This Gen-X PANK Plays a Mom: Stranger Things
Written By Savvy Auntie Staff Writers
In a cover story interview in this week's New York Magazine, Winona Ryder, the actress and PANK (Professional Aunt No Kids) told journalist Heather Havrilesky how she was able to play a mother in Stranger Things, the science-fiction horror Netflix series which premiered last month.
“I’m getting asked a lot, ‘You don’t have kids, so how do you know how to act like a mother?’ I know nothing could compare, and I haven’t had that experience, but when my niece was born, I felt like I would jump in front of a car and die for this little person I didn’t even know yet.” Ryder pauses, then returns to talking about her character, Joyce Byers, a store clerk with a deadbeat ex who’s unraveling from frustration and grief. “I actually felt tremendous compassion for her. I feel like she was one of these people that had dreams [for her life]. But she had kids. And it made me think of all the women that I know who have kids, who when they talk about [anything negative about their lives as mothers], they always say, ‘But I love my kids, I wouldn’t trade them for the world.’ Like they feel guilty for even hinting that they’d want something outside of kids! It’s a weird thing.”
Ryder is an aunt to the now teenage niece she is referring to, and a teen nephew. In 2013, she told The Sydney Herald Tribune how important this role has been in helping her cope with stardom:
''I feel like I had to learn how to take care of myself and find out what made me happy aside from just making films,'' Ryder says. ''I have a niece and nephew I adore and a great life in San Francisco, so these days it's equally as important to me to be a good sister and friend and daughter as it is to make films.
On whether or not she wants her own children, Ryder was quoted two years ago when she was 42 on how being an aunt makes her think about motherhood:
“That’s a hard one. If it happened, I would be thrilled, but I’m not making any plans right now. I do have a lot of children in my life, whom I’m very close to and it’s very nice to be around them, but it’s hard work, too. I have a niece and a nephew who are a real handful- i love them like crazy, but I have days where I’m with them all the time from morning till night, and I’m saying to their parents ‘Wow, how do you do it?’ Of course I do hear it’s very different when they are your own children….so we’ll see what happens.”
For more, see Ryder's full interview in New York Magazine: Winona Interrupted.
Photo: Netflix
Published: August 10, 2016