How did Winona Ryder manage to revitalise her career?
We’re often told that the most successful people are the ones who are consistent. If you frequently work at your goals, you’ll get closer to achieving them, and in many cases, this is true – consistency really is key. In Hollywood, many actors show no sign of stopping as they jump from one project to another, asserting themselves as industry heavyweights and aiming to maintain relevancy. Yet, it’s never too late to bounce back from periods of inactivity or critical and commercial decline, as demonstrated by Winona Ryder.
The actor rose to prominence in the 1980s and became a star, recognisable for her performances in slightly off-kilter productions that aligned her more closely with the weirdos, goths, and outcasts rather than the stereotypical teens of the era. Following her first two movie appearances in Lucas and Square Dance, she played a prominent role in Tim Burton’s Beetlejuice as Lydia Deetz, the moody yet smart daughter of Charles and Delia who also happens to possess one of the greatest hairstyles in Hollywood history.
Ryder earned significant praise for her performance as Lydia, a role she secured despite many popular young actors from the period, including Jennifer Connelly, Molly Ringwald, and Diane Lane auditioning for the part, too. It’s hard to imagine anyone else as Lydia Deetz, with Ryder perfectly embodying the pale-faced teen who almost exclusively wears all-black.
Not long after, she landed the leading role in Heathers, a dark comedy that took a satirical look at high school hierarchies. Ryder played Veronica Sawyer, a disillusioned member of the popular clique whom she decided to seek revenge on with the help of her new boyfriend, Christian Slater’s JD. The movie is a bitingly hilarious commentary on the popularity that helped to secure Ryder’s place in Hollywood even further, leading her to other well-received movies like Great Balls of Fire!, Mermaids, Night on Earth, and another Burton movie, Edward Scissorhands.
Ryder’s success continued into the early ‘90s with parts in a few acclaimed films, often selecting period dramas like The Age of Innocence and Little Women, both of which earned her Oscar nominations. However, the latter half of the decade saw Ryder routinely star in many critically panned movies, from Boys and The Crucible to Alien Resurrection and Celebrity, only reminding audiences of her potential with Girl, Interrupted.
This overall lack of success continued into the early 2000s – the same time that Ryder was arrested for shoplifting – leading most of her publicity from this era to revolve around her penchant for stealing designer goods. It seemed that Ryder just didn’t have a knack for picking good movies, and while many of them had the potential to be interesting and perhaps even slightly subversive, they all fell flat.
With the occasional fantastic film standing out in Ryder’s filmography among many duds, like the Oscar-winning Black Swan for example, the actor completely lost the acclaim and star power she had when she was younger. Judging by the roles she was picking, from Adam Sandler movies to sci-fi action movies, Ryder was struggling to figure out her identity as an actor.
Yet, in the mid-2010s, she made a decision that would change the course of her career. In 2016, she appeared in the Netflix series Stranger Things as Joyce Byers, the mother of missing child Will, delighting those who grew up watching her in movies like Beetlejuice and Heathers. Set in the 1980s, the show was a hit, and Ryder received widespread praise for her appearance as the determined mother who desperately wants her son to return from the Upside Down, even finding a way to communicate with him via Christmas lights.
She has appeared in every season of the show, becoming a well-known figure for a new generation who missed out on her teen roles. Meanwhile, she has appeared in the acclaimed miniseries The Plot Against America and reprised her role as Lydia in Beetlejuice Beetlejuice, as well as asserting her place in the public consciousness with various high-profile advertisements.
By leaning into the roles that made her famous and earned her acclaim, Ryder proved that she’s at her best when she is playing those who exist outside of the margins of normal society. That’s not to say that Ryder is a one-dimensional star, but rather, by tuning into her strongest assets, she reminded audiences of her greatness, which many had forgotten among performances in various average movies. Stranger Things felt like a turning point for the actor’s career, and now it seems as though her next steps could take her anywhere she pleases.
