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Oct. 12--RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK -- Down a maze of hallways in GlaxoSmithKline's Ruvane Building, inside a small conference room, sits a tiny woman in a businesslike navy blue suit. Her back is to the door as I enter.
It's hard not to be nervous about meeting Sally Field, a two-time Oscar winner (for "Norma Rae" and "Places in the Heart"), the woman who played Mrs. Gump and the reporter from "Absence of Malice," the actress who mostly put Gidget and Sister Bertrille behind her by portraying all 16 of Sybil's personalities.
What will strike a conversational chord with the actress? A chat about her current roles on ABC's "Brothers and Sisters" and NBC's "ER"? A question about "The Flying Nun"?
Field looks up from her laptop computer, and what's on her mind soon becomes clear: Boniva. She has come to North Carolina to give a talk at GSK, which makes the osteoporosis drug, and would rather spend the allotted 20 minutes talking about health issues than her screen roles.
Field, 59, becomes chummy when I tell her that a recent bone density test showed I have osteopenia, a bone deficiency that can lead to osteoporosis.
"You are part of that 20 percent of men," she says brightly. "How great that you got a bone density test!"
She talks openly about her medical history. She had her first bone density test when she was in her 40s. Her doctor knew she was a prime candidate for bone degeneration. Her mother and her paternal grandmother had osteoporosis, and Field's condition was recently diagnosed. She takes a monthly dose of Boniva as part of her treatment.
"One out of two women will experience an osteoporosis-related fracture sometime in their life," Field says. "And those statistics are huge."
With baby boomers hitting the age of heightened concern about osteoporosis, Field makes an ideal spokeswoman. And boomers and others in their later 60s have such a cool, active image these days, I say, mentioning Bob Dylan and his recent No. 1 album, and John Lithgow and Jeffrey Tambor's new sitcom, "Twenty Good Years," about the exploits of two wild-and-crazy sexagenarians.
"Certainly, I'm hoping that boomer women get in there and sort of reinvent the mental image of what it is for a woman to age," Field responds. "And certainly, on a health level, the mental image is no longer of, you know, our images of what our grandmothers were -- bent over, passive little women who weren't capable of doing very much. I don't think it necessarily needs to be that way."
We talk about her role as the matriarch on "Brothers & Sisters" and a woman with bipolar disorder on "ER," and I wonder aloud if TV is a more exciting place than movies for older actors these days.
"Television is doing some fabulous things," she says, but adds that she has no preference. She just wants to do good work.
This leads to an ill-advised question: Is she embarrassed by "The Flying Nun," as I read somewhere?
"I'm a little tired of talking about this," she says, looking up at the ceiling. But she continues.
"I wasn't embarrassed about the show. It was the era that it was. I was 19 years old by then. It's hard to be dressed as a nun all the time."
It was also hard being every comedian's punch line, she says. At a time when American youth were engaged in social protest, she was cute little Sister Bertrille, with a nun's habit that doubled as wings.
I ask about the first role that made her feel she could earn the respect she wanted.
"I never think that," she says. "No one ever thinks that."
Then what was the first role that you found really challenging?
"Oh, everything is challenging," she answers rather dismissively. " 'Gidget' was challenging. They were all challenging. And I don't really want to do a rundown of all my credits."
But again, she responds to the question. Sort of.
"I've had the opportunity to be part of some really good work, whether it's 'Sybil' or 'Norma Rae' or 'Places in the Heart' or 'Steel Magnolias,' " she says. "I mean, 'Smokey and the Bandit' was good."
The publicist at the other end of the table gives the five-minute warning. If there's another question about osteoporosis, she says, now's the time to ask.
Instead I ask about "Brothers & Sisters."
"It's beautifully written," Field says. "Jon Robin Baitz, who's the writer-creator, is a wonderful, wonderful playwright -- I've been a fan of his theater work. It's a fabulous cast. Just an extraordinary cast."
We shake hands, and she walks over to a cubicle to sign photographs. There's no temptation to ask for one -- it's enough to have ended the interview on a happy note.
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Copyright (c) 2006, The News & Observer, Raleigh, N.C.
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Business News.
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