SURROUNDED BY LIONESSES

This phone interview was done in January 2020 as part of a larger special on the theme of mothers-in-movies. Dee Wallace had played two iconic mother roles in the early eighties. First as Elliot’s mom Mary in Steven Spielberg’s E.T. THE EXTRA TERRESTRIAL, and then a year later she played Donna Trenton in the Stephen KING adaptation CUJO, fighting for the life of her son against a rabid Saint Bernard. Given the focus on motherhood, other titles in her long career were only mentioned in passing.

I was about nine years old when I first saw E.T. and I remember saving up my allowance to go back to see it again and again. I still love that movie very much. It was only as an adult that I noticed how special the role of Mary was. Most of the time, she is so caught up in her daily life, that she doesn’t even notice what is going on in her children’s lives. Is that something you and Spielberg talked about?

Actually, we didn’t have a lot of conversations about that. I automatically knew Mary and what she was about. I had a mother who had to work, because we were very poor. She would take the bus at seven in the morning to go to work and not return until seven thirty at night. And if I needed care taking I would be with my grandmother. So, I had a pretty good role model: a woman who didn’t have a husband to share all the day-to-day tasks of raising the kids. My mother always seemed to know what was going on and I always felt very well taken care of, but at the same time if I had been a bad kid, she probably would not have known the stuff that was going on with me.

But you were not a bad kid.

No, I was a perfect little girl [laughs].

How important was your mother in you becoming an actress?

My mother was probably the most instrumental and important person in my life and my career. She was a beautiful actress in her own right, in community theatre in Kansas City. She would produce and direct all the religious plays at our church. I actually started out as the baby Jesus and worked my way up to the virgin Mary, before I finally left for New York. But she was also an incredibly strong woman and an incredibly loving woman. The last half of her life she created this organization called Cancer Action and worked on behalf of cancer patients. So, I really saw a lot of love, service and creativity.

So she really approved of your career.

Yes, but I think she was a little fearful for me leaving the Midwest. But she really supported me. I had gotten my teaching degree, which she had asked me to do, so that I had something to sustain myself financially with. That was always a fear of hers. So I taught at a high school, but then I said: Mom, I have to go and chase my dream now. And she said: You bet!

Was she proud when she saw you on television and in the movies?

Incredibly proud! And when I had a television series going, I had the chance to fulfill one of her lifelong dreams and get her hired on the series as an actress. She even got her SAG card, which was the biggest dream of her life.

You are also a mother of a working actress [Gabrielle Stone]. How protective are you of her in the business?

I guide her as much as I can, without taking over the creation of her own life, which is up to her. She calls me for advice and we’ve worked together a couple of times. You know, my job as a parent is just to guide and support her to be the best person she can be, no matter what she does.

Back to E.T., I always thought it remarkable that Spielberg wasn’t a parent when he made the movie, Melissa Mathison wasn’t a parent when she wrote it and you weren’t a parent when you played the role of Mary. So of the people who created the role of Mary, no one actually knew what it was like to be a parent.

That’s a good observation, but you have to remember: we all had parents, we all had the role models. Steven and Melissa wrote the film from the viewpoint of their childhood. Steven always hires the actors by finding the right energy he wants for the character, and for Mary he wanted someone who was somewhat childlike herself. He saw that in me. That’s why he gave me the job, so he told me.

You were quite young to be the mother of a teenager.

I was thirty one, he was fourteen. So it was possible if I got knocked up real early in life! [laughs] But that’s Hollywood. For as long as we can remember, women are always cast younger than men. Men always have young wives. In real life you’d say: Isn’t she a little too young for him?

With CUJO you played a mother who is forced to become a lioness protecting her cub. What did you tap into to play that role?

Well, it was a physical role, an emotional role. Again, I was raised in a family where my father was a severe alcoholic and ended up committing suicide when I was in high school. I watched my very, very, very strong mother get us through all of that. She somehow kept money coming in, she defended us and our family’s situation within our church, our community. Somehow she made sure we had dance lessons and music lessons. When we had no money she would barter her services to get us those lessons. And my grandmother whom I stayed with during the day was also an incredible powerful woman. She was an artist. Growing up I was surrounded by lionesses. There is something in every woman, deep down, that when it comes to their kids, they all know what it would be like to lay down their life for them. It’s an instinctual, genetic thing.

So, when you did have your daughter later on in life, did that result in a different experience watching yourself in CUJO?

I honestly have to say no. Everything I felt during the making of that movie I also felt when I watched it later, after I had my daughter. It’s like this: don’t freakin’ mess with my kid! I’ll kill ya! Every mother identifies with that.

For a while there in the eighties you were being cast as the mother in a whole bunch of pictures. Did it feel like you were being typecast at the time?

Of course! But you have to remember there are many different types of mothers. There are mothers that kill people, mothers that take their kids to Africa while they’re ministering people, there are single mothers, like mine, who do everything they can to keep their families together, there are mothers who are wealthy and don’t have to work a day in their lives. Just to say that you play a mother demeans all of the nuances of the mothers that I played. Having said that, I did at some point started looking for new opportunities. When THE FRIGHTENERS came along, that helped a lot to re-establish me. Because early in my career, when I did all these movies of the week, I played astronauts and doctors and everything. But E.T. is such an iconic film that people sometimes actually identify me as their own mother!

Early on in your career you did a number of horror classics, like THE HOWLING and THE HILLS HAVE EYES, and you are still working in the horror genre. When did you realize that you were an icon of the horror genre?

[Laughs] About five years ago everybody started calling me the iconic scream queen and such. Everybody wants to put their little label on you, you know. It doesn’t bother me at all. I love the genre.

Working with Rob Zombie a few times probably also helped to establish you as a horror icon.

Yes. Rob called me for HALLOWEEN, because he likes to work with people who have a history in the genre. I gotta tell you, he’s one of my favorite directors. He knows what he wants and he’s so creative. He gives you so much room to bring in your own ideas. After HALLOWEEN we established a good working relationship and he’s had me back three times now.

You also do a lot of independent horror movies, some by film makers who are starting out.

I like to do that as much as I can, if I like the scripts and the role and if I think they’re talented. It’s a good way for people who have been in the business for so long as I have to give back. Sometimes my name helps them get financing. I think we have an obligation to pass on the torch as it were.

Do you ever give them any motherly advice?

Ha ha! No. But if they ask, I will help them creatively.

Related talks:

• Rob Zombie

This interview first appeared in a shorter version in the Dutch fanzine Schokkend Nieuws. Above is the full version of this talk, edited only for clarity.