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When women get great roles in life, they start to get great roles in films and TV. Look at Janet Reno, Madeleine Albright, and Mrs. Thatcher. Because those images are coming at us in life, they are reflected in acting.

What I really want to do is create great roles for women. And I'm not talking Nicholas Sparks romance. I think women's roles have gotten ghettoized in these sort of places... I'm thinking women in action, comic books, or like the Tony Soprano of women. We need some complex roles.

When I started in the theater, I'd do plays by Shakespeare or Ibsen or Chekhov, and they all created great women's roles.

We had a moment in the '40s and '50s, where female characters were very strong in film, where these incredible roles were written for women like Joan Crawford, like Bette Davis. But then there was a space of time where - I don't know why - it wasn't like that. It became difficult for women to find certain roles after a certain age.

For most of my career, I've played roles that were written for other actresses.

I've been very lucky with the roles that I've played in that they were wonderful roles for women. They're incredible, flawed characters that I really gravitate toward. I just never want anybody to be able to put me in a box.

If you're a woman doing classic theater, the big roles are often destroyers. I've played Hedda Gabler, Lady Macbeth, some of the Chekhovian heroines, Electra, Phaedra - they're all powerful women, but they're forces of negativity.

I think the type of actor I am, I tend to play strong leading female characters. The shows I've been on happen to be science fiction genre.

My entire career stands on the strong pillars of women-oriented films. This stems from the fact that I am sensitive to the entire aura and mystique of a woman and womanhood.