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» Articles » Interviews » Interview: Poppy (April 1999; by Jane Adams)

Actress Jane Adams knows all about Happiness (she starred in it) - here she tells us about Poppyness

Poppy cheers me up. I first met Poppy Petal Montgomery at the audition for the TV series Relativity (1996-97). I was instantly attracted to her exuberant, elfin quality. Immediately after the audition, we were told we had the roles. I was feeling both pleased and a little lest when Poppy led me to the bar in the ABC complex, where we stayed laughing and talking for hours. I had no sisters growing up; Poppy played my sister on TV - and in real-life she has become like a sister to me.

The best way I can describe Poppy is to refer you to a passage from David Malouf's novel An Imaginary Life (Vintage, 1996): "Scarlet. A little wild poppy, of a red so sudden it made my blood stop. I kept saying the word over and over to myself, Scarlet, as if the word, like the color, had escaped me 'til now, and just saying it would keep the little windblown flower in sight. Poppy . . . just a single poppy, a few blown petals of a tissue fineness and brightness, round the crown of seeds. Where had it come from?"

Poppy was Diane Keaton's daughter in February's The Other Sister and is a blonde bombshell in this month's Life, starring Eddie Murphy. She can also be seen in the forthcoming indie film The Space Between Us.

JANE ADAMS: Tell me about your brothers and sisters.

POPPY MONTGOMERY: All the girls are named after flowers: Rosie Thorn, Daisy Yellow, Marigold Sun, and Lily Belle. And then there's my brother, Jethro Tull. They're all in Sydney. Every time I go home they're mortified by my newly acquired American accent.

JA: What's your mother like?

PM: My mum is a cross between the two characters in Absolutely Fabulous. She says things like, "Sweetie, baby, not a good look. It's very non you." She also says, "Stop talking about the names I've given my bloody children, will you? It's getting boring."

JA: What's her name?

PM: Nicola.

JA: Hello, Nicola. Sorry we discussed your children's names. Poppy, what made you decide to go to L.A. and be an actor?

PM: It just happened. I was working for my dad at one of his restaurants and he fired me because I was rode to a customer. My boyfriend and I broke up, and I was like, That's it, I'm going to the States. I went to Florida first and then I took a Greyhound to L.A. Originally I wanted to go to acting school in New York. Then I read about Bob McGowan, who had been Julia Roberts's manager, in this book called How to Make It in Hollywood. I called him up and in this thick Australian accent said, "Hi, I'm Poppy." He said he didn't represent unknowns. So I sent him a head shot every day. Eventually he signed me by fax from New York. Peg Donegan is now my manager. She's like family, which is really important to me.

JA: To me, you feel like a sister.

PM: I remember your audition for Relativity because you had to pretend you were on the toilet.

JA: Relativity was the first time either of us had ever done series television. It was a great learning experience, just to be in front of the camera every day no matter how you're feeling, no matter what's going on, and to learn it's not something to fret about. That show was unique. Most casts aren't friendly. We became each other's lives.

PM: The schooling I got on that show was incredible. It taught me to rely on my instincts. Because some of the best work I do is when I don't have time to prepare.

JA: I think we all played mother roles to each other.

PM: You and I still do.

JA: It's so great when you work with other women and they're supportive. All of my very close girlfriends are actresses I've worked with.

PM: See, I have found there's never been such a feeling of non-competition between women as there was with you, me, and [costar Kimberly Williams] on Relativity. It's so great when it happens. And it's so bittersweet when it ends.

JA: What are the pressures in Hollywood?

PM: The darker side is that it doesn't always come down to how well does this person portray this character. It often comes down to, Are her boobs big enough? Is her hair the right color?

JA: And yet, what I grew to respect and understand is that a lot of those considerations are very real. If I was producing or directing something, they are the same considerations I would have.

PM: But that's where the actor has to learn to disassociate to a certain degree. I have to learn that it's not a personal attack on me.

JA: You're required to be vulnerable and open, and yet tough enough to withstand rejection after reJection after rejection.

PM: What helps me is reading people like Eleanor Roosevelt - the things she said and wrote - finding strength in other people's strength.

JA: What do you think about sexual stereotyping in Hollywood movies?

PM: I think that talent will win in the end. Initially, yeah, you may lose roles because they want a girl with huge, perfect breasts and an amazing body. But sexual stereotypes are surpassed constantly.

JA: Always, because what I've seen in my own life and on the screen or on TV is that there's an idea of sexy - until there's a new idea of sexy.

PM: If you're unique and you are comfortable within yourself and self-assured - that is sexy.

JA: It's everything our grandmothers told us. See, I've never fallen into the conventional Idea of sexy. You do a lot.

PM: Physically I do?

JA: Well yes, you're a very sexy woman.

PM: But every man I know thinks you're the sexiest thing on two legs.

JA: Oh, now, you know what? I'm going to turn off the recorder.

PM: No, you are not turning off the recorder because it's true.

JA: Who influenced you when you were young?

PM: Molly Ringwald. I thought she was just fabulous because she was so different. She made girls like me with freckles and red hair think, Wow, I'm beautiful too. And Gillian Armstrong's films impacted me beyond belief.

JA: Thank God for women like Gillian Armstrong who put those strong women out there. Because you and I are not living the way our parents lived. I don't have any road that's been paved for me, where I know, Well, OK, if I turn here, this is the right thing to do.

PM: Right, so we find it in films and books.

JA: I want that woman's perspective because it gives me support. It gives me strength.

PM: My Brilliant Career [1979] presented the epitome of a headstrong woman who knew what she wanted and went after it, who didn't marry and give up her writing. Hell yes. [both laugh]

JA: What are you reading lately?

PM: I just finished rereading The Lord of the Rings. Tolkien created this whole alternate universe.

JA: Well, you're sort of in an alternate world now.

PM: I am. In Australia, Hollywood was the fantasy world. Did I ever think I would be playing Diane Keaton's daughter? Did I ever think I'd be doing a film with Eddie Murphy? No, he was like a mythical creature. I do think L.A. has changed me. I used to run around in Australia barefoot - bugs, snakes, I didn't give a shit. And all my little brothers and sisters are like that. They're so tough. I went to visit my mum recently and she said, "Come down and see the rain forest. It's gorgeous." I looked in and there was this tangle of bush and dark and my Mum was just strolling through. I said, "There's spiders, Mum." And she was like, "What happened to you in America? You used to be so ballsy." "Mum, I've got flip-flops on. I just had a pedicure." My mum was strolling around looking like someone out of some fabulous film, walking over bush with open-toed shoes, not caring.

JA: Yeah, but there's a lot of your mother in you. A woman striding through the bush in open-toed sandals.

[source: findarticles.com]

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