Glenn Close’s Emotional Message In Honor Of His Mother

“When my mother turned 80, she told me that she had the feeling of having achieved nothing in life. ” This was one of the emotional and resounding phrases that Glenn Close shared with the public last January when he won his Golden Globe for the film The Good Wife. In her speech she made a deep reflection on motherhood and the need to achieve personal dreams.

We could say that this actress is, today, one of the most admired by the general public. She is not an actress to use, her roles, the women she has played are not. She is the lady with a thousand faces.

For example, he generated a mixture of absolute terror and fascination in his role as Fatal Attraction. That eagerness to kill Michael Douglas, a married man with whom she had a relationship and who later left her, is now part of film history.

She was also unforgettable in The World According to Garp, one of her earliest roles in which she played a strong-minded feminist. We loved it at Albert Nobbs, when he had to dress up as a man. Also memorable were her works such as Cruella de Vil or her roles in El Reencuentro ( 1984) or El mejor (1985).

Dramas, comedies, adventures, science fiction or thrillers, Glenn Close assumes any character with the passion and excellence of the great artists. She adopts each of her roles from the depth of her emotions, from that privileged corner that only inhabits the great actresses. In addition to that, his messages stand out, such as the one he gave us on the night of January 7.

The good wife , the woman hidden behind the man

The good wife begins by presenting us with a lively character with enormous potential. Glenn Close’s character in her youth is the portrait of an ambitious and talented woman living on the East Coast and aspiring to be a writer.

Now, at a given moment the conflict, the contradiction and also the beginning of a personal catastrophe appear. She falls in love with a young man who also wants to be a writer. When he shows her his first manuscript and asks for her opinion, she sincerely offers it to him: it is not good.

His reaction is violent and unexpected. In this movie, unlike others on Glenn Close’s résumé, no one seeks to assassinate her; however, his character will continually be ignored, belittled, and underestimated. Not only for her husband, but also for society itself. Joan Castleman gradually becomes the shadow of her husband, that warm discreet figure who walks after the illustrious writer Joseph Castleman (starring Jonathan Pryce).

Nobody pronounces her name well, in fact, there is not even a need to do so : she is, simply, ‘the good wife’. An accessory figure next to a nominee for the Nobel Prize in Literature …

Glenn Close and his feminist discourse

The film The Good Wife took about 14 years to make, but it took Glenn Close just a few minutes to get the audience and everyone to connect with the significance of his role and also with his personal story.

When he received the Golden Globe and after making the appropriate thanks, he remembered his mother and gave us the following words:

Claiming spaces

Glenn Close’s speech presents more points for reflection. We often forget that mothers are more than just a term or a label; her condition as a woman, as a person who yearns to fulfill her own dreams, is still there. Latent but silenced.

• Somehow, they forget that they are more than bodies, a skin and a heart that nourishes and offers affection. Mothers, wives, companions, etc., are above all people who continue to claim their space for development, creation, autonomy and personal fulfillment.
• Mothers have the right, like anyone else, to continue advancing beyond their own family. Achieving it, combining it and achieving it is a challenge, there is no doubt, but as Glenn Close points out in his speech, it is our obligation to fight for our own dreams and make them come true.

Nothing can be as sad as reaching a moment in our existence and feeling that we have not achieved anything. That beyond the family environment we are invisible beings, specters of hidden and untapped potentials or silenced voices such as Joan Castleman herself, the character of The Good Wife. 

Let’s think about it, let’s work on our goals, whether we are men or women, let’s try to achieve the dreamed objectives to feel, when the day comes, that our life has been worth it.