Riki talks with actress Diora Baird (The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning, Wedding Crashers, My Best Friend’s Girl) about auditions, longevity and the ups and downs of being a woman in Hollywood.
Follow @DioraBaird1 and @Rikilindhome on Twitter!
I really am disappointed for missing this post on my initial visit. Congratulations on the page and insight.
I think that it is all exploitation and prostitution if you ask me. It seems that if an actress has a part where she is not taking off her clothes and part where she is ,people tend to talk about the part where she is naked. The part where she does not might be well acted,Most people never talk about the carnel side of sex scenes. I don’t care how professional or adult we are we all get worked up by what we see. Sex scene comes on we think about sex not the scene as it pertains to the movie. Any one that says the don’t get turned on by seein sex is lying to u and themselves. You don’t need to see to people in bed to know they are a couple. If those scenes were not in a couple of those shows and movies would people still watch them. My theory is this if you build a woman up to be the smartest,sexiest and most talented. Then show her naked now we really get turned on by seeing the perfect woman doing something sexual. Its called selling a fantasy pimps do it.
I just know she gives me a boner
This made me think (again) about how and why actresses are pressured into being naked in movies. It seems like nearly every major actress has been topless in movies. Not that I don’t enjoy it, but I still find it weird.
Thanks, RichieRich. And I echo your thanks for the free entertainment; Nerdist industries is churning out some great stuff.
Riki, as a super-indie budget producer and director, I can’t tell you how helpful your podcast is to me. As a filmmaker who strives to inspire the people I work with and make their experiences with me as positive and rewarding as possible, it’s fascinating and super helpful to hear about the horror stories and bad experiences actors have gone through. I then turn around and work as hard as I can to make sure the people who work with me never have experiences like that. And it’s worked so far – after just one weekend of (paid) shooting on my current film, my lead actor had such a great experience that he has offered to work for free for me should I ever cast him again in the future.
And on top of that, the podcast is super entertaining as well, so keep it up!
I think Diora is fantastic. I think she’s naturally funny, and would be great in comedy’s. And ofcourse…she’s super hot. But it always dissapoints me when beautiful and ‘smart’ actresses, feel they need to expose their bodies in order to get work or sell themselves short to quickly (through nudity or exploitation). Unless they actually do like doing nude stuff (then good for them). Let’s hope Diora climbs the ladder, and we see her in more big budget films and TV series.
I must have missed where I insulted Riki. I’m a big fan of her and Garfunkel and Oates. An even bigger fan of Micucci and the nerdist podcast. It would be cool if you can point me out anywhere I criticized her at all except for expressing doubts about the subject of Doira Baird being a good choice for the podcast. Maybe it came off as douchy in trying to make it a joke but I stand by the original sentiment of a coment and kind of resent the idea that somebody has to be a fan of both or that my questioning of the guest is immediately a diss on Riki.
And I remember somebody in a podcast once mentioning how you had to make a distinction between friends in hollywood as a person and the job they do. Telling me who am I to judge, falls into a person criticizing somebody else by the personal life and not the work they do. I don’t criticize Baird as a person but as looking out into the job they do, the same way somebody criticizes a comedian or a baseball player. I don’t think she’s as talented an actress and I think I’m withing my right to think that. And I also don’t see the point in having her in the podcast and also feel it’s my right to do so.
Frankly it’s your right to criticize too and we won’t see eye to eye on this. I just want to make clear that I think your wrong in grouping me and trying to say I made any negative comment towards Riki. Still I’m a huge fan of your podcast , written several times in other threads and have written of your apreciation to it a couple of times and how much it has meant to me in way.
I have to say it’s pretty weird when a person you are such a fan of and you admire much chews you out and it their first interaction with you. Feels super weird.
Sawyer, nice post. You encapsulated my thoughts almost to a T. Oh Chris, AGREED. Thanks for all this free entertainment! Can’t wait for the G&O show in October, here in Chi-town.
rhzunam: Way to douche up the thread, asshat. You think that just because someone has boobs that they don’t work hard or can’t be talented? Who the hell are you to judge anyone? You’re making a shitty slam without knowing a damn thing about Riki or Diora. They are cool, thoughtful human beings.
#ParForTheInternet.
Another great episode, Riki.
Diora Baird sounds super-cool. Although that sleazy Ben Stein story has put images into my head I would rather not have there.
that should be “villains/irritating characters” in the first line…
You know, there have been a few recurring women villains/ in regular casts in tv, and some of those intentionally unpleasant, but most of the recent examples (as distinct from Lucy Liu’s character in ALLY MCBEAL) have been on cable series that are making a point of being Slightly Different from broadcast offers (Susie Essman’s character in CURB being the most obvious example, though Elizabeth Perkins’s character in WEEDS is another…and now vanished, or the Ally Walker character in SONS OF ANARCHY)…or, like the Liu character, there are a few in the likes of GLEE or the recently cancelled UGLY BETTY who are campy figures of fun. Not too many female Buffalo Bills/Slap Maxwells…not that Dabney Coleman’s series were sustained, no matter how good they were, either…so, exceptions that help prove the rule…and yet, the best dramatic series in production in the States remains, I’d say, on broadcast, in THE GOOD WIFE…where the mother-in-law gets to be an (ameliorated) jerk, but that brings us back to one of our oldest stereotypes…
I will admit, my thoughts can easily stray toward the sexual if I see a naked or partially naked Naomi Watts or Tilda Swinton in a film scene, as well…
Great interview and interesting to hear the humanistic side of what y’all experience on the acting side of life. This would have been a driveway moment had I actually been driving.
@rhzunam: Making it in hollywood, or anywhere, is not just getting enough money to buy a bar of gold to use as a stepstool. Incredibly beautiful women with large breasts may (key word may, because they do have to compete with the other loads of incredibly beautiful women with large breasts also trying to make a living in Hollywood) get the honour of being the first victim to die in a Direct-to-DVD horror movie. If they’re really lucky, they may even get the chance to be the ditzy sidekick in a romantic comedy. But they have to have a significant level of talent/charm to break past simply bit parts in forgettable movies, especially considering that they’re in danger of often getting stereotyped into those roles, which’d make it harder for them to actually pursue something they see as worthwhile. And if their true skill lies elsewhere? What if the incredibly beautiful woman with large breasts actually wants to do comedy for a living and has some great comedic timing if given the right material? What if said incredibly beautiful woman with large breasts is great at playing a David Brent-style character? Or what if said incredibly beautiful woman with large breasts actually has some great dramatic chops and can play a role like Annie Wilkes in Misery and blow people away? Making it is more than being financially successful, it’s also about doing something you truly enjoy. You could say Chris Hardwick had made it when he was hosting Singled Out and Shipmates by that measure, or you could say Riki Lindhome had made it when she did Last House on the Left (as she mentioned in the Jason Ritter episode, people print out the screencap of her topless and bring it to the Garfunkel N’ Oates shows for her to sign, so I’m sure she can parlay that ‘fame’ into roles in a string of slashers if she so desired) but we know that wouldn’t be quite the full truth. So why would it be any different for someone who happens to be incredibly beautiful and have large breasts?
tl,dr: Beautiful women with large breasts can get pigeonholed into parts that doesn’t let them do what they love or show off their talents.
P.S: There’s also the looming question of what happens to such an actress when her breasts start to sag and her looks start to fall victim to age. There’s a very limited career run for women relying just on physical assets.
Yeah become an incredible beautiful women with huge fantastic large breasts and maybe you too can make it! I have to hear this because it’s an interesting podcast but I just have to hear how they are going to play this.
Holy shit, Garfunkel was that crazy bitch from the LHOTL remake? That’s unpossible.
Mr. Hardwick … I may never forgive you for not being a vidcaster … because of this.