Minnie Driver: ‘I had to fake an orgasm in a room full of male execs at an audition for a chocolate bar ad’

Born in London, Minnie Driver, 53, gained an Oscar nomination for Good Will Hunting in 1998. She was Emmy nominated for her performance in the 2007 television series The Riches and has a recurring role in Will & Grace. More recent films include Cinderella, Rosaline and Chevalier. She has a podcast, Minnie Questions With Minnie Driver, and her memoir, Managing Expectations, was published last year. She lives in California with her partner, the film-maker Addison O’Dea, and her son.

What was your most embarrassing moment?

When I was starting out, in the early 90s, I had to fake an orgasm in a room full of male ad execs at an audition for a chocolate bar ad. It was grim.

One negative thought attracting all the others and suddenly you are circling the drain.

What scares you about getting older?

Not being able to swim and surf and run and dance.

Daniel Day-Lewis. I have loved him since I was 12 years old. I watched him play in a football match at my school – and then walked him back to the changing rooms after, and he was so kind and he talked to me about acting.

What do you owe your parents?

To whom would you most like to say sorry, and why?

I know I should be more evolved, but the person I would like to say sorry to I’m not ready to say sorry to yet.

Have you ever said ‘I love you’ and not meant it?

I’ve said it knowing I didn’t mean it how the other person meant it.

Which words or phrases do you most overuse?

What has been your biggest disappointment?

I thought that I would become more mature about certain things, and it didn’t happen.

If you could edit your past, what would you change?

I’d edit out all the awful men I managed to find who confirmed my worst suspicions about my body and my character.

When was the last time you changed your mind about something significant?

Until very recently, I felt my son was safe at school in America. I do not believe that any more.

How often do you have sex?

When the tumble dryer and the washing machine are going at the same time, because we live in a very small, thin-walled house.

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What has been your closest brush with the law?

I’d been shooting in a remote part of California and I was speeding home at 5am, covered in fake blood, when I got stopped by the police. The cop was suspicious and said, “What have you been doing?” I said, “I’ve been shooting”, and he drew his gun. I have never been so terrified. I said, “No no, I’ve been shooting a film – I’m an actress!”

Would you rather have more sex, money or fame?

How would you like to be remembered?

What is the most important lesson life has taught you?

That your life is only in this very second.

It’s lights out for the beautiful carbon-based bit, but I believe in the vastness of our ignorance and that our conscious afterlife is somewhere in that.

dryfire on February 5th, 2023 at 01:09 UTC »

I remember Herbal Essences had a whole string of "orgasm" commercials. . They were always a bit confusing to watch.

leif777 on February 5th, 2023 at 00:49 UTC »

Ive been a shit day player actor for 40 years. The shit they made me do and The horror stories I've heard that woman go through is astounding. I've got a kid that has the traits that would be great for getting parts but I will not be the one to introduce him to that word. It's really awful.

Kerrigore on February 4th, 2023 at 20:59 UTC »

For anyone who actually wants more context:

https://www.eonline.com/ca/news/1330110/minnie-driver-recalls-director-asking-her-to-fake-an-orgasm-as-part-of-an-audition

At the start of her film acting career, Minnie Driver stood up for herself after being humiliated in an audition. How do you like them chocolates?

In an excerpt from her new memoir Managing Expectations, released May 3 and obtained by E! News, the Good Will Hunting actress describes trying out for a part in a chocolate product commercial in her native London soon after she filmed the 1995 movie Circle of Friends, her big-screen debut. Driver, 52, said that inside the room was a male director and more than a dozen people, mostly men from an ad agency. She said she received no script for the commercial.

Driver said in her book that the director asked her, "You've seen the movie When Harry Met Sally?" adding, "You know the scene where she fakes an orgasm? OK. Eat a piece of chocolate and do that."

Driver said she responded, "Fake an orgasm?" and that the director replied, chuckling, "Yes. Unless you fancy having a real one."

The actress said the director told her to do it twice, once "normally" and then again in a "bigger" way, saying that take would be used for a Dutch market.

Driver said she wanted to run out of the room and warn her fellow actresses waiting outside for their chance to audition, or, as she put it, "vying for an opportunity that was actually humiliation dressed up in a pick-me! outfit" or "being lunchtime entertainment for a bunch of pervy execs."

Instead, she chewed a piece of chocolate while faking an orgasm, mimicking the iconic 1989 movie scene with Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal. Driver said she then said she didn't think she could do it again, to which one of the ad men allegedly responded, "Course you can, love, that's the best bit about being a girl!"

Driver said she then told the group she wouldn't do it again because she "will throw up" and that the director then "sneered," "rolled his eyes," and told her, "Well, all the other girls have apparently very much enjoyed this."

The actress said she gathered her coat and said, "They were faking it."

Driver wrote that after the audition, she returned home to an answering machine message telling her that people had said she was "difficult" at the tryout. "I knew I'd now been marked," she said. "Branded with a scarlet D that often comes with saying 'no' as an actress."

Driver had spoken about the experience before, calling it her worst audition in an interview with Backstage in 2018.

"I would categorically put this in some version of the #MeToo world I grew up in," she said. "The audition was for a chocolate bar commercial. These ad guys never show up to an audition (it's usually just a casting director), but I went in, and there were 10 guys with their jackets off, one female casting director, a stool, and broken-up bits of candy. The premise of the ad was the orgasm scene of When Harry Met Sally, and basically she was supposed to take one bite of the chocolate and have an orgasm."

Driver continued, "I f--king did it. I knew it was wrong, and I still did it. I was embarrassed and mortified, and I didn't understand it until years later. That feeling didn't leave me for a long time. And to this day, I wish someone in that room had stood up and said, 'This is outrageous,' because these guys were getting their jollies off, watching woman after woman pretend to have an orgasm. I don't think it would happen today, thank goodness, which is some kind of progress."