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(Susan Alexandra Weaver 1949– ). American actress.
Provided
voice for animation: "Love and Rocket" (2002), episode of Futurama;
Happily N'Ever After (Paul J. Bolger and Yvette Kaplan
2007); Wall-E (Andrew Stanton 2008);The Tale of Despereaux
(Sam Fell and Robert
Stevenhagen 2008); Avatar: The Game (video game) (Kun Chang 2009).
The problem was that casting directors looked
at the renamed Sigourney Weaver and could never quite see her in those terms;
instead, like the similarly tall and gaunt Max
VON SYDOW, she has found herself
stereotyped as a serious performer despite a secret longing for fun and games.
But, as already indicated, Weaver is willing to do whatever she is asked to do,
regardless of her personal preferences. And so, as the Alien series
gradually required her to develop from a competent but unassertive spaceship
crew member into the fiercest, meanest, alien ass-kicker of them all, that is
exactly what she became. However, it was obvious that she had no real desire to
become the female Arnold SCHWARZENEGGER;
the displays of energy and conviction that she brought to her roles in Aliens
and Alien3, though admirable in many ways, were visibly
the work of a dutiful daughter. Only in Alien: Resurrection, when both
the series and her character were starting to lurch into self-parody, did
Weaver occasionally seem to be enjoying herself, suggesting perhaps that the
solution to the recurring problem of creating a genuine fifth Alien film
might be a shift to comedy: Aliens Meet American Pie, anyone?
Outside of the Alien franchise, Weaver
generally found herself in serious dramas, where she performed capably but
unenthusiastically, with only a few follies to her discredit—some wicked
witchery in Snow White: A Tale of Terror and faux New England
colonialism in M. Night Shyamalan's risible The Village. Even when she
was cast as a voice for animated films, she generally found herself playing the
serious roles, like the overbearing ship's computer in Wall-E. In her
most recent starring role, she did the best she could as Dr. Grace Augustine in
James CAMERON's Avatar, but her underdeveloped character was simply
there, in Cameron's mind, as a saintly foil to his sinister soldier Colonel
Quaritch. Nevertheless, Weaver would on rare occasions manage to get parts in comedies,
even though she was given little to do in the Ghostbusters films, Dave,
and Be Kind Rewind. Instead, producers again looked at her statuesque
body and employed her mostly as a straight woman for boisterous male comedians.
Her ultimate triumph, then, came in Galaxy
Quest, and while it may seem shocking, perhaps even blasphemous, to admit
it, this remains my favorite Sigourney Weaver performance. Her blonde hair is
unexpectedly fetching, she for once actually gets to be funny sometimes, and
she contributes a lot to the general aura of affectionate good humor that made
the film such an unexpected success. But while this potential franchise has
remained moribund, it seems inevitable that the dark machineries of
Hollywood film production will someday contrive to force Weaver in another Alien film.
As another idea for a humorous continuation, I might suggest another title: Aliens
5, Galaxy Quest 2. I tell you three times, even if she has resisted
other scenarios, that Sigourney Weaver, willing to do anything for a laugh,
would sign up for that Alien sequel in an instant.
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