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On the heels of winning her first Oscar for Still Alice, the 54-year-old veteran actor and author offers her take on career longevity, roles that matter, and why starting in soaps is nothing to be embarrassed about

by susan hornik

Daytime drama thespians rarely get the recognition they deserve outside of the soap genre. But every so often, standouts like Demi Moore, Morgan Freeman, Marisa Tomei, and Kevin Bacon break through the daytime stigma into primetime television and movie blockbusters. That said, only one actor has ever received a Daytime Emmy, a Primetime Emmy and an Oscar—that distinction goes to actor/author Julianne Moore, who just received her first Oscar for Still Alice.

Moore is only the ninth person in history to receive two acting Academy Award nominations in the same year, for her 2002 performances in Far From Heaven (Best Actress) and The Hours (Best Supporting
Actress), after receiving numerous other awards for both. In all, she has been nominated for four Oscars, eight Golden Globes, six Screen Actors Guild awards, four BAFTAs, and three Independent Spirit Awards.

Based on Lisa Genova’s New York Times best selling novel of the same name, Still Alice tells the tale of a brilliant Columbia professor in the prime of her life who is diagnosed with earlyonset Alzheimer’s. When accepting her Oscar for the role, Moore said, “So many people with this disease feel isolated and marginalized, and one of the wonderful things about movies is it makes us feel seen and not alone.
And people with Alzheimer’s deserve to be seen, so that we can find a cure.”

Further responding to the Oscar, Moore offered dryly that, “I read an article that said that winning could lead to living five years longer. If that’s true, I’d really like to thank the Academy, because my husband is younger than me.”

Backstage in the pressroom, Moore added that, “My husband has been amazing. He has supported me….he was the first person to see the movie. The first time I saw the cut, he came with me. And I told the story about how I heard him crying, and I was like, ‘What’s going on?’ When we walked out of there, he said, ‘You’re going to win an Oscar.’ And replied, ‘Come on!’ I swear to God, that’s what he said to me. And I just couldn’t believe he said that! That’s how much he supported me from the very, very beginning.”

After no fewer than 76 acting turns in both big screen and TV roles, Moore is known for a hours-devoted ethic that borders on the fanatical.

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“I believe in hard work,” she said at a press event for Still Alice. “Mostly I like stories about real people, real relationships, and real families, and that’s what I respond to. And this movie had all of those things. It was about a [critical] issue and relationships and who we love and what we value.”

“Julianne could not only project the scintillating intelligence and complexity of a linguistics professor, but also the vulnerability and simplicity of the later stages,” acknowledged the film’s director, Wash Westmoreland at the same event. “She’d be able to master every beat of the character’s deterioration. She is quite simply one of the finest actors on the planet. We had met with her a few years before on another project, pitched hard to get her to do it, and eagerly waited for weeks and weeks as she deliberated… and finally passed. This time it was different; we sent a message to her about the project and she read the book even before the script arrived. A day or so later, we were on Skype. Within seconds she said, ‘I’m in.’”

And while many pros want to ignore any daytime drama background for fear of not being taken seriously in Hollywood, Moore has been vocal about her time on the (now defunct) As The World Turns.

Upon winning a Screen Actors Guild Award for Still Alice, Moore recalled that, “When I was on As The World Turns, I was excited when they wrote two parts for me: the classic twin sister role—the good and the evil one—and I couldn’t wait to do it. I was so excited, and then realized it’s super boring to act by myself, that what I really loved was being with another actor and feeling that intimacy—the excitement, and the thrill of getting to know somebody in that way. And that’s what keeps me coming back to acting again and again and again.”

Born Julie Anne Smith on December 3, 1960, in Fayetteville, North Carolina, Moore moved around frequently during childhood because of her father’s military service. Often changing schools, she found herself targeted by bullies. After going to high school in Germany, Moore came back to America to study at Boston University, graduating from its School of Performing Arts in 1983, then quickly moving to New York to get into theater.

Then came the film roles; In 1990, she made her Hollywood debut in Tales of the Darkside, then The Hand That Rocks the Cradle in 1992. Other early turns included Body of Evidence, Benny & Joon, and The Fugitive. In 1993, she costarred in Robert Altman’s Short Cuts, based on the stories of Raymond Carver. Transitioning into leading actor roles, Moore starred in Steven Spielberg’s The Lost World: Jurassic Park in 1997 and that same year received her first Academy Award nomination for best supporting actress for her role as porn star Amber Waves in Boogie Nights.

Moore then appeared in the cult classic comedy The Big Lebowski (1998), and was in a remake of Alfred Hitchcock’s Psycho. She also took over the role of FBI agent Clarice Starling from Jodie Foster in Hannibal (2001) (Foster had originated the part in The Silence of the Lambs) and received rave reviews for Far From Heaven and the period piece The Hours.

The new decade began with Moore and Annette Bening starring as a lesbian couple in the 2010 independent dramatic comedy The Kids Are All Right, and she also had a recurring role as Alec Baldwin’s former high school friend on the NBC comedy 30 Rock. Her spoton portrayal of former vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin in HBO’s movie Game Change gave Moore her first Emmy Award win. That same year, she appeared in two dramatic films: What Maisie Knew and Being Flynn.

Most recently, the actress was cast as the mom in the film remake of Carrie (2013), co-starring with Chloë Grace Moretz. Last year, she appeared in the airplane drama Non-Stop and The Hunger Games: Mockingjay – Part 1.

Moore is also successful in the publishing world. She released her fourth book, My Mother is a Foreigner, But Not to Me, based on her experiences growing up with a mother from Scotland. Her previous work includes the children’s book series Freckleface Strawberry, Freckleface Strawberry and the Dodgeball Bully, and Freckleface Strawberry Best Friends Forever. (The original book was also adapted into a successful off-Broadway musical.) Inspired by the volume’s eponymous main character, in 2013 Moore released her Monster Maker app via iTunes, which allows users to make their own monster to send to family and friends. She also has a second app, Dreamtime Playtime, which fosters math skills at an early age.

Moore may have Oscar recognition next year too; her new satirical drama, Maps to the Stars (out on Blu Ray next month) had critics at the Cannes Film Festival raving about her turn as Havana, a washed-up actress in Beverly Hills, so much so that she received a Best Actress award there.

“It’s a commentary on how we live our lives today, but one refracted through the lens of celebrity,” said Moore in a studio interview about the new role. “It’s really more about human nature, about what people want out of the short span of life we have, and how blind we are to our mortality.”

Iconic director David Cronenberg enjoyed the nuance of Moore’s complex, neurotic performance. “Julie’s so funny, so capable, so adept and nimble,” he said. “And once she had her hooks into this character, she required just the slightest bit of guidance here and there. It’s not really a given that an actress can play an actress—actually, many don’t like to play actors—but Julie had such great enthusiasm for this role.”

Cronenberg added that, “She’s created a kind of glorious monster, an earthy, unashamed monster. She was never intimidated by Havana…was completely unafraid.”

Castmate Robert Pattinson found a working synergy working with Moore too. “She’s hilarious, and very sane, which is kind of ironic given who Havana Segrand is,” the Twilight actor explained. “And she shifts so subtly into character; you barely notice what she is doing. It’s kind of amazing.”

Of the two films, Moore said, “It’s been a very lucky year…They’re both fantastic movies with great parts. You know, I was so lucky to get [them], and so close together. I didn’t really think much about it except that I was fortunate to get to kind of explore these really interesting characters. But I certainly never imagined that I would win Cannes in the spring and then follow it up with an Oscar for another film. I keep saying this to my publicist—I’m like, ‘Is this happening? Can this be happening?’ It’s pretty crazy!”