Sigourney Weaver: 'I've never been babe material'

It's hard to believe that Sigourney Weaver – credited with creating the first female action hero – turns 60 next year. It will also be 30 years since she emerged from deep space hyper-sleep in a white singlet to blast the "bitch" in Alien. Ask her how she feels about turning 60, and she laughs. "Bring it on," she says, sounding not unlike her fearless alter ego, Lt Ellen Ripley.

Weaver is one of few "women of a certain age" who haven't suffered a decline in the quality or quantity of work offered. This year, she's starred in five films; next year, there's four. "I am working more than ever, on more different things," Weaver says. "When you have children, you can't do that as much. But my daughter Charlotte has just gone away to college, so I hope to do a lot more."

Wanting work and getting work, however, are two different things. What's her secret? "I have absolutely no idea," she laughs. "I just know that I've always been interested in the story and I really haven't been interested in the parts. I haven't gone, 'Oh, it's time to show that I can do this.' I'd go, 'That's a great story.' I don't care what I play. I'll play a maid or I'll play a queen."

That's not entirely true; she didn't want to play a woman who had to battle aliens. Weaver says: "When I graduated from Yale, I imagined myself having a stage career like my mother [the English actress Elizabeth Inglis]. I wanted to do Shakespeare. If I did do movies, they would be with directors I thought worthy." Ridley Scott (Alien, American Gangster) wasn't on that list, but Weaver went along to see what the "silly outer space movie" was all about. She stood 6ft 2in (in three-inch boots) and towered over Scott. "If Ridley had been less secure in his manliness I would never have got the part," she laughs.

Does Weaver ever tire of being defined by Ripley? She's amassed a hugely varied body of films – The Year of Living Dangerously (1982), The Ice Storm (1997), Galaxy Quest (1999) and The Village (2004) among them – but the image of Ripley in a grubby white singlet is burned into the public psyche. "I certainly wouldn't have had the career I've had without Ripley, and even if the public continues to see me as Ripley, directors send me all sorts of things. In this past year, I've played four parts that are utterly different from each other."

These roles are indeed diverse. In Prayers for Bobby, Weaver plays a Christian who tries to cure her son of homosexuality: "Tragically, a true story." In another, she plays the stripper Gypsy Rose Lee. Then there's James Cameron's 3D sci-fi extravaganza Avatar: "I play a botanist on this foreign planet. I'm very feisty."

But first is the directorial debut of the Pulitzer Prize-winning author David Auburn. Girl in the Park is about a mother devastated by the loss of her young daughter. Weaver, who was at the Marrakesh Film Festival last week to receive an award for her contribution to film, is terrific. "It was very challenging emotionally," she says. "I had nightmares imagining what it must be like to lose your child. But throughout my career I've tried to take on things I didn't think I could do, and I certainly didn't think I could pull this off."

Weaver's performance is, perhaps, Oscar-worthy. She smiles nervously about that; 20 years ago she was nominated for both Working Girl and Gorillas in the Mist but left empty-handed – the first person to lose twice in one night. "But I was thrilled to be considered at all. I remember thinking, 'I hope my professors are watching.'"

You can't blame Weaver for a bit of a gloat. She'd arrived at Yale in 1972 to be told that she was "too tall", she "lacked talent", she might as well go home and save her money. "I was devastated," Weaver recalls. "It was very difficult to hear that from people you admire. I would have left but didn't know what else to do. So I stuck it out."

Alien put her name up in lights, and her talent has kept it there. "I think I was lucky because I've always played these odd women who didn't fit in. I think if you're used to playing a babe, it's much tougher to make the transition to other roles. I guess I was lucky that I wasn't babe material, or maybe just briefly in Ghostbusters." Can she really not know that, among male sci-fi fans, Weaver is the ultimate babe?

Born Susan Weaver, she changed her name at 14 to something longer (to suit her height). She grew up in a privileged household in New York and considered becoming a doctor, or even an anthropologist working with primates, like Dian Fossey, whom she later played.

Her father was president of NBC TV in the 1950s. Her mother appeared in films, among them Hitchcock's The 39 Steps. Performing was in the genes, but her parents were "shocked" when the "painfully shy" Weaver announced her intention to act. "I think a lot of shy people become actors," she says, "because we're more comfortable playing other people than being ourselves. But I'm surprised I had the chutzpah to do it."

The groomed, confident Weaver of today is not unlike how you imagine Ripley to be when she's not off fighting pesky aliens; warm, intelligent, but with a better sense of humour. "Oh, I don't think we're alike at all," she laughs. "I find Ripley inspiring, because she's a go-getter. I'm not nearly as brave."

They are alike in one way – neither is afraid to fight. Ripley fought aliens; Weaver fought against Vietnam. Four decades on, she still fights. "We have a lot of work to do under president-elect Obama," she says. "I think we have so many challenges facing us: education, healthcare and Iraq, and we clearly have to find alternative sources of energy... We had a hard time under the Bush government. We hope Obama's administration will bring real change."

She doesn't just mean politics. "I think our movies will transform as our country transforms under Obama," she says. "I think, after watching Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin [Weaver is "not a fan" of the latter], it's clear Americans are very interested in what women have to say. We're a force to be reckoned with, and I for one feel like I have a lot to contribute regardless of age. So Hollywood had just better get with the programme." Ripley would be proud.

'Girl in The Park' opens on 5 December