ROSE & IVY Introducing December Starring Judith Light

On the Cover, Judith is wearing a dress by Andrew Kwon; Clash de Cartier bracelet; shoes are stylist’s own.

It’s so lovely to chat again judith! it was such a pleasure meeting you in new york. one of the things I was so taken by was your positive energy that radiated at our shoot. do you have a daily practice to cultivate that sort of feeling?

Well, thank you, I don’t do it consciously. I’m very appreciative and grateful; I feel very blessed for the life I get to have and the work that I get to do. I get to be around wonderful creative people, so for me, stepping into the joy I feel from other people really ignites me. I don’t think, gee, I should be joyful today, I’m just appreciative. I know the way we all take ownership of ourselves, our life, and what we bring to other people expands me and I trust it expands other people as well. It takes so little to bring your appreciation to a group, it’s like what do we have to be unhappy or sour about? I don’t mean to sound Pollyanna, but it’s like that for me. What do I want to leave everyone with? I’ve said it in so many interviews, but who do you want to be? How do you want to live? You want to leave people having them be glad they were around you and I want to bring that to life. The other thing I believe is that all you have is that moment. You don’t have anything else.

It’s so true, The moment is often lost because we are zooming onto the next.

Absolutely, it’s the thing that makes us fall down and the thing that takes us out of life. As human beings, we just don’t seem to remember that since as you said, we are always chasing the next thing. What do we think we are going to get? Do we think we are going to get happy, get another job, or all of a sudden everything is going to be fine? But that’s not realistic, that’s not life.

It’s a cycle and a pattern and can go on and on if we don’t break it.

Exactly and if you are the same as you were yesterday then you aren’t growing. Don’t we want to grow? Don’t we want to become conscious, more open, and more expansive? Particularly these days, when all of these things are going on in the world that are divisive, difficult, and disappointing, it’s like really? Is that what we think is going to fix it? Nothing is going to fix it except us fixing it within ourselves.

Your resume in film and tv has been incredible. I’m curious to hear how You would describe the journey to where you are now?

It’s complicated to articulate it because it’s experiential, it’s not in my head. But when I try to articulate it, it’s this ongoing awareness of how I am being in the world and how am I relating to people.

Part of the journey for me was realizing I was off balance and relying on other people to do the work. It’s not like I didn’t go to therapy and do different trainings and all of those things. It’s the recognition that you know you don’t appreciate the life you are living. You can see the way you are being in the world and in your life that is making you unhappy. The word is so overused now but it really woke me up. How am I behaving? What am I placing importance on, what am I chasing, what am I running after? Not why, because why is one of those words you can just keep asking and can circle forever.

When I began to look, I saw I didn’t like myself. I didn’t see how I was going to get through my life having any joy, any appreciation for myself, and for the other people who liked my work and gave me more work out of that. There was a real realization that somewhere deep inside of me, I was unhappy. We have these brief moments of time here, how would I hold it, how would I treasure it? What I would say to a child is: what are you bringing to the world? what are you giving? I say it all of the time, there is nothing to get in life, there is only what you give. What are you giving today? How are you being of service? We must always be of giving and some people might think, that is so exhausting, I want to get something for myself today, but we get plenty for ourselves, we know how to take care of ourselves. Why did you create ROSE & IVY, what is it for? You just said it you wanted to talk to women about their journey, how they got to where they are, and how that could possibly impact other people. You were all about giving something when you created it. Your purpose was something else. When we connect to the purpose that is bigger than ourselves, do we actually implement it? That’s the work that has to be done. You have got to implement or else it is going to be same old, same old.

For me it’s about not letting life pass you by, to take that chance–even if you fail—because that is where the magic is.

Exactly, I was asked to do a play years ago where I shaved my head and had to be naked on stage. I kept saying, no, no, no, I can’t do this. Then I thought about it and said, if I am on my deathbed and I never let myself have that experience will I regret it because I was too afraid to try? You know, they say if you take a leap of faith, you will always be caught, someone will catch you. Buckminster Fuller said—and I am paraphrasing—he talked about the kids who failed at something, and that they should get the high marks in school because they tried something. If you never try something or take a risk, you can never learn anything. It’s hard, okay, so what? You are uncomfortable, so what?

It goes back to the question of who are you? Who will you choose to be? Not want to be, want is for a five-year-old who wants ice cream, but that’s not it. How do you relate to other human beings that are not like you? It comes down to the context of a life question that we are really talking about. We could talk about my career–I am starting to produce now–but the idea that I am intrigued and pulled in by is the life that you will live, how will we relate, and how will we be? People say, oh, I want to be remembered for this, that, or the other thing. But that’s not what you want to be remembered for, you want to be remembered for being nice, kind, or thoughtful to somebody.

Judith is wearing a dress by Aliétte; Clash de Cartier bracelet; shoes and tights are stylist’s own.

I love how food has become a theme in your recent projects, as a self-proclaimed foodie myself. Let’s start with ‘The Menu’ which is a thriller/comedy that recently hit theaters.

I am a foodie, too; my husband and I, with our old managers, had restaurants in Aspen, Colorado. We had one that is there now called The Wild Fig—we aren’t a part of it anymore—but it was the first one we invested in. We also had another, which is now closed, with a great chef, Dina Marino. She was one of the first people to do truffle french fries at Ajax Tavern, which is where we met her. But when 2008 came things fell apart, the economy, the upkeep, and since Aspen is a cyclical town, you don’t always have people there. We had to let it go, but the fact was we did it, and loved it, loved it, loved it. But again, it was about giving and nurturing. I am a cook and my husband is an amazing cook.

We are also very connected to two projects, one of them is Project Angel Food in Los Angeles. In the early days, we were feeding homebound people with AIDS and now we feed people who have all different kinds of illnesses and have difficulty getting nutritious food. The other is In God’s Love We Deliver in New York. My husband, Robert, would go when we were in LA, we would cook, pack up the food, and deliver it. He got to go somewhere where he could cook and he came alive. That’s one of those things where you go, I didn’t know I could do that. The first initial response can be, I am uncomfortable, and then you go, wait a minute, what happens if I do this, what if I am not very good at it, or if I stumble along the path and then all of a sudden I find out I am really good at it?

When we were doing The Menu, Dominique Crenn was there guiding us; she is the only woman who has three Michelin stars. She’s amazing! The thing about The Menu is yes, it’s startling, it’s funny, it’s shocking but it’s also about what it means to be an artist, lose your way in your art, and blame it on other people. It’s also about our country and the discrepancy between the rich and the poor. It’s about the person who is entitled and must have what they must have. It really isolates and illustrates all kinds of people and the psychological dynamics of what they have to have. Do they feel superior? Do they have to tell people or throw their weight around? What happens in the film is that everyone is just a human being. It’s quite devastating on a lot of levels.

Another wonderful project is ‘Julia’ on HBO—as a mega-Francophile and as someone who has read nearly everything by or about Julia Child, it sheds even more light on her career and work.

Did you know how committed Judith Jones was to Julia Child? She made Knopf publishers get Julia Child’s book. Blanche Knopf, who I play on the show, said we are not doing cookbooks, but it kept Knopf afloat. In the series I get to work alongside Sarah Lancashire, who plays Julia, David Hyde Pierce, and Fiona Glascott, we all came from the theater.

It’s such a great cast and series. What else are you working on?

I am shooting a show in LA called Shining Vale, where I am playing Courtney Cox’s crazy mother. This show is another horror, comedy, and drama. The contrast of playing these women is such a delight. I just did something for Rian Johnson’s new show Poker Face with Natasha Lyonne. I am getting to do these wild characters that I never would have dreamt of doing in a million years. I also have another film for Disney+ called Out of My Mind, about a young girl with cerebral palsy.

It must be so satisfying to get to stretch yourself creatively.

It is so satisfying. What’s satisfying is the team and how you get to work. You get to have that kind of joy with everybody.

Especially since making a living creatively can be a challenge, it’s not linear and it can come with bumps in the road, but the reward and enrichment are exponential. Not tapping into your bliss and being unhappy wIll rob you of So much joy and life experience.

Most people never wake up to their unhappiness because there is so much fear there of how will I change it. There is a meditation about waking up and how the real vulnerability is saying, I don’t know. As a culture, as a society, and as a world, we aren’t comfortable with saying, I don’t know. We have to have answers. We are brutal with ourselves and each other, but I think, I don’t know, is the highest form of creativity. But if you leave yourself open and available all of a sudden all of these fireworks go off. I really learned how to do that when I was doing Transparent.

When someone floats around the word ‘icon’ or ‘legend’ when it comes to you and your career, what is your reaction?

Of course, I am appreciative–it’s that person’s experience and you don’t ever want to degenerate or put that down. I don’t think of myself that way. What I do is hold someone else’s thoughts, feelings, and experiences and it goes back to being appreciative.

What I would choose is to make sure it doesn’t hold me in some 2-dimensional form, but that I am a human being with all kinds of flaws and complications. I don’t ever want to be put in a place that makes me only that. But if it’s held as substantive, supportive, generous, gracious, and kind, that adds to the flavor of it. It’s like a recipe. I have fans who have really enriched my life, there is a lot of back and forth and intimacy that is created, and to go back to the food, it’s really delicious.

When you are sitting at a play, and as the person on stage, you feel the audience. There is that relationship that gets created, an energetic flow. That’s what I am always looking at, not seeking, or chasing, but it’s that experience. At that moment in time, there is nothing else. It will never come again, no one will ever have that same experience as you have sitting in that theater; no one on that stage will ever have that experience again. We have enriched each other’s life and that expands our world, and our vision, and relating like that changes our culture.

Follow Judith light on instagram

catch ‘the menu’ now in theaters

Styling Assistants // Kyle Gleason, Beah Avila, Alexis Rolph

Editing // Erin O'Connor

A special thank you to this team, R&CPMK, Sarah Fielman at Brandman Agency, and The Wall Street Hotel.

Introducing December Starring Judith Light