Mary-Louise Parker, the smart, sexy star of Weeds (which starts its fifth season June 8), has known both rapturous reviews and highly publicized heartbreak. In MORE's June 2009 issue she opens up about dating as a single mother, taking a stand against Botox and what she loves—and doesn’t love—about her controversial series, in which she plays a widowed mother who turns to drug dealing to earn cash. Here are a few excerpts from the interview by Meryl Gordon, on newsstands May 26:
About a nude scene she did in Weeds’ season four finale:
She’d been fine with the series’ wildly erotic sex scenes, she says, but the shot in the bathtub in which the camera lingered on her breasts seemed intended to titillate. “I didn’t think I needed to be naked, and I fought with the director about it, and now I’m bitter," she says. "I knew it was going to be on the Internet: ‘Mary Louise shows off her big nipples.’ I wish I hadn’t done that. I was goaded into it.” Weeds’ coexecutive producer, Roberto Benabib, defends the moment, saying that the nudity was necessary to convey the character's vulnerability. "We felt at that point in her life, her defenses had been so thoroughly stripped away, there was a nonchalance to the nudity that informed the scene," he says. "I thought it was wonderful, one of the five best scenes Mary-Louise has ever done [on Weeds]."
Still, Parker enjoys playing her complex and devious character:
“I like it the more extreme it is. Jenji [Kohan, the series’ creator] has been amazing in surprising me.” But, she adds, “I don’t like it when it’s crass and crude for humor’s sake. And I don’t like it when it’s sentimental, when she’s a sweet mother. To me, she’s not that.”
Her anti-surgery stance:
She hasn’t had Botox or plastic surgery, she insists, contorting her face into a series of hilarious expressions to prove it. “Somebody told me that they’d read that I had all this work done and showed me a picture, and it was totally airbrushed . . . . It made me so mad. I don’t like what that says to other women. I’m 44, and I look OK for 44. I’m not trying to look 34.”
About dating as a single parent:
“Some men are daunted by it, some are really attracted. I had someone ask, ‘Does this mean we can’t go out anytime we want?’ And I said, ‘Yes, that’s exactly what it means. It means you come fourth, ’cause it’s my kids, my job, my family.’ ” Then she pauses and defiantly declares, “I don’t ever want to come first to anyone. It’s too much pressure.”
About whether an essay she wrote for Esquire on the allure of sex in hotel hallways was autobiographical:
“It was not all speculative. It was not conjured . . . . I just like danger in general. I don’t like to hang out of an airplane, I don’t want to get on a motorcycle. But I like to reveal myself, and I like things that are psychologically dangerous. That’s why I like acting.”
Read all about Mary-Louise Parker—including why she adopted a daughter, how she felt "crippled by awkwardness" in high school and how she feels about missing out on the movies made from plays she starred in onstage—in MORE’s June issue, on sale May 26.
VIEW BEHIND-THE-SCENES FOOTAGE FROM MORE'S PHOTO SHOOT HERE.
CLICK HERE FOR INFORMATION ON A CHARITY PARKER SUPPORTS.