Cher may have won Best Actress at Cannes for her performance in Peter Bogdanovich‘s 1985 feature “Mask,” but that didn’t mean she enjoyed working with the director.
Cher, who is revisiting her life, legacy, and career in memoir “Cher: The Memoir Part 1,” told The Times that Bogdanovich was an “asshole” to work with. “There are only two directors I didn’t like: Peter Bogdanovich and the guy from ‘The Muppets,’” Cher said, referencing “Mermaids” director Frank Oz.
For Bogdanovich, Cher detailed his sexist remarks on set. “He was an asshole,” Cher said. “He was not nice to the girls in the film and he was so fucking arrogant. I really, really disliked him.”
According to Cher, one tense moment on set included Bogdanovich asking her for her opinion on a scene, and then later chastising her for sharing her perspective. “[Bogdanovich] comes in and says, ‘Cher, where do you think we should film this scene?’ And I say, ‘Well, the kitchen is working pretty well, why don’t we do that again?’” Cher remembered. “The next morning he arrives on set eating an egg sandwich and starts screaming that he’s not going to let me direct this film, I’m a nobody, he can cut me out at any moment.”
She added, “Oh yeah, he was a pig.”
“Mask” centered on the true story of Roy L. “Rocky” Dennis, who was born with craniodiaphyseal dysplasia, a rare genetic disorder that causes cranial enlargements. Cher portrayed Rocky’s mother.
And there seemed to be no love lost between Cher and Bogdanovich: The late director, who died in January 2022, told New York Magazine in 2019 that Cher “didn’t trust anybody, especially men.” Yet Cher tells a different story. “Ask everybody: I’m really easy to work with,” Cher said in 2024. “I’m not arbitrary in the things I say, because it’s right to do what the director wants until you need to speak up. Meryl [Streep] says that if the director wants you to do something you don’t like, you say, ‘Yes, yes, yes, I’ll do it that way.’ Then you do it your way and they don’t even notice. I’ve worked with Bob Altman, Mike Nichols, Norman Jewison… Really great directors whom I respect. I know when to listen.”
She did add, though, that Oz was an exception. “I actually got the guy from ‘The Muppets’ fired,” Cher said. “I said, either you’re going or I’m going, which is a shame because he’s a really good director, but he had a thing about me. He would go, ‘At least my wife loves me!’”
Cher did tweet in honor of Bogdanovich when he died in 2022. “I’m Proud Of The Film [‘Mask’] We Made Together,” Cher wrote, “& In The End I’m Sure He Must Have Been As Well. He made Some Very Memorable Films,& Discovered amazingly Talented artists.”
