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Pam Grier is telling an audience of 350 Midwesterners about how long she takes to orgasm.
Two times, maybe, in an hour or so.
You have a go at have an orgasm at my age?
Its gonna hurt, to your teeth!
All day, I have to rest.
Im not a cougar!
Howd she get from explaining her current projects to describing her orgasms?
Well, every conversation with Pam Grier is a journey.
You feel like she could take you anywhere.
And she usually does.
So I knew Id probably overprepared when I brought ten questions to our 30-minute interview.
I was right I had time for four.
She spent 20 minutes answering the first one.
It wasnt that she avoided answering it.
And some were criticizing him, I said are you kidding me?
), or her theories on self-defense (A woman has only three strikes to render someone immobile).
Her characters were tough, and strong, and at the center of their own stories.
It was the beginning of the womens movement, she explains.
Women were going,Ive never heard these women speak.
Where have they been?
So they had to get out and use what they had.
And I went,Really?Hes got hair on his chest!).
Even after she made and stole those films, she didnt see it as a career.
I just felt I wasnt Annette Funicello!
The roles got bigger, and so did the grosses.
Our films stayed in the theater so long!
I remember the meeting forOctopussy,you know, James Bond, she laughs.
The role was like, I just walk around in a bikini.
When I read this script I said, Is that it?
And I didnt mean to insult Cubby Broccoli and everybody who was there at MGM meeting me.
But I said, you know, Im bringing ahugeaudience, and theyre going to want their money back.
Theyre not going to findyou.
Theyre going to findme.
Eventually, the good role found her.
Griers work was brilliant, but those paycheck roles didnt follow.
No, no, thats a man, thats totally different, she shrugs.
I kinda knew that, because I know the business.
Men like going to see men.
Patriarchy in Hollywood was a fact of life shed long made peace with.
It is what it is, she says.
But it is changing.
Because the audience is changing.
And shes happy about other changes that are rippling through the industry.
My #MeToo has been three times, she says, matter-of-factly.
I had a sexual attack when I was six years old.
I had it again at 18, and then in Los Angeles when I was 20 …
Absolutely, they will change, she says.
Because its a culture.
Its a deep-rooted culture.
In the meantime, shes working.
Ive already done a lot of action and I still plan on doing some more, she tells me.
All comedies, she says, proudly.
Im a funny bitch!
And shes made a happy discovery about working at her age.
Im getting better roles because I have more weight on me, she confesses, semi-conspiratorially.
When Im really skinny, 117, a size 4?
Oh my God, its, Youre too pretty.
So I put on some weight, and Im like,So what it is, bitch?
