NEW YORK, NY.- Brooke Shields has a new office. Its empty, and she hasnt figured out how she wants to furnish it, or even how often shell be there, but its a sign of her new and unexpected status, as president of Actors Equity Association, the labor union representing theater actors and stage managers in the United States.
Shields candidacy was a surprise, even to herself. But when Kate Shindle, who had led the union for nine years, announced in April that she was stepping down, Shields music director suggested she consider the opening, and soon enough, she had tossed her hat in the ring, and in May she won the vote by members, defeating two more-seasoned labor activists. Shes already led her first meeting of the unions council, and came away realizing she has a lot to learn, starting with parliamentary procedure.
Shields, of course, is one of those people who has been famous for so long, and in so many ways, that even she cant remember a different time. She was a childhood model, a preteen movie star, a sex object and an icon of beauty, all before she went off to college (Princeton, thank you very much). In the years since, she has acted on-screen and onstage, has written books, has spoken widely, particularly about depression, and has become a symbol and a subject for an evolving discussion about how women and girls have been sexualized by the entertainment and fashion industries.
She has had five roles on Broadway, each time replacing a principal in an already-running show (Grease, Chicago, Cabaret, Wonderful Town and The Addams Family). She has also performed occasionally at regional theaters (The Exorcist at the Geffen in Los Angeles, for example) and off-Broadway (in the star vehicles Love Letters, The Vagina Monologues, and Love, Loss, and What I Wore, among others).
Now, at 59, she is thinking a lot about middle age. She is recovering from a foot surgery that attracted attention when she wore Crocs (yellow, matching her dress) to the Tony Awards. She has just started a new beauty business, Commence, with hair-care products developed for women over 40; she is writing another book, also aging-focused; and she is seeking new ways to harness the celebrity she can never shed. Thats where Equity comes in she says actors and stage managers were extraordinarily supportive of her when she needed to jump quickly into an unfamiliar show. Now she wants to give back.
Over lunch at Bartusi, an Italian restaurant in the West Village, she talked about her time in theater, and her crash course as a labor leader. These are edited excerpts from the conversation.
Q: Hows the foot?
A: Its both feet. Its going to be OK. This is my sixth surgery. I really blew my feet out on Broadway, from dancing in shows being thrown in, with no training and raked stages and jamming my feet into the shoes and abusing them. Im sure its hereditary too its probably one more thing I can blame my mother for.
Q: You just started a company, youre acting, and the Equity presidency doesnt pay. Why add this position to the mix?
A: Theres something that I grapple with and have struggled with my entire life: being a public persona. You have this thing you have to live with, and its constant. So how do I turn it into something I dont resent? How do I use Brooke Shields that thing that is separate from me, thats a job, and is a commodity of some sort to make a difference for a community thats given nothing but love and acceptance to me when it was not cool to cast somebody who had zero Broadway training? My experience with Broadway, and regional theater, and off-Broadway, is this welcoming community. Those are the people that had my back.
Q: Union activism is new for you.
A: This is going to be a huge learning curve for me. My first time chairing a meeting was something out of Monty Python. I hadnt learned the vernacular. Roberts Rules? Ill get to know them! But if thats my weakest place, then Im OK, cause I can learn it, or someone who can do it better can do it and I can sit right by them.
Q: You dont like conflict?
A: Thats going to be hard for me. In this stage of my life, Im letting go of the tug of war rope. I dont like to fight; I like to discuss.
Q: But youve taken a job where youre going to have to ask producers for things they dont want to give. Its adversarial.
A: Im ready. Ive had to do it in my company letting people go, saying no. Thats a skill to practice and learn.
Q: The union just announced a strike against developmental work, saying negotiations were not making progress. Whats the issue?
A: People arent being compensated fairly.
Q: Also, Disneys theme park performers just voted to unionize with Equity.
A: We have to figure out what they want in their contracts, and then we have to put forward people who can be good in that negotiation.
Q: Whats your sense of how theater is doing?
A: Its not fully recovered, obviously, from the pandemic. But its really great to see how many new shows there were. Theres something for everybody. You can have a Merrily and a Stereophonic and an Illinoise and Appropriate and Mother Play. Its refreshing that its not one note.
Q: Something I often hear from readers is that they wonder why there cant be more streaming of staged shows.
A: Thats a tricky one. The part of theater thats theater is being in person. Theres a different performance every night.
Q: Whats the first show you remember seeing?
A: My mom took me to The Fantasticks and then Mummenschanz. Those were the big ones. And then it was Jesus Christ Superstar. I was 9 when I saw Grease on Broadway and during the preshow there was a hula hoop contest and the winner of the hula hoop contest would get to meet the cast. By the grace of something, I ended up winning it. And my mom, from that day on, whenever I had a moment of doubt, she would say, Remember the hula hoop.
Q: And when was the first time you performed onstage?
A: I was in one scene in After the Fall [a 1974 teleplay]. I walk on, I go sit on Christopher Plummers lap, and then I walk off. I was like 8.
Q: You were always doing film and commercial work. Did you do theater at college?
A: I did every Triangle Show [The Princeton Triangle Club is a musical comedy troupe] in college. I tried out for the dance company, and I didnt get in my freshman year. That summer I took four or five dance classes a day. I went back and got into the dance company.
Q: Are you going to continue to act while leading the union?
A: As long as Im wanted. Ive got a couple of things right now that Im working on. Netflix did really well with the last movie that I did. I have a show in development. What would be ideal is to be on a show here in New York because then I could do it all. And never sleep.
Q: What do you want your legacy to be?
A: I hope Im able to carry through many of the little changes that can make a bigger difference, and that I leave the association feeling kinder and more inclusive and not angry or fractured.
This article originally appeared in
The New York Times.