Morgan Fairchild

Julia Lehman/City Paper

Background

When it came time to take Morgan Fairchild's photo in the lobby of the Four Seasons hotel, she was highly amenable. She tucked her knees together and pouted for the camera. She twisted and turned and then, without prompting, sprawled out like a clothed centerfold across the stone wall of the flower garden. She insisted that our photographer use flash.

"If I'd wanted natural light I'd have stayed in Texas," said Fairchild. "I love the fill that it gives."

Fairchild was in town to promote the new Romance Channel — a station coming to a cable channel near you, now debuting on American Movie Classics. The blond diva herself has been the star of many a soapy romantic saga. From her early days on Search for Tomorrow to bit parts on Mork and Mindy, Falcon Crest, Dallas, a plethora of TV movies and even off-Broadway.

Born in Dallas, Fairchild is now 47 years old and spends much of her free time promoting AIDS education and other political causes.

How did you get involved with the Romance Channel?

They hired me a few months ago to do wraparounds. I fancy myself sort of their version of Alistair Cooke. The channel is geared toward a lot of the romantic things — not just the old movies, but miniseries, biography series.

What has been your favorite romantic role?

I haven't done that many. I've played this funny thing on Cybill the last few years. But that's not very romantic. I usually do the pie in the face or they throw me over a cliff or something. There are the roles that you'd love to play. I'd love to be in Wuthering Heights. I would die to be in the English Patient. But I haven't been cast that way.

Any leading men you'd love to work with?

Ralph Fiennes perhaps. I first saw him in Lawrence After Arabia, a BBC production. I loved him. And I thought, boy this guy is going places. And then there's Liam Neeson. He's a sweetheart. I know him.

You're a big collector of Marilyn Monroe stuff aren't you?

Well, mostly just photographs. As kid I was always fascinated by movies. When I moved to New York, I would go to five or six retrospectives a day. Joan Crawford, Marlene Dietrich, Casablanca, all of the classic ones. Then I became fascinated with how images were created. How makeup men had to work to get Bette Davis' look. How they had to fix the lighting to make Marlene Dietrich look good. How many pounds she had to lose. I studied all of that. What you could create with lighting. And I learned what you could do with closeups. Like on The City [a soap opera Fairchild starred in], I think I drove them quite nuts actually.

What sorts of things would you tell them to change?

They were used to shooting it like a daytime show where everybody comes on the set and wanders around. We were trying to do hand-held camera, a lot edgier and moving more and they weren't used to that. You can't do that and have it look good without stopping and moving a light once in a while. I brought sort of a Hollywood edge to it. If you're going to put everyone in that corner you're going to have to stop and light the corner. You can't just leave people with all these horrible shadows. You can do it to anybody else, but you won't do it to me.

You wrote a book on beauty at one point, Super Looks. Do you have any beauty tips?

I don't drink, I don't smoke, I don't do drugs, I don't go in the sun. And I work out like a fiend. I don't eat much red meat or dairy products — the things everybody really knows. They just don't do it. One of my girlfriends who is really tan asked me one day when we were getting made up, "What cream do you use?" I said, "It's not the cream, you've got to stay out of the sun."

You played Sandra Bernhard's lover on Roseanne. Do you think you prepped Ellen for the big coming out?

When they first called me about it I thought it would be hysterical. It was a great sight gag. I like doing things that are innovative and different. But all of a sudden I had people asking if I'd really gone gay. It was kind of silly. Nobody ever asked me if I was a killer if I played a killer.

Have you ever gotten trashy write-ups in the tabloids?

Sure. My favorite in the last couple of years was this one. My boyfriend doesn't like to go out. And I actually like rock and roll. I started organizing these girls' nights out. I'd get a bunch of girls together and we'd go over to House of Blues. One night we were up in the VIP room and Arsenio Hall was having his birthday party. It was very crowded. We had drinks and then we went down to see the show. The next day, one of my girlfriends who works in my agent's office gets a call from the gossip columnist from People magazine telling her that Morgan Fairchild was with Prince at the House of Blues and he was ALL OVER HER. Necking in the corner. Had his hand down her dress. My girlfriend started laughing. [She told the reporter] we didn't even see Prince. They printed it. And I called [the editor] and told him I wanted a retraction, this just isn't true. I told him, "You know me. You have been with me in Washington and have heard me sitting around talking with the colonel from the Pentagon and the ex-secretary of the Navy about military tactics in the Iraq/Irani war when it was first going on. You know I'm no dummy. I'm telling you we did not see Prince that night. I have never had an affair with Prince. I've been living with a gentleman for 10 years..." Finally they gave a begrudging sort of retraction.

You were very shy as a kid, right? Did acting help you overcome that?

I was so fat when I was a kid. I was fat, I had white hair and white eyelashes. Big, thick Coke-bottle glasses. And I was always in the advanced-placement classes. I remember when I was a little kid I wished someone would notice me on the inside. Then about the time I was 14, I got contact lenses, grew my hair, learned how to do makeup and lost some weight. Suddenly all these cheerleaders wanted to be my best friend. But I still thought, 'I wish someone would notice me, not this [points to her face].'

Looking at your career, what was your biggest achievement?

I really loved doing off-Broadway. I loved being in Paper Dolls. The writing was good. A couple years ago I went to Bosnia and did a movie with Martin Sheen where I played a nun... Paul Reubens [Pee Wee Herman] is a friend and one day, several years ago when I was doing Falcon Crest, he called me upwanting a favor. He said, "We're doing this movie. It has no budget and we really need some cameos. I was just wondering if you could come do it for us." So I get on the set and they say, "Here's your line: 'I know you are but what am I?'" I said, what does that mean? I didn't have a script. He said, "Just say it. It'll be funny in context." So we did that and then they had this ninja fight they wanted me to do. I told him I had the whole day off from Falcon Crest so I said let's do some more! We were on the Warner Brothers back lot and we totally improvised.

Have you ever thought about directing?

Yeah, more and more. But it sounds so corny. A lot of people have told me they thought I should. I have sort of ended up taking over for a couple of directors who were incapacitated by their drug excesses. I've had to direct the ends of movies and things.

How did you come up with the name Morgan?

A girlfriend told me I had to see this particular movie. It was playing at the only art house in Dallas. It was Morgan: A Suitable Case For Treatment about a man who lives in his fantasies and thinks he's a gorilla. I just loved it. I realized she was right. That was the only way I was getting through life — living in my fantasies.

I'm pleased you were sort of hamming it up out there in the lobby. I think the business folks on their lunch had a field day.

I hope so! Hey, hamming it up is my middle name. That's the thing, everyone always thinks I'm going to be a bitch. They have no idea how stupid I am. I'm silly. I'm a wiseass.