Sharon Stone Strikes Again

If you think Sharon Stone's movies have been revealing over the years, you should check out her lawsuits. In June 2001, the actress sued the producers of "Basic Instinct 2: Risk Addiction" for $100 million because they had failed to make the movie and (more to the point) failed to pay her. During her deposition, Stone, now 48, said she'd initially been wary of appearing nude again. "I put up 'Basic Instinct' in my projection room in L.A., put up the naked scene, froze it, took off my clothes," she said. "I had my best friend come over, stood in front of it and she said, 'You look fabulous, you're ready to go.' And I felt great."

It's been 14 years since "Basic Instinct" riveted the world with its unabashed voyeurism, its lethal bisexuals and its ice pick. It became the must-see movie of 1992, igniting the rage of gay and lesbian groups--and the fantasies of straight men--and grossing $353 million worldwide. The movie rescued Stone from a career of forgettable babe roles, and turned her, overnight, into a sexual icon and international star. "I'll tell you what it was like," she says, sitting on a rose-print sofa in her home in Beverly Hills. "The Monday after 'Basic' opened, I was driving down Sunset Boulevard. I stopped at a traffic light. And people climbed on top of my car . It was like locusts."

"Basic Instinct 2" finally arrives in theaters on March 31, and will almost certainly be hailed as unforgettable--though not, perhaps, for the reasons that Stone and the filmmakers intended. The movie, directed by Michael Caton-Jones, finds Stone's oversexed ice-queen author, Catherine Tramell, squaring off against a criminal psychologist (British actor David Morrissey) as she goes on trial for the murder of a soccer player. If you expect an erotic thriller, you may be sorely disappointed. But if you expect soft-core camp, you will be rewarded with a showstopper nearly in the league of the weirdly mesmerizing "Showgirls." Stone prowls, purrs and struts through every scene, delivering a performance so over the top that she elevates a bad movie into a must-see diva extravaganza.

In person, Stone has extraordinary blue-green eyes, which the camera hasn't done justice to. She seems warm if slightly manic, with a high, sharp laugh and a tendency to get teary or impassioned at a moment's notice. (Stone has been a major fund-raiser and spokeswoman for AIDS research for a dozen years, and the subject still chokes her up instantly.) As for her home in Beverly Hills, it has a distinct old-Hollywood feel. There's a grand foyer with a black and white tiled floor and a huge, sweeping staircase. The living room, which is sunken and longer than a tennis court, is framed by huge gray columns and decorated with two enormous gold and crystal chandeliers, a grand piano, hundreds of family photographs and a massive framed portrait of the Dalai Lama. There is a gate, to protect the actress's year-old baby, at the top of the steps. Seated on the couch next to Stone, you feel as if she could laugh, cry, scream, kiss you or slap you at any moment. It's exciting, but you're tense as a cat every second.

For the record, the actress doesn't find her role in "Basic Instinct 2" to be a laughing matter. "That part is insidious," she says. "It takes discipline, and it's incredibly invasive. You don't eat when you play Catherine. You're feral. You watch others eat and you feel sorry for them." She also believes the movie makes a geopolitical statement: "Look at our world leaders. People think they can provoke corruption and violence, and then stand back and watch, without compassion, and claim that they have no responsibility. That's what Catherine does. What is that sociopathology? What does it mean? If you can ask a profound question in a popcorn movie, that's a great avenue for discussion."

For years, the profound question was whether the movie should be made at all. Stone's lawsuit against producers Andy Vajna and Mario Kassar claimed that she had been promised $14 million, with the assurance that she'd get paid even if the movie never got made. The producers missed their February 2001 deadline. Stone filed suit, saying that she had gotten in shape, done costume fittings and passed on other movie offers because she was committed to "BI2." In court depositions, the producers and the then director John McTiernan argued that Stone had slowed things down considerably by rejecting a slew of potential costars, including Benjamin Bratt. "She thought he wasn't a good enough actor," McTiernan said in his deposition. "She said that he looked too young and consequently it might make her look old. She then went on at some length about perhaps she shouldn't be doing the movie at all, that she was too old." Meanwhile, the actors whom Stone wasn't rejecting were busily rejecting her: Viggo Mortensen, Kurt Russell, Benicio Del Toro and even Aaron Eckhart, who passed on a $6 million paycheck. The producers finally settled out of court in July 2004. "I think when they realized I was going to be 153 by the time they figured it all out," she says, "they thought maybe we should work something out."