When Ruth Bader Ginsberg Met Natalie Portman

By Anne Cohen June 15, 2015

In a true “life imitates art” moment, it seems Natalie Portman and Ruth Bader Ginsberg had a little chat about women’s rights.

The actress, who will be playing the Supreme Court Justice in the upcoming biopic, was insistent that the film’s director be a woman, during the American Constitution Society’s convention on Sunday.

“Natalie Portman came to talk to me about this, and we had a very good conversation,” Ginsburg said. “And one thing, interesting, that she insisted on, it held up the project for awhile. She said, ‘I want the director to be a woman. There are not enough women in this industry. There are many talented out there.’ And now they do have a woman director.”

Marielle Heller, most recently known for her critically acclaimed “Diary of a Teenage Girl,” will be directing the film. The script comes courtesy of the nephew of RBG’s late husband, Martin Ginsburg.

“On the Basis of Sex” will focus on Ginsburg’s work as an attorney in the 1970s, and particularly on the Reed vs. Reed case heard by the Supreme Court in 1971.

As for her viral celebrity status? RBG’s staying modest. “It’s amazing,” she told Liu. “To think of me, an icon, at 82?”

Watch the whole interview here:

Anne Cohen was the Forward’s deputy digital media editor. When she’s not looking for the secret Jewish history of Voodoo in New Orleans, or making lists about Ruth Bader Ginsburg, she writes for The Assimilator. She graduated from the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism with an M.S. magazine concentration in 2012.

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