by Chuck Schwartz

Marcia Gay Harden was in a hotel room in her bathrobe when she got word of her Academy Award® nomination for her supporting role as Lee Krasner, wife of artist Jackson Pollock.On the road promoting that film, Harden took out her joy on the bellman who brought her breakfast. Ed Harris, who directed and stars in the film (and who got a Best Actor nomination) calls Haden's work "superb. She worked her tail off". The pair had worked together on stage, in Sympatico and, Harris said, "I've never had as good a time working with somebody on stage, other than my wife, Amy [Madigan, who also performs in the film]. We spoke with Harden a week before the news, but long after she had started to pull down critical raves, including a Best Supporting win from the New York Online Critics, to which we belong.

CrankyCritic: Maybe Tuesday will be lucky
Marcia Gay Harden: You know what? It would be lovely if it were. There was a day last week when I felt panicked from so much hope. I wanted it. I still want it but it means something different to me this week because I've seen the film again and I'm glad I can say that I'm so proud of the film that if it doesn't happen, I'll be concentrating on Valentine's Day, which is the day after. You can't let those awards mean too much because they throw you into that space of thinking about acting as a competition, and it's not!

CrankyCritic: Tell us what you knew of Jackson Pollock.
Marcia Gay Harden: First, I knew little about Jackson Pollock. I had studied him in an art class in school and I knew him as an American painter who had changed the face of art with something called "action painting". So I looked in the museum. Then, to understand about his life and his history, and the history of Krasner as an artist, opened up the art in a whole new way. I think the more people understand an artist's life, the more they appreciate the work. Do we really look at a Van Gogh painting and not think about the ear? [laughs]

CrankyCritic: What is Ed like to work with?
Marcia Gay Harden: He is so intense and so committed and so available. He's beautiful to work with. He's so truthful. It's funny, sometimes he's so intense that it's unusual. He goes right where his thought is. I love his bravery and commitedness. He knew the book ("The American Saga") backwards and forwards. He knew the details of the story. He knew what the paintings should be. He rearranged the set to make it Jackson's space – you usually have the prop person do that. He directed live, when the camera was rolling. When we were working together, he'd feed me his lines and if I wasn't truthful or if I wasn't getting there he'd say do it again. Do it again. Say it again. He'd shake it up. In theater, you do all that stuff in the rehearsal room. It doesn't happen in film, because too often there's no rehearsal and there's too much "respecting each other's boundaries"and retreat to the trailers.

CrankyCritic: What kind of research did you do?
Marcia Gay Harden: I did a lot. I took painting classes. I sucked, but it taught me something. I saw a film of her and met people in her family and then I threw everything away because it was just Ed and me, Jackson and Lee in a room. Always through the prism of Ed Harris' direction.

CrankyCritic: Did your vision of Lee conflict with Ed's and how did you work it out?
Marcia Gay Harden: I deferred to him [laughs] unless it was something I felt strongly about.
CrankyCritic: As Lee appears to defer to Jackson?
Marcia Gay Harden: [It isn't deference]. She got so much from it. She got a place in the artworld as Mrs. Jackson Pollock, even though she was always Lee Krasner an she never took his name. She gained entry to the artworld through him. She was denied entry because her paintings weren't as exciting; she wasn't breaking new ground. I think she was a good painter but I had to trust the art world that he was greater. I think she was good and that she deserved more attention than she got.