Ellen Burstyn Talks U.S. Future At Venice Ceremony

Jury President Maggie Gyllenhaal paid tribute to the 'brilliant and brave' Ellen Burstyn as she presented the Oscar-winning actress with a Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the Venice Film Festival on Monday. 'Let's take a moment in this beautiful theater to remember Lois Farrow in The Last Picture Show, Alice Hyatt in Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore, Edna Mae McCauley in Resurrection, Chris MacNeil in The Exorcist and Sarah Goldfarb in Requiem for a Dream,' said Gyllenhaal in her tribute to the acting legend. 'Ellen is in all of them. Her body, of course. But also, her brain, heart, mind and life. That's brave. It's very loving of her to share it with us.' The ceremony took place before a screening of Flesh Impact, a short film directed by Gyllenhaal, in which Burstyn stars as Marilyn Monroe alongside Dakota Johnson. Johnson portrays Monroe at the height of her fame, while Burstyn stars as a version of Marilyn that the world never got a chance to see. As the Oscar-winner walked on stage, she was greeted with a rapturous standing ovation that lasted for a few minutes, causing her to cry and wipe her tears before starting an acceptance speech. 'You just can't imagine how meaningful this is to me. It's one thing to win an Oscar, a Tony or an Emmy — all of which I've won,' began the Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore star. 'But this … it's a lot. Reflecting on what a Lifetime Achievement Award actually means to her, Burstyn said: 'At 93, you have a fair amount of lifetime to look back on. I realized, it's not just a record of what you've accomplished, but what you've learned.' Burstyn's decades-long career spans film, stage and television. In 1975, she became the third woman in history to win both a Tony Award and an Academy Award in the same year for her work in Same Time, Next Year on Broadway and in the film Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore, for which she also received a Golden Globe nomination and a BAFTA for Best Actress. She became a so-called 'triple crown winner' when she received her first Emmy for a guest appearance on Law & Order: SVU (2009). Talking about experiences of working with Martin Scorsese on Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore, she recalled a terrifying scene in which she driving up a mountain at nighttime. 'There was a big drop off in the cliff on the right side of the car. I had Martin Scorsese, the cinematographer and the camera operator on the hood of my car and I couldn't see the side of the road. I could go off and kill all of us,' she said. 'But then I noticed, this is a two-way road. There's a white line in the middle of the road, and I can see that. So, all I have to do is look up to the left, and follow the white line. And that's how I managed to not kill Martin Scorsese.' She added: 'I wanted to close out saying how deeply appreciative I am of this Golden Lion and I pray that my own country will, very soon, find its own white line.' Burstyn is in Venice with Flesh Impact as well as Kornél Mundruczó's Place To Be, in which she stars in with Taika Waititi and Pamela Anderson. Ellen Burstyn compares a funny story about filming 1974's 'Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore' with Martin Scorsese to the current state of the U.S. at the #VeniceFilmFestival."When I was working on 'Alice Doesn't Live Here Anymore,' there was a scene in which I was driving up a… pic.twitter.com/otHtuQVkbz