Jaws 3D par Romain Néophyte

La toujours délicieuse Bess Armstrong fête ses 59 ans. Je sais, moi aussi j’ai du mal à y croire… Pour l’occasion, j’ai décidé de reproduire ici quelques passages de son interview pour le magazine Marquee datant de l’ été 1983. La plupart de ces informations sont inédites… « The chance to work with whales and dolphins was my initial reason for wanting to do Jaws 3D. I met those whales the first day, and it was love at first sight. I get very gloppy on the subject, I’d heard silly rumours about humans and killer whales, so I spent a lot of time with the trainers. We had a few drinks, and then I asked them about their run-ins with the animals.Then I felt I knew the worst. » Bess Armstrong continue sur sa lancée: « My first whale friend, Kotar, was 6 months old and 16 feet long, and he weighed four thousand pounds. » Un beau bébé qui, visiblement, aimait beaucoup les caresses: « I just stuck my arm in his mouth and scratched. I’m afraid of horses, but for some reason I’m not afraid of whales. » et faire des blagues: « Nobody told me Kotar could release his front gate. When I dove down 25 feet to see if I could touch the bottom of the pool, there he was. I came back up and everyone was laughing! I just grabbed Kotar’s fin and jumped on. I’ll remember that moment for the rest of my life. God save me from a real job! »

Le reste de l’ interview fait la part belle à sa combinaison de plongée…Attendrons nous son 60ème anniversaire pour en parler? Non bien évidemment! « What do you do when you’re working all day in a wetsuit and you have to go to the bathroom? You whisper your need, and someone tells the director ‘Bess has to go to the bathroom. Do we have time? Then I have to say ‘No, it’s not a matter of do we have time. We have to make time. So everything stops and one of the assistant directors announces on his two way radio ‘Bess has to go to the bathroom’. Then I go. While I’m in there I can hear the radio crackling ‘She’s still in there…not yet…yes, she’s coming out now’. There’s no privacy when you’re working in wetsuits! » Si Armstrong a dû apprendre à gérer baleines et envies pressantes, elle était par contre déjà une championne de natation avant le premier coup de manivelle! « When I was growing up my family spent every summer at a lake. My parent had four kids under four. They just threw us into the lake and taught us to swim. So swimming is second nature to me! » L’interview se termine enfin avec une réflexion de Bess à propos de son travail: « We’ve all worked really hard to avoid criticism that will automatically be thrown at us because we’re in this movie. We’re all trying to flesh out our characters. » Bon anniversaire Mrs Armstrong!