The actor talks about her latest role, the importance of her Greek ancestry and having a sideline as a gay icon

That was a long phone number. Where on earth are you?

I'm in Cyprus. I came here to do a play called Mama Pou Pas? with Mimi Denisi but unfortunately she had a car accident and the play got cancelled, so I'm doing a concert reading of Rose (1) instead, ahead of taking the production to Israel. So yeah, I'm in a hotel in Greek Cyprus.

How important is your Greek ancestry (2)?

It's important in that it's who I am. But it's also made me feel like I was an outsider and that I never quite fit in – both in relation to Greek culture and mainstream US culture. Growing up, I was always kind of torn between those two worlds, never quite according enough respect to either one. But that's OK. There's a wonderful line at the end of Rose where she says "Maybe freedom is not belonging". That was a comforting idea for me.

Tell me about Cloudburst (3). That seems very much a film about the freedom of not belonging.

Oh absolutely. It's about two old lesbians who run off to Canada to get married, so that's completely what it's about. And the character of Stella is great: very belligerent and in your face. [Director] Thom Fitzgerald kept pushing me out of my comfort zone and making me say things that were more and more outrageous. I looked at the film in post-production and could barely recognise myself. I thought, My God, that's a man!

I saw that one critic described your character as a foul-mouthed, lesbian Walter Matthau …

Really? I love that! I hope it's true.

How do you feel about this sideline as a gay icon? (4)

I appreciate that my work is seen and understood and feels relevant to people. And I'm lucky enough to have friends of all different sexual persuasions, some of which are utterly inexplicable to me. So it's all good. Last year I was grand marshal at the San Francisco gay parade, and that was good too. You get to ride around in a car and wave at people: that's about it. My arm got so tired from the waving that my brother had to hold it up for me.

You've always been politically active. Your cousin, Mike Dukakis, was famously subjected to one of the most vicious election campaigns in 1988 (5).

Oh yeah, full of lies. Lies, lies, lies. It was very painful because you had people like Loretta Lynn, the southern country singer, who said: "How can I vote for a candidate when I can't pronounce his name?" It was this horrible ethnic slur that stirred up old memories of what we had to fight against on the streets of Lowell, Massachusetts, where Greeks were pitted against the Irish and the Armenians. And Lynn laughed and Bush laughed and the whole thing was sickening. But then American politics has always been kind of sickening. You look at the Republican field now and it boggles the mind.

What do you think Rick Santorum would make of Cloudburst? (6)

We are not going to win his approval, put it that way. I've made my peace with it.

It seems that you've had an upside-down career in that you became a star and won an Oscar in your 50s, at an age when most actresses are struggling to find rewarding work (7). Did success go to your head?

Who knows how that happened. Chance, fate, or a bit of both. But I'm very glad I did Moonstruck. It meant that I woke up the next day and was finally able to pay the bills. But no, I hope it didn't go to my head. I remember one of my sons saying to me: "Now you can get something you want instead of something you need." And then he thought about it for a moment and said: "Actually, no, you're not capable of that." [Laughs] He doesn't have a very high opinion of my ability to choose.

In Cloudburst, Stella says that if she was ever on Death Row she'd demand that her last meal would be between kd lang's legs. If you were on Death Row …?

What? I can't hear what you said.

I'm mumbling because I'm embarrassed. It was about kd lang's legs.

Oh yeah, right. What would my last meal be? Maybe spinach pie. It's not as exciting, but it's just as tasty.

Foot notes

(1) Rose is a monologue by Martin Sherman.

(2) Her dad was from Anatolia, her mum from the Peleponnese.

(3) Cloudburst opens the 26th BFI London Lesbian and Gay film festival, from today until 1 April.

(4) She has made three films for Fitzgerald.

(5) Mike Dukakis bowed out to George Bush in the 1988 presidential race.

(6) Santorum has suggested it's better to have a father in jail than be raised by a lesbian couple.

(7) She won the best supporting actress Oscar in 1987, playing Cher's mum in Moonstruck.