Sharon Stone: I haven’t had a good film part since Casino in 1995

By Laura Harding, PA Deputy Entertainment Editor

Sharon Stone has said she never got a good part again after 1995’s Casino and described herself as “the invisible actress”.

The Basic Instinct star, 66, has since appeared in films such as Catwoman, Lovelace and Basic Instinct 2.

Stone lost out on winning an Oscar for Martin Scorsese’s crime thriller Casino to Susan Sarandon in Dead Man Walking.

Speaking on The Louis Theroux Podcast, Stone said The Godfather director Francis Ford Coppola warned her in advance that this would be the case.

She said: “Francis put his hand on my shoulder and he said: ‘I need to talk to you.’

“I’ve won the Golden Globe for Casino and I was nominated for an Oscar. And I said: ‘Oh sure, what’s going on?’ And he said: ‘You’re not going to win the Oscar.’

“And I looked at him and I said: ‘I’m not?’ And he said: ‘No.’ And I thought I was going to cry and and he said: ‘I want you to feel like you’re going to cry now. I don’t want you to cry in the room, and that’s why I’m doing this, and it feels so mean right now.

“‘But I didn’t win for The Godfather and Marty didn’t win for Raging Bull, and you’re not going to win for Casino.

“‘And it’s because this room can’t hear opera. They don’t let us win because they don’t want us to take over the system.

“‘This is not the level of films they want. And your performance will stand the test of time. And when you lose, Marty and I are gonna be in the room and you’re gonna lose with us. And when you lose, we’re gonna be holding you when you lose.'”

Discussing attending the Oscars when she knew she was going to lose, she said: “You have to pretend it’s fantastic and it’s not fantastic.

“And then I didn’t get any good parts ever again for the rest of my entire life.”

When Theroux replied: “That can’t be true. I’m sure there were other movies you did that were good,” she replied: “No, and guess what? I hate it.”

She continued: “It’s easier to say: ‘She’s cold’, or: ‘I don’t like her’, or: ‘She’s difficult’, or: ‘She must be sick’, or: ‘She’s too old’, or that ‘she’s hard to cast’, or: ‘We don’t know what to do with her.’

“Then: ‘What if she comes in and gives another performance and she gets nominated instead of Robert De Niro? That’s not what we want to have happen.'”

When Theroux followed up to ask if there is any movie after Casino that she feels proud of, she said: “Take a look. Did anybody notice me?

“Did anybody notice me in Lovelace? That was a performance you could sharpen your knives on. Did anybody notice that? Nope. Do you see any acknowledgment for any of this stuff? Nope. I’m the invisible actress.”

She added: “I hate it. I could play Hamlet in the nude. I hate it. There’s just nothing.”

Stone also described her experiences with disgraced producer Harvey Weinstein, who is in prison for sex offences and with whom she she crossed paths at events for the Aids charity Amfar.

She said: “I had a long time of dealing with Harvey and I’m really glad that he’s in prison and I think he should stay there with the rest of the people who are like him. Harvey’s a pig. He’s an octopus and you’re just always getting one of his tentacles off you.

“He always thinks that he’s the boss of all things. I would be doing these auctions for Amfar and he’d come out and put his arm around me and take the microphone and start trying to tell me that I was supposed to take the bid of one of his friends.

“I’d have to unwind him off me and you know, say, like: ‘I call the bids, Harvey, f*** off, get off the stage,’ and everybody would think it was funny.

“I’d come off the stage and he’d be backstage shoving me around or throwing me across the room. He was very violent and he was an anaconda, he was a disgusting pig.”

Asked if she was too powerful for him to try to coerce into sex, she said: “He would say things to me like: ‘You know, you think you’re such a princess, Sharon,’ as I would unwind him off me.

“And I’d say: ‘Yeah, I think I’m the queen of France. F*** off.’

“But he was certainly comfortable with throwing me across the room. He was physically violent to me on more than one occasion because he was so angry at me because I wouldn’t do what he wanted me to do.”

The Louis Theroux Podcast is a Spotify podcast, now available everywhere, with new episodes landing every Tuesday.