tough experience with Bill [William] Hurt on Broadcast News. And then, later, when I did The Doctor with him, he came up to me and brought up Broadcast News and said, ‘You know I’m not drinking.’ And I said, ‘Thank you for that.’ You know what? Bill Hurt was a good guy. He was a good guy to me. And it was an interesting job for me because they had asked me to shave my head, and I was already five months pregnant when I shot that movie. They knew I was pregnant and then they took this long hiatus for Christmas, and then I wasn’t going to work again until February, so I said, ‘Guys, I cannot be pregnant with a bald head. I’m sorry.’ Normally I’d be like, ‘Sure, I’ll just shave my head.’ But being bald and super pregnant was just too much for me to handle, so we used a very good wig cap instead. Oh, and I also wore a lot of scarves on my head. I must say it was interesting to be pregnant playing a dying person. But that movie had a memorable scene… dancing in the desert—such a beautiful moment.”

If her experience in The Doctor woke up the critics to recognize Perkins’ obvious talent, her portrayal of Celia Hodes in the surprise Showtime hit Weeds took Perkins—and co-stars Mary-Louise Parker and Justin Kirk—to unexpected critical and commercial heights. For her unforgettable work on the show, Perkins broke out with a couple of Emmys, Golden Globes and Screen Actor Guild (SAG) nominations each, but after 63 episodes, it was reported that Perkins quit the show for mysterious reasons even as her character’s trajectory was left decidedly unresolved.

“Well, Weeds was weird because at that time premium cable networks weren’t doing half-hour shows, and Showtime was one of the first networks to commit to doing a half-hour comedy,” Perkins says. “I think we were maybe the third show after Californication on the air. I found out Weeds was to be shot at the old Ren-Mar Studios in Hancock Park and then I read the pilot, and I thought, ‘Oh, I have to be in this show!’ The pilot episode closed with me looking at my daughter saying I should have had an abortion. I’m like, ‘OK, I get it—my character is evil incarnate.’ And this is exactly what I want to do. My goodness, she was completely out of her mind—it was so much fun to play. It was also such a joy to work with Mary-Louise Parker because she’s so talented that sometimes we’d be doing scenes with each other, and she’d do something where it would take me out of my thoughts as she’d make such an interesting acting choice. And then I found out that we both felt that way about each other and it was if you’re going to throw a ball, you’re trusting that she’s just going to catch it. It was one of my greatest experiences in Hollywood and after all these nominations for Golden Globes and Emmys, I was suddenly fired.”

Fired?! I distinctly remember reading back in the day how Perkins had unexpectedly quit the show.

“Yeah, I was fired,” Perkins says, looking directly at me. “This is the first time I have ever said this publicly, but, yes, I was fired. We were three weeks away from shooting season six of Weeds and I had already had the conversation of what my character’s arc was going to be, I already had costume fittings and then I received a phone call from my agent who told me, ‘I think they’re going to fire you from the show.’ Jen [Weeds’ creator, showrunner and executive producer Jenji Kohan] and two of the writers called me and said, ‘We’ve decided that you’re not going to be on the show anymore.’ I said, ‘OK, may I ask why?’ And she said, ‘We just don’t know how to write you anymore. We don’t know where this character could possibly go based on where we’re seeing the show go.’ Well, the next call I got was from Mary-Louise, who was just gobsmacked and apoplectic. On the show, they didn’t explain my character not being there. They just didn’t. They just stopped talking about my character. This did put a wrench in my relationship with Jenji for some time. And I remember her saying something specifically to me on that call… ‘Well, I know how hard this is going to be for you because I know how much love you have for the character and all you’ve brought to the character and how much you’re going to miss the character’ and I was just becoming increasingly angrier and angrier as she spoke. I told her that I thought she didn’t give a fuck about my character and ‘I have four children. I’m a working actor, and you just took away my kids’ school.’ And that kind of stopped her in her tracks. Happily, Jenji and I have mended this. I went on to be on her next hit show, Glow, and I have a lot of respect for her as a writer. But, no, I certainly didn’t see that coming. At all.”

Another impossibly difficult time in Perkins’ trek as a very successful working actor in Hollywood was a set of experiences with the endless supply of powerful, lecherous men in the world’s entertainment capital.

“I’ve had three very specific, terrible experiences along those lines, and I don’t think I’m alone,” Perkins tells me quietly. “Even now, Richard, they’re hard to think about. They’re bad ones; really bad experiences. I’m not going to talk about specific people, but this still exists—the threat still exists even now, the shut-your-mouth-or-else still very much exists. Remember, you’re not just taking on a person, you’re taking on a massive systemic cultural problem. And because it’s still transpiring, you just tend to stay out of it. Look, I think any time someone feels unsafe, that’s their reality. That’s the point, right? You can’t tell someone how to feel. But it also goes back to our times. I’m sure Bette Davis would have said something to me about what her work environment was like. And I think Gloria Swanson would have said something to Bette Davis about her work environment. My hope is that we get to a point where no one has to speak to another generation about their work environment, but given the current administration in The White House, I feel like we’re taking massive steps backwards in regard to women in the workplace.”

We near the end of what has become one of the most interesting Sunday afternoons I’ve spent in a long time. I look around The Wick’s now bustling lobby before glancing over to the whip smart artist sitting to my immediate right who clearly wants to change the subject. So I acquiesce. I ask Perkins something I’ve been curious about since meeting her at Blue Stone Manor, the Berkshires home of former Real Housewives Of New York City standout, Dorinda Medley, not only our mutual dear friend (and former cover story in this magazine), but a born-and-bred Berkshires expert who has helped Perkins navigate her new surroundings. “Elizabeth, I want to know, after the incredibly diverse career you’ve had and continue to have, what, in fact, is your ‘white whale,’ your dream role and ideal co-star?” “Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Woolf?” she says, almost before I even finish the question. “My co-star could be Denis Leary; I think he’d be really good in that. Well, I’m also a Daniel Day-Lewis fan for 30 years. There’s also Ewan McGregor and I also like Russell Crowe.” “How about Ed Harris?” I offer. “Oh my God, yes!” she shouts, half laughing. “Ed Harris! That’s who it is. He’d definitely be my number one!” [Laughs]

As we leave the hotel and begin our short walk back to the Norman Rockwell-like Hudson Train Station just in time to make my 6pm Amtrak back to Poughkeepsie, the sun is setting fast, and the temperature has dropped precipitously into the “Whoa! It’s cold!” category. I once again ask Perkins about her new life, her new home, her new experiences.

“You know, I like going to Heirloom Lodge, a newer spot in Housatonic, MA on Route 41 between Great Barrington and West Stockbridge,” she says. “They have this great executive chef, Matt Straus, who came from San Francisco and took over the old Williamsville Inn and turned it into a world-class restaurant with fresh breads and an incredible wine list. Matt Straus is really a very, very talented chef.”

As we enter the train depot, I ask the award-winning actor if people she encounters in the Berkshires see her as “Elizabeth Perkins” or is she just “Elizabeth” to her new neighbors.

“Well, that’s funny because my family calls me Betsy!” Perkins says, with a Cheshire cat smile. “Thankfully, I don’t get that famous person treatment at all in the Berkshires. As a matter of fact, I was in Great Barrington at Guido’s a few days ago and the woman at the checkout told me, ‘You know who that is?’ referring to the man directly in front of me who had just paid for something. I tell her, ‘No, who is he?’ She says, ‘He’s on Star Trek. He comes in all the time.’ As she’s telling me this, she clearly has no idea who I am and it’s so perfect. She then tells me, ‘You know, we have a lot of actors around here.’ And I said, ‘I’ve heard. It’s exciting.’”

Exciting. That’s the word I’ve been looking for. Elizabeth Perkins is exciting in every way a person can be. And it’s indeed exciting—and fortuitous—to have this most excellent human in our midst. Again.