Glenn Close reacts to J.D. Vance's evolution since meeting him on “Hillbilly Elegy ”set: 'I don't know what happened'

Glenn Close is just as confused about VP-elect J.D. Vance's political evolution as other Americans might be.

The Oscar-nominated actress — who was recently censored for using profanity on stage at Sunday's Golden Globes — appeared Wednesday on The View for an interview promoting her new movie Back in Action.

After discussing the film and her aforementioned Globes moment, panelist Joy Behar asked close about portraying Vance's grandmother, Mamaw, in her Academy Award-nominated role in director Ron Howard's Hillbilly Elegy, a 2020 Netflix biopic about Vance's life adapted from the Ohio senator's memoir of the same name.

"I remember him hawking it in the old days. He even visited the set at the time you were doing that," Behar told Close, who responded: "He did, and he helped young Owen [Asztalos], who was playing him [at a younger age]. He helped him."

Close added that the cast — also including Amy Adams as Vance's mother, Gabriel Basso as an adult Vance, and Freida Pinto as Vance's wife, Usha — "all met members of the family," including Vance, and "sat with them individually, one-on-one," to prepare for their roles.

"For me, with Mamaw, I'd say, 'How did she walk into a room? How did she sit? How did she smoke? How did she laugh? How did she change the chemistry? The family was very generous," Close remembered, prompting Behar to quip that Vance "had a whole different personality in those days than he has now," when compared to his ultra-conservative platform leading up to joining Donald Trump's campaign as his running mate in the 2024 presidential election against Vice President Kamala Harris.

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"I don't know what happened," Close replied, as The View's studio audience laughed.

"A lot of people out there are like that.The Invasion of the Body Snatchers I think is the name of that movie," Behar continued, with Close observing, "Yeah, yeah, power is probably the biggest aphrodisiac for a human being."

In a 2020 interview with Entertainment Weekly, Close said that her work with costume designer Virginia Johnson also led her down a deeper road of researching the Vance family's history.

"We had pictures of Mamaw, we met with her family about her mannerisms [and discovered] the Reeboks, the baggy jeans, the men's T-shirts — or her own version of the T-shirt — that was Mamaw. We spent a lot of time over how big the stomach would be, how big the breasts would be," Close told EW at the time. "Mamaw, in real life, was a much taller, bigger woman than I am, so to get that, it added to the atmosphere of the character. And the fact that she smoked constantly… when I walked on the set, I knew that we'd done our job because nobody knew who I was. They thought some strange woman had somehow wandered to the set with a cigarette hanging out of her mouth!"

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Close previously jabbed at Vance's controversial quote referring to left-leaning politicians who don't have children as "childless cat ladies," when she shared an Instagram post in August 2024 showing off an image of herself with her feline companion.

"Eve would have left a bleeding mouse head in the bed of anyone who criticized any kind of lady with a CAT!" Close wrote.

The View airs weekdays at 11 a.m. ET/10 a.m. PT on ABC.

Read the original article on Entertainment Weekly