If she could turn back time, Cher might not have agreed to certain acting jobs.
The legendary songstress, whose acting earned her an Oscar for “Moonstruck” (1987), spoke candidly in an interview Friday about her onscreen career — and named the two filmmakers she liked working with the least.
“There are only two directors I didn’t like: Peter Bogdanovich and the guy from The Muppets,” Cher told The Times.
She was referring to iconic puppeteer Frank Oz, who was set to direct her in 1990’s film “Mermaids,” before Richard Benjamin took over.
“I actually got the guy from The Muppets fired,” she continued about their creative differences. “I said, either you’re going or I’m going, which is a shame because he’s a really good director, but he had a thing about me. He would go, ‘At least my wife loves me!’”
Bogdanovich directed Cher in 1985’s “Mask” to critical acclaim and a Cannes Film Festival award for Best Actress. But he told Vulture in 2019 that she dropped her father’s surname, Sarkisian, because she “doesn’t like men.” He claimed the singer “can’t act” and “can’t sustain a scene” — and only won her Cannes trophy because he “shot her very well.”
“He was an asshole,” Cher said Friday about the late director, who died at 82 years old from complications of Parkinson’s disease in 2022. “He was not nice to the girls in the film and he was so fucking arrogant. I really, really disliked him.”
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The late director told Vulture that the two “did end up liking each other” — at least, until Bogdanovich sued Universal Studios for removing certain scenes from the film, and Cher “sided with the studio.”
In Cher’s view, however, Bogdanovich had been difficult all along.
“He comes in and says, ‘Cher, where do you think we should film this scene?’” she said Friday. “And I say, well, the kitchen is working pretty well, why don’t we do that again? The next morning he arrives on set, eating an egg sandwich, and starts screaming that he’s not going to let me direct this film; I’m a nobody; he can cut me out at any moment.
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Cher concluded, “Oh yeah, he was a pig.”
When asked whether she’s easy to work with, Cher said she isn’t “arbitrary in the things” she argues about on set. She even pointed to her résumé to note she’s worked with “great directors whom I respect,” including Robert Altman, Mike Nichols and Norman Jewison.
“I know when to listen,” she concluded.