If you head to the theatre to see the Melissa McCarthy film, Tammy, this week, it might be hard to suspend disbelief that Susan Sarandon is her grandmother. At 67 years old, the Oscar winner isn’t a grandmother in real life, even though her daughter Eva Amurri Martino is weeks away from giving birth to her first grandchild.
In the summer comedy, the Thelma and Louise star plays Pearl, a randy, lush grandmother to McCarthy’s unruly Tammy. In an interview with The New York Times, Sarandon talked about how “very liberating” it was to step into a character of someone who is “dependent on highlighting every flaw and as much bad lighting as possible.”
She continued, “For the longest time, I was in kind of a death mode, where everyone I was playing was either dying or helping someone die.”
With Pearl, she finds that “it’s certainly more fun” to portray “alcoholic, substance-abuse weird people.”
Sarandon mentioned why she picks certain roles, including the part in Tammy. She shared, “I’m always looking for things that frighten me, which in private life isn’t necessarily recommended, but in a career it’s very good.”
In fact, she’s thinks it’s all working out just fine for her in her personal and professional life.
“I think the universe is conspiring in my favor,” she said, “that everything that would be perceived as bad eventually has turned into something positive and useful.”
“One of my strongest talents,” she added, “is being able to change directions when something crosses my path that I didn’t plan on.”
Tammy opened in theaters nationwide on Wednesday, July 2.
