I’m just plain evil: Bette Midler

Actor Bette Midler talks about pets, bad hair days and social activism

Do you have a pet in real life?
Oh, my pet passed.  I’m a non-pet person at this point.

Bette, did you channel anybody to play evil or did that come naturally?
No.  Pardon me?  Did I channel anyone or am I just plain evil? [Laughs]  I’m just plain evil.  It’s true, and now you know the real me.  [Laughs] 

Like in the movie, if anything happened to your fabulous hair in real life would you also go maniacal and try to destroy the world?
No. No, never.  Something happens to my hair in real life every day and I’m normal.  A long time ago when I first worked in the theatre, I was in Fiddler on the Roof.  I was just a kid.  I think I was nineteen or twenty or something like that.  And one of the girls who was in Fiddler was a Puerto Rican girl and she was famous and the reason she was famous was because the opening night she had done something to her hair. 

She had tried to straighten her hair or something and her hair fell out, literally, and she didn’t even blink.  She went out.  She got a piece.  She slapped it on.  And she gave the performance of her life and she went on and became a really famous opera singer.  And I never forgot that.  I thought, ‘Wow, check that out.’ She didn’t even bother.  She didn’t waste any time and from that time on I never thought twice.  I just look around, grab a piece, put it on and go out.  [Laughs]

You are also an activist. How is that coming along?
Well, a couple of years ago I teamed up with the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation to plant a million trees in New York City and we’ve planted about three hundred seventy-five thousand so far, in the last two years. 

There’s a girl in New York who has a blog about a tree that you planted in front of her house.
And she’s mad? You never know.  You never know.

No.  She loves it.  She has pictures of it and the blog’s about her tree that you planted.
Oh, that’s fabulous.  That’s great.