Actress Maggie Gyllenhaal has called bullshit on sexism and ageism in Hollywood, after revealing to The Wrap that, at 37, she was seen as “too old” to play a 55-year-old man’s love interest in a film.
“There are things that are really disappointing about being an actress in Hollywood that surprise me all the time,” Gyllenhall said in an interview, “I’m 37 and I was told recently I was too old to play the lover of a man who was 55. It was astonishing to me. It made me feel bad, and then it made me feel angry, and then it made me laugh.”
It’s news that’s depressingly unsurprising for Hollywood, and especially echoes Amy Schumer‘s flawless insight to ageism and sexism in Hollywood with her “last fuckable day” sketch earlier this month. Schumer nailed her response to the news:
Maggie you had a great run. Now get in this Viking funeral boat. Deniro still got it though #sowet
— Amy Schumer (@amyschumer) May 21, 2015
Earlier this week, Maggie Gyllenhaal took home an award for Outstanding Female Actress at The Gracies, in a nod to her widely-lauded performance in political-spy thriller, ‘The Honourable Woman’. Gyllenhaal used her acceptance speech to praise Charlize Theron‘s performance in ‘Mad Max: Fury Road’, calling for more of Hollywood to celebrate the beauty of flawed female characters on screen:
“If I were in that desert for ten minutes, my eyes would be super bloodshot…there are the really hot girls whose eyes are not bloodshot, who are wearing bandages and looking really beautiful and lovely, but my heart went out to the imperfect one, the one who showed us herself, her humanity, that sense of being ourselves.”
PREACH.
via The Wrap.
Lead image by Michael Butler via Getty.
