LIBBY INTERVIEWS...

MEG RYAN

 

Libby

 

I'd just like you to know that the readers voted you second. For some reason James Gandolfini was unavailable--believe me I'm not gonna push someone like him. But you were a definite second.

 

Meg

 

...Thanks.

 

Libby

 

Let's get right to it. Poor Meg.

 

Meg

 

Pardon?

 

Libby

 

Poor Meg, we are all wondering with interest how things will go for you now.

 

You have had a career made completely out of cute.

 

I love cute. So cute, the girl next door, cute girl next door. But I have never heard an old woman being considered cute unless she's quarantined in an old folks home and just spit up her red river cereal. Are you worried?

 

Meg

 

Uh, no. I'm just who I am.

 

Libby

 

Yes, and you are cute. Now you've had some distress recently Meg. You just split up with your husband of nine years, Randy Quaid--you must be heartbroken! You have a son Jack Henry, which is a really cute name in a colonial sort of way...

 

Meg

 

Dennis.

 

Libby

 

Is it because of tension at home? Would you look in the mirror and see your cuteness fade and blame him for stealing the best years of your life?

 

Meg

 

No!

 

Libby

 

Or was it your affair with Russell Crowe?

 

Meg

 

I don't want to talk about that. I feel personal lives should remain private.

 

Libby

 

So you thought you'd do an interview. OK, I'll move on. I saw Hanging Up that starred you Diane Keaton, Lisa Kudrow and Walter Matthau. I'm sure I would have liked it dear if it wasn't so noisy.

 

Meg

 

It was a lot of fun working with everyone.

 

Libby

 

I'm sure at the very least it was loud.

 

I am very good at reading people Meg and I sense there is something beneath all that perk, that there is a darker more introspective side.

 

Greg Kinnear your costar in You've Got Mail (which I thought I saw but I'd accidentally watched Sleepless in Seattle twice) said about you "There is such complexity beneath Meg's surface. She is a far more intricately wired personality than you might think" Do you feel that's accurate?

 

Meg

 

I'm definitely not the perky, Suzy Sunshine that the public sees all the time. I think it's a fair assessment. I think we all have a dark side.

 

Libby

 

How do you handle your psychosis?

 

Meg

 

I wouldn't call it psychosis I just have periods like everyone else where things overwhelm me.

 

Libby

 

And what do you do when you plunge into the dark side?

 

Meg

 

I wouldn't call it plunging but I like to meditate or chant. I just feel I need something to make my mind shut up.

 

Libby

 

Oh, that's interesting, something like "redrum, redrum, redrum'...?

 

Meg

 

No! Nothing like that at all, you see I took up yoga because running was too hard on my hips so I find that I can....

 

Libby

 

You're breaking my heart here. I'm looking at America's Sweetheart, all squints and squirts and giggles and now you've got the same problem as my Aunt Hannah? She's ninety!

 

My God at the rate you're going you're gonna end up like Baby Jane Hudson!

 

Meg

 

What?

 

Libby

 

Now your breakup with Randy--who I loved by the way in all the Vacation movies--not in a romantic way of course, but in a buffoon way. Was he frightened that you were going to harm him?

 

Meg

 

First of all his name is Dennis and no, I would not harm anyone.

 

Libby

 

O.K. let's not get excited here and I would appreciate if you would put down that pen. Just a little point of interest here Meg, anger is not cute.

 

Now ,Russell Crowe.

 

Meg

 

I told you I don't want to talk about that.

 

Libby

 

Are you hoping he'll put the twinkle back in your eye, the calcium back in your hips the air back in your bubble?

 

Meg

 

I don't want to talk about that.

 

Libby

 

Someone's got to tell you this. Do you know he's Australian?

 

Meg

 

Yes.

 

Libby

 

Now I'm not one for generalizations, but I feel I must bring this up. Here this, this Australian comes to break up one of America's fairy book marriages it does make you think, doesn't it?

 

Meg

 

I'm not following you.

 

Libby

 

Well... I'm just gonna say it. It makes you think of Hitler, and that you're Poland.

 

Meg

 

What? That doesn't make any sense! Why in the world would you think of Hitler?

 

Libby

 

Well Hitler was Australian wasn't he?

 

Meg

 

He was Austrian.

 

Libby

 

Oh, now the accent makes a little more sense.

 

Well our time was up. As I watched poor Meg leave I had to fight back a tear. I wish we lived in a world where bubbly, perky, peppy people were prized no matter what age, but as it looks very unattractive we don't.

 

Oh, well, what can you do?

 

©2000-2001 Sharon Grehan Howes