Winona Ryder’s agent pleaded actress not to take 1988 ‘Heathers’ role

Winona Ryder recalled the risky decision auditioning for her role of “Veronica Sawyer” in 1988’s Heathers, and how the actress’ agent “begged” her to not go for it.

“I wasn’t considered pretty enough, so I went across the street to the Beverly Center, to the Macy’s counter. They had them do a makeover on me. Then I went back and I was like, ‘Please!’,” the actress recalled the audition process in a video for Harper’s Bazaar.

“But my agent at the time literally got down on her knees, she’s like, ‘Please, you’re gonna destroy any chance of a career,'” she remembered.

“But I actually did lose a job right when it was coming out. I had been cast in a movie, and the director took great offense to it,” she noted, adding: “I think I made the right call.”

Ryder portrayed the character of Veronica in the movie Heathers, a once-unpopular character who joins the bad girls group headed by Heather Chandler (Kim Walker), Heather McNamara (Lisanne Falk), and Heather Duke (Shannen Doherty). 

However, Veronica starts murdering the Heathers and portraying their deaths as suicides, after meeting the enigmatic new boy JD (Christian Slater).