Montana Margot

It’s an actress! It’s an activist! It’s Margot Kidder! Best known as Lois Lane in the Superman films—and more recently for her highly publicized bipolar disorder—the 59-year-old now stars as one half of a terrorized lesbian couple in On the Other Hand, Death: A Donald Strachey Mystery (the third installment of the gay private dick series starring Chad Allen), debuting July 25 on here! TV. Taking a break from her peaceful life in Livingston, Mont., Kidder got riled up with us over gay marriage roadblocks, her disastrous same-sex experience, and Barack Obama’s superhero promise.

You seem pretty choosy about acting projects, so what drew you to On the Other Hand, Death?
I’m not choosy at all! I’ll do practically anything. I’m the biggest whore on the block. I live in a little town in Montana, and you have to drag me out of here to get to L.A., so I’m not readily available. But unless it’s something sexist or cruel, I just love to work. I’ve done all sorts of things, but you just haven’t seen them because they’re often very bad and shown at 4 in the morning. 

What’s the gay community like out there in Montana?
We’re finally getting one, which we know means that our property values are going to go up. Butte has some, and Missoula probably has the biggest gay community in Montana. It’s not huge, but there’s less than a million people in the whole state. But we’re not—I repeat not—Wyoming; we’re not the sort of people who would do what they did to Matthew Shepard. This state is very ferocious about not being seen as redneck like Wyoming—it’s a little familial rivalry. 

Being a here! film, I imagine there were a lot more gays on the set of On the Other Hand, Death.
Oh, working on this movie was such a joy. I was surrounded by the most wonderful gay men, and I was in heaven. I was treated like a total princess. [Director] Ron [Oliver] is to die for, as is Chad [Allen]. I had so much fun, I can’t tell you. I kept saying, “Am I butch enough?” And they’d say, “Oh, yeah! You’re butch enough!” Because although I’m not gay, I certainly think I often come across as gay to some people. 

Do you get hit on by women?
I did in 1970, I remember. You know, I’m almost 60—not when you’re at your most wildly sexual. It's actually a wonderfully empowering thing to not be wildly sexual; it’s like a credit card you don’t get to use, so you fall back on exactly who you are. It’s a great relief. I wasn’t very good at love, romance, and marriage anyway, though I certainly cut a wide swath. My gay man friends said, “Oh, you’re just like a gay man!” [Laughs] And, as you can tell, a picture of discretion. 

Did you experiment with women in the ’70s?
Sure, I did. It was a bit of a disaster. 

Tell me all about it.
Absolutely not! [Laughs] There are a few things that even I get to keep secret. But suffice it to say, it wasn’t going to happen twice. It was not a success.