Demystifying Ms. Sharon Stone: How A High-Flown Celebrity Can Teach Us to Become Better People


 

Sharon Stone – Biography

Source: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000232/bio?ref_=nm_ov_bio_sm

 

Overview:

Born March 101958 in Meadville, Pennsylvania, USA
Birth Name Sharon Vonne Stone
Height 5′ 8½” (1.74 m)

 

Mini Bio:

 

Sharon Stone was born and raised in Meadville, a small town in Pennsylvania. Her strict father was a factory worker, and her mother was a homemaker. She was the second of four children. At the age of 15, she studied in Saegertown High School, Pennsylvania, and at that same age, entered Edinboro State University of Pennsylvania, and graduated with a degree in creative writing and fine arts. She was a very smart girl (with an IQ of 154), became a bookworm, and once was told that a suitable job for her (and her brains) was to become a lawyer. However, her first love was still the black-and-white movies, especially those featuring Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. So, the 17-year-old Sharon got herself into the Miss Crawford County and won the beauty contest.

From working part-time as a McDonald’s counter girl, she worked her way up to become a successful Ford model, both in TV commercials and print ads. In 1980, she made her acting debut in Woody Allen‘s Stardust Memories (1980) as “pretty girl in train”. Her first speaking part, though, was in Wes Craven‘s horror movie, Deadly Blessing (1981). She struggled through many parts in B-movies, notably King Solomon’s Mines (1985) and Action Jackson (1988). She was also married in 1984 to Michael Greenburg, the producer of MacGyver (1985), but they divorced two years later.

She finally got her big break with Arnold Schwarzenegger in Total Recall (1990) and also posed nude for Playboy, a daring move for a 32-year-old actress. But it worked; she landed the breakthrough role as a sociopath novelist, “Catherine Tramell”, in Basic Instinct (1992). Her interrogation scene has become a classic in film history and her performance captivated everyone, from MTV viewers, who honored her with Most Desirable Female and Best Female Performance Awards, to a Golden Globe nomination for Best Actress. After she got famous, she didn’t want to be typecast, so she played a victim in Sliver (1993), and, in Intersection (1994), she was the aloof, estranged wife of Richard Gere. These movies didn’t “work,” so she got herself again into more aggressive roles , such as The Specialist (1994) with Sylvester Stallone and The Quick and the Dead (1995) with Gene Hackman.

But it wasn’t until she played a beautiful but drug-crazy wife of Robert De Niro in Casino(1995) that she got far more than just fame and fortune–she also received the acknowledgment of the movie industry for her acting ability. She received her first Golden Globe and an Oscar nomination. She did a couple of films afterwards, teaming up with Isabelle Adjani in Diabolique (1996), and as a woman waiting for her death penalty in Last Dance (1996). In 1998, she married a newspaper editor,Phil Bronstein but they divorced later in 2004. She received her third Golden Globe nomination for The Mighty(1998), a film that her company, “Chaos”, also co-executive produced. The next year, she played the title role in Gloria (1999) and entered her first comedic role in The Muse(1999), which gave her another Golden Globe nomination.

Sharon Stone, a diva who thoroughly enjoys her hard-won stardom, is now a mother of three children: Roan, Laird and Quinn.

– IMDb Mini Biography By: Johannes Prayudhi

Spouse (2)

Phil Bronstein (14 February 1998 – 29 January 2004) ( divorced) ( 1 child)
Michael Greenburg (18 August 1984 – 20 January 1987) ( divorced)

Trade Mark (6)

Platinum blonde hair

Sparkling blue eyes

Voluptuous figure

Deep sultry voice

Often plays femme fatales

Relentless self-promotion

Trivia (119)

Chosen by Empire magazine as one of the “100 Sexiest Stars in Film History” (#49). [1995]

Playboy Magazine’s “100 Sexiest Stars of the Century,” Number 24. [1999]

Entered Pennsylvania’s Edinboro University at age 15.

Ranked #77 in Empire (UK) magazine’s “The Top 100 Movie Stars of All Time” list. [October 1997]

(1993-1994) Engaged to producer William J. MacDonald.

Former model for the Eileen Ford Model Agency.

Owns her own production company, Chaos.

Went to school at Saegertown High School, Saegertown, Pennsylvania.

Has one older brother (Mike Stone), one younger brother (Patrick Stone), and a younger sister (Kelly Stone).

Auditioned for the Cathy Moriarty role in Raging Bull (1980).

As a teenager worked part-time as a McDonald’s countergirl.

One of People Magazine’s “50 Most Beautiful People” and “25 Most Intriguing People”. [1992]

Auditioned for the role of Breathless Mahoney in Dick Tracy (1990).

Turned down the role in Exit to Eden (1994) that later went to Rosie O’Donnell.

Speaks Italian.

Ex-husband Phil Bronstein is one of the editors of the San Francisco Examiner.

Received a humanitarian award from the Human Rights Campaign, a well-funded organization specializing in gay and lesbian rights, for her role in If These Walls Could Talk 2 (2000), in which she plays the lover to Ellen DeGeneres, with whom she wants to raise a child. [2000]

(3/2/00) Stone’s former housekeeper Socorro Del Carmen Membreno pleaded not guilty to grand theft of $300,000 worth of jewelry and other valuables from Stone’s Los Angeles home two months earlier. In June, the former housekeeper was sentenced to 16 months in prison after she plead no contest to taking items from Ms. Stone. Judge Victoria Chavez ordered Socorro Del Carmen Membrano to pay Stone $50,000 in restitution after it was found that the maid had taken jewelry, handbags and other items from the home. Among the items taken were dozens of evening gowns worth over $20,000.

As a child, Sharon once said she would become the next Marilyn Monroe.

Sharon was granted a restraining order against Agostino P’omata, who allegedly had made threats of violence against her. [March 2001]

She has English, German, Scottish, and Irish ancestry.

Is a close friend of Jeanne Moreau. Presented a 1998 American Academy of Motion Pictures life tribute to her.

Spent many long workdays in agony while filming scenes for Casino (1995). She has back trouble due to an old injury, and the gold and white beaded gown she wore during a casino scene weighed 45 pounds.

She passionately kissed fan Joni Rimm for charity after she paid $50,000 for the pleasure. She auctioned the kiss in aid of Project Angel Food, a Los Angeles charity providing meals for homeless people. [August 2003]

Made a teenage ballet star’s dreams come true by giving her $75,000 for tuition fees.

During Total Recall (1990) filming, she complained to director Paul Verhoeven that she wasn’t sure whether her character really was married to Doug.

Her husband, Phil Bronstein, underwent foot surgery after being attacked by a Komodo dragon during a private tour of the Los Angeles Zoo. The tour was arranged by Stone as a Father’s Day gift for Bronstein, who had always wanted to see one of the Indonesian lizards up close. The attack occurred after Bronstein had removed his white shoes. Zookeepers later speculated the 5-foot-long lizard may have mistaken the shoes for white rats it ate regularly. [June 2001]

Met her close friend Mimi Craven on the set of Deadly Blessing (1981). They subsequently worked together on the film Last Dance (1996) in 1996.

A sex scene in The Quick and the Dead (1995) between Ellen (Stone) and Cort (Russell Crowe) was shot, but Stone and director Sam Raimi decided that it wasn’t a necessary part of the story. The scene was not included in the American release of the film, but international versions do include it.

Received the Knight of the Order of Arts and Letters from the French government in 1995.

Her scar on her neck is from a childhood accident. She was riding a horse and she ran right into a clothes line and it ripped her neck open.

Is a big supporter of the AIDS research organization AMFAR.

Her famous “leg crossing” scene in Basic Instinct (1992) was voted “Sexiest Leg Moment on Screen” in a poll for Veet.

Entered the Miss Pennsylvania Pageant at age 17.

Appeared as spokesmodel contestant on the pilot for the syndicated series Star Search(1983); won the competition. [1983]

Won the Miss Crawford County (Pennsylvania) beauty pageant and was also queen of her high school’s spring festival. [1975]

As a child, put on theatrical productions in the family’s two-car garage before an audience of neighbors seated at a picnic table; as one garage door went down, the other would go up, revealing a new Stone-created set.

January 28, 2005, World Economic Forum, Davos, Switzerland: At the end of the debate on “funding the war on poverty”, she stood up and pledged $10,000 and asked people to follow her. Within five minutes they raised nearly $100,000 – she wanted to raise at least one million. It’s money that will go directly to the Global Fund to Fight Aids Tuberculosis and Malaria – to buy bed nets to stop deaths from malaria in the developing world.

She attended Edinboro State University of Pennsylvania where she majored in creative writing and fine arts in the 1970s on a writing scholarship, but left the school before graduating to pursue a modeling career. However, she was later awarded a honorary Doctorate in Philosophy in public service by the school in 2007.

Member of the Jury at Cannes Festival in 2002, alongside David LynchChristine HakimClaude MillerMichelle YeohRaoul RuizRégis WargnierWalter Salles and William August(full-length films category).

Created Officer in France’s Order of Arts and Letters by Festival President Gilles Jacob, 20 May 2005, on the sidelines of the 58th edition of the Cannes International Film Festival.

A dedicated fund-raiser and advocate for AIDS research for the past 10 years, she received the Harvard Foundation’s 2005 Humanitarian Award at the Memorial Church. Her friend, Rock Hudson, died from AIDS.

Good friends with singer Christina Aguilera and attended Aguilera’s November 19, 2005 wedding to music producer Jordan Bratman in Napa Valley, California.

She donated many items to Rocky Stone to be given to less fortunate kids as part of the Toy Mountain Campaign.

Owns a ranch in New Zealand.

Her publicist is Cindi Berger.

Daughter of Joseph Stone, a tool and die manufacturer, and Dorothy Stone, an accountant and homemaker. Her aunt, Vonne Stone, was a painter and writer.

Chosen by Australian men magazine Zoo weekly as one of the Top 50 Hottest Babes Ever. [2006]

For her role on The Quick and the Dead (1995), she was trained by renowned Hollywood Gun Coach Thell Reed, who has also trained such actors as: Russell CroweVal KilmerEdward NortonLeonardo DiCaprioBen Foster and Girard Swan.

After Richard Gere introduced her to the The Dalai Lama, she converted to Buddhism.

Felt offended when Gwyneth Paltrow portrayed her on Saturday Night Live (1975). [February 1999]

Auditioned for the role of Lana in Risky Business (1983).

Appeared as one of the celebrity models in a charity fashion show staged by Thierry Mugler to benefit AIDS Project Los Angeles. [April 1992]

Was considered the role of Crystal Connors in Showgirls (1995).

Born at 4:52 PM (EST).

Temporarily lost custody of son, Roan Joseph Bronstein, to Phil Bronstein after their divorce.

Lives in Beverly Hills.

Ranked #11 in Men’s Health 100 Hottest Women of All Time. [December 2011]

Received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6925 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood, California in 1995.

Said that Rock Hudson was instrumental in helping her build up her confidence and skills as an actress early in her career (in the television movie The Vegas Strip War (1984)). She also became good friends with Hudson and became a lifelong crusader for AIDS research due to her friendship with him.

She turned down the role of Laura Alden in Wolf (1994) that went to Michelle Pfeiffer.

Suffers asthma and diabetes and is allergic to caffeine.

Dated Bernie Cahill.

Suffered cerebral hemorrhage. [September 2001]

She was considered for the title role in Jade (1995) that went to Linda Fiorentino.

Fainted at a fashion show in Milan, Italy after severe head pains. [September 2012]

Dated Johan Eliasch.

Release of the biography, “The Sharon Stone Story”, by Mike Munn. [1997]

In 2015 Stone was guest of honor at the Pilosio Building Peace Award in Milan. She began an impromptu auction on stage in front of a crowd of CEOs from the construction industry and other dignitaries. She gained enough pledges to build 28 schools in Africa.

Attending the Shanghai International Film Festival in China. [June 2007]

Suffered a few miscarriages before adopting her 1st son Roan in July 2000.

She was originally set to co-star in So I Married an Axe Murderer (1993). She actually wanted to play both female roles, but studio executives at Sony did not like the idea and upon realizing this she refused to accept the part. The roles went to Nancy Travis and Amanda Plummer.

Has three adopted sons: Roan Joseph Bronstein (b. May 22, 2000) with ex-husband Phil BronsteinLaird Vonne Stone (b. May 7, 2005) and Quinn Kelly Stone (b. June 8, 2006) as a single parent. She adopted Roan and Laird from Texas.

She was considered for the role of Poison Ivy in Batman & Robin (1997), but it ultimately went to Uma Thurman.

As an elementary grade student at Brookhauser Elementary in the Saegertown Schools, Sharon was one of seven students chosen based on individually administered intelligence exams to enter a gifted program. That 1966-67 school year was the first time gifted programs were offered to rural elementary school students in Northwest Pennsylvania. To qualify, students had to possess an IQ in the upper 3%. Sharon surpassed that 130 IQ threshold with an IQ that placed her in the upper one half of one per cent, above 150 IQ.

Dated Dwight Yoakam in the early 1990s, and was rather famously quoted as saying, “Kissing Dwight is like eating a dirt sandwich.”.

Dated Dweezil Zappa.

Dated Bob Wagner.

She was the first choice to play Grace McKenna in U Turn (1997), but salary negotiations fell through. Jennifer Lopez replaced her.

Dated George Hamilton.

In 2001, Stone was linked to a biopic of the German film director Leni Riefenstahl. Prospective director, Paul Verhoeven, and Riefenstahl herself, favoured Stone to portray Riefenstahl in the film. Verhoeven, with whom Stone had worked previously, pulled out of the project, reportedly because he wanted to hire a more expensive screenwriter than the producers did.

Dated Craig Ferguson.

Dated Rick Fox.

Dated Barry Josephson.

Dated Garry Shandling.

Dated Christian Slater.

Dated David Duchovny.

Dated Martin Mica.

Dated Hart Bochner.

Dated David DeLuise.

Dated Johnathon Schaech.

Dated Christopher Peters and his dad, Jon Peters.

Dated Jack Nicholson.

Dated Shareef Malnik.

She was meant to play a character called Sharon Stone in The Flintstones (1994). When she dropped out to do The Specialist (1994), the character was renamed Rosetta Stone and Halle Berry replaced her. Sharon and Halle worked together ten years later in Catwoman (2004).

Stone was hospitalized on September 29, 2001 for a subarachnoid hemorrhage, which was diagnosed as a vertebral artery dissection rather than the more common ruptured aneurysm, and treated with an endovascular coil embolization.

She was originally cast as Stacy Mansdorf in Blue Ice (1992), but dropped out in order to do Basic Instinct (1992). Sean Young replaced her.

Dated Johnny Zander.

She wanted Kristin Scott Thomas‘ roles in The English Patient (1996) and The Horse Whisperer (1998).

Dated Larry Austin, Michael Benasra, Jim Connelly and Chase Dreyfous.

Dated John Kennedy Jr..

Dated George Englund Jr..

She was considered for the role of Emma Peel in The Avengers (1998).

Dated Steve Bing.

She turned down the role of Lilly Raines in In the Line of Fire (1993) that went to Rene Russo.

Dated Eric Clapton.

Was roommates with Angela Robinson Witherspoon when they were models.

Signed with CAA, a talent agency. [September 2017]

Manager for 30 years was Chuck Binder.

As of 2018, has never appeared in a film nominated for the the Best Picture Oscar.

Demi Moore has taken over the role for Stone, who was originally set to star Corporate Animals (2019) but had to exit due to some scheduling conflicts.

Mentioned in Joe Esterhaus’ memoir “Hollywood Animal”.

Despite being both a Buddhist and a believer in God, she is a supporter of Planned Parenthood.

Dated Angelo Boffa.

Has worked with Woody Allen four times: Stardust Memories (1980) (she was just an extra in that), Antz (1998) (voice-over), Picking Up the Pieces (2000) and Fading Gigolo(2013).

Despite her va-va voom image, Sharon’s movies never attracted more than minimal box office. Gloria (1999) marked rock bottom, grossing just over $4 million in wide release on an estimated $30 million budget.

Measurements: 35B-24-35 (as Ford model-1980), 36B-25-35 (self-described in 1993 as wearing a 36B bra) (Source: Celebrity Sleuth magazine).

Current boyfriend is journalist Enzo Cursio. [November 2018]

Has said that she considers it a skill to have no shame.

Personal Quotes (70)

I was, like, forty at birth. When I wasn’t even a year old, I spoke, I was potty trained, I walked and talked. That was it. Then I started school and drove everybody crazy because they realized I had popped out as an adult. I had adult questions and wanted adult answers.

“My father has always been supportive of my individuality.” – in a Barbara Waltersinterview, September 1993.

It’s traumatizing for me to come to Washington during a Republican administration because I don’t have any Republican clothes. – Washington Post, June 20, 2001.

Any man in Hollywood will meet me if I want that. No, make that any man anywhere.

My personal style and public style are very different. When I go out, I play dress up.

Never play cards with a guy named Doc. Never eat at a place called Mom’s. And never have sex with anybody who has more problems than you do.

…be willing to say yes, no matter who says no, and to say no, regardless of who says yes.

On the benefits of being famous: “I find I get to torture a higher class of men.”

“I dress up to show that I am happy.” 1994.

“It was my first movie (Stardust Memories (1980)) and the opportunity of working with Woody Allen. It was a great experience, and I can compare it, in sexual terms, with the loss of virginity”.

It’s my experience that you really can’t lose when you try the truth.

People don’t change their behavior unless it makes a difference for them to do so.

Asked to pay tribute to troops fighting in Iraq: “I know it’s a difficult time for you to come out to party during such a time of strife in our world. My feeling is that I hope everyone will be safe and protected and taken care of, and our prayers are with the people around the world who will be affected by this.”

I like to drive with my knees. Otherwise, how can I put on my lipstick and talk on the phone?

I’ve had the same breasts for my entire adult life.

If you have a vagina and an attitude in this town, then that’s a lethal combination.

Stone found her brush with death from a brain aneurysm has given her a new lease of life: “This brilliant, bright, white vortex of light was upon me. And then I was met by some of my friends, people who are very dear to me. But it was over very fast and suddenly I was back in the room and in my own body. It affected me so profoundly that I realized my life would never be the same again. It has definitely given me a new perspective on my career.”

Ava Gardner was the most beautiful woman in the world, and it’s wonderful that she didn’t cut up her face. She addressed aging by picking up her chin and receiving the light in a better way. And she looked like a woman. She never tried to look like a girl.

Women might be able to fake orgasms. But men can fake whole relationships.

If you act like you know what you’re doing, you can do anything you want- except neurosurgery.

I bake all the time, but I don’t like to eat the cookies when they’re done. I just like the dough.

I don’t believe make up and the right hairstyle alone can make a woman beautiful. The most radiant woman in the room is the one full of life and experience.

When told Madonna has said she wants to kiss her: “Not in this lifetime. Why? Because I’m the only one she hasn’t done it to.”

We Barbie dolls are not supposed to behave the way I do.

I believe that if you truly, truly love your children, you need to supply condoms in a place in your home, at a quantity that makes it a non-judgmental situation for them to have them… If they want to make water balloons out of them, great. If they want to carry them so they feel tough, great. If they want to give them to their friends, even better.

Carole LombardClark GableGinger RogersFred Astaire – that was my idea of what it was supposed to be like. I thought, ‘Well, I can do that even if no one else does.’ Who cares? I dress up to show that I am happy and grateful to be there. That’s what you do where I come from. I don’t feel like saying, ‘fuck you.’ I feel like saying, ‘thank you.’

I thought when I made my first big mistakes in public that that was really going to be the end of me. My parents cried. My friends were desperate.

On fame: “It would walk into the room and eat you, or take you for a ride through a fabulous jungle – or it could slap the living daylights out of you, laugh, and leave.”

If you don’t want my peaches, don’t shake my tree.

I have this philosophy that money talks and cash screams.

“After you’ve been through all that stuff, the rest of this is just kid’s stuff. As Winston Churchill says, when you’re going through hell, keep going”.

People get very hung up on whether they gave birth. … I’ve come to understand that it’s not who ‘has’ you, but who loves you that shapes you as a person.

Peace does exist. It exists in your heart and soul.

I’m more honest, more true, more vulnerable because I used to think that I was supposed to be fearless. Now I know that its okay to be afraid as long as you show up.

The villain is like a cobra. They watch, they watch, they watch. And then they strike.

Celebrity is a pretty stunning thing. At first I was like ‘They love me! Oh, I love them, too!’ And suddenly, I was tap-dancing on my pedestal and it was WHACK! Facedown in the dirt.

[Talking about Basic Instinct 2 (2006)]: “By the time the film is released, I will be 48 and I wanted to do the nudity in a way that’s quite brazen. I wanted her to be very masculine, like a man in a steam room and I wanted the audience to have a moment where they realize she’s naked and then realize that she’s a forty something woman and naked. Because we’re not used to seeing that in movies. We’re used to seeing Sean Connery and his granddaughter, you know what I mean? Or Mel Gibson and his daughter”.

My mother gave me a jar of Avon Rich Moisture Cream when I was 14. She said, ‘Don’t ask me why; you’ll thank me later.’

-Woman’s World, 4-11-06.

In this business there is Plan A, in which you become successful by living and acting with a lot of integrity. Then there’s Plan B, where you sell your soul to the Devil. I still find it hard to distinguish one from the other.

I’ve really given up my life to God, and I know that’s why I’m OK and at peace. I’ve never had a conflict when I’m praying on a set.

I’ve been at this so long that I knew everyone in the business long before I became famous, and I didn’t have any value to many of them. Now, suddenly, the people who were coarse and rude to me before treat me as though we’ve never met, and now I’m fabulous, they’re fabulous and isn’t it fabulous we’re chatting.

My children need to have someone they can look up to, someone they can look at and say, Gee, I’d like to be just like him, So I don’t want to just bring some schmuck around them. When I meet people I have to think about are they going to be a good example for my sons.

For the first half of your life, you get the face that you’re born with. And for the second half you get the face you deserve. And it’s important to recognize the beauty within you and allow it to grow by being the greater person that you can be.

People are just sitting there going, ‘I don’t care what she’s saying, I just want to know does she get naked in the movie? Is she naked? Nude nude nude naked, do I see her boobies?’

-during a Basic Instinct 2 (2006) press conference.

At 47, you have thoughtfulness and dignity and spiritual elegance…You have something to say. It’s not just, Hi! I look terrific in a bathing suit.’

When you’ve had a long career, nobody has not made movies that aren’t successful, it’s your job, not a hobby.

Being professional in what I do is very important to me. Flakes don’t make it to the top, pros do. Acting is a tough scene that becomes your whole life and to survive in that kind of environment you must be humane and honest.

I was this cute young girl with a nice ass who was a terrible actress. But I’ve worked real hard to become a good actress and now I think I’m starting to reap the benefits of that hard work. (from a 1990 interview)

I feel at great pain when the spotlight is on the death of 4,000 American soldiers, while 600,000 Iraqi deaths are ignored. War is not a movie, it is a tragedy of dead bodies, victims, the disabled, orphans, widows and the displaced. I feel sad when I realize how much truth is being changed or obscured in the American media.

[2004] I suppose there was a time when I ran my celebrity like a business-but those days are over. I had a marvelous time doing all the great “Sharon Stone” things, and I love being an actor, loved achieving in that world, but I don’t really feel the need now to stand in the line going “pick me, pick me!” anymore. “Sharon Stone” was one of the things that I did, but I don’t think it’s the only thing that I’m ever GONNA do or the only thing I ever WANT to do.

[on what three things should a movie star have] An unknown address, friends they knew before they were famous, and people who love them enough to tell them they’re full of shit.

[on Basic Instinct (1992)] At least it proves I’m a natural blonde.

I feel that it’s so disappointing in films when you see the comforter taped to someone’s chest. It takes you out of the scene and doesn’t protect you from something within the scene.

When it has common sense it doesn’t make sense to do something else. It really is the costume of your character. What else are you gonna do? It seems foolish to do something else and if you do something else, that distracts the audience if you’re in authentic.

If you’re inauthentically naked then it’s distracting to the audience when you are naked.

I just think television kind of has more to offer right now. Good film parts are less and less common, because the studios have less and less grip on how to bring people to film. They’ve used tentpole movies to such a degree that they’ve wiped out their own business. The film industry has kind of wiped itself out.

If I have to diet, I’m gonna diet. If I have to work out, I’m gonna work out. If I have to sleep upside down like a bat so I don’t look like a basset hound, that’s what I’m gonna do. Because I’m not leaving!

On Martin Scorsese: There is no one more exquisite to work for than Scorsese.

I will not work in any state that holds or is actively creating laws to legally support discrimination against American citizens whether due to their race, religion, gender or sexual orientation, nor where those laws are passed or approved by the government of said state.

We have leaders and people who are trying to be leaders who are running campaigns based on fear, and that’s a contagion. It’s horrible. Holocausts have occurred when that fire catches loose.

[on Donald Trump] When I go abroad and listen [to what people say about us], I just feel very, very sad. It was one thing during the George W. time where you just had to sit in shame, but this? What can I say that he doesn’t say for himself? I think the ever-changing muskrat on his head speaks worlds about his confidence. Unfortunately, there is a lot of humor attached to Trump in the media, but it isn’t funny and it wouldn’t be funny if he became president.

[when asked by Lee Cowan of CBS in 2018 if she’d ever faced any sexual harassment working in the industry] I’ve been in this business 40 years. Can you imagine the business I stepped into 40 years ago? Looking like I look? From Nowhere, Pennysylvania? I didn’t come here with any protection. I’ve seen it all.

[on what made her decide to join the “Mosaic” cast] When Steven Soderbergh writes something for you, once you get done screaming and get back up off the floor, I think it’s time to say yes! I really got it with him.

[on Diabolique (1996)] The original is and will remain a classic. Ours is a funny, campy, one-box-of-popcorn thriller.

[reflecting on her hot streak] A lot of my women in my business, Shirley MacLaine and Faye Dunaway, said, “It won’t last forever, love every single second of it, throw yourself into it.” It was so fun during this young time in my life, and you know, no kids, running around the world, making big movies, that’s an extraordinary time.

The fact that I married two Jewish men is related to my obsession with studying and eating, which are two pillars of Jewish culture. It is probably related to the fact that I prefer dark men, which pretty much limits the possibilities. Judaism places emphasis on culture and education, and that’s important to me.

We all have a destiny. What’s up to us is with how much integrity we meet it

When I lived in a little neighborhood with my house right on the street, and a basketball hoop on my garage, the neighbors were great, they’d tell the paparazzi, ‘Get off our street’. Then I moved to the rich neighborhood and the neighbors let the paparazzi shoot through their bushes for another 20 bucks.

I used to love wine, but I don’t drink at all now. I think, at a certain point, it’s better for women not to have any alcohol because it can make your face, breasts and midsection get very bloated.

I see women who don’t wanna say how old they are – and I just think that is such incredible bullshit!

Salary (8)

Basic Instinct (1992) $500,000
Sliver (1993) $2,500,000
Intersection (1994) $5,000,000
The Specialist (1994) $5,000,000
Casino (1995) $2,000,000
Diabolique (1996) $6,000,000
Last Dance (1996) $6,000,000
Basic Instinct 2 (2006) $13,600,000

 

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15 Thrilling Facts About Basic Instinct

BY GARIN PIRNIA

 

MARCH 20, 2017

 

Source: http://mentalfloss.com/article/76944/15-thrilling-facts-about-basic-instinct

 

 

Twenty-five years ago—on March 20, 1992—Sharon Stone introduced moviegoers to Catherine Tramell, a novelist and suspected serial killer who stabs her victims with an ice pick while engaged in acrobatic sex acts. Michael Douglas—who starred in another erotic thriller, Fatal Attraction—played her love interest, a San Francisco detective named Nick Curran. Directed by Paul Verhoeven and written by Joe Eszterhas (who would team up again for 1995’s Showgirls), Basic Instinct grossed $352,927,224worldwide against a $49 million budget, making it the ninth highest-grossing domestic film of 1992. (The much-delayed 2006 sequel, on the other hand, bombed at the box office.)

 

The controversial movie angered the LGBTQ community (particularly in San Francisco, where filming was protested) because of the psychopathic nature of Stone’s bisexual character, though Stone saw her more as a “party girl,” and Eszterhas thought of her as being omnisexual. Here are 15 not-so-basic facts about the revolutionary thriller.

 

1. THE SCRIPT SOLD FOR A RECORD $3 MILLION.

Back in the day, spec scripts could sell for millions of dollars. Joe Eszterhas joined that club when he sold Basic Instinct—a script that took him just 13 days to write—for $3 million in 1990. Eszterhas told The A.V. Club that the media liked to focus on a writer’s failures, which occurred when Eszterhas’ Showgirls tanked at the box office. “CBS Evening News came with a helicopter crew and found me on a beach in Florida and interviewed me about the money I got for Basic Instinct,” Eszterhas said. “The other thing that I don’t think was quite fair was that after that whole period, where scripts—mine and Shane Black’s and half a dozen other writers’ scripts—went for a lot of money, the media zeroed in on the box office for some of those scripts, and they always zeroed in on the failures … When Basic Instinct went on to earn $400 million worldwide, there were no stories that said, ‘[Executive producer] Mario Kassar paid three million bucks for this.’”

2. CATHERINE AND NICK WERE BASED ON REAL PEOPLE.

Before he became a multimillionaire screenwriter, Eszterhas was a police reporter for Cleveland’s The Plain Dealer. “I met a cop who just liked the action too much,” Eszterhas told Nerve. “He was always in the middle of shootings. He was a great cop on one level, but on another, you suspected he liked it too much. That’s what Nick Curran does in Basic Instinct. As Catherine says in the movie, he got too close to the flame. He loved the flame.”

Tramell also comes from a person Eszterhas knew in Ohio, this time a go-go dancer in Dayton. One night he picked the stranger up and they went back to his hotel room to have some fun. “She reached into her purse, and she pulled out a .22 and pointed it at me,” he told Nerve. “She said, ‘Give me one reason why I shouldn’t pull this trigger.’ I said, ‘I didn’t do anything to hurt you. You wanted to come here, and as far as I know, you enjoyed what we just did.’ And she said, ‘But this is all guys have ever wanted to do with me, and I’m tired of it.’ We had a lengthy discussion before she put that gun down. Those two random characters are where those parts of Basic Instinct come from.”

3. MICHAEL DOUGLAS AND PAUL VERHOEVEN APPROACHED THE MOVIE AS IF IT WERE A DETECTIVE NOVEL.

Verhoeven wanted to make a modern version of an Alfred Hitchcock thriller—except with a lot more sex. “In traditional films, the killer lurks in a house and the victim walks into the kitchen, turns on the radio, makes coffee, opens a book, gets comfortable—and then the killer strikes,” he told The New York Times. “In this film, the killer hides—but on the bed. The situation is the same, but the two people are facing each other in bed, not the kitchen.”

Douglas agreed with the film noir aspect of the movie. “Fatal Attractionwas a picture close to home for a lot of people because you could identify with those characters,” he also told the Times. “It was a reality tale, while Basic Instinct is like a detective novel that people like to read in the privacy of their homes. It’s almost Gothic. It’s certainly more dramatic. And the real question here is: Is anybody really worthy of redemption?”

4. THE ICE PICK SCENE GAVE SHARON STONE NIGHTMARES.

In a 1992 interview with Playboy, Stone revealed that she didn’t mind the sex scenes but did mind the violence. “I made my best friend lie by the bed while I did the scene—just lie there by the camera telling me jokes,” she said. “God! They had a paramedic with an oxygen mask there because I’d start to feel like I was going to pass out.”

By the time she had to loop some of her sequences in post-production, Stone “had seen the film and recognized that Catherine was like a carnivorous cat on the kill,” she said. “That’s how I understood the energy of it. Once I got that—once I understood the roar of the kill—I told them I didn’t want to loop it one bit at a time like they usually do. I wanted to do it all at once. I wanted all the lights in the room turned off. I wanted to just do it. When they turned the lights back on, you could have knocked Paul off his chair with a feather.”

5. VERHOEVEN GOT AWAY WITH LONG SEX SCENES BECAUSE IT WAS A THRILLER.

Basic Instinct was slapped with an NC-17 rating, and Verhoeven, whose contract required a R-rating, had to go back to the MPAA eight times before they’d lower the rating to a R. “Because it was a thriller, the idea that Sharon Stone could kill him during sex was always an element of protection,” the director told Rolling Stone. “So we could show sex and nudity much longer than normal, because there was another element there—the element of threat.”

Mike Medavoy, the head of the movie’s distributor, TriStar, talked Verhoeven into the lesser rating. “If we make Basic Instinct as an NC-17, it could make $50 million or $250 million—I have no idea,” Medavoy told Verhoeven. “But if we make it as an R, it will certainly make $150 million. So let’s do that.” “And it made sense, at least from a business point of view, so I had to adapt to that,” Verhoeven said. “But going back and forth between the studio or the editing room and the MPAA, having to go back and change more and more frames … it was very unpleasant. Strangely enough, the shot of Sharon Stone spreading her legs was never a problem.”

Verhoeven ended up cutting about 40 seconds of material, which showed up in the European version. “Actually, I didn’t have to cut many things, but I replaced things from different angles, made it a little more elliptical, a bit less direct,” Verhoeven explained to The New York Times.

6. THE LEG-CROSSING SCENE WAS NOT IN THE SCRIPT.

Basic Instinct‘s most famous scene is undoubtedly the interrogation scene, where Stone notoriously crosses and uncrosses her legs. But Eszterhas didn’t write it. The scene has been parodied many times throughout the past 20-plus years, including a 2015 bit with Douglas on James Corden. “Paul Verhoeven decided that scene would be more fun if Sharon didn’t wear any underwear that day,” Eszterhas wrote in his 2005 memoir, Hollywood Animal. “In other words, the most famous moment of any of my films was Paul Verhoeven’s. I am a militant and militantly insufferable screenwriter who insists that the screenwriter is as important as the director, who insists the director serves the screenwriter’s vision, and whose most famous and most memorable screen moment was created by the director, Paul Verhoeven.”

During a Story Expo Q&A, Eszterhas again talked about that famous scene. “I think it was brilliant for Paul to do it that way,” Eszterhas said. “I deny that’s the reason why the movie was a hit … In some ways I’m really sorry I didn’t write the damn scene.”

7. STONE PLAYED THE INTERROGATION SCENE AS IF SHE WERE PLAYING A GAME.

Instead of allowing the male law enforcement to intimidate her character, Stone played the role with confidence. “The ruse they use—‘We have the power, we’re going to show you’—didn’t cut the mustard with [Catherine],” Stone told Playboy. “Her attitude was, ‘You’re so powerful. Aren’t you cute!’ And, of course, she had all the power. These men put her in a position where she was alone in a chair in the center of an empty room—surrounded. That would be a very intimidating position to be in unless she disarmed them, which she did. At the police station she could have been stricken and scared. But instead she thought, ‘This is going to be fun. Oh, so you want me to sit in the middle of the room here? Oh, charming. Why is that? You want to make sure you can look up my dress? OK, you can look up my dress.’ It was a game.”

8. ESZTERHAS REGRETS “GLAMORZING SMOKING” IN THE MOVIE.

In 2001, Eszterhas was diagnosed with throat cancer, and he lost a significant amount of his larynx. He wrote an op-ed in The New York Timesin 2002 about the hazards of smoking, especially in the movies. “Sharon Stone’s character smokes; Michael Douglas’s is trying to quit,” he wrote. “She seduces him with literal and figurative smoke that she blows into his face. In the movie’s most famous and controversial scene, she even has a cigarette in her hand.” He said Big Tobacco loved the movie so much that they launched a Basic brand of cigarettes. “I think smoking should be as illegal as heroin … So I say to my colleagues in Hollywood: What we are doing by showing larger-than-life movie stars smoking onscreen is glamorizing smoking. What we are doing by glamorizing smoking is unconscionable. A cigarette in the hands of a Hollywood star onscreen is a gun aimed at a 12- or 14-year-old.”

9. STONE DIDN’T FEEL COMFORTABLE AROUND DOUGLAS.

Stone told Playboy she didn’t think he felt at ease around her either, but it worked for the movie. “I think that kind of discomfort lends itself to this kind of movie,” she said. “Tension is good. I basically didn’t get to know Michael. There was something about the mystery of not knowing each other that lent itself to this situation. It’s odd, because now I have this very intimate bond with a stranger.” Despite that, Stone described working with him as “primal.” “It was all about watching him, observing his movements, provoking him. If one were to believe in karma, I would say there is some karmic circle yet unfulfilled between the two of us. Our energy together was strong. It still isn’t comfortable for me, but I think it works very well for our work together.”

10. VERHOEVEN DIDN’T THINK THE MOVIE WAS JUST ABOUT SEX.

“I always thought the movie was about evil,” Verhoeven told The New York Times. “I always thought that with an economy falling down, with the dangers of life all around you—the danger of AIDS, the danger of crime—people are more aware of the fact that evil is an existing, everyday factor in your life. But this is my intuition. I don’t want to push it. As an artist, as a director, it’s sometimes better not to be too clear with yourself about what you’re doing. Otherwise you might be pushing too hard.”

11. STONE MANIPULATED THE DIRECTOR TO GET THE PART.

Thirteen actresses besides Stone were considered for Catherine, but only Stone was willing to do it. Just as Catherine manipulates men, Stone manipulated the director to get the role. Back then Stone wasn’t a big name, and didn’t read for the part fearing she’d be disappointed. She finally read the script and knew she was right for the role but didn’t want to call Verhoeven—whom she had worked with on Total Recall—and ask if she could audition for him. “I wouldn’t ask, because I didn’t want him to test me just because he felt obligated,” she told Playboy. One day Verhoeven had her come in to dub lines for an airplane version of Total Recall, so she wore a tight Catherine-esque dress to demonstrate to Verhoeven that she could play the maneater part. “I was being cool. Very cool,” she said. “I didn’t want him to think I was insane, but I did want to give him a general idea that I could transform myself. Men are visually stimulated—and that’s usually enough, at least at first.” The dress worked, and Stone tested with Douglas and won the role.

12. ESZTERHAS QUIT THE PROJECT BUT CAME BACK LATER ON.

Eszterhas felt Verhoeven was compromising his script. “My intention when I wrote the script was that it be a psychological mystery with the love scenes done subtly,” Eszterhas told the Los Angeles Times in 1990. “Every love scene in my script begins with the words: ‘It is dark; we can’t see clearly.’”

He then thought Verhoeven and Douglas ganged up on him. “Michael was leading the fight, feeling that Catherine was one-upping his character all the time, and that there was no redemption, and he wanted the movie to end with him shooting and killing her,” Eszterhas told the London Screenwriters’ Festival. “Paul backed him up. I said, ‘If you want to do this I won’t be involved in killing my own child. It would make it into a bad TV movie.’ In my mind, this was film noir, not a morality tale, and that’s what made it unique and daring. Paul stood up and said, ‘I am the director, you are the writer, you do what I tell you!’ I said, ‘Like f*ck you do!’”

A few months later, Verhoeven called Eszterhas and decided to return to his version of the script. “He said he hadn’t understood the ‘basement’ of my script, as he called it, that it was about good and evil,” Eszterhas said. “He not only went back to my draft, he actually held a press conference and said this. For a director to mumble these words is quite something; for him to hold a press conference is mind-boggling.”

13. IT WAS “BASIC HORROR” FOR STONE TO SEE HERSELF ON THE SCREEN.

Having abandoned herself so completely to the character, when Stone finally saw the film on the big screen she “couldn’t believe that it was me. I couldn’t remember doing all the things I had done,” she confessed to Playboy.

“Halfway through the movie, it was as if I were impaled. I was just sitting there, mouth open, staring at the screen, listening to my heartbeat and wondering how long it would be before it was over, wondering who I should call first to tell them never to see this movie. It was basic horror. It’s one thing when you take enormous risks and go way out on a limb in life. It’s another thing when someone plays it back for you.” After struggling on the sidelines for so many years, she knew Basic Instinct was the “opportunity of a lifetime.” “I’m either gonna play this part and it’s gonna rock things, or I’m gonna be hanging my head in shame at the supermarket. There was no gray area. It was an all-or-nothing roll of the dice.”

14. KATHLEEN TURNER WAS A MODEL FOR CATHERINE.

For her role as a femme fatale-type character, Stone referenced Barbara Stanwyck in Double Indemnity and Kathleen Turner in Body Heat. “Kathleen Turner is a great, great actress whom I have always enjoyed watching,” Stone told Playboy. “You never know what she’s going to do. So, yes, I thought of her when I did my part. I thought, if Kathleen Turner did this, she wouldn’t draw a line here, she’d go further. I also thought of Judy Davis. If she did this part, we’d be rocked right out of our seats. I saw Impromptu regularly while I was making the movie, thinking, she has great courage. I want to be like her.”

15. STONE AND ESZTERHAS HAD A ONE-NIGHT STAND.

In Hollywood Animal, Eszterhas recounted the time he slept with Stone after the movie came out. “I’m glad I nailed her, though. Not because nailing her felt all that good (it was okay). But because as a result of Sharon Stone’s presence in my life, I met and married Naomi, my one true love,” he wrote.

He’s referring to the filming of Sliver (Eszterhas wrote the script), when Stone had an affair with producer William McDonald, who left his wife of five months, Naomi Baka, for Stone. The couple got engaged but eventually Stone dumped him. On the plus side, Eszterhas swooped in and hooked up with Naomi; they are still married today.

Eszterhas said neither he nor Stone “attached too much significance to our one-night stand.” “I figured that since I had written the biggest hit of her life for her, she was just saying thank you. And I knew that Sharon thought she was flattering me that night by treating me as if I were the director [she wouldn’t sleep with Verhoeven] and not a screenwriter, but still. Basic Instinct had been the number one box office hit of the year … in the whole world! I felt I deserved her.”

 

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Whatever happened to Sharon Stone?

Source: https://www.thelist.com/105230/whatever-happened-sharon-stone/

 

Sharon Stone - Whatever Happened 1

 

Sharon Stone was a bonafide ’90s icon thanks to her attention-grabbing roles in Total Recall and, of course, Basic Instinct. Following her Oscar nomination for Casino in 1996 (she nabbed the Golden Globe that same year), Stone seemed on course for a world-conquering career. But now, 20 years on, it’s difficult to pick out even one role since that comes close to those three.

 

Although Stone has worked consistently over the past two decades, she’s also been mostly out of the spotlight (perhaps by choice?). When she does pop up in the media, it’s usually to discuss whether the infamous leg-opening scene was kosher. Or it’s because director Paul Verhoeven is flapping his gums again about what she really agreed to do. But, in the background of all this, Stone has been quietly building a life, family, and a career for herself that’s worth taking notice of, too.

 

She’s played a variety of roles that toyed with her persona

 

Sharon Stone - Whatever Happened 2

 

First and foremost, she has been working. A quick glance at Stone’s IMDb shows nary a gap in the schedule, in fact. There may not have been a big, career-defining moment like that of her most (in)famous role, but that doesn’t mean she’s been sitting around knitting blankets for 20 years. The intervening two decades since Casino have, interestingly, seen Stone focus more on tough, difficult female characters in smaller indie movies. It’s unlikely she’s about to pop up in the next Transformers (even if Anthony Hopkins is there to greet her).

 

She’s also been taking aim at her sexpot persona. The year 2013 alone saw her playing a repressed mother in Lovelace, and a woman paying for sex out of desperation and loneliness in Woody Allen’s Fading Gigolo. In a 2014 interview with The Independent, Stone waxed lyrical about her choice to play such roles, deadpanning that she feels the concept of shame was “invented by a man.” Whether this was in reference to Basic Instinct, and the ensuing controversy, is open to interpretation but Stone is certainly unafraid of toying with the public’s long-held idea of who she is.

 

She suffered a massive brain hemorrhage

 

Sharon Stone - Whatever Happened 3

 

Back in 2001, Stone’s life changed forever after she suffered a massive brain hemorrhage. As she detailed in an emotionally revealing op-ed in The Hollywood Reporter, Stone bled in her brain for nine days straight. After spending a week in the ICU, noting the survival rate for what she went through “is very low,” Stone had to learn how to walk, talk, and read again.

 

She spent the next two years trying to piece back together who she was, a process Stone now credits with making her unafraid of the aging process because she knows “what the alternative is.” The actress described it as a “humbling journey” that has forced her to work at everything in her life a bit harder as a result. She’s made a habit of eating clean and works out four or five days a week, and she doesn’t drink alcohol. But she hasn’t lost her sense of humor, admitting, “People don’t want to see a fat Sharon Stone, do they? I know my brand!”

 

She made a home for herself on TV

 

Sharon Stone - Whatever Happened 4

 

Off the back of her aneurysm and the difficult recovery period, Stone admits she found herself pushed to the back of the line. A guest spot on Law & Order: SVU led to difficulties with remembering her lines, but Stone pushed through and has found significant success on TV as a result. Although she’d already appeared on the likes of The Practice and Roseanne over the years, it’s only now that she’s found a real home for herself on television.

 

In particular, Stone headed up TNT show Agent X, playing none other than the President of the United States. She also proudly executive produced the show. Next up on her roster is the intriguing Mosaic, in which she plays popular children’s author Olivia Lake. Considering the show is based around solving Lake’s murder, it’s fairly likely Stone will be front and center once more. She also found time to narrate children’s TV show Harold and the Purple Crayon throughout its 13-episode run, a nod perhaps to her status as a quietly content single mother.

 

Although Stone has worked consistently over the past two decades, she’s also been mostly out of the spotlight (perhaps by choice?). When she does pop up in the media, it’s usually to discuss whether the infamous leg-opening scene was kosher. Or it’s because director Paul Verhoeven is flapping his gums again about what she really agreed to do. But, in the background of all this, Stone has been quietly building a life, family, and a career for herself that’s worth taking notice of, too.

 

 

She’s been a vocal proponent for women’s rights

 

Sharon Stone - Whatever Happened 5

 

Those who have only seen Stone’s name popping up in relation to that  Basic Instinct moment (she’ll probably still be discussing it when she’s 80) will be surprised to learn she’s actually quite the activist. A loud and proud proponent of women’s rights, Stone has discussed everything from the gender pay gap to the #metoo movement.

 

Back in 2015, Stone spoke out at a fashion event hosted by her sister Kelly about how “no one wanted to pay me” after Basic Instinct. Stone recalled sitting at her kitchen table with her manager, crying with frustration. And, even though she took a stand by refusing to work for free, Stone still got paid significantly less than her male co-stars.

 

The struggle to survive in a male-dominated industry is something Stone discussed again, in an interview with AARP, accompanied by fellow actresses Jane Fonda and Alfre Woodard. The three women discussed aging and the pressure to continue to be desirable in Hollywood. She also spoke to Luxury London about just how much strength it takes to survive in the business as a woman and how her strong characters represent that eternal fight.

 

She’s been the Chair of amFAR for 20 years

 

Sharon Stone - Whatever Happened 6

 

Not content with simply being a voice for marginalized women, Stone has also been quietly working away as an activist for the past 20 years. In fact, she’s been the Global Campaign Chair of amFAR (AMerican Foundation for AIDS research) since 1995. Stone initially signed on for a three-year stint in 1995. Then, in 1998, she renewed her term until a safe and effective AIDS vaccine could be found (i.e. it’s still going).

 

This impressive career as chair is detailed in all its glory on their official site, but suffice to say Stone’s efforts have been more than exemplary over the years. Nothing she does is small, and from spreading awareness to fundraising, she’s more than made her mark. In August 2000, she even hosted an auction at the starry Venice Film Festival that raised over half a million dollars. She won the Peace Summit Award in 2013 for her work.

 

She held an impromptu auction to build schools in Africa

 

Sharon Stone - Whatever Happened 7

 

Speaking of auctions, Stone seems to have a bit of a knack for utilizing them to their greatest potential. One of her most impressive moments as an activist and humanitarian came in 2015 when she held an impromptu auction to raise much-needed funds for Africa.

 

As a guest of honor at the Pilosio Building Peace Award in Milan, Stone could have just smiled for the cameras and reveled in the moment. Instead, she took the opportunity, in front of a crowd of the most powerful and wealthy construction industry CEOs in the world, to raise both money and awareness.

 

Stone managed to gain enough pledges just from this one moment of spontaneity to build a whopping 28 schools in Africa. As it turned out, the idea was spurred on, Stone explained, from her meeting a businessman earlier who pledged to build two schools in exchange for a picture with her.

 

She adopted three sons

 

Sharon Stone - Whatever Happened 8

Arguably Stone’s biggest personal achievement over the past two decades, however, is as a single mother. Stone adopted her three children Quinn Kelly, Laird Vonne, and Roan Joseph in 2000, 2005, and 2006 respectively. She’s kept them mostly out of the limelight, but in 2017 they presented her with a Mother Of The Year Award at the Associates For Breast and Prostate Cancer Studies (ABCs) Mother’s Day Luncheon in L.A.

 

In her acceptance speech, Stone admitted that motherhood “didn’t come easily” to her. Stone also told PEOPLE, in relation to life as a single mother, upon initially adopting Laird, “I have more love, help, friendship and kindness than at any other time in my life.” Although they’re mostly kept off social media and out of the public eye, Stone did post a fun snap sharing her 59th birthday with her kids to Twitter. Roan also broke with tradition and accompanied her to the 2018 Golden Globes.

 

She dabbles in music on the side

 

Sharon Stone - Whatever Happened 9

 

With a busy acting career, three children, and a massive humanitarian commitment all to contend with, it’s amazing Stone finds time to breathe let alone do anything else. And yet, in an interview with The Independent, she admitted to yet another creative pursuit: songwriting. Albeit, naturally, with a humanitarian twist.

 

Stone revealed that the first song she ever had published was in aid of Hurricane Katrina, as part of a fundraising album (Come Together Now). Her song was actually the title track, which is no small feat. Elsewhere, she revealed, “I had a song come out in Argentina last year about a terrific writer and poet who was murdered in his car.” Even further afield, Stone released a song in Sweden called “Let’s Kiss.”

 

Stone explained she went to college on a writing scholarship at just 15 and has “always been a person who’s loved to write.” She’s even had several stories published in magazines over the years. This may be less of a hobby soon enough if the right project comes along.

 

She was the face of a high-fashion campaign

 

Sharon Stone - Whatever Happened 10

 

Stone has had brushes with luxury brands before, launching a special line of personally-designed vanity cases for Louis Vuitton back in 2000. Sales of the cases reportedly generated more than $3 million for amFAR. But, in 2016, she got even closer to the fashion world.

 

As detailed in an eye-catching spread and in-depth interview with Luxury London, Stone starred in Austrian label Airfield’s S/S 2016 campaign. Clad in a variety of stunning, age-appropriate looks, Stone is the picture of assured confidence. She spends much of the interview discussing her seemingly everlasting sex appeal, noting, “Sexiness comes from deep inside. It’s the feeling of being present, having fun and liking yourself enough.”

 

She actually began her career as a model, as the interviewer notes, before moving forward with acting. So, the campaign surely came easily to her. And it most likely won’t be the last for a woman who doesn’t let age get in the way.

 

She set herself up as a bloodthirsty talent agent in The Disaster Artist

 

Sharon Stone - Whatever Happened 11

After years spent working away quietly in the background (relatively speaking), Stone stormed back into the multiplex in the most take-notice way she could. Taking aim at her own man-eater personality, cultivated over years of the media and public alike being unable to let the leg-crossing go, she turned up in The Disaster Artist.

 

Almost upstaging James Franco himself in the sweet, true-life take on Tommy Wiseau and Greg Sestero’s ultimate good-bad movie The Room, Stone appears as a bloodthirsty, platinum blonde talent agent. Called into the room by a subordinate who’s visibly terrified of her, Stone turns her sights on Dave Franco’s Greg, naively enthusiastic, grabs him in her claws and tells him simply “you’re mine.” It’s a funny, Hollywood-skewering moment in a movie full of them. It also reaffirms Stone’s standing as an icon, even if many people will struggle to think of what they’ve last seen her in.

 

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Finally, a note from this author:

 

The regular readers of this blog site already know that its primary objective is to prepare ourselves for “a Better Tomorrow; a Better Future and a Better World.” While this goal may seem lofty to many people, this author allows herself to assure you that it is neither ridiculous nor an attempt at being high-handed, arrogant and narcissistic on her part to promote these high ideals and values among all the inhabitants of this world – OUR world.

 

There are about 130 blogs (or more) that have been penned by this author on this site with this sole aim in mind – each and every single blog has been published to the general public of the world.

 

It makes absolutely no sense to grumble and grouse endlessly and daily on the woes that have befallen our Earth in days gone by and recently- not to mention the frightening increase in crime and the rise of basic wickedness and evil ways of countless people who unfortunately take sadistic pleasure in the pain and suffering of their victims. The idea is to take some sort of positive action against it. This blog hopes to Unify the World as One Whole – to make it a world that will stand as a Formidable Adversary promoting basic goodness and benevolence against Evil, wherever it might lurk.

 

Now, I’m sure that most of you are wondering if, yet again, this author has ‘lost the plot’ so to speak and is rambling on and on uselessly, without getting to the point in a timely fashion. You will be disappointed to note that this author stands with her two feet planted firmly on the ground – there’s no frivolity with me, let me assure you!

 

I have purposefully used a person with a high celebrity status and image, like Ms. Stone to underline how Fame (and if need be, Fortune) can be used for good advantage to either improve oneself as a person or to use this legendary status to help the less fortunate millions the world over.

 

If I start out by telling you that Ms. Stone is a highly attractive woman – I think that I would be doing her a gross injustice.  To say that she is stunning and oozes tons of sex appeal is more like it – I can assure you that she is capable of turning heads of many a man and many a woman alike (even though many women would prefer not to admit to this fact.) What makes Ms. Stone truly beautiful is not her physical beauty. It is the many small acts of beauty and kindness that she has undertaken, as true acts of love, for the benefit of others, much less fortunate to her, that make her truly beautiful. What’s sad indeed is that most people do not even know this fact.

 

We are so busy creating stereotypes for ourselves and believing in them, that sometimes the truth evades us even when it stares us in the eye. Ms. Stone’s most successful acting role was undoubtedly as the villainous author, Catherine Tramell, in the “Basic Instinct” movies. In these erotic thriller movies, she played the role of a manipulative femme-fatale and evil seductress who used her stunning good looks to have promiscuous sex with random (male or female) acquaintances or even total strangers. Yet it doesn’t imply (as per stereotypes), that she is such a person in real life. Learn to see the beauty in other people. It will make your own life happier and beautiful in its own way.

 

This is entirely my perspective and my point of view as an author. I think we should stop and think how appearances can be truly deceptive. I’m not stating that Ms. Stone (or any of us, for that matter) hasn’t done any wrong things in life – but honestly, can any of us truly state that we are blameless saints? Of course not. But then, who are we to judge other people in any case? Leave such judgments to the Lord our God in Heaven. It makes life so much simpler an easier!

 

Live and let live – be happy and allow others to be happy too, in their own turn. Don’t poke your nose into matters that don’t concern you – it makes for a much easier and simpler life on the whole. Avoid negativity – smile and watch the world smile with you.

 

Ms. Stone is one of the few people who immediately comes to my mind when it comes down to reminding you that the creation and undue belief in stereotypes can be very misleading indeed. For an actor, it is only an honest day’s job but for the world sometimes judging people according to stereotypes can be not only an act of jealousy but of deep spite and malice too. More often than not, appearances ARE deceptive and rash – initial judgments made hastily can be later proved to be false and wrong.

 

So, sit back and think a little bit about the deeper meaning of this blog – even a high-flown celebrity can teach us a thing or two of importance – whether you choose to believe it or not. It can be a very humbling experience indeed!

 

 

 

 

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