When Michelle Pfeiffer met her acting idol and couldn’t stop crying: “My eyes kept filling with tears”
Ask a group of actors to name their Hollywood idol and there’s a good chance a fair few of them will say Michelle Pfeiffer. From her early days in Scarface and The Witches of Eastwick to her show-stealing performance as Catwoman in Batman Returns to more modern characters like Janet Van Dyne/The Wasp in the MCU, Pfeiffer has always given it 100% and created a stunning cinematic legacy. Even Grease 2 isn’t as bad as you remember it. ‘Cool Rider’ is and forever will be a certified bop.
When it comes to legendary actors, Pfeiffer has worked with more than her fair share. Her appearance in Kenneth Branagh’s 2017 adaptation of Murder on the Orient Express allowed her to share the screen with the likes of Penélope Cruz, Johnny Depp, Daisy Ridley, Willem Dafoe, and Sir Derek Jacobi. However, one co-star in particular had a profound effect on her.
“It’s Judi Dench,” she told Variety of the one cast member she found most awe-inspiring. “I cried when I met her. My eyes kept filling with tears.” Dench played Princess Natalia Dragomiroff in the film, one of the many passengers (and later suspects) aboard the titular luxury locomotive. Pfeiffer portrays Caroline Hubbard, a wealthy widow with a dark secret. Although, it should be said, most people aboard that train have some sort of dark secret, so hers probably isn’t even worth mentioning.
The volume and accomplished nature of the Murder on the Orient Express cast was a little overwhelming to Pfeiffer at first. “I have to say acting with all of them kind of intimidated me,” she revealed. “The amount of talent in the room was not lost on me. I didn’t get over that for the first few days.”
She needn’t have worried, as she left a good impression on her colleagues. “There’s almost a tomboy quality in her easy humour and warmth, and then the next moment she stuns you by an entirely womanly femininity that takes your breath away,” said Branagh, who directed the film and starred as Belgian super-sleuth Hercule Poirot. “A third of the time, I laughed a lot with Michelle; a third of the time, I marvelled at her wondrous command of camera and scene; and a third of the time, I just tried to get the image of her sliding across the piano in that red dress in The Fabulous Baker Boys out of my mind.”
Murder on the Orient Express was a big hit, grossing over $350million on a $55million budget. More snooty critics weren’t fond of its hammy acting or by-the-numbers structure, but for a modern retelling of a decades-old book, it did its job just fine. Branagh has since made two more appearances as Agatha Christie’s moustachioed detective – Death on the Nile from 2022 and 2023’s A Haunting in Venice – though the nature of murder mystery stories has prevented Pfeiffer from reprising her role.
Pfeiffer doesn’t do much acting these days. She’s only made six movies since Murder on the Orient Express, three of which have been Ant-Man-related ventures. She’s clearly very selective regarding her work, so perhaps the chance to work with so many talented people and appear in an adaptation of such a famous book drew her to Branagh’s film. Or maybe she just really, really wanted to meet Judi Dench.
