Sophie meets Stingo -- click link to watch scene

 "... She seems often to be moving sideways to avoid confrontation, she seems to be shunning the close scrutiny of others... [T]he overall impression of her movement is sidling, gently attempting to hide herself in open space."  - Stanley Kauffmann, The New Republic

During the 1980’s and early 1990’s, film actresses were frequently asked during interviews to comment upon their opinion of Meryl Streep's work. Michelle Pfeiffer, Sissy Spacek, and Debra Winger all commented specifically upon Streep in Sophie’s Choice; and Diane Keaton, Jodie Foster, Glenn Close, Cher, and Shirley MacLaine all commented upon Streep generally.

Michelle Pfeiffer, in a feature in Movieline magazine that asked filmmakers the question, "What's your favorite scene in your favorite video, as follows:

"The first thing that comes to mind is a scene Meryl Streep did in Sophie's Choice, where she's just serving tea or coffee. Very simple. I don't even remember the dialogue. Just her tiniest movements and her mannerisms were so real. She has these moments in her work. They kind of stop me in my tracks."  -- November 1995, p. 77.

Debra Winger, nominated for Best Actress (for An Officer and a Gentleman) the same year as Streep for Sophie's Choice, was quoted somewhere (as I recall) as saying that she saw Sophie's Choice with her parents. Afterward, she said, she knew she had lost the Oscar.

Glenn Close, on the other hand, so often compared to Streep in the 1980's and 90's, was asked in an interview what she thought about Streep's work.

"Meryl Streep has never made me cry," Cliff Jahr wrote that Close ventured softly. "Oh, I've always been dazzled by her, of course-- she's a brilliant, brilliant technical actress. But you see, I think the actor is a kind of magician who must make audiences believe so that they get emotionally involved and surrender themselves. When I'm in the audience, that's what I seek." -- Ladies Home Journal, January 1991.

While Close didn't specifically cite Sophie's Choice, of what Streep performance could making one cry be more relevant?

(originally published on my blog on November 28, 2021.)