Kathy Bates claims that late director Garry Marshall declined to cast her in a film because he thought she wouldn’t be believable as a romantic protagonist.
The Oscar winner stated in a Vanity Fair interview published on Tuesday, May 27, that Marshall would not cast her in the 1991 film Frankie and Johnny, despite Bates having created the character in 1987 alongside F. Murray Abraham in Off-Broadway’s Frankie and Johnny in the Clair De Lune.
“He couldn’t imagine that people would see me onscreen kissing someone.” Me kissing a man onscreen — that would not be romantic,” Bates, 76, told the publication. Marshall died in 2016 at the age of 81.
The role was instead given to Michelle Pfeiffer, who played opposite Al Pacino.
In the Vanity Fair story, Bates recalls boarding a trip and coming across a magazine showing Pfeiffer advertising the picture.
“I wanted to board an aircraft. They responded, ‘Actually, Ms. Bates, there’s one leaving right now. I said, ‘Great. Get me on it. I boarded Virgin Air. Sat down. I picked up a magazine. “It’s about Frankie and Johnny,” she explained.
In 2009, Bates and Pfeiffer, both 67, co-starred in two films, Personal Effects and Chéri.
During the extensive conversation, Bates also stated that she “never felt that I belonged” in Hollywood, “but that’s okay.” The Matlock star stated that not depending on traditional beauty standards helped her maintain her lengthy career.
“I watch them float away in their dresses…. So what now? It’s a delicious retribution. Oh, Miss Beauty Queen, you had a profession until your 40s and are now unable to work. Too awful!” she said to Vanity Fair, adding, “I’ll think, ‘Oh, you shouldn’t say this. Oh, you shouldn’t say that’.” But then I say, ‘F— it—I’m 76.” Can’t I just say it?”
In January 1991, Bates informed The New York Times that she had lost sections of her body due to her appearance.
“I am not a gorgeous woman.” I was never an ingenue; I’ve always been a character actor,” she noted at the time. “When I was younger, it was a major issue since I was never considered attractive enough for the roles that other young ladies were put in. The roles I was fortunate enough to secure presented tremendous challenges for me, typically involving characters who were older, somewhat eccentric, or otherwise unconventional.
She added, “It was hard not just due to the job shortage, but also because you had to face how others saw you.” And you think, ‘Well, you know, I am a genuine person.'”