Gina Gershon is most famous for her risqué roles in movies like Showgirls and Bound, but her career has brought her into contact with all manner of stars from the worlds of film, theater and music.
In her new book, AlphaPussy (out now), Gershon, 63, looks back on the twists and turns her life has taken, with plenty of famous faces making cameos. Younger fans who recognize her as Jughead’s mom from Riverdale, for example, may be surprised to learn that Gershon has a robust theater background. While studying at New York University, she participated in a workshop with Pulitzer Prize–winning playwright David Mamet, which Gershon describes as an “intense and informative” experience.
Later, Gershon cofounded a theater company called the Naked Angels with a group that included Fisher Stevens, Joe Mantello and Nancy Travis. “John F. Kennedy Jr. came on as a board member,” she recalled. “We were very happening.”
Keep scrolling for more of the best — and wildest — celebrity name-drops in Gershon’s new memoir:
Sharon Stone
For a short period, Gershon and Sharon Stone were cousins by marriage: Stone was married to Gershon’s maternal relative Phil Bronstein from 1998 to 2004. Years earlier, Stone encountered Gershon and told her to start lying about her age because she looked younger than she actually was. Gershon didn’t initially want to heed Stone’s advice, but she then ended up lying about her age for Showgirls, because she felt she “needed to be older” to convincingly play the “hard-bitten, seen-it-all, Margo-like star, Cristal Connors.”
Dorothy Stratten
Gershon took her first trip to the Playboy Mansion at age 15 and eventually met one of the organization’s most infamous names: Paul Snider, who murdered his wife, Playboy model Dorothy Stratten, in 1980.
In the book, she recalled being out dancing in L.A. with Jodie Foster when Snider allegedly approached her and asked whether she’d consider modeling for Playboy, noting that his own wife was an actress before giving her a business card.
“Jodie and I looked at the card, which had Paul Snider written on the front. Creepy. I threw it away and we got out of there,” she wrote. “Three weeks later, I read in the paper that Paul Snider had brutally murdered his wife — Playboy centerfold Dorothy Stratten.”
Lenny Kravitz
While attending Beverly Hills High School, Gershon met a fellow student who went by the name Romeo Blue with whom she “quickly struck a bond.” Romeo Blue, it turned out, was Lenny Kravitz — and they became lifelong friends.
Martin Landau
Before college, Gershon studied with legendary actor Martin Landau, whom she describes as “an actor’s actor, an incredible human and a wonderful teacher.” They later starred together in the 1987 B movie Sweet Revenge, which was produced by Roger Corman.
Tom Cruise
Gershon filmed her first love scene for the 1988 movie Cocktail opposite Tom Cruise. “He could not have been sweeter or sexier,” she recalled. “We definitely had chemistry and I couldn’t believe I was getting paid to make out with him.”
At one point, Cruise started tickling her, and she accidentally kneed him in the face. “I thought I had broken his nose,” Gershon wrote. “I apologized profusely. I felt terrible. But Tom, the eternal gentleman, said he was OK and acknowledged that he’d been warned.”
While some of today’s biggest A-listers got their start in the ’80s, many of their famous contemporaries in the “Me” decade live quieter, more low-profile lives today. From Tom Cruise, who bravely donned those tighty whities in Risky Business, to the boys and girls of the Brat Pack, click through to see which stars got their big breaks in the 1980s — and see where they ended up!
Bruce Willis
During college, Gershon waited tables at Cafe Central, which was a New York City hotspot in the 1980s. Gershon noted that Bruce Willis was a bartender while she worked there, and her “actor boyfriend didn’t like him much — I think he was threatened by Bruce’s charm and swagger.” In addition to Willis, Gershon once saw Mickey Rourke dining there.
Bridget Fonda
While studying at NYU, Gershon was in a class with Bridget Fonda, who worked with her on a scene from David Rabe’s play In the Boom Boom Room, which is about a go-go dancer.
Robert Altman
During a meeting with a producer, Gershon ran into legendary film director Robert Altman in the hallway and struck up a conversation. He eventually cast her in his film The Player, which hit theaters in 1992. “Working with Altman was an incredible experience,” she wrote. “It felt very communal. Making a movie can sometimes be so isolating, and this was just the opposite. Plus, there was free pizza.”
Rick Rubin
While participating in a roast of Denis Leary, Gershon met Jeff Garlin, who told her that her bit was “the funniest thing he had ever seen.” This led to an offer for a role on Curb Your Enthusiasm, which she initially wasn’t sure she could take. Superproducer Rick Rubin, however, convinced Gershon to say yes, telling her, “If there is only one job you do all year, it should be Curb.”
Bob Fosse
After graduating college, Gershon auditioned for a new production of Sweet Charity — and legendary choreographer Bob Fosse was in the room. “At the end of the day, when they were teaching us three new dances to learn for the next callback, Fosse himself — cigarette dangling iconically from mouth — came up behind me, put his hands on my hips, and showed me exactly how to move,” she recalled. “I was in heaven.”
Bob Dylan
While prepping for Bound, Gershon decided to incorporate boxing as part of her training. At one point, her trainer paired her with a new sparring partner: Bob Dylan. She hesitated to hit him at first but eventually “threw a right hook as hard” as she could at Dylan, who “went down.”
She immediately apologized, but Dylan was unharmed. “Bob started laughing and said, ‘I need a good woman to kick my ass every now and then,’” she wrote. “We became sparring partners and good friends after that. I love him.”
Joan Jett
Before filming the 2003 film Prey for Rock & Roll, Gershon worked with Joan Jett, who coached her on playing electric guitar. “In a very Joan Jett way, she said, ‘Spread your legs, place the guitar against your c***, and pretending you’re jerking off,’” Gershon recalled.
Sylvester Stallone
While filming the 2001 movie Driven with Sylvester Stallone, Gershon decided she wanted to learn how to drive the race cars they used during production. But she didn’t actually train with the professional drivers — and then lied to Stallone about it when he asked her to hop in a car for a photo shoot. “He never found out that was my virgin ride,” she wrote.
Guns N’ Roses
To promote Prey for Rock & Roll, Gershon played actual concerts with a real backing band. At the Sundance Film Festival, that band happened to be made up of Guns N’ Roses members Matt Sorum, Slash and Duff McKagan. Gershon was already friends with Sorum, who arranged the other guys’ participation “within five minutes” of his conversation with the actress.
