photo credit Alison Rosa/HBO

If you’re a film director with a budget of $500,000, what’s the best way to make it seem like your movie has a budget ten times that amount? One surefire method is to convince an actress of Susan Sarandon’s stature to star as your lead (and getting Ralph Fiennes to play opposite her doesn’t hurt either). That’s exactly what Bob Balaban, the director of HBO’s new film Bernard and Doris, managed to do.

The story of Doris Duke, the tobacco heiress once known as the richest girl in the world, and her gay, Irish butler (played by Ralph Fiennes), Bernard and Doris is a quiet movie featuring a stand-out performance from the actress mostly recently seen as the evil queen in Enchanted.

AfterElton.com recently talked with Sarandon about what drew her to the role, her feelings about her status as a gay icon, and why gay men make the best friends.

Susan Sarandon in The Hunger, The Rocky Horror Picture Show, and Thelma and Louise

AfterElton: Do you consider yourself a gay icon?
Susan Sarandon: I think I have gathered enough coupons by now that I am considered a gay icon and I’m proud of it and I count on it and I enjoy it. I know The Hunger is way up there on the list of films because I’ve been on the phone now for two hours with a lot of gay radio stations and publications. I even found something from the late 60s that I actually had framed at one point that was out in I think the Village Voice, that said something like Future Gay Icons, and it was Marisa Berenson and myself and a bunch of people before I even did The Rocky Horror Picture Show, so I just must have been in the right circles.

AE: I just wanted to make sure, because I found a quote where you supposedly said you played Queen Narissa in Enchanted so you'd become a gay icon like Cher. If you didn’t know you already were, it would have been a grave travesty of justice.
SS: Thank you. I’ve been told that. I said I would love to have [Queen] Narissa in the Halloween parade in the Village. I don’t quite understand the word icon in any context, but believe me, I so count on and I so appreciate that I have the loyalty and the admiration of so many people that are gay.

Sarandon and James Marsden in Enchanted