Three Leading Ladies On Top At HIFF

A blonde, a brunette and a redhead landed on the East End during Columbus Day weekend.No, this is not the beginning of a bad joke. The ladies in question were none other than Patricia Clarkson, Hilary Swank and Julianne Moore—and the media-swarmed red carpets and packed Hamptons Film Festival screenings proved that the actresses’ arrival was certainly no joke.

Patricia Clarkson is so over talking about herself.

Dressed in a fitted black dress with a pop of color on her red lips, the 54-year-old actress folded her hands in her lap, nestled inside the His Majesty Suite of The Living Room at c/o The Maidstone in East Hampton during a rainy Saturday afternoon.

“We are deeply selfish people. It’s just the nature of our business,” she mused. “It’s probably the biggest fault I see most in all of my colleagues. We are remarkably selfish people. But so much of our life is about us.”

She rolled her eyes.

“Look, I’m sitting here, chatting to you about me. Kill me now. I’m so tired of me. I am so done with me. But yet, why we talk about ourselves is ’cuz it always comes back to the work that we love.”

Most recently, that is “Learning to Drive” for the seasoned actor—who is best known for her work in “The Station Agent” and the HBO drama “Six Feet Under”—starring opposite Sir Ben Kingsley, which made its United States premiere during the 22nd annual film festival last Friday night after a decade of rumination, pre-production and uncertainty.

Ms. Clarkson portrays Wendy Shields, who decides to sign up for driving lessons after watching her comfortable life crumble overnight. She meets Darwan (Mr. Kingsley), her instructor and part-time cab driver, who is on the brink of an arranged marriage, and together, they navigate the roads of life, not just Manhattan.

But for the actor behind the wheel, it was not an easy ride. She barely drives, herself.

“The trust Sir Ben had to put in me to drive over the Queensboro Bridge ...” she trailed off into a giggle. “It was life imitating art imitating life. Poor Sir Ben, gripping the dashboard with all his heart! We had some crazy times in that car, driving around.”

This wasn’t their first time working together in close proximity, Ms. Clarkson explained. The two became the best of friends while shooting “Elegy”—especially after shooting a sex scene.

“Mmm, well, talk about an intimate sex scene. Matt Salinger,” she said of her character’s romantic interest in the film, played by Mr. Kingsley, “he’s a beautiful man. And sexy as heck. I mean, I couldn’t have asked for a dreamier man to get naked with. He showed up ready to go, knew everything you could know about tantric sex, God bless him. We just rocked and rolled.”

But in all seriousness, Ms. Clarkson said playing Wendy has taught her to pay attention to the world around her. This is not a story about a woman discovering herself—“I just don’t know that we need to ever see another movie about that,” she said—it is about a woman finding other people.

“This is, to me, very modern-day, even though the story is 10 years old,” she said. “It’s a journey of a woman who has it all, who realizes that maybe she didn’t. She shifted me. She made me realize that I have to look up. I have to look more at the road ahead of me.”

Hilary Swank was in Sag Harbor when she got the news.

While staying at The American Hotel with a group of her friends nearly 15 years ago, she learned that she had landed the lead of “Boys Don’t Cry.” And the next day, she cut off all her hair. She was committing to the role of a lifetime.

“I don’t know if you can ever be fully prepared for that moment, when it was the little-movie-that-could. It was really made with a lot of love,” Ms. Swank said. “And we had no money. I don’t know if you guys realize, I made $3,000 when I did that movie. So I had an Academy Award—but I didn’t have health insurance.”

Today, sitting in Bay Street Theater, a short walk from The American Hotel, the 40-year-old actor marveled at how she has come full circle, with a full head of hair, while visiting the Hamptons again—this time for the East Coast premiere of “The Homesman.” Keeping with her track record of portraying strong female characters, Ms. Swank tackles the role of independent-minded farmer Mary Bee Cuddy, who transports three “damaged” women through the Nebraska territories in the mid-1800s, with the help of George Biggs, portrayed by Tommy Lee Jones, who also directs.

“I realize that I’m really drawn to these strong women who defy stereotypes and are real and are making great choices and make me look at life in a way that maybe I didn’t before I read that story. And that’s the beauty of art, in whatever form it is,” she said. “Lucky for me, I choose characters who don’t care about their wrinkles.”

And aren’t afraid to get dirty. On set, Ms. Swank learned how to ride a horse, drive a plow and steer mules, giving her a whole new appreciation for Midwestern farmers, who happen to be her ancestors, the Nebraskan native explained, noting that she grew up poor.

She said she has never lost the pressure to perform and get it right, and she is the author of her own story.

“I lose sleep and think, ‘Oh, please, I hope I don’t mess it up,’” she said before her Bay Street talk on Sunday at The Living Room at c/o The Maidstone in East Hampton. “If I don’t have nerves, then I know I’m going to fail. If we share that with each other, we can feel less alone in our nervousness and our own insecurities. So, yes, I get nervous all the time and, just like everybody else, I just try to find the best ways to handle it and utilize it.”

Julianne Moore shot down the first pitch from writers-directors Richard Glatzer and Wash Westmoreland after batting it back and forth. It wasn’t for her, a dramatic actor who has sealed her fame with her work in, most notably, “Far from Heaven” and “The Hours.”

Their second pitch got her attention. The film was called “Still Alice,” based on the book by Lisa Genova about a 50-year-old woman’s rapid descent into early onset Alzheimer’s disease.

“They sent me the script right away, and I read it, and I was, like, wow,” Ms. Moore said during a talkback following the film’s screening, which closed the festival with its U.S. premiere on Monday night at Guild Hall in East Hampton. “I literally said, ‘I’ll do this,’ immediately. I was on my porch in Montauk. I Skyped them and said, ‘This I’m gonna do.’ But as an actor, I didn’t know if I was going to be able to do it, frankly.”

“You did it!” an audience member shouted out.

“Yeah!” another encouraged.

“Agreed,” moderator David Nugent, the festival’s artistic director, said as the theater burst into applause.

“Thank you,” Ms. Moore said.

The 53-year-old actor committed herself to research, visiting with clinicians and researchers, as well as patients. One of her first interactions was during a Skype call with a woman, Sandy, who was diagnosed at age 45.

“She had red hair, she’s fair-skinned and slender,” Ms. Moore recalled. “I said, ‘Oh, Sandy, you look like my sister!’ She ended up consulting me through the entire film and celebrated her 50th birthday on the set.”

Since wrapping, the Alice character has been a hard one to leave behind—and not one that Ms. Moore necessarily wants to.

“My children have helped—I have a 12-year-old and a 16-year-old,” she said, by way of explanation. “They don’t care what you’re doing. When you come home, you just have to get back to it. But that did help because in a way, too, it’s a movie about mortality and about who we are. And what lives we’re living and who we’re connected to.”