Winona Ryder has played numerous peculiar or rather non-conventional roles of her time. These roles not only allowed the American actress to gain a strong foothold in the industry but also set her apart from the rest of her female co-stars.
The reason behind her playing different roles than her peers was because of the way she looked. Not considered pretty or attractive, the Beetlejuice actress was offered ‘the ugly girl’ roles and even told she would be unable to make it in Hollywood due to her looks.
Winona Ryder Was Told She Could Not Be An Actress
Now considered among the timeless beauties of Hollywood, the Edward Scissorhands star was once branded as the ugly girl by the whole of Hollywood. Regarded as not being pretty or attractive enough as per the beauty standards of that time, most of her scripts had her play the unattractive girl. Winona Ryder remembered a casting director bluntly telling her that she was not pretty enough.
“I remember one time in particular. I was in the middle of auditioning, and I was mid-sentence when the casting director said, ‘Listen, kid. You should not be an actress. You are not pretty enough. You should go back to wherever you came from and you should go to school. You don’t have it.'”
In one interview she revealed how the majority of roles she was offered early on were for unattractive characters and that she lost out on roles due to her looks.
“If I showed you scripts from my first few movies, the descriptions of the characters all said “the ugly girl.” Starting with the character I played in Lucas; she was described as homely, unattractive.”
Despite these horrendous experiences while she was still a teenager, Winona Ryder was not even mildly bothered by this criticism. Calling herself lucky, she says that it wasn’t until Dracula that people started calling her pretty.
Winona Ryder Is Immensely Grateful To Tim Burton
Back when the whole of Hollywood and even her peers considered her not pretty enough, Winona Ryder found support from the director Tim Burton. The actress who collaborated with Burton for two of her major roles, says that it was Burton’s support that helped her navigate through those times.
“I don’t actually think of that time as hard. But I have to credit Tim Burton with that enormously. Not just in getting to work with him as a director, but in getting to know him as a person, as a friend—I kind of went from feeling a little bit weird to feeling very special.”
Winona Ryder’s journey through the film industry is a testament to resilience and talent, that continues to inspire and encourage budding actors.
You can stream Winona Ryder and Tim Burton’s Edward Scissorhands on HBO Max.
Source: Interview Magazine
