In One for the Money, Katherine Heigl got the chance to work with screen and stage legend Debbie Reynolds, who pops up as her sass-talking grandmother.
It wasn’t just an opportunity to work with someone she admires, but Heigl says it also gave a chance to put her long work hours into perspective.
“I was sort of complaining one day about the hours — as I’m known to do — and Gary, our producer, said, ‘Oh, you ought to hear Debbie’s stories about her hours on Singing in the Rain,’” Heigl remembers.
“It was so horrifying what that woman went through to make that movie. I think she said they were working something like 20 hours a day, and she would just get a few hours of sleep on the sofa in her dressing room and then go back to work a few hours later. I thought she was exaggerating and it was sort of one of those ‘When I was your age I walked to school in bare feet in 10 feet of snow.’ This can’t be true. And then she told me how she had to dance with bleeding feet at one point, and Gene Kelly was like, ‘I guess we should stop, Debbie’s feet are bleeding all over the scene.’ And she was like, ‘No no! I’m fine, I can wrap them up! I can keep going.’ So then I stopped complaining about my hours.”
