It's always been a desire of mine to work with my parents, so Wild at Heart was a wish come true. The first day we did a scene together I came down the stairs and my mom pointed that finger at me: "Don't you dare talk to that boy again!" You know, I've seen that finger for 23 years. And I started laughing, she started laughing, then the whole crew broke up - in that moment, they all knew that she and I had been there before.
Laura DernI'm friends with Renny Harlan, who directed Die Hard 2, and I will say, I thought it was beautifully done. What I loved about it was that the bad guys are basically American political figures. They don't have East German accents or whatever.
Laura DernThe only thing that I can personally turn to is compassion, gentleness, a willingness to allow myself to be angry instead of like why am I so angry. It's so embarrassing. I've got to let this go. I'm not going to be a good person if I walk around angry like this.
Laura DernI made a commitment to myself: that I wanted to be an actress, and I wanted to do films that make a difference. Whether it makes someone laugh, or it has a moral to the story - it doesn't have to be an ethical film, but it has to move people. If it doesn't excite me, it's not worth doing - it's better to work on myself and my own life and wait until another great thing comes along.
Laura DernThere was a television show called The Innocents of Hollywood. Brooke Shields is a friend of mine and she saw one of the introductions to it, and she called me and said, "I think you better check this out." And on this show they talked about parents who'd ripped off their kids. One of them said, "My mother stole $300,000 from me as a child." Well, my mother opened a bank account for me when I made $60 on my first day of work as an extra. She's that kind of mother. But god knows what people will say when this movie comes out.
Laura Dern