Although the film catapulted Winona Ryder to cult queen status, not everyone was onboard with her role in 1988’s Heathers.
The Academy Award nominee recalled that her agent begged on bended knee for her not to take the part of Veronica Sawyer in the “very subversive” teen dark comedy from writer Daniel Waters and director Michael Lehmann.
Recalling the audition process, Ryder said in a video for Harper’s Bazaar, “I wasn’t considered pretty enough, so I went across the street to the Beverly Center, to the Macy’s counter. They had them do a makeover on me. Then I went back and I was like, ‘Please!’
“But my agent at the time literally got down on her knees, she’s like, ‘Please, you’re gonna destroy any chance of a career,’” recounted Ryder.
“But I actually did lose a job right when it was coming out. I had been cast in a movie, and the director took great offense to it,” she noted, adding: “I think I made the right call.”
Winona Ryder, Kim Walker, Lisanne Falk and Shannen Doherty in Heathers (1988). (New World/Courtesy Everett Collection)
In Heathers, Ryder stars as the formerly unpopular Veronica, who joins the titular clique of mean girls, which includes Heather Chandler (Kim Walker), Heather McNamara (Lisanne Falk) and Heather Duke (Shannen Doherty). When she meets mysterious new kid JD (Christian Slater), they begin killing off the Heathers and making the deaths look like suicides.
Although the movie was considered a flop at the time, grossing $1.1 million worldwide, Heathers has found a cult following over the years. The film has since inspired an Off-Broadway musical and a short-lived 2016 TV reboot that was quickly cancelled after it was met with similar criticism as its source material.