The Help - Viola Davis interview

VIOLA Davis talks about drawing on some of her own family experience when playing a maid in The Help as well as the responsibility she felt towards the role on a number of levels. She also talks about learning from some of her peers and the secret to career longevity (as revealed by her friend, Meryl Streep). She was speaking at a UK round table...

Q. Did you connect any part of this movie with your personal life?
Viola Davis: Yeah, absolutely. You always use yourself as an actor and my grandmother was a maid, my mother was a maid, my aunts were maids, so I understand who these women are… beyond the book. I understand who they were every day – what they looked like, what they acted like. My grandmother was paid $25 a week for taking care of children and cleaning homes and she had 18 children of her own at home – only 11 survived. So, this is a woman who had a life that she had to leave in order to raise all of these children who always remembered her, for the rest of their lives. They wrote her letters. My grandmother lived in a house that had no running water or electricity… just an outhouse. So, I drew on that.

Q. Does the responsibility of taking on a role like this cut deeper because of the burden of representation? I mean, there are some really, really big issues being discussed and yet the story focuses on a white girl, which has been criticised in some quarters…
Viola Davis: I felt an incredible sense of responsibility to the African-American community. I felt there was going to be a huge backlash playing the maid in 1960s Mississippi during the Civil Rights Movement. It’s usually a role that carries a lot of stigma to it so I was very reluctant to sign on, I have to admit… very, very, very reluctant. But I also know that I’m on the front lines as far as being a black actress in Hollywood. I read the scripts, I get them, so I know what’s out there, so therefore I can look at Aibileen and say it is a great role. Other people look at it from the outside and they have criticisms or whatever but they don’t know what I know, which is that I could play an extraordinary number of urban crack mothers, even by black writers and black directors.

So, at the end of the day I had to weigh it all in terms of my sensibility as an actress and as a human being. I know a good story when I see one. I know a great character when I see one, and Aibileen is a great character. I saw beyond the fact that she was a domestic and I saw the human being and the human being behind the uniform is very rich. And it was something to play. I went on a journey with her and I’m sorry it’s a lead role for a black actress in Hollywood and you’re not going to see that too often. You certainly didn’t see it last year or the year before. The last time you saw it was with Precious. And before that, I don’t know when. So, it was too much of an opportunity to pass down.

Q. How sensitive does this topic continue to be in America?
Viola Davis: Race in the ‘60s is a very sensitive topic in America. There are certain things that are very sensitive to me. I remember one time an actress friend of mine auditioned for a role in a play and she didn’t get it. It was then on Broadway, a very good actress was playing the role, and she said: “I’m not going to go and see the play because I’m not going to be objective.” I thought that was an incredibly mature response. My whole thing is that if you’re not going to be objective, then don’t see it. Don’t see it, don’t look at it, don’t come anywhere near it! Sometimes things are just too sensitive and too close to you. In my opinion, it’s a collaborative process and the audience is part of the collaboration. So, in my opinion, if you come in with anger and with attitude then you’re not a part of the collaboration. So, whatever I’m doing on-screen isn’t going to persuade you otherwise.

Q. Has racism changed in Hollywood over the years?
Viola Davis: Hollywood is not a politically correct place. It’s probably more politically correct than other places and other institutions but it’s about making money and making movies. It’s about putting a lot of six-pack abed men and beautiful women on-screen… as soon as you hit over 40 you can see a true shift in your career as a woman. And so [is there] racism? Absolutely! If you don’t have international appeal, and usually a lot of black actors and black storylines don’t have international appeal, then frankly – and I’m sure all of you are very lovely people so don’t take this personally – that’s also on you. That’s why even Tyler Perry films and a lot of films that are predominantly black don’t do well in the foreign market and so therefore you send a very direct message to Hollywood that those movies are not going to be successful, so therefore they shouldn’t be made. And then people say: “Why aren’t black actors in movies?” Well, because you don’t see those movies as having broad appeal. I think Something New, which was a very good script that an actress named Sanaa Lathan was in, along with Alfre Woodard and Blair Underwood, did $1,500 overseas! $1,500! So yeah, it still exists.

Q. And is Hollywood getting more conservative?
Viola Davis: It’s all about profitising and it’s all about making money. So, they take their cue from the audience. I’ve been a part of so many failed TV shows it’s unbelievable [laughs]! But they give it maybe five shows and after four or five episodes if they don’t get the viewership you’re out. And it’s that 18 to 34-year-old demographic. So, my whole thing is that it’s the audience at the end of the day.

Q. Emma Stone has said that women are sometimes afraid to lose their vanity for great dramatic roles. Is that something you’d agree with?
Viola Davis: Well, we all had to gain weight for this and Tate Taylor wasn’t into lots of make-up or whatever, so we didn’t have to worry about our appeal. I remember Meryl Streep saying that the secret to her longevity is that she never worried about her appeal to men. And sometimes I think that women just think of themselves in context to men. Hollywood is a very male-driven culture. From the minute you walk into the room you’re thinking about how cute you look. And I think that women are dismissed if they’re not attractive… by other women as well as men.

Q. Is there anything you can remember that you took away from your peers on this film?
Viola Davis: Yeah, people ask that question all the time and it always takes us a minute because you’re not thinking about learning anything when you’re actually doing it. I was on survival mode. But I certainly learned so much from Cicely Tyson. I mean her dedication to embodying every character that she’s ever played. Her professionalism… there’s no small roles as far as she’s concerned. I mean, even if she has no lines in a scene she chews into it like it’s Shakespeare. I always learned something from her, even though we weren’t in any scenes together. She was my inspiration growing up because I just saw black people in sit-coms. That’s one area, actually, that we accept women who are funny – black women. I could name all 50 million black comedies – What’s Happening 227, The Jeffersons, That’s My Mama… I could pick them off and yet there’s probably been two black dramas on TV ever: Get Christie Love! and Julia. I mean, there have been very, very few. But Cicely was the first woman I saw who just played a character in films like Sounder, so I always learned a lot from her.