Kathy Bates, Still Badass: The Icon on ‘Matlock,’ Saying ‘F– You’ to Weight Loss Critics and Why Being an Old Emmy Nominee Is a ‘Badge of Honor’
When it comes to describing his onetime co-star Kathy Bates, Sam Rockwell doesn’t hold back. “She’s a badass motherfucker,” he says about his time working with her on Clint Eastwood’s “Richard Jewell.” “It was nothing short of extraordinary. She’s a beast; she’s an animal. She’s an assassin. She’s a baller! Marvel and DC should make her a fucking superhero — or supervillain!”
But as we sit in her “Matlock” dressing room on the Paramount lot, Bates is not quite feeling like a baller. It’s late in the evening after a long day of shooting an episode of the CBS drama’s upcoming second season, and Bates just came off struggling with a tongue twister of a line, which she unraveled with the help of her costar Skye Marshall.
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“When I have to do the legalese, sometimes I get kind of turned around,” she says. “And we go so fast — we’re really rehearsing on camera. By the time we’re making soup, it’s like, ’OK, cut! We’re gonna go to the next angle!’”
And yet, Bates doesn’t seem exhausted. When Rockwell’s salty description of her comes up, she brightens. Does Bates feel like a badass motherfucker?
“When I’m around him, I do!” she says. “We’re always texting each other. He’ll write, ’I love you, you fucker!’ And I was watching him in ’Seven Psychopaths,’ because I love that movie so much. I took a screenshot of my TV and sent it to him and said, ’You fucker! I love you too!’
She admits Rockwell could be onto something with that Marvel/DC casting idea: “I’d love to be a superhero who could fly. But be sexy and transform from one thing to another. Maybe a combo platter: A villain who then transforms into a sexy, crazy, perfect woman.”
This is the gregarious, no-bullshit Kathy Bates people keep talking about. Having been a superstar for decades — that 1991 “Misery” Oscar win was nearly 35 years ago, when Bates was already a seasoned stage performer in her 40s — she’s no stranger to transformation.
But at 77, Bates is as close as she’s ever been to her own sexy, crazy, perfect ideal.
For starters, Bates’ career is speeding up, thanks to the tremendous success of “Matlock,” which returns next month for Season 2, as the show’s writers accelerate the face-off at the core of the series. Bates has embraced the challenge of being No. 1 on the call sheet, too, even using her clout to make sure “Matlock” films in Los Angeles, and that its cast and crew are treated properly on set. And then there’s how she’s feeling: better than ever.
Bates calls this the “redemption stage” of her life and career. She’s made it to the other side of some tough times, and now things couldn’t be happier. “I finally feel like I’m who I am,” she says. “I’ve fought my way through the rapids. I feel this is the best time of my life. I’m glad I stuck around for it!”
There’s a new swagger in her step, partly because of her weight loss (she’s dropped around 100 pounds). And she’s got a clean bill of health after surviving multiple bouts of cancer. And then, following some worries about whether her best acting days were behind her, Bates booked the lead on “Matlock.”
Not only is “Matlock” a hit — delivering nearly 16 million viewers across broadcast and streaming last season — but it has led to a new string of honors for Bates (who has two Emmys and a Golden Globe in addition to that Oscar), starting with a Critics Choice Award in January. Now, thanks to the show, Bates is the oldest-ever Emmy nominee in the outstanding drama actress category.
And she’s not bothered that we keep mentioning that age-related historic stat. “I love that,” she says, noting that “this feels totally different” from the success that has come before. “It’s true, first of all, and it’s a badge of honor. It’s just the serendipity of all of it. I’ve never had any of this stuff happen before, where I’ve got five different designers sending dresses!”
It’s all a bit overwhelming, Bates says, as she reveals what happened the other day when her new stylist shared some of those stylish clothes. “She had a beautiful dress for me to try. I looked at it on the hanger, and I thought, ’That’s not gonna fit.’ I put it on, and it fit, and I just melted down,” Bates says. “I just started crying and crying. I’m still figuring out what it’s like to be without all of that weight. What was it for? What was I hiding myself from? What are the emotions that are pouring out because I don’t have that armor? It just really surprised me, really shocked me.”
When Bates says all of this is a redemption, she’s not talking about the weight. But first, she has one more thing to add about that: “People say, ’Well, it was the Ozempic.’ Fuck you, it was the Ozempic! It took me years to do this. I got this diagnosis about diabetes — my father died of it; his mother died of it; one of my sisters is in peril. When they said ’diabetes,’ I figured out what to do to slowly, over years, to lose the weight. And then when Ozempic came along, I was able to lose the last 15 to 20 pounds and keep it off.
“But the juxtaposition of getting healthy and then this show coming along is just unbelievable,” she says, changing the subject. “The timing of it is great.”
“Matlock” has also been a bit of a career redemption for Bates, who says that she was “about ready to hang it up” when the show came along. And that’s not just hyperbole. There’s pride from Bates that at this time in her life she’s on a network drama that requires so much more work and output than streaming shows that deliver just six or eight episodes a season.
And she’s doing it at her “Oscar winner Kathy Bates” performance level. On “Matlock,” Bates juggles multiple tones as the tough-as-nails Madeline Kingston; Kingston is out to avenge her daughter’s death from opioids by going undercover as the folksy Southern charmer “Matty” Matlock. Matty has infiltrated the law firm she blames for covering up the pharmaceutical industry’s role in the addiction crisis. Bates frequently has to play several versions of the character in the same scene, and her performances are flawless.
The drama was sold, in part, for its rich twist on the old Andy Griffith “Matlock” courtroom format, this time reimagined by creator Jennie Snyder Urman. Urman’s pitch amounted to “Underestimate a woman of a certain age at your own peril,” and she had Bates in mind for the role. They hit it off immediately upon meeting, dissecting Matty’s motivation from the first moment. (Bates now regularly sends Urman books about addiction and other topics that make her character tick.) She’s awed by what Bates is doing every day as both the star and an executive producer: “Her stamina and her ability to stand at the center of a demanding network show, it’s incredible,” Urman says. “We go to deep depths.”
“It’s extraordinary,” says CBS Studios president David Stapf. “It’s like watching an incredible painter. Like, how does she do that?” Adds CBS Entertainment president Amy Reisenbach, “And she’s not slowing down.”
Alongside Bates is Marshall, who plays Matty’s superior, Olympia. The relationship between their characters — which has gone from friendship to a powder keg about to explode now that Olympia has discovered Matty’s ruse — is at the heart of “Matlock.”
“She has this way of empowering you in the simplest forms,” Marshall says. “I was standing with her in Times Square when Paramount lit up the Megatron with the first big ’Matlock’ poster. We just prayed that the audience would receive all the sweat and tears that we put into those characters, and here it was: The pilot had already aired, and the numbers were through the roof. We looked at each other, and we both started crying. We were giggling like cheerleaders.”
Bates shares that sentiment: “This afternoon you saw me screw up, and Skye was there for me. She does that sometimes — she’ll just jiggle me and it’s just joyous. That’s what feeds me. When Skye and I are working together, we just have this ability to lock in with each other that feels so safe.”
The changing dynamic between Matty and Olympia provides some of the tension on “Matlock” — but Bates also delivers some laugh-out-loud moments on the show. In one episode last season, Matty got stoned with the law firm’s boss, played by Beau Bridges. The script had Matty plowing into a pie with a fork and knife, but Bates had a better idea: “She said she didn’t need a fork and knife, and then started to eat it with her hands,” Urman says. It became one of the season’s most memorable scenes.
“She’ll punch up lines on set, too, and it’s always better,” Urman adds. “Matlock” balances the serialized Matty Matlock story with procedural cases of the week, and that comes with thick scripts and lengthy dialogue. Bates relishes the challenge: “It keeps my mind sharp. I just love it so much.”
Kathy Bates may be tremendously comfortable in her own skin now, but she freely admits to being in over her head when she hit the big time with “Misery.” She was 42 when the film elevated her to the A-list — yet recalls feeling woefully young and out of step. “Just like a child,” she says. “I had no clue. In fact, there’s a picture of me getting out of a car wearing a black-lace bib and a white bra underneath — just so tacky! I just always felt like it was a nightmare. I just felt so ill prepared, like a country bumpkin.”
Bates remembers “Misery” director Rob Reiner likening that naivete to the ingenuousness of her character, Annie Wilkes. “Looking back on those years, I felt unprotected,” she says. “I didn’t know what I was doing. I was a middle-class kid from Memphis, Tennessee, with older parents, and really 20 years behind the times. I didn’t know anything about anything, and it haunted me for years.”
She also cringes at her follow-up performance in “Fried Green Tomatoes.”
“I could have done a really good job with that part, and I didn’t do nearly enough,” she says, noting that she was distracted by her “Misery” press tour and filming another project, “The Road to Mecca.” But Bates’ list of acclaimed roles continued to expand in the years that followed, both on TV (“The Late Shift”) and on the big screen via “Dolores Claiborne,” “Titanic,” “Primary Colors,” “About Schmidt” and a memorable comedic turn as Mama Boucher in “The Waterboy.”
“She added a kind of prestige to the whole thing,” John Travolta says of working with Bates on “Primary Colors.” “A dimension that had gravity and color, and it affected all of us. When you act with Kathy, you’re in a safe zone. And what makes her so exciting is that she’s not a predictable actor. ’What will Kathy do with that role? What will she do next?’ It’s a beautiful anticipation.”
In recent years, Bates’ résumé has been somewhat eclectic. She earned an Emmy in 2014 for “American Horror Story: Coven,” followed by nominations for the franchise in 2015 and 2016, as well as another Oscar nod for “Richard Jewell” in 2020. She also did something completely different on TV in 2017, starring as a medical marijuana dispensary owner in the Chuck Lorre sitcom “Disjointed.”
“Kathy’s one of the best actors I’ve ever worked with,” says fellow “American Horror Story” alum Jessica Lange. The two most recently starred opposite each other in the 2024 HBO film “The Great Lillian Hall,” which landed Bates a SAG nomination. “I adore her,” Lange says. “She’s no bullshit and doesn’t suffer fools, which I appreciate.”
Anthony Ramos, who presented with Bates at the Golden Globes in January, says he’s still in awe at what felt like a “spiritual moment” backstage with her. “She just carries herself with so much grace, but she’s hilarious at the same time,” he says. “I was like, ‘Kathy, you still get nervous with these things?’ Because I was kind of nervous. She was like, ‘all the time.’ And then she asked me to hold her hand before we got on stage. Just having such a human moment with somebody who’s so revered… I don’t take that for granted.”
The last time Bates earned an Emmy nomination for a starring role in her own broadcast TV series was in 2011 and 2012, for David E. Kelley’s legal drama “Harry’s Law.” In it, Bates played Harriet Korn, a sharp-tongued lawyer who forms her own criminal defense firm after being fired from her job as a top-level patent attorney. The show was a hit with older viewers but lagged with the young adult demos that networks were obsessed with at the time. NBC canceled the show after two seasons, even though it attracted nearly 10 million viewers a week.
Bates was heartbroken, but debated whether to say anything. A year later, when she was meeting with the press for her next TV project, “American Horror Story: Coven,” she was asked about “Harry’s Law” — and couldn’t hold back.
“I think they treated us like shit,” she told reporters on a Television Critics Association press tour, taking dead aim at NBC’s then-crumbling numbers. “They kicked us to the curb. They disrespected us. They disrespected our seven to 11 million viewers a week. And I think they’re getting what they deserve.”
Bates now chuckles at that outburst: “They said, ’We can’t monetize on old people.’ And I felt like, ’Fuck you!’” She smiles. “Success is the best revenge,” she says, humorously dusting her shoulders.
Vindication is one thing, but Bates is also proudly wielding her power with the show’s network and studio, in a way that has made her a one-woman Hollywood stimulus: Not only is she helping to give broadcast TV a shot in the arm, but Bates leveraged CBS’ desire to cast her into making sure “Matlock” — which shot its pilot in Toronto — would film the series at home in Los Angeles, at a time when local production losses are a key industry concern.
“This is the first time in I don’t know how many years where I’ve been able to unpack my suitcases and put them away,” she says. “One thing about being 77 is traveling has gotten difficult. I really can’t go on the road by myself anymore. You’re away from your support system.”
And the L.A.-based cast and crew of “Matlock” are grateful. “The fact that Kathy is at a point in her career where she can say, ’I would like to shoot in L.A.,’ and they go, ’Yes, that’s where we’ll be shooting’ — we’ve all been able to benefit from that,” says co-star Jason Ritter. “My daughter started kindergarten during the first season, and it’s so nice to get to go to work and then come home.”
Bates gets fired up when productions shot outside Los Angeles are mentioned. “Come on. This is Hollywood, for Christ’s sake,” she says. “This is a huge industry for California. There’s so much history here. And it’s not just the people who work in production; it’s every other industry that Hollywood supports. The drivers, the restaurants. I don’t want to pack a bag!”
The well-being of the artisans around her is always top of mind. “Everybody says, ’Oh, you’re so nice to the crew,’” Bates says. “But me walking up to the Emmy stage would be for them, because this doesn’t happen without every single person not only putting their heart and soul into it, but also being lovely. You try going in there and hammering shit together 12 hours a day. The grips and the electricians, they have to turn over these stages and the lights; it’s not easy. Every single person in every crew or office, they make this show.”
It’s obvious Bates is protective of “Matlock,” so she’s careful with what she says about the state of the world. But she’s worried about attacks on the arts, especially since she believes that acting and performance can help spread the message of finding the humanity and empathy in others.
“In the theater, you literally go and pick out the shoes, and you put them on, and you walk around,” she says. “As my mother used to say, ’You’ve got to walk around in somebody’s shoes for a month before you know what their life is like.’”
“Matlock” focuses on the relationship between two women of different ages and backgrounds, and Bates wonders what the rollback of diversity and inclusion in Hollywood might mean for a show like hers.
“Are they going to start telling us what stories we can tell?” she asks, noting that she just accepted a best dramatic actress prize for “Matlock” from the African American Film Critics Association. “That’s a big deal to me, especially coming from Memphis and growing up during segregation. And learning through my experience but also watching movies. Seeing all of that culture blossom and change our society in so many ways. Is that going to go away?”
Then there’s her role as a global spokesperson for Lymphatic Education & Research Network, a personal cause in light of her struggle with lymphedema following a double mastectomy for breast cancer. “We were really making great progress, and I don’t know what’s going to happen now,” she says, referring to all the governments cuts to funding.
On another topic — how AI might transform the industry — Bates has firsthand experience with it muddying the waters: “My college roommate, she asked, ’Are you hawking a diet about bananas?’ I said, ’No!’ But she was like, ’Well, it’s you, your face and voice and everything!’ Apparently on Facebook, my AI version is selling a banana diet that just works like crazy. You could have me out there selling ICBM missiles or whatever! You just don’t know whether it’s fake or not.”
If you see her out there pimping ICBM missiles, don’t believe it — unless (and we can only hope this comes true) she’s playing that sexy, crazy, perfect comic-book-movie outlaw. Because Kathy Bates is just getting started as a badass motherfucker. “I hope this keeps going,” she says. “I love doing this.”