I remember a time when Anjelica Huston was a movie star. From the mid-80s to the mid-90s she was making some really great movies. Prizzi’s Honor, The Dead, The Addams Family, The Grifters and then, poof, she disappeared. Her parts got smaller as she got older. Happens to lots of women. Thank goodness for Wes Anderson because he singelhandedly kept her on our radar screen in a bunch of his films. Every time I would see her I would say god I love Anjelica Huston. Why isn’t she in more films?

She’s done what other movie actors are doing regularly now, gone to TV. She’s taken the role of Eileen Rand on Smash and boy does she look like she is having fun.

The character of Eileen is quite a great character and I’m sure that is one thing that drew Ms. Huston to the script. Eileen is getting a divorce from her philandering producer husband Jerry. She is at 60ish coming into her own, producing by herself for the first time, and starting over. It’s exciting to watch a woman who clearly has lived her life a certain way fight to establish her own reputation away from her ex. She’s like a kid in a candy store and last week she headed down to the Bushwack for cheap martinis with a cute bartender (who it looks like she is going to get it on with) and violent video games.

Smash has given us such a variety of interesting characters and Eileen Rand is one of the most interesting women to come along in a while and in the hands of a pro like Anjelica Huston she is even more special. Can’t wait to see what happens next.