Tall, lithe, patrician and great-looking, Sigourney Weaver is a thinking man's actor on both stage and screen. She's also not above having a few laughs, whether it means being possessed by Zuul the Gatekeeper in Ghostbusters or being chased by an evil extraterrestrial in Alien. Weaver had just returned from nearly a year in Europe, with a sassy new hairdo and three completed films (including Aliens), when she met Contributing Editor David Rensin at a Viennese restaurant on New York's West Side. Afterward, says Rensin, "She told newlywed stories. The prognosis: So far, so good."

Q 1

PLAYBOY: You've played bright, sensible, forthright women. In Half Moon Street, you play a woman who is a hooker on the side. Was it good to be bad for a change?

Sigourney Weaver: I'm always offered roles as straightforward women with integrity. Even as Lauren in Half Moon Street, I'm a callgirl with integrity. [Laughs] But I have more going on as an actor than I've been able to show, and in Half Moon Street, I could express something that was already there--though I still have a long way to go with that. None of the three films I've done this year was particularly funny, but humor is what I'm best at. The director was a fairly serious person, and so it will probably be a serious film. There aren't too many callgirl jokes in it.

Q 2

PLAYBOY: What's your character's approach to sex?

Sigourney Weaver: It's interesting. She understands quite clearly that sex is mental. That's why she doesn't get dolled up for her dates. She just goes as herself. Sex is also other things, though Ph.D.'s are probably more mental than the rest of us. One of the reasons Lauren is good at her job is that she sizes up how to get to a person fast. Then she can arouse him mentally or physically or emotionally, depending on what she thinks would be successful. Money just makes it more interesting for her. If you have to fuck a lot of people you don't care about, at least it would help. I certainly didn't find her a perverse character in any way. If that means that I'm perverse, so be it.

Q 3

PLAYBOY: Are the required nude scenes more or less of an issue to actresses these days?

Sigourney Weaver: I had to do a nude scene in One Woman or Two, the French film I made with Gérard Depardieu.. It now seems like an invasion of those characters' privacy. In a comedy, you don't want to go into the bedroom with the characters. You want to close the door and leave them to it. But one of the reasons I did it was that it was the last day of filming and I thought, Well, I have to take off my clothes for the next film, anyway. I would have thought more about it. Nudity becomes a major issue only when actors are asked to do something that they know is artistically stupid. Also, a lot of women are misused in films. You often see them nude, but not men--unless it's a Richard Gere movie. [Laughs] As for the idea of being naked in a film--as an actor, you're naked anyway.

Q 4

PLAYBOY: Is there an advantage for a leading lady in falling in love with her leading man?

Sigourney Weaver: I make it very clear to my character, inside me, that it's all right to fall head over heels in love. I say to that part of myself, "Go. Have fun." But the line between character and reality never gets blurred. I remember Depardieu said to me in the first couple of days of our film, "You're very much in love with your husband. Good. I'm very much in love with my wife. Now we can fall in love on screen. We can really be with each other."

Q 5

PLAYBOY: What surprises you most about marriage?

Sigourney Weaver: It's a lot easier than I thought it would be. I expected to have to tell myself every day that I must be more unselfish. I figured living alone had made me selfish. But in my case, it was the reverse. I could really embrace the change, because I lived alone longer. I also discovered that Jim was, well...terrific. I'll probably get in trouble, bragging in this interview, but he's so much fun. I knew this before marriage, but when your schedules are difficult and you're under a lot of pressure, you find out more quickly who people are. He's an effortlessly good companion.

He's just always there. He never seems to drop out. He's not a moody person at all. It's fun.