What I like about Debra Winger

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Those who know me well might know that ever since I was 13, I have been a huge admirer and fan of Debra Winger. From the time I first saw the 1980 film Urban Cowboy on TV, 11 years ago, I’m still captivated by her performance of Sissy, a spunky cowgirl living in Houston, Texas, and love interest to John Travolta’s Bud Davis, a construction worker by day and cowboy by night. 

Now, I’m counting the days until the December 2nd premiere of The Anarchist, Debra’s Broadway debut. The play, written and directed by David Mamet, revolves around two women: one is a prisoner who was involved with a violent political group, played by the Tony Award winning stage veteran Patti LuPone; the other is a warden played by Winger, and the action has them engaging in a battle of wits. With this cast, I have no doubt that it will be a fantastic show.

 I think my initial fascination with Debra’s character of Sissy was her determination to ride the mechanical bull installed at Gilley’s, a Houston nightclub. I found her character attractive inside and out because I saw something unique and different unlike other Hollywood actresses I knew of at the time. Of course Debra Winger is beautiful, perhaps not in the traditional glamorous way, but it’s a more wholesome and intelligent beauty. ‘Down to Earth’ is the perfect way to describe her.

As I learned more about Debra herself, I was impressed to learn that she had no desire to be a movie star or to conform to or be swept up in Hollywood’s glitz. No--she stayed true to what her real passion was: acting and being able to express herself as other people. In the months after I first saw Urban Cowboy, I made it my business to watch her other works, including her three Oscar nominated roles An Officer and a Gentleman, Terms of Endearment, and Shadowlands, and the 1995 romantic comedy Forget Paris co-starring Billy Crystal, which would be her last film for six years.

One of the greatest moments in my life came when I was 16 and my mom told me that my favorite actress was going to be performing a reading with her husband (Arliss Howard, also an actor) at the New York Theater Workshop in the East Village. 

Tickets were already sold out, but my mom and I went to the theater anyway, to see if there were any cancellations. So we arrived about a half an hour before starting time and waited outside. I was thrilled when my mom suggested that there was a possibility that Debra and the other panelists would enter the theater from a dressing room in a building next door.

Sure enough, I kept my eyes peeled and noticed a small, beautiful woman slowly approaching. Since I was too overwhelmed and shy to introduce myself, my mom approached her and said, “This is my 16-year-old daughter and she’s your biggest fan.” I looked into her eyes and I smiled and said “Hi” and she looked back at me happily and enthusiastically and shook my hand. Since my mom had already introduced her to me, I simply said “Nice to meet you” and she said “Nice to meet you.”

It turned out there were no cancellations and therefore no extra tickets for the show but I felt like the luckiest, most grateful teenager on Earth right at that moment. I had just met my favorite actress, someone I greatly respected and admired for three and a half years who seemed very happy to have met me even though very briefly. I have seen nearly all of her films by now, and thought she was perfect in every one of them.

Coincidentally, it was around the time I became a fan of hers that she went back into films with independent feature Big Bad Love directed by and co-starring her husband Arliss Howard. Since then, for the past decade, she’s appeared in more films including Radio (2003), Eulogy (2004), and Rachel Getting Married (2008) co-starring Anne Hathaway (another brilliant actress who I also had the pleasure of seeing in person briefly on a separate occasion). 

While I am happy that Debra has been acting more since 2001, I still respect the fact that Hollywood doesn’t appeal to her. She is still as beautiful and down to Earth today as she was playing characters like Sissy, or Richard Gere’s love interest in An Officer and a Gentleman, or Shirley Maclaine’s daughter in Terms of Endearment. 

In her most recent appearance in this year’s independent film Lola Versus, Debra wasn’t given nearly enough screen time she deserved as the main character Lola’s (played by Greta Gerwig) mother but I have high hopes that will soon change with her Broadway debut in The Anarachist.