Zoneboy
10-08-2009, 06:38 PM
Don't confuse actress with her characters
Link (http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20091002/SCENE03/910020315/1011/SCENE/Being+Doris+Roberts)
The first surprise is Doris Roberts' voice. It is deep and husky, more Greta Garbo than Lucy of “I Love Lucy.” Which is to say, Roberts, 77, sounds nothing like the high-pitched, nagging mother, Marie Barone, she played on the popular TV show “Everybody Loves Raymond” for almost a decade.
Roberts felt her real voice would sound too threatening on the sitcom, which was anything but threatening. Raymond, played by Ray Romano, is ordinary, which is why Roberts thinks the show has proved so popular. “I think it could be everybody's life,” she said during a phone interview.
Everybody's but Roberts'.
Spending three decades on Broadway, appearing in countless feature films and TV specials, winning five Emmy Awards, having a best-selling memoir and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame is far from ordinary. For these accomplishments, Roberts will be recognized with a Lifetime Achievement Award Saturday during the Louisville International Festival of Film.
While she may be best recognized for her role on “Raymond,” she won her first Emmy for playing a bag lady on “St. Elsewhere.” To get into character, Roberts spent time with the homeless. The experience was “very emotional, certainly, and I looked like a bag lady.”
Her character in the coming Hallmark Channel movie “Mrs. Miracle” was a different experience entirely. Roberts plays a sort of “fun angel,” helpful and full of life. It is the closest she has come to playing herself, she said.
Which explains why she doesn't want to dwell on how “Another Harvest Moon,” one of the movies in the film festival, relates to her own life. In the movie, Roberts is one of four friends coping with life in a nursing home. But as far as her own mortality goes, she said: “I'm still in denial.”
To prove her point, she explained that she did most of her own stunt work in the movie “Aliens in the Attic,” earning her the nickname “Kung-Fu Grandma” and “Ninja Nana.”
Lifetime achievement award or not, she said, she has no plans to stop working. “My life is not over,” said Roberts. “There's more to come.”
Link (http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20091002/SCENE03/910020315/1011/SCENE/Being+Doris+Roberts)
The first surprise is Doris Roberts' voice. It is deep and husky, more Greta Garbo than Lucy of “I Love Lucy.” Which is to say, Roberts, 77, sounds nothing like the high-pitched, nagging mother, Marie Barone, she played on the popular TV show “Everybody Loves Raymond” for almost a decade.
Roberts felt her real voice would sound too threatening on the sitcom, which was anything but threatening. Raymond, played by Ray Romano, is ordinary, which is why Roberts thinks the show has proved so popular. “I think it could be everybody's life,” she said during a phone interview.
Everybody's but Roberts'.
Spending three decades on Broadway, appearing in countless feature films and TV specials, winning five Emmy Awards, having a best-selling memoir and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame is far from ordinary. For these accomplishments, Roberts will be recognized with a Lifetime Achievement Award Saturday during the Louisville International Festival of Film.
While she may be best recognized for her role on “Raymond,” she won her first Emmy for playing a bag lady on “St. Elsewhere.” To get into character, Roberts spent time with the homeless. The experience was “very emotional, certainly, and I looked like a bag lady.”
Her character in the coming Hallmark Channel movie “Mrs. Miracle” was a different experience entirely. Roberts plays a sort of “fun angel,” helpful and full of life. It is the closest she has come to playing herself, she said.
Which explains why she doesn't want to dwell on how “Another Harvest Moon,” one of the movies in the film festival, relates to her own life. In the movie, Roberts is one of four friends coping with life in a nursing home. But as far as her own mortality goes, she said: “I'm still in denial.”
To prove her point, she explained that she did most of her own stunt work in the movie “Aliens in the Attic,” earning her the nickname “Kung-Fu Grandma” and “Ninja Nana.”
Lifetime achievement award or not, she said, she has no plans to stop working. “My life is not over,” said Roberts. “There's more to come.”