Q 6

PLAYBOY: You did a play called Beyond Therapy, which was about two people who found each other through personal ads in The New York Review of Books. Before she got married, how might Sigourney Weaver's ad have read?

Sigourney Weaver: [Laughs] That's a wonderful question. OK: "Tall, shy brunette loaded with degrees would like to meet smart, happy-go-lucky man...in his early 70s...[Laughs] to skate with at Wollman Rink."

Q 7

PLAYBOY: Do you have a most treasured fan letter from a famous person?

Sigourney Weaver: I remember something that's similar. I was having trouble getting into Australia for The Year of Living Dangerously, so my agent had to write to about ten directors to get their recommendations. I never read them, but I know that people such as Robert Altman and Woody Allen and Bob Benton all sent telegrams saying nice things. I'm sure they didn't spend a lot of time thinking about it, but I was very touched that they would take the time to give me a recommendation.

Q 8

PLAYBOY: What doesn't the press understand about actors?

Sigourney Weaver: We're all different. I read something once where Bill Hurt tried to explain about being an artist and trying to remain one. What I respect about Bill is that he's not afraid to sound like an asshole when he talks about these things. They're important. It's what we're all feeling. Actors are society's creatures. We try to pull something out of people's private places and illuminate it. We're the fire bearers. Some of the most intense affairs are between actors and characters. There's a fire in the human heart, and we jump into it with the same obsession we have with our lovers. Acting is not, as some think, an attempt not to die. We don't judge it. We just celebrate it all.

Q 9

PLAYBOY: What qualities should the perfect director have?

Sigourney Weaver: I don't think there is such a thing. But a good director is someone who chooses people who are good at what they do and allows them to do it. Also, it's nice if a director is prepared. I was lucky this year. I worked with three who had written the scripts they were directing.

Q 10

PLAYBOY: You've spent time on a kibbutz. Why?

Sigourney Weaver: I wanted to be Jewish. When I was in college, all my friends were Jewish, and they were all very funny. But there weren't really a lot of laughs on the kibbutz. People were working too hard and were too vulnerable. This was in 1970. It was a sober place and very traditional. Women did all the kitchen chores and men were out in the fields. It was much more traditional than I had had in mind. I had expected some sort of Utopian community where everyone was equal. But I was one of only ten girls--and the rest of them were there to find good, upstanding Israeli husbands. They weren't interested in changing the way the kibbutz ran. I got into a fair amount of trouble trying to do it myself. It was the most boring two months I ever spent. I discovered that Jewishness and Israeliness are different things.

Q 11

PLAYBOY: What stays with you most about the making of Aliens?

Sigourney Weaver: Truly? The big thing was that I worked with a nine-year-old girl [Carrie Henn] for most of Aliens, and I'd never had a little friend I saw every day. She was really good company. Our relationship was one of equals, on and off the set. And I was very proud of her at the end. That relationship was probably the focus of the movie, and certainly that changed my notion of what children are about. I used to think they were just children. In fact, they're little people. You may change and grow, but you're basically who you are from early on. The experience also made the thought of having my own kids seem like more fun.

Q 12

PLAYBOY: Your dad, Pat Weaver, played a crucial role in the early development of TV programing. He created The Tonight Show and the Today show, put spectaculars and Sid Caesar on the air. Do you recall a moment when the realization of his accomplishment blew you away--and not just because you're his daughter?

Sigourney Weaver: I remember exactly. I was at Stanford, taking a course in communications, which frankly bored me. All everyone there was interested in was films and filmmaking. Television was considered "yuck." It wasn't exciting anymore. But my father was asked to come up and speak, and within 20 minutes, he had galvanized all those people into wanting to work in television. He reminded them of what television was originally there to do. When you hear my father, not only do you get his spark but you get moved by television's potential. And you get horrified at what's happened to an invention that started out to be such a glorious thing. It's there to wake people up and to give, as he says, the common man the uncommon experience. And now it's sort of a dead nerve. It puts people to sleep.