Oh so sexy at 63, Susan Sarandon is a woman without fakery. In her varied career, she’s never felt the need to hide who she really is, as she tells Chrissy Iley.
The first thing you notice about Susan Sarandon is how comfortable she looks in her own body. She often talks about how proud she is of her breasts, but it’s more than that. There is something about how connected she is to herself that makes her hugely charismatic and cosy to be with.
She is instantly accessible, perching on a little sofa in Claridges hotel wondering why the green tea is brown. She is wearing black leggings, trainers and an oversized sweater with a cream lace shirt underneath. A curious outfit, yet somehow you notice her, not its oddness.
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Her skin is flawless, her eyes huge and all consuming. She is not afraid to look at you and she’s not afraid to let you look right at her. It’s an open face. No slyness, no manipulation. She is renowned for being a woman who doesn’t fear most things and certainly doesn’t fear speaking her mind. It is that truth-telling that, during the interview, makes us come a little undone, but more of that later.
We’ve met before, the last time a few years ago. Susan turned up feeling sick, had to go and vomit halfway through the interview, but she didn’t want to cancel because it might have inconvenienced me. She is old school – the show must go on.
“I celebrated my 63rd birthday and got blood tests and saw a nutritionist. I want to do a pre-emptive strike on whatever is building up in me, so I’m travelling with this dehydrated green stuff and red stuff, and cutting out all sugar and all liquor. I rarely drink, so that wasn’t hard.
“The bad one was bread. I love bread. I cheat sometimes. When I did the play [Exit The King on Broadway], I got run down and was drinking serious caffeine, so I needed to clean up my act. I’m very susceptible to drugs of every kind. Coffee, it’s great because it gets me very up, but then I crash.”
I tell her I find coffee comforting. It doesn’t make me particularly speedy. She surmises, “You are probably someone who takes Ritalin to calm them.”
When she says drugs have such an effect on her, I ask what kind of drugs she means. “I mean anything! I’m not really interested in drinking. Tequila maybe, but champagne makes me fall asleep. It doesn’t take much.
“When I’m travelling, I only need to take half an Ambien [a sedative] to sleep on the plane. I love mushrooms and I’ve done those successfully, but I don’t like anything chemical. I didn’t like LSD and ecstasy wouldn’t agree with me. I like stuff you can smoke.”
I tell her that I’m the opposite. The stuff you smoke makes me paranoid and depressed. “Everyone is wired differently,” she says. “Some people can do stuff that others can’t. That’s what I told my kids. Some drugs can kill you, some are a lot of fun, so talk to me first.”
It doesn’t surprise me that, seven minutes into our interview, we are discussing chemical versus herbal drugs in great detail. Susan is curious and open. Some things she just can’t be bothered to hide or be polite about. She doesn’t watch her words or think that she has to recreate a cleaner, blander, less-lived self for the purpose of an interview.
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Read more of this interview with Susan Sarandon in the June issue of The Weekly out now with Rebecca Gibney on the cover.
