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Laying Down the Law

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In 1984 Sarandon came down with typhoid during a relief mission to Nicaragua. Although doctors had told her a couple of years before that she couldn't have children, her daughter, Eva, now 9 (fathered by Italian film director Franco Amurri), was born less than a year later. "After I contracted typhoid," she says, "I went to Italy and miraculously became pregnant. I think it burned something. A kind of purification ritual was imposed on me through typhoid." After Eva, she had two sons, Jack Henry, 5, and Miles, 2, with Robbins.

Whether in New Canaan or in their Manhattan apartment, she and Robbins tend toward domesticity. There is no full-time nanny, so Sarandon tries to avoid acting jobs that will take her far from home during the school year. During family time between 5 and 9 p.m., Sarandon and Robbins don't answer the phone. And yes, like any other American family, they talk about the O.J. Simpson case. "We were just discussing it last night," says Sarandon. "I guess the good thing that will come out of it is more discussion about abuse. And also, it's such a clear example of the injustice of the death penalty. If he is guilty, I'm sure he won't go to the electric chair."

Sarandon, the daughter of a television producer-turned-advertising executive and a housewife, has spent her own adult life rebelling against her conservative upbringing in Edison, N.J. "It was fairly insulated," she says of her childhood. "I don't remember much. Whatever it was made me what I am today and that's fine." With four younger brothers and four younger sisters, she says, "You get used to a kind of group need, and it's taken me quite a few years to stop mothering grown men."

The first man in her life was actor Chris Sarandon, whom she met at Washington, D.C.'s Catholic University and married in 1967. Their relationship, which ended in divorce in 1979, was followed by a three-year affair with Pretty Baby director Louis Malle. What's so great about Tim Robbins, whom she met in 1987 on the set of Bull Durham? "One-stop shopping," she says. "He's a great father, and he definitely lets me know when I'm full of s---. And so it's not exactly what I'd call all the time a very calm relationship, but we don't spend a lot of time worrying whether there's somebody else out there who would be better, or worrying if one of us is going to leave. We're kind of in a take-no-prisoners mode." And, she adds, "his face is really rubbery and reflects everything that's going on inside. Which is great."

Wedding plans?

"I must say I'm a little nervous about it, because something always seems to go wrong when people finally get married. I was talking to the kids about them [conducting the ceremony] when they got old enough, and then they would be a part of it. It would be a really good excuse for a party. People could dance about it into the night."

The Client is not a very Susan Sarandonish film; though you'd expect to see her slinging hash (White Palace), juicing lemons on herself (Atlantic City), driving off a cliff (Thelma & Louise), or even wing-walking (The Great Waldo Pepper), she's not the summer blockbuster type. Schumacher, who says he "wanted Reggie to be alive at 45 and divorced — I didn't want her to feel sexless" — lured his star by proposing on his knee in a crowded restaurant, promising she'd have fun. "If he'd tried to seduce me with some pretentious bulls--- about the significance of The Client," says Sarandon, "it never would have worked.

"There were two things that really intrigued me. One was the tape of these boys [Brad Renfro, who plays the title role, and David Speck, who plays his little brother], because they were such wild cards. They weren't professional actors or anything. And the second thing was the challenge of making one of these kinds of movies, whatever these movie-movies are, that actually would have some humor and some heart." Mindful of the slick glamour that other stars and directors imposed on The Firm and The Pelican Brief, she says, "At one point I did turn to Tommy and I said, 'Don't you feel like we're the Lucy and Desi of Grisham — a little wacky compared to everybody else?' We weren't burdened by sincerity too much."

She didn't worry much about pleasing Grisham purists, either, and fans of the book might not recognize her as the woman Grisham described as "fifty-two [with] very short, very gray hair." Sarandon, not one to withhold her opinion on a set, insisted on slowing the pace at which Reggie learns the whole truth about her young client and his family ("Therefore, she doesn't have the burden of being stupid and not getting them in a Witness Protection Program immediately") and asked for a spikier relationship between the two ("They shouldn't like each other at the beginning, because then there's nowhere to go").

"Obviously, I described the character of Reggie as quite different," says Grisham, who has seen the film twice. "I had some doubts. But when my wife and I saw her on the set, we said, 'You know, she's awfully good.'"

In one pivotal scene, Reggie was supposed to place the boy in jeopardy when she already knew he was in grave danger; Sarandon insisted on rewrites because she found the scene, in her words, part of "the Whitney Houston-Kevin Costner school of suspense." She also insisted on cutting a scene of her character at an Alcoholics Anonymous meeting. "It would have been fun to do, but it slowed down the action. So, you see," she adds, jokingly, "I am capable of cutting scenes that are good for my character."

"Susan is very vocal," says Robert Ackerman, who directed her and Sam Shepard in the forthcoming drama Safe Passage. "But she's perfectly willing to back off if you don't agree. And she doesn't fight unless she knows she's absolutely right."

Passage will be released this winter, as will Sarandon's just-completed Little Women, a remake of the Louisa May Alcott novel; she plays mothers in both films. "My representatives didn't want me to do either of these parts," she says. "Becoming a mom traditionally eliminates your choice in terms of sexual parts. But there are millions of mothers out there who still have a pretty hot life. I did Little Women for my daughter. And in Safe Passage, I hope to give dysfunctional families a good name. It's about family love that doesn't look like The Waltons...and a marriage that isn't a classically happy marriage."

Although she may next work with Piano director Jane Campion on her adaptation of Portrait of a Lady, Sarandon says she'd really like to do a romantic comedy. "I get a lot of scripts aimed at my icon status, women who are fighting a fight for something or another," she says. "I don't want to get nobled out, because the difficulty [of] these parts is to make sure they have some crack or self-doubt, so it's not all one-note. Even in Lorenzo's Oil, she was pretty uncompromising, but she was a wreck."

Sarandon is restless. Robbins and the kids are waiting for her at home, and the chicken is surely ready. And so, one last question before she disappears into the day. Would she ever pull a Jane Fonda and retire?

"No," she says. "Jane Fonda worked really hard for a long time, and I think she got really frustrated with the parts that she had access to. I suppose if that happened to me, maybe I'd direct. Maybe by that time I would have developed the patience to deal with the suits." Before she picks up the chicken and returns to mother mode, she admits to one professional goal: "I'd like to be the oldest living actress who's functioning."