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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).
However, casting directors who looked at the renamed
Sigourney Weaver could never quite see her in those terms; instead, like the
similarly tall and gaunt Max VON
SYDOW, she has been 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
an Alien 5 might be a shift to comedy: Aliens Meet Animal House,
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. But whenever
she could, she tried to get parts in comedies, even though she was not given a
lot to do in the Ghostbusters films or Dave. Instead, producers
looked at her statuesque body and made her play the straight woman to boisterous
male clowns.
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. Perhaps my
suggestion for its title needs to be revised: Aliens 5, Galaxy Quest 2?
I tell you three times, no matter how much she has resisted other scenarios,
Sigourney Weaver, willing to do anything for a laugh, would sign up for that
Alien sequel in an instant.
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