Ellen Burstyn Reflects on Hollywood Ahead of Venice Honor

Ellen Burstyn is being honored at the Venice Film Festival while still adding new work to a career that has stretched across six decades. The 93-year-old actor is set to receive the festival’s Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement on September 7 at the Palazzo del Cinema.

La Biennale di Venezia said its board approved the award on the recommendation of festival artistic director Alberto Barbera. The presentation accompanies a screening of Maggie Gyllenhaal’s short film Flesh Impact, in which Burstyn plays an imagined older version of Marilyn Monroe.

A Marilyn Monroe memory comes full circle

Speaking with reporters in Venice, Burstyn recalled seeing Monroe across a nightclub table early in her own career. The two did not work together, but Burstyn remembered the sense that Monroe had noticed her. That encounter now gives Flesh Impact an unusually personal connection for its star.

The short, dedicated to Monroe in the centenary year of her birth, also features Dakota Johnson, Peter Sarsgaard and Sepideh Moafi. Burstyn is additionally appearing at the festival in Kornél Mundruczó’s drama Place to Be, opposite Taika Waititi.

Looking back at women’s place on set

Burstyn also used the Venice conversation to reflect on the film industry she entered. She remembered sets with virtually no women behind the camera and described a gradual change as women moved into a wider range of production roles.

Her own choices helped expand what women could carry onscreen. After The Exorcist, Burstyn pushed for a story that reflected women she recognized from real life. That project became Martin Scorsese’s Alice Doesn’t Live Here Anymore, which earned her the Academy Award for best actress.

The Venice honor recognizes a body of work that also includes The Last Picture Show, Requiem for a Dream and Interstellar. Yet the timing keeps the celebration from feeling like a retirement marker. Burstyn arrives with two current festival projects, one of them connecting a formative memory of Monroe to a new performance.

That combination of reflection and continued work gives the tribute its shape: Venice is looking back at Burstyn’s influence while audiences are still discovering what she does next.