Bening on Beatty, baby, 'Beauty'

Bening's latest project pairs her with comedian Garry Shandling in "What Planet Are You From?"

From Paul Vercammen
CNN Entertainment News Correspondent

March 8, 2000
Web posted at: 5:42 p.m. EST (2242 GMT)

HOLLYWOOD (CNN) -- As Academy Award voters ponder the candidates for this year's Oscars, Annette Bening, the much-lauded star of "American Beauty," is one of the nominees they're considering for the best actress trophy.

But Bening has more than the March 26 Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Science ceremony to consider. While she's been busy talking about her role as the frustrated suburbanite wife of Kevin Spacey, she's also got other projects cooking: a new baby and a new film.

Her latest film is "What Planet Are You From?" in which Bening co-stars with veteran comic Garry Shandling.

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"He finds me and wants to have a baby with me, and there are problems," Bening says. "It wouldn't be a movie if there weren't dramatic problems, as my daughter tells me, my 8-year-old."

Bening says she always wanted to have a big family. Now that her brood is growing, says Bening, she's "exhausted." Bening and husband Warren Beatty have two girls and a boy, with a fourth expected at month's end.

The two connected when Beatty interviewed the actress for a role in his 1991 film "Bugsy." She got the role -- and more. They wed in 1992, then co-starred a second time in "Love Affair" in 1994.

The two are the sort of Hollywood team that members of the Academy love. Beatty, who has the rare distinction of twice being nominated for producer, director, writer and actor on a film, will receive the Irving G. Thalberg Award for producers. Bening is a serious contender for her role in "Beauty," one of eight nominations the movie collected.

Bening met Beatty during casting for the film "Bugsy"

"It's wonderful, isn't it, that so many people on the movie are being recognized," Bening says. "We're this wonderful little family of people that did this kind of small picture. We just did it because we thought it might be a good movie and we loved the script."

But childbirth could keep Beatty and Bening from attending the ceremony. And even if she does make the event, Bening still hasn't written an acceptance speech.

"It's very tricky, because you want to be ready to lose, and yet you also want to be ready to win," she says. "I don't know, ... but I've got a little bit of time."

Bening's mind, naturally, is on other things: children, pregnancy, the sacrifices expecting husbands can make -- a Dairy Queen "Blizzard" for an eight-months-pregnant wife, for example.

"That is such a good idea," she says, laughing. "You're making me want a big burger with fries right now."

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