I remember great times in this theater,” says former Northwestern student and notable actress Laura Linney Friday at the Wallis Theatre at a lecture and Q&A for theater and film students.

Linney, the star of The Squid and the Whale and Oscar nominee for You Can Count on Me, recalled fond memories of being a freshman theater student at Northwestern in 1982 and even wore an NU t-shirt offered by an aspiring thespian.

“I still have a scar on my arm from a glue gun in the wardrobe department,” she says. “But it was worth it.”

Even after Linney left Northwestern to complete her bachelor’s degree at Brown, she remained friends with theatre professor David Downs, who she declared to be “the best acting teacher on the planet.” She suggested to Downs that she give a talk to NU theater students about the acting craft, studying theater academically and her thoughts on life.

“So many young ingénues find initial success in acting, but then have no room to grow,” Linney says. “Studying drama academically allows you to evolve.”

Despite garnering such acclaim for her film and television work, Linney never thought about acting for the big screen in her youth. She started out in community theater, summer stock and eventually made it to Broadway.

“I never considered acting for film or TV because I was just too scared,” she says.

Linney remarked on this fear when discussing her first movie, 1992’s Lorenzo’s Oil.

“I couldn’t get used to the fact that in movies there isn’t a back wall,” she says. “That was the first time I had ever acted outside.”

For Downs, Linney’s former professor, seeing her return to Northwestern such a success is a triumph.

“She’s the real deal,” Downs says. “She’s as basic as genius must be and as poetic as artistry demands. She has created a career that must be the envy of most actors on the planet.”

-Christian Blauvelt