Maya Hawke reveals sexist remark she received from Hollywood producer: “I was really upset”
Maya Hawke revealed in an interview earlier this week that she had an unpleasant interaction with a Hollywood producer in which he made a sexist remark about her acting.
The daughter of actors Uma Thurman and Ethan Hawke is known for her roles in Quentin Tarantino’s Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, the Netflix series Stranger Things, and Wes Anderson’s Asteroid City. Her most recent work was as Anxiety in Pixar’s Inside Out 2.
Speaking on the Happy Sad Confused podcast, Hawke described an experience on set when a producer suggested that she keep her mouth closed.
“A director told me — actually, I think it was a producer, but they were in cahoots — told me I looked prettier with my mouth closed and that I should close my mouth after I speak more often,” she revealed (via Variety). “I do often let my mouth hang open depending on what character I’m playing, because I feel like jaw tension and mouth tension is so important to express what kind of person you are.”
The actor found the comment particularly frustrating and incongruous because of the type of role she was playing. “I was really upset about being told that I should close my mouth more to look prettier, because I was playing a character that was distinctly unselfconscious,” she said. “That was a trait of the character… so it was clearly just a desire of the aesthetic of the thing, and I was annoyed about it.”
Hawke didn’t reveal what the project was or who the producer was. She is set to appear in the upcoming final season ofStranger Things, as well as Stephen Frears’s biopic on Billy Wilder.
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