Goldie Hawn recalls how she and Kurt Russell came up with their 1989 Oscars bit about tying the knot: “We’re taking a shower together...We didn’t tell anybody anything about going off-script.”
On the evening of April 7, 1970, the budding 25-year-old actress, with just two film credits to her name, was half a world away from the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion in Los Angeles when Fred Astaire opened an envelope and read her name as the best supporting actress winner for “Cactus Flower.” Instead of basking in the glow of television history, the “Laugh-In” star was sound asleep in London as an early call time loomed for her next film, “There’s a Girl in My Soup,” opposite Peter Sellers.
Though Raquel Welch accepted the coveted statuette on Hawn’s behalf that night, Hawn never watched footage of the moment until just a few weeks ago, while traveling with this year’s Oscar host, Jimmy Kimmel, to a mutual friend’s party. “He said, ‘Did you ever see the part where you’re being announced by Fred Astaire?’ And I said, ‘Fred Astaire?!’ He’s my idol. And I didn’t know he was the one that announced my name. I got emotional when I finally saw it.
When it comes to Russell, the patriarch of their sprawling, blended family, Hawn keeps her words brief. “Kurt is extraordinarily brilliant and creative and collaborative — not in the kitchen,” she says with a laugh. “But really he’s just amazing.” In a family in which everyone is famous, Hawn doesn’t seem to take celebrity too seriously. “Kurt and I are very similar,” she says. “He doesn’t consider himself a movie star. Nor do I. Neither one of us walks around thinking about that stuff.” But there’s no mistaking the impact she’s had on female stars, paving the way for generations of A-list comic actresses like Meg Ryan, Sandra Bullock and Julia Roberts. On-screen, Hawn was equal parts silly and sexy, but somehow managed to be subversive.
Hawn grew up in suburban Washington, D.C., the younger of two daughters of a musician father who played the violin, saxophone and clarinet and a dancer mother. Growing up in a duplex on a dead-end street with her sister, Patti, a longtime Hollywood publicist, her upbringing was steeped in the arts, with her father performing for presidents like FDR and at John F. Kennedy’s wedding.
Her first job was dancing at the 1964-65 World’s Fair in New York. That turned into acting roles in stage musicals that brought her to Los Angeles. Success came quickly when Hawn landed a starring role on “Rowan & Martin’s Laugh-In,” a sketch comedy show that was akin to “Saturday Night Live.” Hawn became a household name as the ditzy blonde with saucer eyes and a disarming giggle. But the threat of being typecast was real.
Over the next decade, Hawn’s face on a poster delivered box office manna for a string of comedies, including the Warren Beatty sex romp “Shampoo” in 1975 and the noir sendup “Foul Play” in 1978, opposite Chevy Chase. As her career was hitting overdrive, Hawn married musician Bill Hudson in 1976 while pregnant with their son, Oliver. Three years later, she gave birth to their daughter, Kate. But Hollywood isn’t the most natural place to be a mother.
The 1980s also brought forth her first real collaboration with Russell. The pair first met on the set of “One and Only, Genuine, Original Family Band” when Russell was 15 and Hawn was 22. He was on set with his mother, who suggested they watch a group of young women auditioning. “He’s finally living his karma,” Hawn says of Weinstein, who likely will serve the rest of his life in prison after being accused by dozens of women of assault and abuse. “Harvey basically undermined me and Madonna.” While they were developing “Chicago” in the late ’80s, Weinstein commissioned a new script in which Velma was 23 years old — two decades younger than Hawn was at the time. “I said, ‘Don’t fuck with me. Because I know just what you’re doing. We made a deal,’” she recounts.
And ramble she does, but usually in an endearing way. Over the course of a two-hour interview, Hawn rarely answers the question at hand. And there are topics she evades, such as working with Woody Allen on “Everyone Says I Love You.” All she’ll say is that the movie was “a joyful experience.” There’s no denying that Hollywood has changed since Hawn ceded the spotlight. And some of those shifts make her uncomfortable — namely, the idea of “cancel culture.”
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