INTERVIEW: Stratford actor Sarah Douglas found fame in the Superman movies and has led a fascinating life - she is currently in Shakespeare & Hathaway
Born and raised in Stratford, Sarah Douglas found fame in the Superman movies before moving to Los Angeles to work. Now back in Stratford, the actor tells Gill Sutherland about her fascinating life ahead of an fundraising appearance for Stratford Foodbank.
SITTING in her cosy Old Town terrace facing the house where she was brought up with her close-knit family, actress Sarah Douglas notes that the “place is heaving with memories, in a good way”.
Sarah, now 72, has one of the best ‘home girl done good’ stories.
Cast as baddie Ursa in the original Superman films in her 20s, she also played Taramis opposite Arnold Schwarzenegger and alongside one of her soon-to-be best mates Grace Jones in the 1984 sword-and-sorcery epic fantasy film Conan the Destroyer.
A ton of other screen roles followed while she settled in Los Angeles, including soap Falcon Crest.
Perhaps most excitingly for Stratford folk, she moved back to the town before Covid and is still working and has just filmed an episode of Shakespeare and Hathaway.
She first made the pages of the Herald as a 16-year-old Alcester Grammar schoolgirl, when she was selected from 2,700 girls to win a place with the National Youth Theatre.
To say Sarah is good company is an understatement, not only is she warm and welcoming, she’s a terrific conversationalist with the best stories.
What’s more she’s a proud Stratfordian, and long been a supporter of the Herald, which makes us love her even more.
Her roots are firmly bedded in the town – she was brought up in Stratford by dad Edward, an RAF man, and mum Beryl, both of whom have sadly passed, and sister Marilyn Price.
A rather impressive scrapbook is on the table before us as we discuss Sarah’s fascinating life. That original story in the Herald has long been treasured.
“The Herald was supportive at the beginning, and still here you are,” she said.
Her time with the National Youth Theatre proved to be highly formative.
“We’d travelled all over Europe performing, including Amsterdam and opening the Berlin Festival. I was only 16 but we had such freedom, we were on our own – although dear Barrie Rutter [actor and director] was looking out for us.
“I’ve still got a letter I wrote to Mum from Amsterdam saying, ‘It’s a very strange street, there were lots of ladies sitting in windows’.”
The need for punctuality is an abiding legacy of those days.
“To this day, I arrive everywhere about 10 to 15 minutes early, because I was late once for rehearsals at 16 and I was made to stand on that stage and apologise to everybody,” recalls Sarah. “Now, even if I’m under a bus, I’ll phone and say, ‘I’ll be five minutes late, I’m under a bus’. It was absolutely brilliant training.”
Recalling her earliest influences, Sarah says loved English and drama while at Broad Street School, although she was traumatised there by an early rejection.
“I was meant to be playing Oberon in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, but Miss Bolton demoted me to First Fairy after I was naughty,” explains Sarah. “I later shared that anecdote on the Terry Wogan Show saying I’d never felt such disappointment. Poor Miss Bolton probably wasn’t amused.”
Putting that early letdown behind her, Sarah went on to greater glory in Alcester Grammar School’s Twelfth Night, when she played Viola.
“I’ve always written stuff down, and while it’s not exactly a diary, I wrote about how much I loved doing that show.”
Her mum Beryl’s job at the RSC was also a big influence.
“She was a physio at the theatre and was very involved with all the greats – Laurence Olivier, Charles Laughton and Vivien Leigh. So I was always going to drama school, there was no question about that.
“I went to Rose Bruford College of Speech and Drama, but was persuaded to do drama teacher training, because that’s what the county council wanted me to do in order to get a grant – the thinking was I would have teaching to fall back on. But I kept thinking, ‘No, I’m going down that path, I’m going to act’, and eventually dropped out.”
Sarah now looks back at her youthful dreamer self and the advantages given her with wonder.
“I was about 18 and had the most lovely boyfriend called Patrick Garland, who was a major player in the theatrical world. He would introduce me to people, I remember being made pasta at Twiggy’s house.
“One day he said, ‘Do you want to come to the opening of Private Lives? It’s with Maggie Smith and Robert Stephens.’ Naturally I was terribly keen. And I rushed to get the train from Sidcup where I lived. When I got to the theatre foyer, Patrick said, we must hurry up because we don’t want to be late for The Master. I thought, Oh, he’s got his headmaster coming or something.
“And of course, it was Noel Coward, known as The Master. And we joined him in his box.”
Not finishing drama school certainly didn’t hold Sarah back – she quickly got an agent and soon landed her first role.
“After about two months I got a very good agent, and I was off and running. I went straight into film and TV, I barely did any theatre. My first film was called The Final Programme, with an actor called Jon Finch.”
Superman – which was an incredible phenomenon around the world - became life-changing for Sarah.
“I was on Superman for three years – films one and two, it took a lot of time, from age 27 to 29.
“I did a massive amount of publicity, going around the world for nine months – travelling first class, it was terribly extravagant – getting limousines in LA. Then I would come back to Narrow Lane and get the National Express coach from Heathrow, and Mum would meet me at the Little Chef. There couldn’t have been a bigger contrast.”
Recalling how she got the part of badass Ursa, Sarah says: “I was working on a film called The People That Time Forgot out in the Canary Islands and word was out that they were looking for this girl for Superman. This was pre-mobiles and the internet, so I hadn’t heard anything, but when I got back to England they wanted to see me – where it was being filmed at Shepperton film studios.”
Sarah continues: “The wonderful casting lady, Mary Selway, called me and she said, ‘This is the part for you’. Up until that point, I was absolutely playing nice girls who were a bit naughty on the side.
“They decided I didn’t need to do a screen test but I did have to do a flying test. I turned up in my little black leotard, hair tied back, pumps on, all very proper and very keen.
“Some big Italian movie star went before me… A lot of girls didn’t like being 40ft off the ground or were panicked. Anyway I did it and loved it, then one of the crew looked up at me and shouted, ‘Hey darling, you’ve got no chance... the last bird flew without any knickers on!’”
Needless to say Sarah got the role of Ursa, despite keeping her knickers on.
Around 1983 Sarah temporarily moved to Hollywood, encouraged by her then husband, American actor Richard LeParmentier, who she later separated from.
Even though Superman had been huge, Sarah managed to stay relatively low-key.
“Nobody knew who I was because I wore a short cropped wig in Superman, but as my hair was long I looked different.”
The day she was due to come back to England, she landed the plum role of Pamela Lynch in primetime soap Falcon Crest, which led to her permanent move to the States.
The schedule was so demanding that she even missed her mum’s wedding.
“My mum got married after 26 years of being on her own but there was no time for me to fly home for her wedding. So I missed that. She married one-time Stratford mayor Paul Sainsbury. Just a few weeks after her wedding, they discovered that he was very ill and pretty much cancer everywhere, and he only lived for nine months, and I wasn’t given time off to come back for the funeral because of the scheduling.
“All in all, the restrictions were crazy, and I didn’t want to continue in the show.”
Her character in Falcon Crest was a leather-clad dominatrix – another good girl with a naughty side.
“In reality it was organza but it looked real,” laughs Sarah of the saucy leather-look outfit.
Off-screen, Sarah was enjoying great times.
“It was the 1980s and I was running with a flash mob. It was a very heady time and it was, and there weren’t many English actresses – although of course there was Joan Collins and Jane Seymour. We were absolutely the flavour.
“So I flew all over the place, and did every single talk show that existed in America.
“Producers would say, ‘God, in Superman you seem really quite evil and bad, but in real life, you’re quite amusing and funny. How do you manage it?’
“And I reply, ‘Well, in England, we call it acting.’”
Reflecting now, Sarah says despite her success, she probably didn’t pitch herself in the right way or make the most of her opportunities – such as finding herself at Steven Spielberg’s house and failing to network.
“My dear friend Kathleen Turner – we’re old friends from Body Heat days – loved to go to Spago, it was one the restaurants to be seen at. Katherine said I confused the producers – they didn’t know what to make of me. She thought I should be more sexy when I met them in real-life. I tried but it didn’t work because really and truly I’d be happier talking about my allotment.”
The Herald can attest to Sarah’s passion for garden – her bijou Old Town space, is fecund with plants and delightful.
Other well-known stars Sarah was best friends with include Grace Jones.
“I met Grace at Studio 54 in the 1970s and then we worked together on Conan the Destroyer. She’s remained a very close friend.
“Grace has stayed with me in Stratford – going to the then West End pub round the corner, and she loved Barry the Butcher – she’d go down there in her mink coat and wellies. There was always chaos.
“We’ve travelled extensively together – including to Russia. We’ve been thrown off planes together – well, she got thrown off, I didn’t. We’ve had a brilliant time.
“We had many a night out in Hollywood, luckily mobile phones weren’t about.”
Despite Grace’s tempestuous reputation, Sarah says: “She’s pretty damn regular. She doesn’t appreciate being interrupted if she’s having dinner in a restaurant – she didn’t suffer fools gladly in that sense, but she’s always got time for everybody. Mum loved her. She and Mum even appeared in the Nigel Dempster’s gossip column in the Daily Mail.”
There’s nothing boastful in Sarah’s telling of her tales, even as the starry names keep coming thick and fast – including talk of her famous co-stars, including the sadly recently departed Terence Stamp and Gene Hackman.
“Terence was the great joy – working literally every day with him was just all my dreams come true. And Gene was just a regular fabulous guy, we’d go out a lot when on location.
“I remember one time being with Terry filming a helicopter scene on Chobham Common, and he fancied some apples. There was a high wall and an orchard on a big estate next door and we’d got our trailers there. And he said he would give me a shimmy over the wall. And I said, I’ve got nothing to put the apples in.’ He said, ‘Stick them in your boots.’
“So I was over the wall in my Ursa outfit, scrumping apples for Terence Stamp.”
And how was Arnie?
“Schwarzenegger was, uh, was a lot of fun. Um, very much a sort of a man’s man. It was, you know, all cigars and the guys,” says Sarah with a hint of diplomacy. “When we were in Mexico we went to a bullfight with him – macho stuff.”
Continuing, Sarah says: “I met Pierce Brosnan when I did Remington Steele, he was delightful and wonderful. My mum loved him and kept a photo of her and Pierce by her bedside until her dying day.”
Sarah’s even had acting advice from Marlon Brando – another Superman co-actor.
“Meeting him was the highest honour,” says Sarah. “I worked with him for three days. He wasn’t good at remembering lines and used cue cards. At one point he had me sitting on his lap and we chatted about acting. I asked him about the intensity of his acting – he said, ‘I screw my eyes up because I can’t see without my eyeglasses.’
“He revealed that in Last Tango in Paris, he needed the ‘idiot cards’ for prompts even during the sex scenes. He told me, ‘As I was going down on Maria Schneider, I’ve got all the words written on the other side of her body.’ He was brilliant, an absolute joy and a delight.”
Many more names and anecdotes follow, as the fascinating conversation with Sarah continues…
And some lucky people will be able to enjoy her ‘Tales from Hollywood’ stories when she shares them in a fundraising talk for Stratford Foodbank on 10th October at Holy Trinity Parish Centre. However the show is now sadly sold out.
“My sister Marilyn volunteers at the foodbank along with her daughters, Rebecca and Lucy, You always think of Stratford as being affluent, but a lot of people struggle to be able to afford to eat.
“I’m just happy to be able to give something back,” adds Sarah, without a hint of evil villainess.