Glenn Close talks 'Hillbilly Elegy,' another chance at Oscar and what's on her Thanksgiving menu

Tough. Outrageous. Fierce.

That’s what members of the Vance family told Glenn Close about their late matriarch, whom she inhabits in director Ron Howard’s "Hillbilly Elegy" (streaming Tuesday on Netflix), based on J.D. Vance’s 2016 memoir about his Appalachian clan.

Played by Gabriel Basso, J.D. is a Yale Law student who returns to his Ohio hometown when his abusive mom (Amy Adams) winds up in the hospital after a heroin overdose. In flashbacks, Close co-stars as J.D.’s tough but caring grandma Mamaw, who takes in her young grandson (Owen Asztalos) when he needs her the most.

The real-life Mamaw “changed the room when she walked into it. She was very much larger than life,” says Close, who reunited with her “Albert Nobbs” hair-and-makeup team for her grandmotherly transformation. “And also she was very frail. She was not well: She probably had emphysema and she had a bad hip. It's interesting to play somebody (who's) a force of nature in a weak body."

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Close could relate to that kind of family: Her parents lived in Big Piney, Wyoming, for 30 years, and Close’s father was the local doctor for the working-class ranching town.

“Though it's a very different culture, those people are kind of land-rich, cash-poor and work really hard and are very independent-minded. I've met people that kind of had the same outlook on life as Mamaw had,” Close says by phone from her home in Montana, where it’s getting “a little hairy” with COVID-19 surges. “Our hospital is apparently full. Montana went red all the way down the ticket and they don't believe in wearing masks, so a lot of them don’t.”

The 73-year-old actress – who will soon start work on the Apple TV+ drama "Swan Song" with Mahershala Ali –talks about her "Hillbilly Elegy" role, her own grandmas and if she might finally win an Oscar after seven previous tries.

Q: You’re almost unrecognizable as Mamaw. Did that help in becoming her?

Glenn Close: I didn't want to be distracted by my own face, knowing that it was my face that people were seeing. When I got into full drag, I really felt that I was in her shoes and it was incredibly helpful. I couldn't have done it otherwise. There was an article that was just written by one of her nieces for one of the Ohio papers that I read and you see pictures of her. It's quite astounding how much I looked like her.

Q: What did your own grandmothers instill in you?

Close: My Grandmother Close was someone to contend with. She had basically run away from Texas during World War I hoping to drive an ambulance in Europe and discovered that it was something that socialites did. You basically had to buy the ambulance before you could drive it. She ended up staying in New York and working in Morgan Guaranty Trust and putting her sister through college. She was quite remarkable.

And then my other grandmother, she should have been an actress. She had that mentality, but of course she wasn't allowed to. She actually got encephalitis lethargica during the great bird flu epidemic near the end of World War I. She had my Uncle Johnny when she had encephalitis. This was when abortions were really taboo but the doctor said, ‘You shouldn't have another child,’’ and she chose to have my mom. I wouldn't be here without the kind of individual determination of my grandmother.

Q: Who knows what awards season will look like this year, but are you excited to be back in the Oscar discussion?

Close: I’ve gone without an Oscar for 40 years. I don't know how to answer that question. I was thrown by reading something that somebody wrote about how if I got it, it would be a consolation prize, which really kind of (ticked) me off. It was ignorant and I found it insulting actually about the craft of acting.

Q: Well, eighth time might be the charm.

Close: But also it might not be bad to keep the record going. You can always roll me out in a wheelchair. (Laughs) That would be a consolation prize!

Q: Your Instagram has been full of dog pictures and political stuff lately, like you wearing a Joe Biden mask on Election Day. Are you hopeful about America?

Close: You have to be, because what's the alternative? We all felt so great when Biden won and he won so decisively, but what's going on is so deeply disturbing and frightening. I think we're in for a long, rough time actually in this country. The divide has gotten so broadened and it really makes me incredibly sad when people can't listen or talk to each other anymore. But the election made me realize how much I love this country and how fragile our democracy is. We took it for granted for so long, and now we can't anymore.

Q: What's your COVID Thanksgiving looking like?

Close: I'll certainly Zoom with my daughter, but my two sisters are going to come over to my house and we decided today what we're going to have to eat, because none of us want to gain weight. (Laughs) We decided roasted chicken and green beans, and we have to have sweet potatoes. But we won't have marshmallows on top.

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: 'Hillbilly Elegy': Glenn Close discusses Oscars, her Thanksgiving menu