A Return For Debra Winger

The Oscar-Nominated Actress Talks About Her Path Away From Hollywood ... And Back To Film

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Oct. 12, 2008

(CBS)  "I basically said, 'I better do what my deepest dreams are,' and I just happened to, you know, I caught a good ride."

Success came fast. On TV, she played Wonder Woman's younger sister, Drusilla. And then came "Urban Cowboy."

"I was ready. I knew that girl. I knew that role. I knew I could do it."

So sure, that she put on her cowboy boots and marched onto the studio lot.

"Literally the director came back from lunch, and I was there, dressed as that character."

And yet fame, when it came, scared and confused her. She fled to a Hollywood hotel.

"Hiding," she describes it. "It was pretty scary in the beginning."

"What were scared of?" Smith asked.

Winger laughed. "I don't know. You're only scared of the unknown. So, I have no idea."

She didn't hide for long. Two years later she starred opposite Richard Gere in "An Officer and a Gentleman" (left), a film with a storybook ending that both she and Gere fought against at first.

"If the story couldn't stand it, then it would just be a hokey ending," Winger explained. "The story holds it. And if a guy carries his girlfriend out of the theatre because of it, then bravo! One less girl walkin' to a parking lot!"

Although that film earned Winger an Oscar nomination, it also fueled rumors that she was "difficult."

"It's really not that important," she says now. "I didn't hurt anyone. I didn't, you know, kill anyone, that I know of."

Her second Oscar nod came for "Terms of Endearment," in which she played Emma, the terminally ill daughter of Aurora Greenway, played by Shirley MacLaine.

"Just in preparing for that role, did you channel your relationship with your own mom?" Smith asked.

"I don't think we want to use 'channel' in 'Terms of Endearment'!" Winger said. "I want that camera on, just 'cause I said nothing, you did everything, and I will take the hit," she laughed.

On screen, the mother/daughter sparks flew. So did off-screen rumors of real-life tension between Debra and Shirley.

"We worked together. Whatever anyone else will say and what we have said for the sake of spicy publicity …"

"Is that what it was?" Smith asked.

"Well, I think you can kind of figure it's Shirl and I. I mean, you know, we're not stupid."

"So, let's play up this conflict a little bit?" Smith asked.

(Left: Winger as Emma in "Terms of Endearment.")

"No, I don't think it was ever on purpose. But we could see that it was, like, a very easy way out of the conversation. Who wants to sit around and talk about what you did and how you worked the character and, i mean, you don't wanna sit around and talk about acting. So you just go, 'Yeah. Boy, we really dusted it up that day.' And partially, it was true. We were constantly, you know, picking at places.

"I think we did it for the right reason, to explore that relationship. And you know, none of us were hurt by it. We're both big girls."

"and maybe the end result was better because of it?"

"How could it not be?" Winger replied. "You're going somewhere you haven't been before."

"Can you dispel a myth? Did you guys actually slug each other?" Smith asked.

"Don't remember. Possible!"

"That's a good answer."

"Totally possible. Slug, no. There was no blood drawn. There might have been a scuffle. I don't remember. I mean, we were wild, you know? She's not a wilting violet. (laughter) She's tough, too."

MacLaine won the Oscar that year. Debra went on to make several more successful movies … "Legal Eagles," "The Sheltering Sky," and "Shadowlands," which got her yet another Oscar nomination.

But as her resume got thicker, her patience with the movie business was wearing thin.

"I started to have children and they were so fascinating to me. And I didn't really want to be away that much. So I would do one film a year. And then it became one film every two years. And then, I just said, 'You know, it's better to just make this clean.'"

So she disappeared from Hollywood, moved to New York, and focused on being a mom, working with the charity Sightsavers International, tending her garden and writing.

"I think it was sort of a decade of reflection for me, and this book is that."

She stuck her toe in the water occasionally, appearing in and helping produce "Big Bad Love" with her director-husband Arliss Howard.

And now, you could say, Debra Winger's ready to come down from her mountain retreat. She's getting rave reviews for her part in a new movie "Rachel Getting Married." This time she plays the mother, of troubled daughter Anne Hathaway.

And while she's through with talking about the past ...

"I'm exhausted from my life!" she laughed.

… Debra winger is ready and eager for whatever roles lie ahead.

"So are you hopeful that there are some good Debra Winger parts out there in the future?" Smith asked.

"I don't know what a 'Debra Winger part' is, frankly," Winger said. "But I do know that I have experienced 10 years of, you know, meeting women that have compelling stories to tell within other people's films. And, you know, I hope I get the chance to bring it the way that I look and the way that I am. I'm not sure that I will get that, you know? It just remains to be seen."

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