Laura Dern has been an actress for 47 years. Yes, you read that right. Now 52, Laura's first roles were as a child: two uncredited performances in films starring her mother, Diane Ladd. Since then, she has delivered a series of electrifying performances in films including Wild at Heart, Mask, Blue Velvet and Jurassic Park and TV classics like Big Little Lies and Twin Peaks. But 2019 seemed to be a particularly prolific one for Laura, thanks to two acclaimed roles in Marriage Story and Little Women. Her performance in the former has earned her her third Oscar nomination, and while we don't know if she'll clinch it at the ceremony on February 9th, there's one thing we do know: If she wins the Academy Award, we'll be able to see every laughter line as she makes her speech, thanks to her healthy approach to ageing in Hollywood.
Back in 2004, Laura was interviewed by fellow actress Naomi Watts, for a piece published in Interview Magazine. Naomi praised Laura's lack of vanity.
'I was raised by an actress,' Laura explained. 'I watched all those women turn 60 and ask, "Should I get face work?" And my mother and Anne Bancroft said to each other, "We are who we are, and we're not going to fall into that."' Anne Bancroft, a friend of Laura's mother, starred in films such as The Graduate and The Miracle Worker.
Laura continued. 'Something scary is going on in our generation of women, because there are 35-year-old actresses who have completely redone their faces. We're 35! We're kids! And yet we're questioning whether we should be altering ourselves. I'm supposed to just be an actor and be honest and authentic. I'm not supposed to look a certain way.'
It's not the only time Laura has discussed her refusal to go under the knife or use fillers. While she was filming Jurassic Park, director Steven Spielberg gave her some advice. 'When I was 23,' Laura recalled in an interview with Vulture, 'right before a close-up on Jurassic Park, Spielberg said to me, "People will tell you what you could do to your face years from now. Don’t you ever touch your face." He was saying, "Your face is perfect, it’s female, it’s emotional." I am determined to be human in my acting, and when you own your power and your womanhood, you grow into your beauty. Your face finds you.'
Laura isn't the only person to express concern with how women in the public eye have tampered with their faces in the pursuit of so-called anti-ageing. In The Goop Lab, the new Netflix series from Gwyneth Paltrow, the actress ponders the Botox phenomenon. 'Sometimes, you'd look at somebody and couldn't tell if they were 25 or 55, you know?' she said.
Could a win from Laura show women all over the world to love their own, natural faces? Fingers crossed.
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