The life lessons Geena Davis’ most famous movies taught her
Throughout a wide variety of nuanced acting roles and a series of instances in which she proved her advocation and commitment to several social causes, Geena Davis is one of America’s most prominent film icons. With much commendation to her name, Hollywood has one of its brightest stars in Davis, a star that continues to shine bright.
Starring in the likes of Tootsie, The Fly and Beetlejuice brought Davis fame and acclaim, and she won the Academy Award for ‘Best Supporting Actress’ for her effort in 1988’s The Accidental Tourist. Like any actor, Davis has learned a lesson or two throughout her career and once detailed her journey on Morning Edition.
Davis begins relating her lessons learned with her debut, the 1982 satirical romantic comedy movie Tootsie, directed by Sydney Pollock and starring Dustin Hoffman, Jessica Lange, Teri Garr and Bill Murray, telling of a talented but difficult actor who must adopt a new identity as a woman in order to land a particularly acting role.
Dustin Hoffman advised Davis not to sleep with her co-stars and to not listen to the voice that held her. She should have done better. “Nobody told me, ‘I’m sure you must know this, but you only come on the days you’re working,'” Davis noted. “So I guess they assumed that I was, you know, there to absorb all this knowledge and whatever. And I loved sitting there and absorbing knowledge. But I had no clue.”
It’s hard to look beyond Davis’ performance in Ridley Scott’s 1991 movie Thelma & Louise as one of Davis’ most significant. Starring alongside Susan Sarandon, the film tells of two friends who take a road trip to escape from their bleak everyday lives with Harvey Keitel, Michael Madsen and Christopher McDonald in support.
The chance to work with Sarandon left a big impact on Davis, who noted, “Watching the way Susan walked through the world, how she said what she thinks without any qualifiers in front of it. Everything I said started with, ‘This is probably a bad idea … You’re going to hate it.’ She never did that. Somehow, I’d never been exposed extensively to a woman who moves through the world like that. And it was like a lesson every day in how to speak up for yourself.”
Finally, Davis also starred in 1992’s sports comedy A League of Their Own, directed by Penny Marshall. It’s a fictionalised tale of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League, also starring Tom Hanks and Madonna, and Davis soon discovered that she was rather adept as an athlete after practising baseball for the film.
“I only realised well into it that that was one of the things that was incredibly appealing to me,” Davis said, noting how she’s also gotten into archery, horseback riding, ice skating and sword fighting for other film roles. “You get satisfaction from how well you did instantly, without anybody else’s opinion having to come into it.”
