Few Hollywood legends have lived as many lives as Jennifer Tilly. Not only did she earn an Oscar nomination for her performance in Woody Allen’s Bullets Over Broadway in 1995, but the actor has since enjoyed fruitful voice acting career (you can hear her signature breathy pipes on Family Guy), gained a cult following for her role as Tiffany in the Chucky franchise (“Barbie, eat your heart out”), and kickstarted a lucrative career as a professional poker player.
Now, Tilly is gaining a whole new legion of fans, thanks to joining season 14 of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills as an official friend-of. “The Housewives is really crazy—it’s not really a career move that a lot of people would recommend,” laughs Tilly over Zoom this week. “But at this point in my life, I just want to do things that are fun.”
Fun is certainly the world to describe Tilly’s Real Housewives takeover this season. Not dissimilar to how Kathy Hilton entered the series, Tilly has brought some highly entertaining scene-stealing irreverence to the mix. Four episodes in, and viewers are already obsessed with her glamorous fashions ($33,000 Louis Vuitton bags!), unexpected lore (she owns a stake in The Simpsons!), and eccentric personality. For Tilly, transitioning into this world of reality TV has been a fun, if not unexpected, challenge. “It s not like anything you would ever imagine,” says Tilly. “First of all, these ladies sit down at dinner, and they start screaming at each other before you ve even eaten your amuse bouche. But in a weird way, I enjoy it. I feel like I have a front row seat at the Super Bowl.”
Vogue caught up with Tilly to chat about diving into the Real Housewives world, how she dresses for reality TV (fans of Tom Ford-era Gucci should tune in), and her decades-long career.
Vogue: Fans are loving you on this season of Real Housewives of Beverly Hills. I was curious: What first excited you about joining this universe?
Jennifer Tilly: For the last three summers, I ve been filming the TV series Chucky, and when it was inexplicably cancelled, I was looking at a really long, empty summer. It’s always been a fantasy of mine to be on the show; I had an idea of how fun and glamorous it would be. My best friend, Sutton, has been on the show for about four years, and I did a couple of scenes last season. They’d been asking me to be on the show for about three years. I thought, well, how many people at my age have the opportunity to be on Real Housewives? So, I agreed.
You’re a “friend” this season versus a full-on cast member. Does that make it more fun?
They gave me the choice, and I thought it would be better, because you don’t have to wake up to a camera man straddling your bed. As a friend-of, you’re allowed to not get involved in the main drama, so you can jump in as little or as much as you want. I have realized, though, that it’s kind of weird for me to be a supporting player. I’m always like, “Hey, I’m over here!” I m wearing my jewelry and nice outfit, and I sit there trying to make an interesting reaction face so that they’ll cut to me.
I’ve been loving your fashions on this season—you’re certainly bringing the glamour.
We’re always going to these fabulous parties and restaurants—and we like to dress in costume. We had a cowboy party, so I wore my Chanel double-gun necklace, and studded cowboy boots. I also had a caviar and caftans party. I love dressing up [inspired by] other cultures; When I travel, I always like to buy the local things and wear them. I love cheongsams, and thank goodness I’m half Chinese, so that I can wear one without people yelling, “cultural appropriation!” Whenever I m in Santa Fe, I also wear all the turquoise jewelry, squash blossom necklaces, and beaded hats. I love Charles Loloma jewelry, who was Hopi. I haves several of his bracelets and a necklace; I also have a beautiful beaded Sandra Okuma bag. Life’s too short to wear torn jeans and a white tee. I m kind of like a female drag queen—I love anything campy and over the top.
One of my favorite moments this season was when Erika Jayne was admiring your $33,000 Louis Vuitton boat purse.
Oh gosh, yes. I had no idea they were going to put the price of it at the bottom of the page! I didn’t even remember how much I paid for it. I love that boat so much. You know what’s cool about Erika’s style? She’s similar to me in that she has a lot of fun with clothes. She s not looking around to see what everybody else is wearing. And she knows her stuff. I own a David Webb bracelet that once belonged to Estée Lauder, and she goes, “that’s David Webb, isn’t it?”
A lot of people assume that the housewives have stylists. But, at least per your style, it seems to me that you all craft your own looks?
Some of the girls have stylists, and you can tell. There will be this one Chanel dress that makes the rounds amongst all the housewives, going from one house to the next. In some instances, the girls will even show up in the same dress. Or some of the stylists will even bring in fake designers clothes. But I don’t have a stylist. I have a very strong sense of what I like, and I have relationships with the designers. Even in the ’90s, I would always go to photo sessions with a big suitcase of my clothes; I didn’t want to get stuck with what the stylist brought.
Did you work with one when you were nominated for the Oscars, in 1995?
I didn’t. When I got nominated for the Oscar, I knew that you could borrow things. I remember Prada offered to make me a dress, but I went with a fabulous black sequined Isaac Mizrahi dress instead. But he wanted it back afterwards! I was really disappointed I didn’t get to keep it.
It’s kind of wild to think of a time when Oscar nominees didn’t have stylists.
I love to look at pictures from the seventies, when people are all wearing their own clothes! Now, you see all the people going down the red carpet in looks from the five same stylists. I don t like everybody so impeccable—there s no personality! And the worst of all, is when there’s a new up-and-comer who is styled in something edgy, and you can tell they’re really uncomfortable. They’re not wearing the dress—the dress is wearing them.
I want to pivot for a second and talk a bit about your enduring role as Tiffany in the Chucky series. Did you ever expect that franchise to be what it’s become?
Never. When I did Bride of Chucky, I was coming off my Oscar, and I thought I was going to be Dame Judi Dench. I thought I was slumming it by doing a horror movie, especially about a foul-mouthed little doll who goes around killing everybody. But when I read the script, I really liked it. I liked my character. She s wistful and melancholy, and she s also campy and strange. Tiffany dies at the end of the first film, so I thought I was done—but nobody ever really dies in horror films. Now, 25 years later, I’ve done four Chucky movies, and three seasons of the Chucky show.
I love that your Tiffany doll makes a cameo in Real Housewives.
I have my own Tiffany doll, the actual one we used in the movie. Jean Paul Gaultier even made her an outfit with the bullet bra. Dolce Gabbana said they’d make one for her, too. I have to negotiate them down, though—it is just a doll. I know people are saying $5,000 for a dress for a doll? I’m like, that’s cheap for a haute couture outfit!
Part of what makes Tiffany so iconic is her voice. You have become quite a successful voice actor, with roles on Family Guy and Monsters Inc. Do people ever hear you enter a room before recognizing you?
Absolutely. Actually, as I become more prominent on Housewives, I’m going to need a bit of a disguise now. When you’re on Housewives, people think they’re your friend. There were some people recently standing outside Garcelle s house when we were having a sleepover, and I think they expected us to invite them in for some pizza.
Let’s get back to fashion. I know you have an impressive archive of designer clothes. What’s some of your prized possessions?
I have things that I can t even fit into anymore. I recently went in the garage and I found stuff that I thought had disappeared. I used to be obsessed with Tom Ford Gucci. I found this denim skirt, and it has Lesage rose embroidery all over it. That was my prized possession. It was very expensive. They told me, “Jennifer, only five people in the United States have this.” Of course, it could fit around one of my legs now. Maybe I ll go on some sort of crazy non-Ozempic drug type thing; Maybe one day I ll think eating is not fun anymore. I would have the most fabulous wardrobe! I have these Vivienne Westwood dresses that I had custom-made for me. I also have the John Galliano dress that Drew Barrymore wore on the cover of Italian Vogue.
Where do you keep everything?
I am a bit of a hoarder. We film Real Housewives at my house next door, but we can t even use the whole upper floor, because it’s all rolling racks now.
It this the house you said was haunted?
My Malibu house is haunted, yes. By an old guy. In California, you have to disclose if somebody died in your house, and they told me that the man who lived here loved this house so much, that his wife brought him back so he could die in it. But this guy does not know that he s dead. We hardly ever go there; Nobody ever wants to go there. My house keeper once saw a man standing in front of her on the sofa. I once also heard my doorknob turning, but nobody was home. He’s a friendly ghost—but I just don’t want to hang out there myself.
Are you a collector of anything in particular?
Back in the ’80s and ’90s, I was obsessed with the twenties. I bought a lot of beaded dresses and bags. I probably have around 300 Cloche hats from the twenties. (I have a giant head.) I also have a lot of Fortuny gowns. In the ’90s, I remember I really wanted to get Victorian boots, but the leather was always rotten. I would buy the Victorian boots, and then I d wear them for about a week and the leather would fall apart.
I also read that you own a lot of memorabilia from fellow famous people.
I have some pieces from Marlene Dietrich’s auction. I have a lot of her clothes: I have a Schiaparelli suit, and the top part is a fur coat. I have a Pucci dress that she had, and a swimsuit of hers. But I really went to the auction to get a love letter that Ernest Hemingway had written her, because I m a big Ernest Hemingway fan. I also have a charm bracelet that belonged to Joan Crawford. It has little mini Oscars on it, which you can t do anymore; There’s a law against replicating the Oscars. The little charms were given to her by her lovers.
Lastly, we can’t end this chat without talking about your poker career. You are a championship-winning player. How did you ever enter this world?
My dad had a poker problem. He gave me computer game called The World Series of Poker, and we used to play it all the time at his house. I’ve always loved poker. My boyfriend, Phil Lack, is a famous poker player; I met him at a celebrity poker tournament. When we began dating, I won a gold bracelet at the World Series. It’s very coveted: All the poker players measure their worth by how many gold bracelets they have. That was the beginning of my poker career.
I find it interesting that you’re made it a whole lucrative career.
Celebrity poker playing is wildly entertaining—and because I m an actress, when I see a camera, even though I m playing with my own money, I like to entertain. I m one of the few poker players who plays high stakes poker, and I m practically the only woman that plays high stakes poker. So always am putting on a show. I will wear a glamorous dress. I like to play a character called “Lady Gambler.” I’ll wear my big diamonds and jewelry and a low-cut top, and a feather boa. It amuses me. Last year, I was inducted into the Women s Poker Hall of Fame, which I was very proud of.
I’m going to Vegas this week. Any tips for a first-time poker player?
You have to disengage yourself from the money, and just think of it as chips. You can t think like, “Well, if I lose this pot, it s a Ferrari, or it s a condo in Scottsdale, Arizona.” Because can lose a huge amount, and then win it back 20 minutes later. You may think people are better than you, but I guarantee you they re not. It’s all about trying to figure out what the other person is afraid of, and then representing it. And if you start feeling you re unlucky, never say that; Don t let people know when you re feeling sad or unlucky, because your body will believe it, and manifest it. And just be prepared to lose money!
