Tell a young actress she isn't sexy and it hurts deeply, even if she's a practical feminist who doesn't put much store in glamour.
Talented Ally Sheedy, veteran of a dozen movies and many TV shows, grimaced the other day in her manager's office as she lamented the number of times she's been rejected for plum roles for lack of sex appeal.These frequent such rejections, however, are not simple judgment calls by casting directors, producers or directors. There are other factors. She wears jeans and sweatshirts to auditions. Her unwillingness to appear in nude scenes is a salient factor.
So too, perhaps, is her refusal to grant sexual favors to slobbering power brokers - no matter how subtly such revolting offers are proffered.
Yeah, even in these enlightened times, Ally says, the casting couch remains a decorative and utilitarian item in many an executive suite.
The insulting behavior of some filmmakers has cost Sheedy roles, partially explaining why she turns to TV for work, as she has done for "Deadly Exposure," a two-hour drama scheduled for NBC in January.
She plays the protagonist who accidently photographs the commission of a murder, after which she attempts to track down the killer and the story involved.
Her romantic interest is played by French actor Francois Eric Gendron, providing Sheedy with the opportunity to speak French - which she does fluently - for the first time in her career.
Moviegoers have watched Ally grow up personally and professionally from the time she made her teenage acting debut in TV back in the '70s. Happily or otherwise, she looks little more than half her 30 years. There isn't a line or a wrinkle on her face.
"In a way, that's good," she said, "but it has kept me from playing mature women. The Brat Pack reputation lingers. These days I'm usually cast as a female in her early 20s.
"Growing up seems to be an on-going process for me, at least in the eyes of producers and directors who still think of me as a girl. Maybe it's because my voice is sorta childlike. I get dismissed very easily for lots of roles.
"Also, I'm not a big movie star like Demi Moore (with whom she co-starred in `St. Elmo's Fire') and Julia Roberts who get so many good parts. They tell me I'm not sexy or pretty enough - right to my face.
"I don't shrug off those comments philosophically. Whether it's professional opinion or not, I take it personally. It really hurts. It's terrible. We all perceive ourselves in a certain way and when that's challenged, it is painful.
"I think it's crazy to be rejected without even getting in to see the director. Without an audition or reading. But it happens.
"It's strange because when I go to Europe, as I did earlier this year to do `Tattletale' in France, filmmakers don't have preconceived ideas about who or what is sexy or pretty or both."
Truth of the matter, Ally Sheedy IS sexually appealing and she is anything but plain. Europeans unanimously agree. They also see her as a woman of 30.
But Hollywood's concept of glamour star beauty rarely gets past the Marilyn Monroe-Elizabeth Taylor standards.
"Being unique is an asset in Europe," Sheedy went on. "In Hollywood it seems to be unacceptable. I am an individualist and, I think distinctive, in my appearance as well as my thoughts and attitudes. I'm unpredictable personally and professionally.
"As a result I'm cast in off-kilter roles like `The Breakfast Club.' I'm not complaining, because I enjoy playing eccentrics. But I'd like to play more mainstream characters, too.
"The actresses I admire most march to a different drum too: Ellen Barkin, Rosanna Arquette, Debra Winger and Shirley Mac-Laine. They're wonderful actresses and they lead different lives.
"I'm very comfortable with myself. I like the way I look. I don't like to wear makeup and dress up in glamorous clothes.
"I've been told to change the way I look. It's an affront to my sensibilities. I thought about changing and it just doesn't work.
"When I'm told right to my face that I'm not sexy enough, there is nothing I can say. It has nothing to do with acting a part.
"What's really sexy to most executives is the bottom line. If you're coming off a super box-office hit, then you're sexy. If not - and some of my recent pictures haven't been that financially successful - then you're not.
"I'm not about to take off my clothes in a film or pose in the nude for the cover of Vanity Fair. That's tacky and I won't try to change people's minds about my sexuality by doing those things. I just want to be an actor.
"If I'm asked to play a more sexual role, and it's well-written and I can be good in it, then I can do that. But I can't take off my clothes to make my point. That's not about acting. Katharine Hepburn and Bette Davis never had to do it."