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Jessica Lange Says Hollywood’s Treatment of Actresses ‘at a Certain Age’ Hasn’t Changed Much

Jessica Lange, a Tony nominee for Broadway's 'Mother Play,' tells PEOPLE that sexism in Hollywood may have been 'more extreme back then in the ’40s and ’50s and ’60s,' but it endures today.

Playing the late Mildred Pierce star in 2017’s miniseries Feud: Bette and Joan gave Lange an “extremely poignant” perspective, she says, on how roles for women in Hollywood tend to become scarce — from the time Crawford was filming Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? “I've always been extremely willful, and it's not something I'm proud of, but I recognize it,” Lange tells PEOPLE when reminded of her feature film debut: Dino De Laurentiis’ blockbuster King Kong remake in 1967. Lange has since defied the industry’s tendency toward bias, winning two Oscars (for 1982’s Tootsie and 1995’s Blue Sky), three Emmys (for 2009’s Grey Gardens and seasons 1 and 3 of American Horror Story) and a Tony Award (for 2016’s Long Day’s Journey Into Night — a performance she’ll reprise in a film soon).

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